Last issue, I mentioned a game with my MERTEN collection of WW II 40mm, skinny, plastic, anatomically disadvantaged figures. The MERTENS came off the shelf because of a renewed interest in low level, i.e., squad level, skirmish gaming brought on by Arty Conliffe's CROSS FIRE. Fred Haub was asked to design the scenario and he set to work... "Gimme some houses!" and we gave him some houses... "Gimme some woods!" and we gave him some woods... "Some hills!"... "More houses!"... "Some roads!"... "More trees!"... "More hills!"... and after awhile, we saw arising before us, a small town occupying perhaps half the ping-pong table. The MERTENS are all single mounted, and, for CROSS FIRE purposes, I defined three of them as a squad. A platoon was composed of 3 squads, and a company of 2 platoons. I commanded the town's defending forces... 2 companies, giving me a total of 12 squads. Against me, there were, initially, 4 attacking companies. One of these companies, commanded by Fred Haub, appeared on the northern edge of the field, just outside a ruined factory complex... since I had stationed 2 squads in the factory, I shouted "I can see you!" and the battle was on. CROSS FIRE is an "I can see you" game. Side A, the side with initiative, moves, until his opponent, Side B, shouts "I can see you!", at which time the opponent fires. Side B tosses his fire dice (6-sided) and if he scores 2 or more hits, he wins the initiative, and begins to move his own men. Initiative is transferred when: a. Side A, the active side, fires and doesn't score 2 hits. Side B then gets the initiative. b. Side B wins the initiative by firing and scoring 2 hits. c. Side A tries to rally one of his units and fails. My 2 squads in the factory complex "saw" the enemy approaching, and fired. Each squad tossed 3 dice for 'targets in the open'... and I scored the requisite 2 hits on one of the approaching squads, thus winning the initiative. When hit dice are tossed against a target, hits are scored on rolls of 5 or 6. The results are: 1 hit Target is pinned, can fire but cannot move 2 hits Target is suppressed, can neither move nor fire 3 hits Target is killed I had spaced my squads throughout the town, and was doing fairly well in popping off against enemy troops that dared show their heads trying to approach my beloved town of Chubl Nuvl (where my grandparents had been born, and their grandparents before them), when suddenly, doom descended on Chubl Nuvl. John Shirey arrived for the game. "Let's give John another two attacking companies!", shouted my opponents. Which meant that now, instead of odds of 2:1 against me, there were 3:1 odds. Withdrawal When I won the initiative, and tried to withdraw deeper into the town, I made the mistake of giving up a vantage point which controlled the entire western half of the field, this now allowed the enemy to approach without being seen... i.e., less opportunities to shout "I can see you!" CROSS FIRE guidelines indicate that in a multi-player game, if one side, the active side, loses initiative, it doesn't transfer immediately. Instead, all the players on the active side are permitted to receive and complete their action. When all are done, it's at that point that the initiative transfers. We followed this guideline for some time, when Terry Sirk, one of the opposing players, indicated that the initiative should be transferred immediately it was lost, without waiting for all players on a side to complete their actions. The thought was to regard the encounter as any other simple, 'two-opposing-player' game. This approach placed more restrictions on Chubl Nuvl's attackers than on my troops. Now, instead of Fred Haub, Terry Sirk and John Shirey each being guaranteed their actions, sometimes one, or two, of them, would be deprived of their opportunity to move and fire. Regardless, Chubl Nuvl fell. Inside the town, there were only so many places into which I could withdraw. I was down to 2 defending squads when I raised the white flag. But I had taken a big chunk out of the attacking forces. With our CROSS FIRE scenario completed, and with the magnificent town of Chubl Nuvl displayed before us, we decided to lay out another game using the MERTENS. In this one, I used data sheets for each 3-man 'squad'. There were three separate ways to track the casualties taken by a squad: a. First, by crossing off columns on its data sheet. Each squad had 7 columns, hence could absorb a maximum of 7 hits. b. Second, by removing one man to the Rally Zone, where he had to be rallied to return to his unit. If he didn't rally, he stayed in the zone. c. Third, I used casualty figures when a squad took a hit. These were temporary hits, and could be removed at the end of each bound. Looking at the above, the only true way to eliminate a squad was to knock off its data sheet columns. Casualty figures were themselves eventually removed, and people would, sooner or later, return from the Rally Zones. The reference, in Item (a), above, to 'columns', looks at the parameters recorded on the data sheet: Morale Level 80 80 75 70 70 65 60 Strength 6 6 5 5 4 4 3 The first edition of these rules, which I described last issue, had utilized a Fire Deck for the fire phase. I had thought that the random draw of cards from the deck, each denoting which side fired and how many units fired, would add a bit of interest to the fire-fight proceedings. Instead, I received nothing but catcalls... out went the Fire Deck. I am nothing if not responsive to my audience. I had tried out the rules at the October PW meeting... across the table from me sat Tony Figlia, and we both seemed to agree that the procedures gave rise to a boring, boring game. In fact, a very, very boring game. Tony's troops entered the field and took up positions behind cover. Then my men entered the field and took up positions behind cover. And that was all the action that occurred. No more movement. Tony's men fired, and my men fired, then Tony's men fired, and my men fired, and so on. A boring, boring game. Part of the reason, I thought, was that neither of us had any particular objectives in mind other than to kill the other guy. And so in the battle for Chubl Nuvl, we grafted on a movement requirement... John Shirey, as attacker, had to enter the town and work his way to, and destroy the radio tower, voice of the Chubl Nuvl citizenry. Fred Haub and I defended the town, placing our troops in whatever defending positions we thought would be key. John's men were permitted to move first... he advanced on the field, moving his units up to 20 inches each. It would first appear that 20 inches were quite a bit, but a look at the sequence for the half-bound shows that the 20-inch distance wasn't often taken advantage of: a. Initial movement by the active side of up to 20 inches Reaction by non-active side. If he can target any of the opposing side's units that moved more than 10 inches, he gets a 'freebee' shot. b. Fire by the active side's units Reaction by the non-active side. If any of his units are fired on, there's a 30 percent chance he can return fire. c. Close assault d. Rally Note that the active side can move, in the first phase, up to 10 inches and not be fired at. He can then fire in the second phase... but then his opponent can (or rather, may) react to his fire by firing back. For the most part, John chose the more conservative 10-inch movement distance for his troops. He had more manpower than the defenders, hence more firepower, and 10-inches was not a distance to be sneezed at. Besides, once in the town, as units flitted from one area of cover to the next, the 10-inch move was more than adequate. John's attackers proved magnificent in their ability to withstand our defensive fire. When a squad was hit, and a column crossed out, the squad took a morale test using the Morale Level noted on its data sheet. Rarely did John's men fail. In contrast, whenever one of his units fired at my boys, off they would run, getting deeper and deeper into town. An entire platoon of 9 men was permitted to fire as a unit at a given target. Each man firing contributed a number of points( rifle... 10, LMG... 20, etc). For example, as one of John's infantry platoons fired, he got: +10 points for every rifleman firing, for a total of 90 points -20 points for firing at a target in cover This gave him a final total (FT) of 70 points which was referred to a Hit Chart: Above FT: No effect Between 1/2 FT and FT: Receive 1 cas figure and Lose 1 column Under 1/2 FT: Receive 2 cas figures and Lose 2 columns If he tossed low (in the above case, below half of his FT of 70, or below 35), the target would receive 2 casualty figures and cross out 2 columns. These casualty figures and columns could be 'spread out' amongst the squads in the target platoon. Every squad that received a casualty figure was required to make an immediate morale test. The 'owning player', therefore, had the option of piling on the hits on one squad, thus weakening that one squad, or spreading the hits out on a couple of his squads. In the latter instance, of course, there was the chance that one or two squads would take off. Failing a morale test immediately removed one man to the Rally Zone. A second way of losing a man to the Rally Zone was to accumulate three casualty figures on a squad. The rationale for spreading the hits out on the target was that during the time duration of the fire phase, an entire platoon wouldn't necessarily concentrate its fire on a single enemy squad, but would spread its fire on all available targets. Near the radio tower, Fred Haub had stationed, not only his rifle squads, but a heavy machine gun and a flame thrower (worth 30 and 40 fire points, respectively). Lots of defensive fire power... but it just failed to stop the attackers. As the flame thrower bellowed forth, we'd hear, from the depths of the black, greasy smoke ball: "Ouch! Yike! Wow! That hurts!" from the attackers, but it only seemed to make them angrier. Finally, as the attackers got nearer and nearer to the radio tower, one or two of John's squads closed with ours in hand-to-hand combat, i.e., close assault. Resolution of close assault used the 'Strength' parameter noted on the squad's data sheet. A fresh squad's Strength started at '6', and as the squad took hits, went down to '3'. There were provisions for bringing in a supporting squad, and for each of the leading squads pummeling each other by crossing out the opposing unit's columns... but we defenders just couldn't drive off the offensive units, which seemed to fight all the more fiercely the closer they got to the radio tower. Perhaps it was something in the radio waves being generated in Chubl Nuvl. In contrast to the very static, uninteresting game that I had set up and played at the PW meeting, I thought this scenario produced an entirely different affair. Back to PW Review November 1997 Table of Contents Back to PW Review List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1997 Wally Simon This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. 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