One Saturday night, Jeff Wiltrout visited, and we gave five minutes to a discussion as to what type of game we'd like to layout. We eventually settled for a modern, house-to-house 'Serbia-type' encounter employing my single mounted 25mm figures. And so, on half the ping-pong table, appeared the little town of Zda, composed of about 13 houses. A house could hold one squad, and a squad consisted of 4 men plus a sergeant, five in all. Except for two squads, all our forces were initially off-table, and Jeff and I secretly designated the houses in which each of our two hidden squads had been pre-placed. What we wanted to do was to develop some sort of 'reactive sequence', in which, when one side (Side A) was fired on, its own squads could react and move and fire, after which, the opposing side's squads (Side B) could react, after which, Side A was to again react and so on. In other words, once the cycle got started, the continuing series of reactions by the sides would keep it free-wheeling and continuously in motion. We drew up what we termed the 'Reaction Deck'. Here, each side was given 10 cards, numbered from 1 to 4. When a side reacted, we'd draw, at random, a card from this deck, and the number drawn indicated the number of that side's squads that could react. We each had 6 squads, and so a side could never react with all its troops... we thought that a reaction maximum of 4 out of 6 units would be playable without overloading the system. And on the other end of the scale, a side always got to react with at least 1 squad (there were no zeroes in the deck). Sooner or later, however, when all the reaction cards of a side were drawn, i.e., a side's reactive capabilities were truly down to zero, the deck would be reshuffled, and the number drawn would be the number of squads allowed to 'move only'... no fire, just move. Battle Began And so, the battle began. We tossed dice for the initiative, I won, and my first card, to start the cycle, was a '1', hence I was permitted to move only one squad, and one of my squads ran up the field, making for the thatched hut supposedly occupied by Farmer Shladma and his wife. "But no!", shouted Jeff. "One of my secretly-placed hidden squads has already ejected the Schladmas, and is now waiting in ambush, and I'm about to fire on you." "Aha!", I shouted back. "I, too, chose the Schladma house in which to hide one of my squads, and we're about to begin the scenario with a bloody hand-to-hand combat for this one bedroom, one potty, no-running water, un-airconditioned Schladma hovel." After the game, we each discussed our reasons for selecting the Schladma hut in which to place one of our hidden units. Jeff's answer focused on the tactical aspects of play... the house had a commanding view of the town, it had a full field of fire, etc. My own answer was a more practical one... the Schladma hut was the house nearest me, one I could easily reach without leaving my seat. For the melee, we simply paired off our men... each tossed a 10-sided die, and the lower fell, wounded, while the higher fought on. At the end of the melee, none of my men were on their feet, and Jeff had only his sergeant and one man standing. But he had the house. Now, in truth, I don't remember how we continued the sequence, but somehow, we got back into the Reaction Deck, and the cycle proceded. I do remember that Jeff brought on a couple of supporting squads on the other side of the village, while I, in response, attacked the Schladma hut again: My response could be divided into four phases: First, I drew a reaction card, which told me of the number of squads that could react to Jeff's movement. I drew a '2'... I wanted one squad to provide covering fire, while the second squad charged to contact. Second. for the squad providing covering fire, I went to a 'Response Deck'. This was a 10-card deck with numbers ranging from 1 to 5. This indicated the number of men in the designated squad that would actually fire... sort of a 'squad efficiency factor'. Rarely would all 5 men fire upon command... Here, the card I drew was a '3'... 3 men would fire. Third, each man that fired contributed 10 Fire Points (FP) to a squad reference base of 20... this gave me 50 FP. But from this, I subtracted 20 FP for the target's cover, resulting in a net of 30 FP. I had, therefore, a 30 percent chance of hitting anyone... I missed. Fourth, my charging squad entered the hut and gave Jeff's defenders what-for... the Schladma house was mine again! At this point, the Schladma property was littered with downed men... lots of casualty figures... my own from the first melee, and Jeff's, from the first, and now, this, melee. It was time to withdraw the wounded, my own plus Jeff's... I thought I could earn several victory points by dragging his men off to be interrogated. In my 25mm collection, there are a host of 'buddy figures'... a casting of two figures... one man helping the other, who is wounded, off to safety. I replaced all of my victorious squad's men with 'buddy figures', and they began to trudge back to their baseline. And that's how the battle went... a few glitches at first, but the sequence soon smoothed itself out. We kept the fire point percentages low, since each squad only had 5 men in it and we didn't want too many wipe-outs. When a man was hit, he was replaced by a casualty figure, and there he remained until a buddy arrived to take him to safety. One item I will change is the 'buddy ratio'. When a man is hit, and you designate another able-bodied man to assist and help him back, this immediately puts two men out of the five in the squad out of commission. That's too much of a one-time gulp. One able-bodied man should be permitted to assist more than one wounded man at a time. Back to PW Review December 1998 Table of Contents Back to PW Review List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1998 Wally Simon This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com