Am I descending into the pit of senility? Am I gradually losing my senses? 'Twas just the other day that I played a game of PIQUET (PQ) and almost enjoyed myself! What's happening to me? Bob Wiltrout brought a truly beautifully painted army... two armies... of 30mm figures to the house and presented a PQ game on my ping pong table. I forget the name of the particular PQ module, but the scenario took place during the American Revolution. Each side had two brigades. I commanded the American left flank with one brigade, consisting of a cavalry regiment of 3 stands, 4 infantry regiments, each of 8 stands, and an artillery battery of 2 stands. PQ's normal set-up uses a 4-stand regiment. According to the rule book, one stand is removed when a unit, on a given phase, takes hits equal to the number of figures on the stand (usually three). Bob's configuration differed slightly from that of the standard PQ... he had divided each 4-stand entity in two parts, 2 figures per stand, giving him the 8-stand formation. Here, Bob removed the smaller 2-man stand when the unit took 2 hits. PQ uses an impulse system of action and reaction. When active, a side wins a number of impulses, or impetus points, giving it the "initiative", which enables it to draw cards from its action deck. If, for example, an "Infantry move" card is drawn, the basic draw of the card costs one of the impulse points. Then, when units are moved under the auspices of the card, additional points are used up. Which means that a side will rarely get to draw cards equaling its initial allotted number of impulse points. The "initiative" will swing back and forth, as the sides compare the rolls of 20-sided dice to see who wins. The cards in the deck permit such specific actions as "Reload", or "Move cavalry", or "Resolve melee", or "Deploy", etc. There are lots of useless cards, which, to me, makes for slow going. A unit fires its muskets, and then sits there, waiting for a "Reload" card to appear... I think the Americans had 3 "Reload" cards in their deck of some 30 cards. Or a unit advances to contact, and again, sits there, waiting for the "Resolve melee" card to show up. One of the things that bothers me about PQ is that during the game, it provides no hint of the passage of time during the turn. The text defines a turn as "... a variable number of phases until one of the sequence decks is exhausted..." Here, we're introduced to the term "phase", which is defined as "... a part of a turn totaling twenty impetus...(points)...". Putting this all together, we have: a. The sides compare 20-sided dice, and the higher wins an "initiative" for the difference in the dice throws, and receives impetus points. b. When the side uses up its impetus points, dice are tossed again, with high side getting the "initiative". This repeats and goes on until an accumulated total of 20 impetus points have been reached. At this point in time, we've completed a "phase". c. The "phases' continue until one of the sides has run completely through its deck, and then, at last, we've completed a "turn". Why did I bang away at all this? Because, for 25mm figures, the turn is defined in the text as "... a half hour of actual time regardless of length or total impulses..." Now, follow me on this. Here's my hypothetical situation. a. Suppose I move my unit up and fire on the enemy. My weapons are now unloaded, and need a "Reload" card to fire again. b. Suppose my last actions used up all of my cards, and therefore, the "turn" is over, and we're to begin anew, i.e., it's time to begin a new "phase" for the next "turn". c. For this new turn, the opponent wins the "initiative", and starts drawing his cards. d. When he's finished, he wins the "initiative" again, and draws some more cards. And he wins again and again and again, and eventually draws all his cards. Which means that this "turn" is now over. By definition, a half-hour has passed since my boys fired. In fact, a half-hour has passed since they've done anything. By not winning an "initiative", my boys can't draw cards, and they remain immobile. They are impotent, and when I tell them so, they burst into tears. Can the above happen? Yes. Not too probable, but yes, it can. And even if I win an "initiative" and get to draw some cards, there's only a small probability that, out of my 30 cards, one of them will be a "Reload" card. And so my boys will simply stand there in the face of the enemy, and cry a little. I like clever gaming ploys. I admire ingenious gaming systems. I admire inspired gaming procedures. I respect inventive gaming techniques. But I have to tell you that PQ's routines open the door to questions, questions, and more questions, lots of which can't be answered logically. I think the author ran into trouble when he tried to equate 'real time' to the phases within his system. Especially so, with his definition of a half-hour turn. I would have bought a definition of a "turn" as a passage of 5 minutes, but a half-hour is too much to swallow. As Bob tried to explain and rationalize the system, you, as the Commander, waiting for Colonel Farquar's unit on the left flank to reload muskets and fire, have no idea as why he failed to give the order to reload. His failure simply shows up as a lack of "Reload" cards. That's fine... a certain fog-of-war is good stuff. The author speaks to this in his booklet: "Within the half hour represented by a turn in Piquet, all units move in a non-sequential manner. Some have more impetus (energy) than others within the turn and may accomplish more. The unpredictability of the sequence cards takes away another unrealistic bit of knowledge: the player's ability to predict with certainty what will happen next." But PQ carries this to the extreme... why hasn't Colonel Alpha given the order to advance? And why hasn't Colonel Beta given the order to deploy? And why hasn't Colonel Gamma given the order to enter the woods? And why hasn't Colonel Delta given the order to charge? And why hasn't Colonel Omega given the order to rally? And Colonel Zeta? And Colonel Theta? All this is going on simultaneously. This is not fog-of-war. I have no problem with a certain number of unknown factors beyond my control popping up on the gaming table, but to cloak the entire field in black is too, too, much. I've been toying with randomized card sequences for twenty years, and I've never fully rationalized what the cards represent in terms of the passage of time. After experimenting with many systems employing specific 'order cards' (a la PQ), I gave them up because the concept (a) was not at all well received at my gaming table, and (b) appeared to be more than slightly illogical. I dropped back to systems using simple 'action' cards. Draw a card and receive, for example, a card denoting 2 actions. It requires an action to fire and an action to move 5 inches, so your troops can move up 10 inches, or can fire and move 5 inches. The unknown becomes the number of actions drawn, either 2, 3, 4, etc. In our game, my good-looking Queen's Rangers advanced on Hotchkiss House, and fired a volley and received an 'unloaded weapons' marker. The defending unit fired back. Then they reloaded, and fired again. Then they reloaded and fired again. And again. They were lucky enough to draw a number of "Reload" cards to get them going. Nothing wrong with this... they were simply more efficient than the Rangers. The Rangers, in contrast, could draw no "Reload" cards, and took it on the chin, eventually routing. So what's my gripe? My gripe is not that the Rangers didn't reload muskets, but that, by definition, for almost a half-hour by PQ standard time, the Rangers stood in the field at point blank range, and never even got a chance to reload their weapons. That's what I mean by stating that PQ carries this unpredictability business to the extreme. When my Rangers approached the wall surrounding Hotchkiss House, and were fired upon, they took losses... one or two stands were removed. The opposing British then played a "Morale Chip" to force a morale check on the Rangers. Morale chips are good things... they're limited in number (I think the Americans had about 20 of them), and are used for rallying and for this preemptory morale test. You lose morale chips when failing a morale test, and losing a melee. Here, the Rangers tossed, I think, an 8-sided die. All combat in PQ uses comparative die rolls, and this includes morale testing. The Rangers started with a 10 sided die, but because of their losses, their 10-sided die was reduced to an 8-sided, while the opposition tossed a 6-sided die. If the opposing die toss is double yours, your unit routs. If the opposing die toss is more than yours, you go into disorder. Here, the Rangers 8-sided die failed to top the opposing 6-sided... the Rangers were in disorder. If, heaven forbid, they ever got another volley off, their initial 8-sided die would have been reduced once, for losses, once, for being in disorder, and once, for firing at an enemy under cover. That's three reductions on the type of dice thrown... from 8-sided to 6-sided, down to 4-sided, and then to...? PQ bottoms out on 4-sided dice. It also tops out on 12-sided dice. Which means that an elite unit, using a 12-sided die, and firing a "Crushing volley" (there's a special card for this), can't improve their type of dice, and so simply adds +1 to their roll. I've never liked the 'groping for dice' type of combat... it should have remained buried with CHAINMAIL. There were three players per side at our game. One was designated as the Commanding Officer, and the other two each commanded a brigade and moved troops. The only people who actually 'did things' on a continual basis were the Commanding Officers... they didn't move troops, but they had the card decks, and so they were continually busy. The other players sat and hoped for the proper card to turn up. What was interesting was that when a 'good' card, a useful card, did show itself for either side, this was so rare an event that all parties at table-side reacted and sat up and smiled and took an immediate interest in what was going on. Then they lapsed back into relative lethargy. Early in the battle, my one cavalry unit, 3-stands strong, charged and contacted an opposing 4-stand British cavalry regiment. There they stood, awaiting a "Resolve melee" card. Some interesting items emerged from this encounter. (a) First, if a "Move cavalry" card popped up before the "Resolve melee" card, a unit could withdraw from contact, being defined as in disorder. (b) Second, If the "Resolve melee" card did appear, it wasn't mandatory for either side to use it. The units could simply stand there, remaining head-to-head. (c) Third, there's an 'upward' die adjustment, i.e., a plus factor, for a unit "initiating contact". The question arose... who initiated contact?... was it the unit that first charged into contact, or was it the unit whose "Resolve melee" card was used? After all, even though it 'looked like' the units were in contact, by PQ's view of things, the melee couldn't start until the proper card showed up. Despite all the above grouching, grinding, and griping, I repeat... I had a good time. Bob, acting as host, ran a tight game, and when questions arose, he'd quickly cap the discussion so as to speed the game. Note that the term "good time" is relative... I lost my cavalry, I lost the Queen's Rangers, I lost the entire 54th Regiment, my artillery battery only fired once in the battle, the 61st Regiment remained in disorder throughout the battle, and I still don't fully understand the functions of the general officers on the field. It takes some doing to get familiar with the concepts presented by PQ. I'm not at all happy with 'groping for dice'... I think the system would have been better served using percentage dice. But a game is a game is a game. The author wants to grope for dice... so be it. I like what the author is trying to do in terms of the fog-of-war. Somewhat overdone, somewhat distorted, somewhat illogical, but it does provide for a series of unexpected events on the table top. And I must add they are 'slow going' events... they don't occur often enough to keep you on your toes, and, for me, to prevent a lapse of attention as to what's going on. The theory, says the author, is to plan your attack in advance and wait for the proper cards to show up. My plan, in simple terms, was to assault Hotchkiss House, and so I moved when I could, and fired (rarely) when I could, and waited for both "Reload" and "Resolve melee" cards... which never appeared. This was a superior plan, and I took full advantage of all that was placed on my platter. Unfortunately, the platter just wasn't full enough. Back to PW Review September 1999 Table of Contents Back to PW Review List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1999 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