The first battles of our division will take place tonight, although it should be obvious to the SAGA reader that the other division has had the majority of their meetings. I'm sure an update of the conflicts will find their way Into print and because of this I wanted to discuss something which is (and hopefully won't become) not an issue.

I've read a couple of battle reports lately and have noticed that the battlefield is a difficult place for an observer to reconstruct. It's probably the dilemma of the press trying to understand the situation when the commanders are having a hell of a time trying to do this with more information at their dispossal. Anyway, this is magnified when the press and the commander are one in the same individual.

I've always found that the nature of the report, no matter how focused the writing, is aided appreciably by a task organization chart in the beginning of the article. For any of you stalwart individuals who are going to write battle reports, my heartfelt thanks. I was thinking about my playing the other day and came upon an interesting section of the WRG rules. Let's talk commanders! You have a superb plan and the foolish enemy probably has none. All you have to do is wait until he moves his motley soldiers over the well placed treacherous terrain you have been fortunate to have received. Then you will pounce.

Your soldiers have orders and they are itching to get at the cannon fodder the enemy commander has moving toward you. Suddenly a flare goes off and your soldiers move out of the concealment they were in. They cross the deadly, horrid terrain and become disordered. They arrive in front of the enemy as a rabble and are dispatched accordingly. You look at your retreating figures and want some explainations. Who gave the signal early?

The enemy commander looks with pride at his victory and decides to give a medal to the hero who had the idea to send up a dummy a signal. It worked marvalously!

CAN THIS HAPPEN TO YOU?

You bet It can. Page 21 states that 'signals are obeyed even when made inadvertently or accidentally.' There is no prohibition on a commander from sending out a dummy signal and I am aware of the prohibitions discussed on pape 44.

In fact, the whole signal system needs some work. I have no problems with the visual signals Identified on page 21 because these are observable (ie..a burning village, or the Commander In Chlef's banner advancing). What is more difficult is the almost immediate effect of a flare going up. Who issued flare guns? Perhaps this topic can generate some thoughts as I would be interested in hearing how others handle this aspect. To say that everyone deals with this topic the same would be saying that all football teams only run between the hash marks!

I had the chance to observe a game in which one unfortunate player took a few waivering tests and was pissed off that he lost. I was not a participant in the game and so tried to keep an objective outlook at the circumstances of his argument. His opponent took far less waiver tests but the bottom line as far as my thinking goes is that if you take waiver tests (regardless of your morale grade) you have to be prepared to pay the price. The commanders who continue to win are the ones who take less waiver tests than their opponents. Occassionally a thing called luck/chance comes into play and in a waiver test one can luck out but to chance this too much is not a good strategy.

The reason I bring this up is because of a discussion I recently had regarding any set of rules and the battlefield in general. Luck does play a part but the able commander limits the times he must rely on it and its effect on the outcome of the battle. Whether it is real life or the gaming table the same holds true.