American Civil War Game Club (ACWGC)

In the thread on Melees Bob Breen mentioned some possible house rules
1. Leadrs needed to melee
2. Only units of the same Brigade can melee the same hex.

I was wondering what House Rules have actually been used in battles?
I have used these rules
1. Units out of command radii may only move one hex and may not melee
2. Brigades with an average fatigue of 7 or above may not enyer ZOC or melee
there were also rules governing starting units and routed units moving back to the front after routing or single unit reinforcments etc.There were also some night rules.

These games played quite well and it was not difficult to remember the rules.

What else has been actually tried-the successful and the not so successful?
2.

Field Lt. Tony Best

I have played with the best house rule of all:

NONE![:o)][B)][:0]

I think the only house rule needed might be the one about units exiting the map, if in firing range, except at scenario exit hexes.

<b><font color="gold">Ernie Sands
LtGen, CO XXIII Corps, AoO

ACWGC Cabinet member
</b></font id="gold">

I agree with Ernie in that I do not fancy house rules to achieve 'historical' play, however, I would be willing to try a few as a change of pace with an adament opponent.

Lt. Col. Brad Slepetz
III Corps
AoG

House rules that I use regularly are
-- unless impracticable due to terrain restrictions, infantry has to deploy into line before entering enemy rifle range (as mentioned frequently, I believe the column in the game to be a road column that would never be used in combat);
-- units may only withdraw from the map when they are not within rifle range of the enemy;
-- at night, no major movement and no combat may take place.

In MP games I also enjoy communication rules where for instance players may communicate freely only when their map counters are in the same hex, otherwise there is a delay of as many turns as a courier with 36 MP would need to travel between the locations of the leaders. Or something to that effect.

Gen. Walter, USA
<i>The Blue Blitz</i>
AoS

Dierk,

I'd love to see both road column and attack column, sort of how it is portrayed in Age of Rifles. I don't know how much coding would be involved, however.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by D.S. Walter</i>
<br />House rules that I use regularly are
-- unless impracticable due to terrain restrictions, infantry has to deploy into line before entering enemy rifle range (as mentioned frequently, I believe the column in the game to be a road column that would never be used in combat);

Gen. Walter, USA
<i>The Blue Blitz</i>
AoS
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

-Brett Schulte
HPS Playtester

ACW Campaign Games Design Center:
http://www.brettschulte.net/ACWCGDC/index.html

My Civil War Book Collection:
http://www.brettschulte.net/ACWBooks/

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by bschulte</i>
I'd love to see both road column and attack column, sort of how it is portrayed in Age of Rifles. I don't know how much coding would be involved, however.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

Well, so would I, but for the Nappy games. As I pointed out frequently before, there are less than a handful of known instances were columns of attack in the ACW were formed on a lesser front than one full battalion. I.e. in the game all historical column attacks except this handful can and should be portrayed by individual battalions <u>in line</u> stacked several deep.

Cf. my last statement in this thread

http://www.wargame.ch/board/acw/topic.a ... IC_ID=7913



Gen. Walter, USA
<i>The Blue Blitz</i>
AoS

What about this,

In order to perform a column melee, a unit must have at least half or more MPs remaining. In other words, you must really want to use the column formation and not just tank down a road and attack!

Rich

In <i>Age of Rifles </i>it <i><b>is</b></i> actually possible to fire or even melee when in march column formation - just not really advisable.[:D]

More formations would certainly benefit the HPS engine, especially a distinction between march & assault columns in the Nappy engine. But the AoR defensive & "disordered" formations and supported line would also be beneficial. As Dierk points out, the normal ACW equivalent of the Nappy assault column would be the supported line formation.

If players are eager for conflicts involving rifles and assault columns they should try some mid 19th century European battles instead of ACW.

Col. Rich White
3 Brig. Phantom Cav Div
III Corps ANV

Okay we have some discussion on attacking in column but any other house ruels that have been used? Also-Dierk how did you like your rules on forming up before attack? Did it make for a better game?

Field Lt. Tony Best

The best way is to have two formations, road column that has road movement rate and attack column that can cross bridges, enter towns and melee but has no special movement ability other than that. Attack column should probably suffer a more severe fire penality due to its density which is probably column of companies.

BG. Kennon Whitehead
Chatham Grays
III Corps, AoM (CSA)

You all are talking about rules for infantry meleeing, what about cavalry meleeing. Wouldn't the cavalry be mounted to melee instead of dismounted?

Lt. Col. Gery Bastiani
Fightin' Carolinians
4/2/II AotM CSA

Have you ever had a scenario that you were short on artillery ammo and the better supplied opponent kept putting out his supply wagons out front of valuable combat units to draw arty automatic defensive fire? I found that a simple house rule fixed it if each supply point lost to arty automatic defensive fires would cost 40 victory points, equivalent to 100 infantry. Not bad considering that it could resupply up to a 1000 man unit. Anyway, the issue would then go away.
House rule: Each supply point lost to artilery automatic defensive fire gains 40 victory points to the artillery owning player, who manually records the points for addition to his score at end of the game, or subtraction from his opponents score, whichever is to his advantage.

BG Ross McDaniel
2nd Div, III Corps, AoG

In the new Shiloh game firing at or capturing supply wagons gains victory points so that helps. But besides that I thought it was already considered unethical to use supply wagons in the way you describe?

MajGen, 2/VIII/AoS
"Beer! It's not just for breakfast anymore!"

I think when I first joined the club, some standard house rules were posted somewhere, maybe VMI. One I recall was no scouting with leaders. Another was no blocking of lines of retreat with leaders or supply wagons. A third was that you couldn't retreat off the map. I think this last rule was specifically aimed at BGS. Ideally, the game engine would render house rules obsolete. For example, the new modification that allows a retreating unit to overrun supply wagons and leaders. For the house rule that only allows a unit that is out of command to move one hex, I wouldn't think that would be too hard to add to the game engine, but I'm not sure I agree with that philosophy. I can think of only one house rule my opponent and I agreed to on our own. That was an agreement not to deliberately use supply wagons to block fire. The incident was a firefight across a creek in a Corinth campaign trying to force a bridgehead. Actually, when you think about it, ammunition wagons probably ought to explode when hit, but that's not how it works.

MG Mike Mihalik
1/III/AoMiss/CSA

That's the code of conduct in the club rules. Most of its stipulations are really house rules.

http://www.wargame.ch/wc/acw/acwrules.htm#conductcode

Gen. Walter, USA
<i>The Blue Blitz</i>
AoS