Napoleonic Wargame Club (NWC)

While this rule wouldn't apply to all actions I believe that alot of our large battles suffer from "maximus amountus of unitus movus every turnus"

Frankly, there should be some sort of army commitment level and a friction cost for your army (in VPs) as you commit more troops.

Simply put as your opponent commits more men your point level would rise (acceptable level) to a certain point after which your VPs would drop (first player loses points - second player adds points to total).

This way the players would be more prone to win a battle with as little force as possible.

This would require the use of orders - Attack, Defend, Maneuver, etc.

Attack orders would cost 2x while maneuver only 1x.

Formations that are stood down would reduce the Army Commitment level and help regain VPs.

The idea plainly is to stop the usual format of players moving everything on turn 1. Most players hate Fixed units but frankly if done properly a scenario with SOME fixed units is VERY historical. Set piece actions mainly or those where the detached commander had no idea what was going on.

Comments?

Bill Peters
HPS Napoleonic Scenario Designer (Eckmuhl, Wagram and ... more to come)

[url="http://www.fireandmelee.net"]Fire and Melee Wargame site[/url]

Wellington's Victory had a system much like you describe. Each army had an amount of points available at the start and each brigade committed reduced this point total. Once the points were exhausted there were penalties. I also like the idea of a "brigade effectiveness level" like were in "Terrible Swift Sword" and "The Gleam of Bayonets" With this a brigade had a ratio depending on the quality of the regiments. For example an average brigade of 2000 men might have an effectiveness level of 1000. Once the losses of all the regiments in the brigade exceeded 1000 all the regiments suffered brigade retreat and had to take a morale check. There were also penalties for offensive actions. Tony Best an I experimented with something like this in a BG Gettysburg game. In that game one the average fatigue of all the regiments of a brigade reached 7 the regiments could no longer offensively melee or fire. This penalty was imposed until the units rested and regained fatigue to an average of 5.

I like the idea of more structured battles. In other words you send in a divsion for an attack on a position and it may succeed but can no longer exploit due to being "bled out" or they get repulsed and retreat to regroup. Too often these game end up with every units taking action and then fighting to the death.



Marechal Jonathan Thayer
Commandante Moyenne Garde
Duc de Saalfeld et Prince de Friedland
10/III
Armee du Nord




jonathanthayer@bellsouth.net

I tend to prefer the historical battles with fixed units myself. However, I've played in some scenarios where the Russians advanced all the way to an entire fixed Corps which just stood there fixed and watched as the Russians destroyed my artillery. LOL

General Hector Lopez
Duc de Vienne et Comte de Turin
Cmdt. Chasseurs à Pied de la Vieille Garde

This sounds good to me..More Historical..Thats the way to go...[:D]

<font color="red">Marechal</font id="red">
<font color="red">BEECHAM</font id="red"> Commandant
1ème Division de Cuirassiers,
1 Corps Res Cav,ADN.

"Toujours féroce,jamais étourdi"

It's an interesting idea but, I don't like it. I like the idea that I can move all or none of my units. Airmchair general and all. But it's more than that. Sometimes you can overcommit your forces to a sector and pay heavily both in terms of victory points and troop losses. That's the way it should be, but if you are smart enough to be, as General Forrest would say, the first with the most than I don't think that should be penalized.

Lt. Don Golen 7eme Regiment de Dragons, 2eme Division de dragons, I Reserve Cavalry Corps Armee du Nord

Don..

What we want is a more Historical kind of play with Nappy fighting..

We all know that some commanders could not command to many men..And there were some that could command more...

There is to much Blitz kind of fighting...Yes Blitz fighting happened in WW2 and maybe AWC..But not two much went on in this time ..Anything to slow this down is the way to go..

I have played a lot of these games now and love playing them...but i have seen to many men killed in an Historical battle to what did get killed...

Me and Andy Moss just ended a Waterloo Campaign..It went very historical to the end and yes i lost but the Kills were not to high..
we made a rule up for men with Half there strength to pull back and take know part in an attack but could defend..
This was also played with the MOE III rules..

And may be one of the most Historcal games i have played..



<font color="red">Marechal</font id="red">
<font color="red">BEECHAM</font id="red"> Commandant
1ème Division de Cuirassiers,
1 Corps Res Cav,ADN.

"Toujours féroce,jamais étourdi"

One problem we overlook is that these were real men with real commanders who were not 20th century educated military men.

Ok so you (Don) want to be able to pick up your entire army on turn one and move it and start attacking with it. That is your call. But we have seen over 10 years of this style of play since BG Waterloo came out. Frankly its getting beaten to death.

Many of us would like to see some national restrictions to armies. For the French perhaps an unpredictable leader (Ney and Bernadotte to name a couple) that would decide on turn 12 not to move. Or perhaps an Allied wing leader that would stick with his attack when he should be moving over to help out with the center (Austerlitz).

Some variety is needed in the game in this dept.

The Austrian army at Wagram, for instance, was so command poor that Charles had to draft his orders by late evening so that his army would have some direction. Attempting to issue an order to an Austrian army during a battle was almost impossible.

I am not saying that the French system was perfect either. More flexible but less than perfect by far. You had guys like Ney that would make rash attacks and so on.

I am not saying also that we have to repeat the mistakes of the past but we should have some command restrictions on maneuver to some degree. Try going out to a reenactment sometime and getting large groups of men to move. Sans cell phone of coures or walkie talkies.

Smoke and noise will make it very difficult.

Even better yet, let someone drive you out to a battlefield you dont know and tell you where your units are. Try getting six guys (couriers) who also have never been there to go with you to issue those orders. Odds are some of them will get lost trying to find the commands. Or a local commander will have moved his unit out of harms way (cannon fire) and the courier will take an extra 15 mins. trying to find him.

The best games I have been in in this club and any other were umpire-driven. You get so much more of a feeling of the tactics that way. Rich White and others have helped contribute to some of the most enjoyable games I have been in for realism.

Bill Peters
HPS Napoleonic Scenario Designer (Eckmuhl, Wagram and ... more to come)

[url="http://www.fireandmelee.net"]Fire and Melee Wargame site[/url]

Bill,
I would agree with some way to show the horrible command prescence in the armies of the time. Most of the historical scenarios, if played in the unleashed style, mostly favor the Allies. The Allied small units quality wise were just as good as the French - battalion for battalion. But at the Brigade/Division/Corp manuever area the French clearly outclassed the Allies. This was very true early on in the wars. I just played Marengo and even though my opponents was better than me I don't think the French had a chance with equal commanders. Your just to badly outnumbered. Austerlitz is another example. Can you see the Allies losing in an unleashed scenario? I don't.

I like the action point idea. I believe the Empire rules set had something also, but can't remember. Also, the MOE III house rules do a lot to kill the blitz. Only mass cavalry charges have any of that flavor. But I only play HPS with the MOE III house rules. YMMV

General de Division Doug Fuller
Duc de Montmorail et Comte de Hainaut
2e' Grenadiers a' Pied de la Vielle Garde
I Corp Commander
AdN

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by buffpilot</i>
<br />Bill,
I would agree with some way to show the horrible command prescence in the armies of the time. Most of the historical scenarios, if played in the unleashed style, mostly favor the Allies.
General de Division Doug Fuller
Duc de Montmorail et Comte de Hainaut
2e' Grenadiers a' Pied de la Vielle Garde
I Corp Commander
AdN

<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

Where is Ken Jones when you need him!

Ken, another Frenchmen claiming that the Allies have an advantage. Quickly now, get out the French-swatter and kill that pest!!

Ok - just having fun with you Doug. The concept of either side in the series having an advantage is lost over the now thousands of scenarios out there. It all depends on the commander IMHO. I have yet to see one side have a definite advantage. But I am sure that Ken will whack me one really good!

Bill Peters
HPS Napoleonic Scenario Designer (Eckmuhl, Wagram and ... more to come)

[url="http://www.fireandmelee.net"]Fire and Melee Wargame site[/url]