Napoleonic Wargame Club (NWC)

Did not realize that there were the 15 minutes ones in the new Jena 1.03 version. I will pick those for the future. Excellent.

When switching games between the 'regular' and 10-minute play you really have problems getting into the groove at times.

In the long campaigns the 10 minutes turns are too slow. I also think that by reducing the amount of time allows for more micromanagement which if you think about it decrease realism. Any gain in realism, ability to better react to some situations, is offset by unrealistic control. I have the same opinion about 2 gun batteries (ACW) more realistic for batteries set up but unrealistic in the amount of control.

It is a difficult thing to make a game playable yet realistic.

I think that the movement rates for all of the series should be the same. There should be fewer rules choices 3 or 4 max. This would satisfy 98% of all players who are confused by all the choices and differences. Most have no clue what the effects of the rules are and do not play the games enough to learn them, me included who has a few games going all the time. It also creates a lot of problems when trying to get games going in the club. 20 rules and you have 20 different player choices to confuse thing. Bad enough to have single and multi phase choice. To confuse the series and system for a minor percentage of players is detrimental to the hobby. IMHO

I almost want to go back to the TS series a lot simpler to play and find opponents.


General de Brigade Pierre D.
Armee du Rhin
VII Corps, 22eme Division, 1ere Brigade

Pierre

What 3 or 4 Rule choices would you keep ?

<center>
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<center>
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<center>Monsieur le Marechal Baron John Corbin
Commanding L'Armee du Rhin
Grande Duc de Piave et Comte de Beauvais
Commanding the Division de Cavalerie de la Moyenne Garde
NWC President</center>

Some should be automatic. I think that the most important choices should be:
manual defensive fire
line movement restrictions
rout limiting

The rest could or not be incoporated as standard. How many people realy know about the melee terrain modifers, sounds like it should be be standard, how about optional fire results, what is that about? why is it an option, VP for leader casualties, why a choice should be standard, flank morale adj shoudl be standard. etc.....

How many people actually know what they all do? I recently read some that choose all just to not have to argue, some choose some because they were recommended, why they don't know.

These games are great and I love them but it just seems that they are now starting to be designed by committee. We all know how that works out.




General de Brigade Pierre D.
Armee du Rhin
VII Corps, 22eme Division, 1ere Brigade

Hi Pierre
On the other side of the coin I believe 10 minute turns are much more realistic because:

- They reduce the blitz effect

- They increase the importance of firepower over shock

- They make for more reaction time to enemy manuevers as oppossed to the 'shock and awe' effect of for example NRC.

regards to all






General de Brigade Knox
Baron de l'Empire
2e Regiment Gardes d'Honneur (the regaled pheasants)
La Jeune Garde
CO. 1er Brigade, III Division Cavalerie Legere, III Corps Armee du Nord
http://www.aspire.co.nz/colinknoxnwc.htm

Manual Defensive Fire? No way. Who plays with that option? Not that many folks.

I think you also use the 98 percent figure far too easily. Where are your polls to prove this? I totally disagree with that finding.

Am glad you like the 15 min. move scenarios. They were put in to give those that have problems with the 10 min. move to enjoy the game.

However, facts have shown that formations got runover using the 15 min. moves and that WITH the new No Melee Elimination rule.

The 10 min moves caused me to enjoy the series again. Frankly I was about ready to stop work for John due to the usual results. The Jena game restored MANY of us to wanting to play again. That much I CAN prove by emails and other folks that thanked me for using the new turn rate.

Manual Defense Fire takes away the ability of the Defender to fire at you while on the move. Its the old Panzer Bush again. The ACW series has added in a new twist - basically the Melee Phase comes after the Movement/Fire Phase BUT you still get fired on as you try to melee a unit. I think that several folks like Gary M. wanted this for the Nap series and since its optional I am more than willing to see it get added in. Charges would occur during the move phase with the melee occuring during the Melee Phase. After all Melees are done then the turn is over.

We might be able to turn OFF the No Melee Eliminations in certain cases if we had this feature I think. Its been something I have been pondering over since I heard about the discussion at TC2. I would be willing to try out a test engine from John to see how it works.

In the end there never will be a general consensus on this engine. However, I know that alot of folks were thankful that the turns went to 10 minute moves for the battles. I may agree with you on the large campaign games but having had play several of them it really didnt matter much in the end. I just knew that I would have to return more files per game but in the end when it came down to the main show I would have the slower rate of movement and thus wouldnt get steamrolled (quite as bad anyway!).

Colonel Bill Peters
Armee du Rhin - V Corps, Cavalerie du V Corps, 20ème légère Brigade de Cavalerie, 13ème Hussar Regiment
HPS Napoleonic Scenario Designer (Eckmuhl, Wagram, Jena-Auerstaedt and ... more to come)

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

I recall a survey of players before Bill reintroduced 15 min moves in Jena found that most people preferred Jena.
I for one far prefer the 10min turn. It is a pain for marching but when it comes to batttle its way superior IMHO.

I would be in favour of the whole series adopting it.

regards
Colin

General de Brigade Knox
Baron de l'Empire
2e Regiment Gardes d'Honneur (the regaled pheasants)
La Jeune Garde
CO. 1er Brigade, III Division Cavalerie Legere, III Corps Armee du Nord
http://www.aspire.co.nz/colinknoxnwc.htm

And Colin there is nothing wrong with putting together 10 minute versions for the Waterloo scenarios. Really isnt hard to do. Just use the PDT file from Jena with some minor tweaking. Or use the Waterloo ones and update some of the fields.

I am close to getting work and will have a better routine by then to do more of this kind of work perhaps but if you need help hey, I can teach you how to modify them. Its not that hard.

In many cases you can leave the times in the .scn file alone. The only tweak it needs is to change the amount of turns (increase by 1.5). You can just modify the PDT file in certain places and that is all you need.

If you really want to do a bang up job you would want to change all 15 and 45 min times to something like 20 and 50 respectively. In some cases you have to check out the groups to see if you will jam up a road by converting them. I will sometimes use 40 instead of 50 and 10 instead of 20. Thus 1045 would be 1040 or 1050.

Anyway, if you want guidelines let me know.

Colonel Bill Peters
Armee du Rhin - V Corps, Cavalerie du V Corps, 20ème légère Brigade de Cavalerie, 13ème Hussar Regiment
HPS Napoleonic Scenario Designer (Eckmuhl, Wagram, Jena-Auerstaedt and ... more to come)

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

Mon General at the rate we are playing now we be talking about this, this time next year. I hope I be around! Oh by the way ma better half is tired of moi playing all night as well[:D][8D]Bonswa from Gator land were the crawdaddies are King! try one of them there Lusanna hot pot[:D] wa toi pli tar[8D][:D]

Col de Art 6/3 II Corps AN Marbot CS

Monsieur de Generals after close consideration and complete objecify, I 'm completily convince that some of you should run for political office. Down here in the Bayou and on the main highways we call the swamps. We all would surely vote for you double talkers!But as we get near to the lights of the City I'am sure some of you boys belong to the Long clan! I'am just an old swamp rat an that's ma view Bonswa.

Col de Art 6/3 II Corps AN Marbot CS

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Colin Knox</i>
<br />I recall a survey of players before Bill reintroduced 15 min moves in Jena found that most people preferred Jena.
I for one far prefer the 10min turn. It is a pain for marching but when it comes to batttle its way superior IMHO.

I would be in favour of the whole series adopting it.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

The survey at GameSquad showed a 50/50 split on movement preferences.

I fall on the original 15 minute turn side. [8D]

Maréchal Hamilton,
Duc de Barbancon
21st Division
VII Corps, ADR

1er Regiment Garde
Fusiler-Grenadiers

Yup, the poll was 50/50 which for me as a big surprise. I expected more opposition to the 10 min. moves than that. I expected about a 2/3 or 3/4 majority for the older style of play.

If the 10 min. move was so much a problem we should have seen more folks vote for the 15 min. move. That it didnt indicates to me that we can live with two measurements. And in fact that if folks got used to the 10 min. moves they would find it more realistic if not more able to hold their line against the likes of Paco or Jeff Bardon.

The main thing is that I added in the 15 min. move scenarios for Jena and that should make the other 50 percent of the folks happy.

Colonel Bill Peters
Armee du Rhin - V Corps, Cavalerie du V Corps, 20ème légère Brigade de Cavalerie, 13ème Hussar Regiment
HPS Napoleonic Scenario Designer (Eckmuhl, Wagram, Jena-Auerstaedt and ... more to come)

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

Yes I used the 98% freely but I was referring to the optional rules were most people, 98%, have no clue as to what they all mean not the 10 minute turns. Could someone detail the effects of each optional rule compared to the basic game as well as the interaction of only picking some. Yes the 10 minute turns do make for a different situation, is the series not ready for a major overhaul rather than a patchwork of scenario designer preferences?

I have only played the large Jean scenarios and they are fun but tedious due to the slow movement before the big battle. I agree that the 10 minute turns allow you more time to react but is that more realistic? My major issue with these games is the total control which is the root cause of all the unrealistic play not the single phase etc. Need some kind of activation/action point system to compensate I think.

Fun to discuss.



General de Brigade Pierre D.
Armee du Rhin
VII Corps, 22eme Division, 1ere Brigade

Hi Pierre, and all,

I think you hit the nail on the head Pierre when you said:
<font color="red"><i>"My major issue with these games is the total control which is the root cause of all the unrealistic play not the single phase etc. Need some kind of activation/action point system to compensate I think."</i></font id="red">

My thoughts exactly. I must disagree with the likes of Colin and other who say more reaction time is good, i think its bad! Armies fought in formations that were issued and followed orders and often in the heat of battle officers at most levels could not see the ends of their formations let alone what was "behind the hill/smoke and village. Yet we react and issue orders with the eye and hand of an all (mostly)seeing eye and telepathic control.

I would love to see a major reduction in officer visibility ranges and virtually NO visibility to units. Maybe even smoke effects after multiple vollies/discharges, like we do with fog/dawn/dusk. Position officers so if a unit is out of direct command range they can only see and react to immediate threats dependant on their visibility range and threats seen within it. But thats all very contentious Im sure.

I would also like to see SLIGHTLY different movement rates for different nationalities and quality/trained troops.

Not to mention the recieving of fire fire and then moral check before charging home for Inf! Frontal melee attacks on steady inf just DID NOT happen!

Fire EFFECT, not just casualties inflicted! and moral were the key I believe.

I do like the games threat level system but believe that needs to be extended to include a friendly support level as well based on close visible support! It should all be based on visible threats and support.

Anyway my 2c rave for the day [:D]. Still love the games and totally support John T, Bill, all the team and HPS keep up the GREAT work guys!! [:)]

Lt Col Mike Ellwood
Konig Regt
1 Bde, 22 Div
VII Saxon Corps, ADR

Hey Guys
I actually agree with what you are saying on this issue. I was really referring to the unrealistic blitz effect in the 15 min move and being able to not let it go to far.

Units in real life would not just sit there like dummies and let themselves become encircled. In the 15 min move with the absence of embedded melee its a free for all similar to a panzer attack. Which in my view has little to do with Napoleonic warfare but can be fun I guess.

I also agree though Mike HPS is excellent!

Regards
Colin

General de Brigade Knox
Baron de l'Empire
2e Regiment Gardes d'Honneur (the regaled pheasants)
La Jeune Garde
CO. 1er Brigade, III Division Cavalerie Legere, III Corps Armee du Nord
http://www.aspire.co.nz/colinknoxnwc.htm

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Colin Knox</i>
<br />Hey Guys
I actually agree with what you are saying on this issue. I was really referring to the unrealistic blitz effect in the 15 min move and being able to not let it go to far.

Units in real life would not just sit there like dummies and let themselves become encircled. In the 15 min move with the absence of embedded melee its a free for all similar to a panzer attack. Which in my view has little to do with Napoleonic warfare but can be fun I guess.

I also agree though Mike HPS is excellent!

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

That depends a lot upon player style...there's some in this club that play Blitz & there's other who do their darnedest to play historically, without the need for excessive special house rules. So the Blitz statement that continually gets repeated on this board only applies to a small handful of players.

And my solution for those players that insist on blitzing and ZOC'ing everything in site at every opportunity is to not play them anymore...

Maréchal Hamilton,
Duc de Barbancon
21st Division
VII Corps, ADR

1er Regiment Garde
Fusiler-Grenadiers