Help me decide - SYW

[Womble67]

hi shecky
            i would go with black powder and it 18th century supplement the last argument of kings which covers the syw.

take care

andy

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Except for a few glaring errors, such as Austrians at Bleinheim...

[toxicpixie]

To be fair to Warlord they did almost immediately release the errata to say "whooooops, ignore that, here's what we should have printed, sorreeee!".

[civvycivvy]

I'd go for Black Powder. Just getting to grips with them myself and had some quite enjoyable games in 10mm. To make things more interesting, you can add combat values to the various nationalities as well, the purchase of the supplement is recommended.

[Last Hussar]

Oy, Pixie, at least give me an attribution

http://lasthussar.wordpress.com/2011/02/01/war-of-spanish-succession-for-black-powder/

Also we have amended the 'Broken Brigade' rule

http://lasthussar.wordpress.com/2011/03/05/black-powder-broken-brigades/

I have considered modifying the Command roll, so you only get 3 moves if you roll half or under of the target value.

With BP you can modify all the stats for units, so units can have higher stamina or morale, making the units harder to 'shake' (Morale acts as a saving throw, Stamina is the number of hits needed to make the unit 'shaken'.

Its figure number independent.  In the rules as written a 28mm figure unit is a line about 240mm long (ish) and measurements in inches.  We just measure in cm, and use lines of 120mm for 10mm.  Up to you how you base, as long as the line is 'about' the right length.

[toxicpixie]

@Last Hussar, sorry if that looked like any misattribution! I'd assumed anyone frequenting here would know whose they were They work well We can't resist some tweaking, but then what gamers can't...

[Last Hussar]

We've tweaked, but I can't remember how. 

[Shecky]

Well the little bundle of SYW joy arrived this afternoon!

Now I have to decide on which rules to use. I'll give myself a day or two to make the decision while I clean the figures.

[toxicpixie]

We've tweaked, but I can't remember how. 

We allow cavalry to contact formed, ordered infantry frontally BUT the infantry counts as having a Pike Company, so no "victory bonuses" to the Cav, and double dice for the infantry. It's *sometimes* worth a try, but...

Err... and we monkied with some of the factors a bit, and added a few more of the special characteristics to a few of the units here and there (eg I made the Vieux Regts. Steady IIRC) and we give Platoon Fire infantry a second "first fire dice" so they get two turns of improved shooting instead of one (as I/we think that whilst Platoon Fire simply wasn't as awesomesauce amazeballs as some sources claim, it a/ did have an effect, and I/we think it probably helped retain fire discipline a little longer and b/ we want to distinguish a little between armies, in the same way your Cold Steel vs Shot cavalry amendment does!).

[Last Hussar]

Understand completely are the differentiating armies. Wouldn't do it personally -a turn is about 10 minutes, and they already get 5 dice.  May I suggest instead of 2x first fire,allow unit that does nothing else, and does not come under fire etc for the previous enemy turn to attempt to regain its first fire. It can't be shaken or other wise disordered, and possibly no enemy within single moved (charge) distance,then passes an order.

I toyed briefly with this, didn't really  flesh it out as I didn't want to overcomplicate the basic ideas.

[toxicpixie]

We originally gave platoon firing units an extra dice in firefights against no -pf's. Which was too much - it was basically always an extra dice and was massively better. Then We tried two dice of first fire on the same turn. Better but seemed to give such a big "lead" the French never recovered. We've currently settled on two turns of first fire which seems right - it's painful but if you hang on you get back to parity and no one evaporates straight away (often).

I agree on the turn times - I'd think they're actually longer, tbh, more 15-20mins - but - we wanted a minimal book keeping, easy to use difference that didn't end up overwhelming or useless, and so far...

* as ever, ask me again after the next game I lose

[Hertsblue]

The issue of platoon firing is a vexed one. If you think about it rationally, there is no reason why 500 men in three ranks firing by platoons should produce a greater volume of fire than 500 men in four ranks firing volleys. The main advantages of the platoon firing are 1) the longer unit frontage (the fourth rank of the volley-firing unit has difficulty getting its aim in), and 2) the flexibility of the platoon firing system and the ability to always have a platoon in reserve. So, should the platoon-firing unit have that great an advantage?

I would have thought that the majority of the major combatants in the SYW would have adopted platoon firing, though. The issue is more of a problem in the WSS.     

[toxicpixie]

Hertsblue, sorry - you're right, I think it's common in the SYW (along with metal ram rods etc etc), but we've veered seamlessly into WSS territory, which is my fault! We were looking for a way to show it had some effect, but not an overwhelming one, which is either a great compromise or a terrible fence sitting non-solution that reflects neither camp

[Last Hussar]

A forum thread getting derailed?  No one saw that coming.

The advantage of platoon over rank is that while fewer people are firing at any one time, there is always someone firing.  I believe the fire rate WSS was 1 per minute.  Equally spaced ranks would fire every 15 seconds.  With platoon it was one of 16 companies - so one every 4 seconds.  Additionally the rank 1/4 is evenly spread across the front, where as Platoon is 1/16 in a block, so I'm guessing does proportionately more damage due to the narrow arc gives less misses.

Because you don't fight (you can of course) armies of different periods against each other, they are equal so their stats are equal.  But would they be doing less damage in the WSS so it takes longer to get to that break point?  At the moment it takes the same number of shots (statistically/on average) to shake a WSS, SYW, AWI, Napoleonic, Crimean and ACW unit.

I worked out the 10 minutes a turn by reference to unit frontages - 1 Move Unit equals about 10 yards. This works with the 'close range' of 6. Because we use cm, we call 1mm = 1 pace, so we can give more atmospheric orders -"The Prussians will advance 200 paces".

Because I'm a maths nerd, I worked out the average move for an average unit with Average ( leadership (from memory I think it came out at about 1.6), doing it for Road Column and Field line etc.  10 mins makes a field line move at about 1 mph in battle - which seemed reasonable (12 Move Units x 1.6 x 10 yards x 6 moves/hour)

[paulr]

I worked out the 10 minutes a turn by reference to unit frontages - 1 Move Unit equals about 10 yards. This works with the 'close range' of 6. Because we use cm, we call 1mm = 1 pace, so we can give more atmospheric orders -"The Prussians will advance 200 paces".

atmospheric orders, are very important. We did something similar with General Quarters and changed the ground scale from 4" per 1000 yards to 1cm per 200 yards so that the conversion was easier. Much better to think of your opponents ships at 15,000 yards (75cm) than 60"