One rules to ring them all?

[steve_holmes_11]

I've forgotten the original question.

When I read battle reports, I observe a repeating cycle though history.
 * New weapon is introduced, often to little fanfare.
 * One faction improves its use - starts winning - everybody who can afford it fancies a bit of it.
 * Sometimes we hit a "linear" stalemate here with grinding "soldier's battles".
 * Somebody adapts their drill to crack the deadlock with an "impetus move".
 * Return to step 1.

Rule writers tend to write for two cases.

The traditional one popularised by WRG is "a universal ruleset for everything between these dates".
The later development addresses a specific (or several adjacent) wars and often hinges on "Dreyse changed everything".

I'm still trying to get my head around.
What changed gradually.
Where are the revolutionary steps that can be added as modules?

[Last Hussar]

So, on the thread about converting ACW cavalry to ECW Fred said

That feels a stretch


Infantry fire power was massively higher in the ACW - not least as half the unit wasn't carrying pikes. But also the move from how weapons were loaded, speeded up rate of fire significantly.

Then artillery was very different too

And as stated above Cavalry changed role too.

Armies were bigger

Supply situation completely different with railways

and Gwydion posted

I think if your ECW rules work for ACW there is something wrong with the rules or the scenarios, or both. Two hundred years of military evolution should be catered for differently, otherwise your rules are VERY generic.

My point is we aren't worried about the weapons or the percentage casualties, we are after the effect OF the unit, not the effect ON it.

So to answer this I looked at 5 battles - 3 17th Century, 2 19th. I picked the names at random - the first 6 that came into my mind/I found (Technically first 4 and 6th and 7th. the Appomattox campaign was very one side in numbers and thus in casualties).

Edge Hill 1642.
Two even armies, about 3% killed, 10% wounded on each side.

Marston Moor 1644.
Parliament 300 of 24,000 killed (1%)
Royalist 4,000 of 17,000 killed (23%)

2nd Newbury 1644
Royalist 1,500 of 8,500 (17%)
Parliament 2,000 of 19,000 (10%)

1st Bull Run 1861
Union 2,700 of 33,000 (8%)
Confederate 2,000 of 35,000 (6%)

Stones River 1862
Union - 9,100 of 43,200 (21%)
Confederate 9,300 of 35,000 (26%)

2nd Bull Run
Union 15,00 of approx 77,000 (18%)
Confederate 7,300 of 50,000 (15%)

1) Figures rounded from source, and those are probably inaccurate.
2) Approx 35% of Union casualties are listed as missing, rather than actually accounted for.
3) Wounded/Killed ratio tends to stay steady at 3:1 to 4:1

Is the ACW more bloody than ECW - yes, a bit, but I would point out the record keeping for ECW is likely to be... interestingly done, so possibly a bit higher. Also look at the ranges - they are all over the place, within the conflict and compared to each other.

But that's not what we should worry about.

On the table we are, like commanding generals, worried about the result (Pyrrhus not withstanding). Can that unit fight on?

What we are worried about is the effect.

Infantry fire power was massively higher in the ACW - not least as half the unit wasn't carrying pikes. But also the move from how weapons were loaded, speeded up rate of fire significantly.

Yes, but infantry formation changed because of this.

Then artillery was very different too

But how different was its effect? Lines were looser. Grande Battery worked for Napoleon NOT because of the individual pieces, but because he massed them.

And as stated above Cavalry changed role too.

I intend to count them as Dragoons - mounted infantry.

Armies were bigger

Two points here.
1) Lots of H&M games have the Battalion (or equivalent) as the basic unit on table. Does it matter if you game 1 army of 120 points, or 1 Division of 120 points in a 3 Corps army? You've got the same (effectively) stuff on the table.

2) The Blucher Rules.
A base of infantry is part of a Corps, not necessarily a discrete division. It represents 2-3000 troops (for infantry) Midpoint of about 2,500 men. IV Corps is 11,550 men so 4 or 5 bases.
HOWEVER... In the advanced rules you can do the small scale - 1,600 as the mid point, or Grand Scale - 4,000 men a base. How do the rules change?

They don't. Sam Mustapha addresses this head on in the Q&A. That 'Base Width' range may be 210 yards, 330 yard, or 530 yards (the system is base widths, not inches or cm, so as to allow any basing), but the range of musket remains 1BW. They still move 2 BW.

I'll let Sam Mustapha explain why

Regarding Changing the Game Scales
Some players might object that changing the unit scale should also entail changes in things like
movement rates, weapon ranges, or the radius around the CinC marker when activating by command.
Blücher's approach is in some ways a throwback to the older or "classic" concept of wargames, in which
movement rates, weapon ranges, and the lengths of turns were deliberately elastic so that you can play
battles using the figures and space that you have. It does not matter whether an infantry unit represents
three battalions, or four, or five .... It matters only that the units interact with each other and with the
enemy in plausible ways.

The rules are concerned with relative proximity and engagement. Are your units committed against the
enemy or not? We still need to know things like: can this enemy reach the artillery to attack it in this turn?

But that's a question that can be answered with movement rates; it doesn't require a fixed scale.
As for scaling casualties, fire effects, and so on: we are not counting dead men in any event, since even
the most gruesomely bloody battle produced a relatively small number of men actually killed in action.
We are concerned with the effect of combat on units: does this fire break the will of the men to carry on?
Does this cavalry charge make exhausted defenders run away? Those sorts of questions don't change
whether a unit represents 1000 men or 3000 men.

Weapon ranges, of course, can begin to look odd if people do the math on large table scales. If this really
bothers you, then you can change the scales or ranges or whatever you like. But I suggest you play it first,
and I suspect you'll find that the ranges and movement rates "work" in game terms and produce results
that make sense, even if a literal interpretation of the distances wouldn't make sense.

Blücher's most important goal is not a faithful scale representation of the range of a Brown Bess. Rather
it is to allow you to play battles in as many ways as possible, within the limitations of your space, time,
and collections.

We should not be worried by counting buttons - any rules that tries that WILL get it wrong. A game should be concentrating on 'An average unit can receive 5 hits [say]. What is the probability that an average unit, when firing, will cause 1 hit? what adjustments are a factor?'

I would argue that this has stayed fairly constant for hundreds of years - it was the invention of long distance fire for the 20th Century that changed this.

Supply situation completely different with railways

It ties armies to supply points, it affects grand theatre strategy, not tabletop tactics.

Were archers in 1360, Shotte in 1660, Muskets in 1760, rifled muskets in 1860 REALLY doing that much difference, in real terms. Note I am NOT suggesting, for 1 second, that you could put the army of Henry V up against Meade's Army of the Potomac. What I am saying is that the Army of North Virginia cancels those advantages - a Base Width is 300 yards, not 100 yards but the bookkeeping is still the same.

[Last Hussar]

Sorry that's a bit long!

[Orcs]

I think you are looking for the holy grail of wargaming - It just doen't exist.

BP sought to be a one stop set of rules, but has brought out various suplements for specific periods. These are not jsut a few pages of adjustments but complete books in themselves, not much thinner than the orrigial rules.

Just pick a single ruleset for each period/tactical level and learn tham.. It will be quicker and easier to do this than the amount of time you will spend constantly looking at and tweaking a generic ruleset that does not quite get the feel of the preriod and tactical level of any period/level.

I use BKC for tactical WW2 in 10mm
Chain of Command for platoon and company level WW2
Fire and Fury for ACW
Midgaurd for Fantasy/ medieval

[Last Hussar]

This is more of a discussion than me wanting an homogeneous set. Some people like painting (because their weird). Me, I enjoy writing rules.

It's a wonderment, say. When do rules stop being ECW, and become WSS? When do they become SYW, and those then slide into Napoleonic? How different is the ACW? Can you use ACW for Franco Prussian?

[Chris Pringle]

Morning, LH. I'll make just two points (rather than writing the whole essay that your long post yesterday could invite).

% casualties: a major factor in this is troop density, ie, how many men per yard of frontage (or vice versa). If two opposing armies of a given size are compressed onto a narrow battlefield, they will inflict much higher casualties on each other than if they are strung out across a wider more open area.

Artillery firepower: actually this did change a lot in the latter half of the nineteenth century. Improved barrel technology meant Napoleon's guns were not only lighter than the old ones, they were also longer-ranged and more accurate. Lighter guns with improved carriages were more mobile and could command more ground. This made the battlefield deeper and contributed to the change from linear warfare (essentially static guns with short effective range) to 'impulse warfare'.

[steve_holmes_11]

I think you are looking for the holy grail of wargaming - It just doen't exist.

BP sought to be a one stop set of rules, but has brought out various suplements for specific periods. These are not jsut a few pages of adjustments but complete books in themselves, not much thinner than the orrigial rules.

Just pick a single ruleset for each period/tactical level and learn tham.. It will be quicker and easier to do this than the amount of time you will spend constantly looking at and tweaking a generic ruleset that does not quite get the feel of the preriod and tactical level of any period/level.

I use BKC for tactical WW2 in 10mm
Chain of Command for platoon and company level WW2
Fire and Fury for ACW
Midgaurd for Fantasy/ medieval

I'm not at all convinced that Black Powder ever set out to be the one true ruleset.

Their 1700 start point is reasonable from a kit perspective Muskets and swords).
The rules are rather obviously Napoleonic, with afterthoughts.

When one considers Warlord's background, the business model is very familiar.
 * Rules that require a large figure count.
 * Codex, Codex, Codex.

I do wonder how this collides with the historic grognards who:
 * Houserule for different scales, table size and troop types.
 * Historic research, historic research, historic research.

[steve_holmes_11]

Were archers in 1360, Shotte in 1660, Muskets in 1760, rifled muskets in 1860 REALLY doing that much difference, in real terms. Note I am NOT suggesting, for 1 second, that you could put the army of Henry V up against Meade's Army of the Potomac. What I am saying is that the Army of North Virginia cancels those advantages - a Base Width is 300 yards, not 100 yards but the bookkeeping is still the same.

I think  I'm on the same page.


Each of those steps in shooting power certainly killed more people.
That would be a significant consideration in the 1960-70 days of figure removal = killed soldiers.

My rather sparse research shows that firepower disrupted attacks.
This led to tactically static shooting exchanges until somebody "worked it out".
IT being: How to advance under fire, close with the enemy and stick 'em with your cold steel.

Sometimes technological changes caused the shifts, particularly increases in firepower.
Unpicking the deadlock usually relied on a switch in training and tactics.
Examples: More open formations, closing directly (they'll only get one volley), or a close range crashing volley before a charge.

In short, the "targets" found ways to mitigate the rise in firepower.
This fits more modern rules where damage models loss of combat effectiveness.

[kodiakblair]

Thoughts, gentlemen?

Ed the 2 Hours Wargames guy has this covered with his Reaction System.

First version appeared over twenty years ago and he's been refining it ever since. System runs from gladiators, fantasy skirmish, dungeon crawling, alien boxing matches, Vietnam, WWII, French Indian war, Napoleonic (big battle & skirmish), Sci-Fi and Ancients; even has naval and spaceship combat 

Core rules stays mostly the same, just tweaks for movement and weapon range.

There's always some form of campaign and background fluff included. Major draw is Ed's system was developed to be solo and co-op games friendly.

[Last Hussar]

Yes - forgot about these!

[FierceKitty]

Sorry, that's a bit long!

I've heard that from so many women....

[Last Hussar]

I've heard that from so many women....

Usually threads here devolve into farce. FK is trying the new tactic of just lying...

Unless he is talking about his love of speaking about the Bronze Age.

[FierceKitty]

Safely claimed by a man on another continent!