Bolt Action

[Luddite]

W played a game of Bolt Action last night, using a historical scenario (6th June 1944, German recon into St Mere Elgise) with a company of Germans vs a couple of platoons of US paratroopers.

Turned out OK for Jerry as we managed to achieve our objective, although we took a real beating from the dug in Yanks.

However, i thought you chaps might like a brief run down of what i thought about these new rules.


Bolt Action seems to be a large skirmish/small tactical game, and I’d say a company per side is about the size of game that’s right for this scale.

We used a German comapny with a French tank and an MMG against two US platoons supported by an AT gun and a 30 cal.

The brief 'Review'


My key reservations:

Card activation
Alright you use dice in place of cards, but essentially it’s the random activation process.  Each unit has a dice (all the germans will have black dice for example, and all the Americans have green dice), and all these dice are in a bag.  You then get a bit of Scrabble action as one die is drawn and given the the side with the corresponding colour.  they then choose and activate a single unit, and mark is as done (and the order is used - 1 = fired for example).

Not as bad as some games (eg TFL), as every unit does get to act each turn, but its still random activation which I remain to be convinced about.

Getting a poor run of activations can stuff your best laid plans.  Fair enough I suppose â€" fog of war and all that. 

But well trained troops with good command and control are equally at the mercy of random chance as say irregulars and partisans.

Its also a bit fiddly and seemed to slow the game down a bit as essentially it breaks the turn up into IGOUGO but a the individual unit level. 

I think its safe to say that we’ve seen this random activation mechanism in a few games now, and its not something that I generally like, although i'm not sure why.  It works in Maurice for some reason so i'll have to have a think.  Perhaps because Maurice isn't WWII and allows you to activate more than one unit at a time... 

I’m not sure why this current random activation fad persists with game writers.


Clutter

Its fiddly with lots of counters on the table. 

Sure it’ll be less with single based figures (we were using multi-based 20mm figures, set up for Crossfire), but still, there seemed to be an awful lot of putting counters down only to take them off again almost immediately.   

Counters are of course unavoidable in most WWII games so not a big worry this, but I think getting some nice looking muted markers rather than garish dice will enhance the appearance.



Last man standing
Units were down to 1-2 men and still in the fight. 

I’d like to have seen something like ‘X% = autobreak’ to prevent this. 
Or some method of making ad hoc scratch units from these survivors.

That’s a simple house rule though.



Fixed orders
There appear to be only 6 types of orders (advance, run, fire, rally, down, and...um...), so no option presumably for special actions?

First aid?
Set explosive charge?

We didn't use off table support so i don't know how you call in artillery etc.


‘Jean Luc Picard’ commanders
Commanders seem to be basically redundant, other than to keep everyone’s morale up with a +1 activation modifier.  Activation is automatic for steady units, but pinned units have to dice to get going.

Riker:  Captain, there are 50 Borg cubes off the starboard bow and the warp core’s about to explode, what should we do?!

*Picard sips tea, Earl Grey, hot*

Picard: You deal with it Riker, I’ll be in my Ready Room playing the flute.


Machineguns
Fixed position guns were very underpowered.

Experience and doctrine from WWII talks about the firepower of a fixed MG being roughly equal to a squad of infantry, so a 30 cal or MG34 should be kicking out about 10 dice, not the paltry 3-4 dice they get.  We were expecting our MGs set up to be the usal pain that they should be but they were very unimpressive.  Also they're quite mobile, simply giving up their shooting if they move, so you can hump that Vickers at a run across a field and set it up ready to go next 'turn'.   


OK, Onto the good stuff…


Intuitiveness
Not sure of its just years of playing Rick Priestley’s rules, but they seemed to be very intuitive. 

Nothing’s truly new of course, but I found they actually played quite closely to Warhammer 40k, with a good deal of WWII staple elements overlaid.

Unusually for me, I picked things up within a turn or two.

It all sort of made sense and I feel with a bit of practice games will run a lot smoother.  We were 'learning as we went' after all.

It also produced expected results.

Germans in the open taking a real beating...although not quite as bad as i'd have expected!  That said out forward units were torn to bits and it was the second line and scattered survivors who managed to take the objectives.  Very pleasing.

There were also a few nice surprises!
A successful assault or two, one against the odds.
Units panicking off to the rear for no good reason and an unpopular German commander getting ‘accidentally’ shot by his men (you want us to run at those dug in Doughboys across this large expanse of open ground without fire support?  Certainly sir...*click clack*).


Mobility
Nice and simple movement rules (in terrain no running â€" simple).  None of that faffing about with half moves, etc.



Combat resolution
Seemed very smooth and intuitive with the dice pool vs target number thing.  Reminds me strongly of the core Warmaster mechanism.

I’d have preferred to have seen the Warmaster fixed target numbers (4, 5, or 6), with only the dice pool size changing, but it doesn’t take too long to get your head around the modifiers.  It did seem odd that running units weren’t easier to hit though.  And sometimes the modifiers pushed you into needing '7's on a d6, and the GW 6+6 thing kicked in.

It also still has the layer rolling of ‘to hit’ then ‘to wound’ which seemed a bit superfluous (why not combine them into 1 roll?) but that’s to be expected from Rick!

Essentially you determine your target and how many dice you're rolling (e.g. 7 rifles (7), 1 LMG (3), 2 SMGs (4) would be 14 dice), roll to hit (target number anywhere from 2-7 ish), and for each hit roll to wound.  Each wound = 1 kill (figure removed) and 1 pin marker on the unit.  Pins = remaining figures?  Bad things ensue!

Pins are also nasty as they force you to test to activate the unit, and act as negative modifiers for attacks etc.
Outnumbered units will get pinned fast...

Consistency
The same basic mechanic seems to be applied across infantry and armour, which is good. 
Also, basically the 40k vehicle rules are being used here, which is no bad thing as I’ve always felt they are surprisingly elegant.



Tactical decisions
There did seem to be various options for the ‘point of decision’ at each unit’s activation. 
These were limited in our game last night by the constraints of the scenario time limit and victory conditions, which is a good thing I suppose, but in meeting engagements I think you’ll have lots of options to consider on which unit to activate, and what to do with it.


Any good?

Overall I’d say it’s a bit clunky, and reminded me of ‘the Rick Priestly rules’.

First impressions it seemed to be like a cross between Warmaster and 40k but chromed and polished enough to feel like WWII. 

If you can get around the fiddly bits, it does give a decent game.


I think we'll be giving it a bit of table time to see if it 'beds in' with us (as we still haven't settled on a tactical scale ruleset to compliment out larger action set of choice - Spearhead), and I’d love to give it the AVBCW treatment.

I've also heard a rumour that there’s a WWWII version coming out.  If that's true I’ll be all over that!

[Nosher]

I'd agree with quite a lot of whats been said, but I have to admit that I really like the rules.

I have only ever played WH40K once and that was edition 1 which I actually quite liked until GW started pissing around with it I have played other Rick games and still do (Black Powder, Hail Caesar, Pike and Shotte, Warmaster etc) and even rules/games as old as 1644 so can see what Luddite means by 'Priestly-ism's' however i am led to beleive that the book was largely written by Alessio.

I'm a big fan of 'random' command systems. They remove the omnipotence some players love to have and I like the challenge of thinsg not going to plan and then trying to make a buggers muddle out of what you're dealt with.

I agree that there's a fair bit of game board clutter, however i seem to have got this down to some home made markers based on the pin markers warlord sell only mine cost a fraction of the price being home made.

Artillery can be devestating, piss poor or comedy of errors. I have had each in games I have played in.

My jury is out on team weapons. HMG do appear a bit feeble but its been noted in quite a few discussions that if you start messing around with the stats the odds stack the otherway and they become uber-weapons and game killers.

All in all I like it and think it works well for a pick up and play game or when scenario driven.

The Weird War plans Luddite mentions aren't plans as such, merely suggetions on how you incorporate Warlords Weird War 2 figures into the game. I have roughed a US list and German Weird War list based on Secrtes of the third Reich miniatures and I posted this on warlords website where it got not much more than a passing comment or two.

[vladgothic]

Not played them but got the overall feeling they might be in the GW roundabout style, doesn't appeal to me. But thank you for taking the time to post the report, interesting analysis.

If your looking for a tactical set of rules have you looked at panzermarsch? they run pretty well, and a company sized action would be the largest you might want to play.

I hear that clockwork goblin are due to be working/releasing a set of rules to support their WWWII, primarily aimed at 15mm it might be worth a gander.

[rexhurley]

hey guys a question for you, while I know the rules are based at a platoon + action using 28mm how do you think it would go if you used say multi figure stands (say half sections or something) on a similar size base to a single 28mm figure?

Cheers Rex

[Nosher]

I would imagine its do-able but the rules do involve single figure casualty removal

[Ben Waterhouse]

Cheers Luddite, that's persuaded me to get a copy. 

[Derek H]

I’m not sure why this current random activation fad persists with game writers

Because some people really like it and think it adds interest and excitement to a game.  Me for example.

I even use the optional rule in Muskets and Tomahawks that ends the turn after three event cards are drawn.

[Luddite]

hey guys a question for you, while I know the rules are based at a platoon + action using 28mm how do you think it would go if you used say multi figure stands (say half sections or something) on a similar size base to a single 28mm figure?

Cheers Rex

Yep it works fine.  We're using our 10mm and 15mm multibased stuff to get a handle on the rules.  No problem, you just mark casualties on the base until they're gone.  

And to update things a bit, we've played a few more games (another tomorrow night).  These are really good rules.  The more we've played them the more they grow on us.  We 'stress tested' them last game with something like 30 units per side (usual 10-12) and it still worked fine. 

The rules themselves seem to work out as really intuitive, elegant, and we're finding they give pretty 'historical' results while moderating a decent game too.

[Baker Boy]

How do you deal with the ahistorical ranges of weapons and the ahistorical rates of fire? 

We tried Bolt Action and dismissed them as they were so utterly gamely, more like 40k than WWII. 

[Luddite]

How do you deal with the ahistorical ranges of weapons and the ahistorical rates of fire?  

We tried Bolt Action and dismissed them as they were so utterly gamely, more like 40k than WWII.  

All games abstract this.  The concept of fixed time and ground scales appears long-gone from modern rules so in terms of ranges i'm generally fairly happy with that.  Ranges often (as with Bolt Action) appear to be internally referential, so that the desired game effect works as the writers intended.

Frankly for most WWII games if historically accurate weapon ranges were a consideration you'd get some very odd results.

In terms of RoF, again i'm happy for rules to take gamist abstractions.  For example, a typical fixed position MG is (if i recall) considered to give out the firepower of a typical infantry unit, so the LMG should have 10 dice in Bolt Action.

Utterly gamey?  40k more than WWII?

Yep, as i said above.
 
However, i'm less interested in 'cause' than 'effect', and so far we've found them to produce surprisingly interesting and consistent outcomes that fit our WWII expectations.  That may change as we play more of course, and we're keeping a weather eye on a few suspect mechanics like close assaults.  After all, we were originally impressed with FoW!!

However, so far they're holding together and we've not encountered an agregious mechanical problems, or wildly ahistorical outcomes...so...

Tonight we're doing an old Rapid Fire scenario 'FINAL BATTLE FOR GAVRUS  30th June 1944  (Gavrus, Normandy)'

The British have to escape therough the German lines...should be very tricky indeed...



EDIT:  Discussed my thoughts on rules abstractions here http://www.pendrakenforum.co.uk/index.php/topic,5803.30.html

[Nosher]

Once again agree with Luddite as he sums it up pretty well.

I'm also worried that the Close assault rule is a bit suspect - it has certainly caused some consternation at the club that were working on.

There are other things that are creeping into the game through '40k play/utter fromage' which are becoming quite prevalent on the Warlord Forum. Medics are running around killing things and Observers are being used to snipe to gain additional pin markers. There are even a few people on their forum who are willing to condone such bollocks I mean nonsense.

Thankfully the people I play with are a bit more knowledgeable about the era the game is set in and we can discuss things pretty rationally. As Luddite points out BA is a reasonable set that gives a good game in quite a tight timescale - no four hour games with this rule set at 1000 points a side.

One word of caution though. Dont bother wasting money on the 'Armies of' supplements. I just received my copy of Armies of Germany and am majorly disappointed that it is fluff and nothing but fluff. Anyone with a sprinkling of knowledge of WW2 can come up with the stats that aren't present in the main rule book without wasting £15 which would be better spent elsewhere. Still, I only have myself to blame as I went against my own better judgement instincts and should have known better.

[Ben Waterhouse]

That's good to know Nosher - I'll just get the main rule set. Ta

[Luddite]

So tonight we played this RF scenario http://www.worldoptions.com.au/fourpipers/rapid/gavrusrf2.pdf

No pictures unfortunately (especially as we were using Pendraken's lovely 10mm figures), but it was a jolly fun game and very close at the final count.

In brief, the Germans stormed forwards, cutting the British to pieces as they desperately fled across the river and decamped to try and escape.

There were a few British stings in the tail - 1st turn the 17pdrs brewed up a German StuG III, but other than that it was a desperate rearguard action.

The British hopes were bolstered somewhat as they finally managed to get some artillery cover called down that pinned the Germans across the river, wiping out a couple of units, flattening the bridge, and unfortunately falling short killing a few brave British PIAT troops.  D'oh!

Anyway, the balance of the game came down to the final British unit - a 17pdr gun.  As the crew desperately tried to limber up and bug out amid a hail of German fire, they found themselves assaulted by Jerry infantry and surrendered.  

By the narrowest margin, the Germans managed to snatch the win!

Overall, rules-wise everything held together again.  Something that developed as the British casualties began to tell was the switch in initiative that occurred.  As units (and their cards) were lost, the Germans took the initiative, dominating the card draw.  Interesting.

[Steve J]

Sounds an interesting game with plenty of action. Shame about the pics though .

[Derek H]

Medics are running around killing things

In Jeeps with .50 cals