We played out an Arras 1940 game. Very realistic and very scary for me (the British player)
The chap who put on the game has a house near the battlefield and has driven it extensively. He pointed out how flat it was, but there are gentle folds in the ground level.
So we did this:
Folds / rises - area terrain, no penalty for movement or cover for firing (unlike hills), but they do block los. They offer no height advantage for FAOs or FACs.
Really useful being able to form up "ready for the off" in some gentle dip and then drive off into the storm! :(
Am I missing this in the rules, or did we inadvertently invent the "fold" or "dip"?
I'd assumed that the ability to hug the wrinkles in the ground was why low profile troops got the -1 but your version sounds like a perfectly valid terrain type to me.
I have used cut up area templates of felt as folds or dips and any unit in it is not visible, unless they or an enemy unit is on the edge.
The low profile issue never came up since we allowed anything to hide behind it.
But I can see that I'm in good company anyway. :D
I tend to think of the maddening roll of 1 for shooting as covering things like small wrinkles in the surface of the battlefield.
But our "wrinkle" means that the FAO and FACs can't see them either.
It certainly worked well in the game. Much of the real area is a billiard table otherwise on maps, but there are patches of dead ground in reality.
Hi Dr Dave
One minor point of note - and one for Big Insect rules clarification maybe ....
Although the Cover table on p13 of BKCIV has been updated ...it still records 'hills' as giving partial cover -
This was previously clarified in BKCII as only applying to hill crests.
Is it intended to run the same way in BKCIV - I would hope so.
AJ
Correct AJ - the line of site and crest rules should still apply.
One for the clarifications.
On the wrinkles in the ground concept - this was actually my thinking about all Infantry and Infantry Support as being classified as Low-Profile.
No terrain is exactly flat - even carefully ploughed and harrowed fields (exclude dried up salt lakes for now!) so infantry will naturally use the small folds in the ground, the shrubs and bushes etc to mask their movement.
I am in 2 minds about all Command units being classified as Low Profile - personally I think this doesnt work as some commanders are in trucks or AFVs etc. and this is included in the 6 to hit aspect of a command base.
Thanks
Mark
I think in most cases you are right about the low profile, but I think you should lose low profile if in fortifications and to a certain extent in buildings as it makes them even more difficult to KO.
Good call on the Low Profile in Fortifications - I was originally inclined to say that all Bunkers and Pill boxes were low-profile - but then of course some stand out like saw-thumbs and are at least Average profile ... we are then getting into a whole new level of granularity >:(
:) I can understand a pill box, but not a large bunker, there is still a H669 at Hermanville sur mer and it is pretty big, certainly taller than a tank. I understand the need sometimes to have standard rules and not over complicate things. I like the low profile idea, but I think if you add that to troops in Fortifications it is nigh on impossible to knock them out!
I totally agree re Low-Profile within a bunker or pill box ...
TBF I am not 100% comfortable with the way fortifications work more widely in BKC. But I think what we have got works OK (for now).
In reality, it is the fortification that is the target priority and that has it's own profile, hits and saves value - that should be what is being used to take any hits etc.
I can see the idea that small arms fire at the slit of a pillbox with an MG in it will do little damage to the pillbox but potentially suppress (& maybe hit) the MG unit - but when it comes down to larger scale ordnance it is the pillbox that is the target.
I worked on an idea that Suppression on a fortification was then applied to the units in it. But as the fortification was providing cover any units inside were a lot harder to suppress.
I agree, that is why i am starting to come round to the idea of suppression on quality -6 Elite/Veteran (plus the -1 for suppression/fall back), 5 for trained and 4 for fragile/Green or conscript (and the additional dice for Suppression/fall back).