More Playtests

Since getting back from my holidays I've had a few chances to do some further
playtesting via solo games for some of the rulesets.

I've done three recent ones:
1. Napoleonic: French v Russian (1807)
2. Second World War: US v German (1944)
3. American Civil War: Eastern (1862)

All were highly enjoyable and played the way I wanted them to with the
historical outcomes I was seeking to simulate.

The Napoleonic game was a vanilla scenario (no house rules) using similar forces
as presented in the example battle in Neil's book. Boy are the French Imperial
army a strong force. I thought the Russian army was pretty cool but the French
surpasses it, particullarly with the additional tactical flexibility of the
rapid formation change. The Russians were slightly imbalanced in their
deployment and the French concentrated their forces in a vital area where the
Russians were exposed. They also seized the strategic terrain features which
allowed them to dominate the surrounding areas. It was a hard struggle for the
French but they finally forced the Russians to concede (5 units to 2).

Moving almost a century and a half forward, this was my first "pure" WWII battle
using the rules in Introduction. I've done a SciFi and a couple of 19th Century
Colonial variants but not a genuine WWII scenario. This was a really hard fought
game which had all the drama I expected from two balanced forces fighting a pure
encounter battle for three clearly defined terrain objectives (one bridge and
two towns). A German victory (just) with two objectives held for one period,
however, the US force did inflict some serious damage on the German assault. My
Tiger I was immobilised by a Sherman early on which blunted a lot of my ability
to backup assaults on the key positions. Typically for the Germans, their
tactical flexibility allowed them to rapidly adapt and utilise as plan B their
assault gun and a rather cavalier Pz IV which had two kills to its merit by the
end of the game until it became the victim of a bazooka ambush from a wood, well
within US zone. I did have some house rules employed e.g.from Rapid Fire I use a
chance test for observation of units that withold their fire: this I find really
adds to the tension of close range troop interactions.

The final game, which I completed last night, was an ACW encounter set in 1862.
I've been looking forward to playing an ACW game: I had a good experience of
this last year when I was initially dabbling with rules and gave the Neil Thomas
Introduction rules a go. My setup gave the Union the task of assaulting a
smaller but more experienced CSA force in what materialsed to be a strong
tactical position, which included a couple of towns and a long ridge. What was
very distinctive in this game was the "ebb and flow" feel, with units made to
test for charges, be forced to retreat and then charge back to engage. I took
the mechanics for this literally sometimes such as in the case of units defeated
in melees having to retreat twice (one for losing the melee, a second retreat
for failing a morale test for losing a base). After a rather epic cut and thrust
fight the Confederates were victorious. Two out of three of the Union assaults
failed. The Union had a rather unimaginative deployment and battle plan with
three assaults. One would act as a feint and which actually should have been a
primary thrust as it was against the weaker CSA flank with more favourable
terrain to move quickly and exploit. Also the Union artillery, which could have
been a far more influential factor, was again deployed without much thought
about focusing on the key areas required in the Union assault plan.

On relection three fine games. Next I'm going to do some Ancients games and I'm
dying to try out the 18th Century variants I've created: WSS, SYW and AWI. Think
I'll go for a Macedonian v Celt next with an AWI game on the back.