I wasn't intending to return to the SCW version of the Portable Wargame, but I thought I'd give it at least one more go, as I'd got some answers to queries from the io group.
Rather than bother the Monday Night Group with it, I ran a solo game and reverted to squares.
I set up the Republicans as Jon did in our game a week or so back. Following a comment by Bob C I decided to use a couple of Nationalists to pin them in place, and then send off the others left flanking to turn the position. I re-rolled for quality - the Nationalists got the edge there - and for air superiority, which the Republicans got.
The Nationalists moved first. As they can't move and debus in the same turn (or indeed unlimber) it does mean that they will have to suffer at least one round of shooting before being able to fight.
The Republicans targeted the Nationalist artillery with their guns, and inflicted a hit, destroying the limbers. I mused for a minute on whether that meant that the guns now counted as unlimbered, but the point was moot, as they took another hit from small arms fire and so were destroyed. I decided not to use the officer to try and block the hit, as losing him would mean that the Nationalists were 1 SP from exhaustion. If they get exhausted in this scenario they can't win, as they can't exit the board.
The Nationalists in their next turn debussed their Falange unit, and pushed the other trucks out wider. If I've read the rules correctly*, the Falange are in a "deadzone" and can't be shot at by the defenders in the wood. That means the defenders will need to move out of the cover to shoot at them or attack them in close assault.
The Republicans were having a lucky run with their activations. The unit defending the village skipped out and hit the Falange, pinning them. The Asaltos likewise pushed up the hill and hit the Moroccans in the truck. This pinned the unit and cost them an SP as well. On the plus side they were now debussed and able to shoot a turn earlier than expected. The Nationalists had already lost 6 SPs now, three for the artillery and their tows, two for the Moroccans and their trucks and one for the Falange.
Luckily for them the Anarchists in the olive grove decided not to obey any orders, and had a meeting instead.
I debussed the Legion troops in their previous turn, and was now able to leap frog them through the Moroccans, after shooting at the Asaltos with the Falange and the Moroccans to no effect. The Legion also failed to inflict a hit. All looking a bit shambolic.
Then the Republican air force showed up, but luckily was ineffective.
The Falange took another hit from the troops by the village. The Anarchists now got themselves sorted, and being unable to fire at the Falange, skipped sideways out of the wood, and close assaulted them as well. This inflicted another SP hit. Nationalists were now at 8 SP damage, against an exhaustion level of 9.
I may be doing something wrong, but this is really tough for the Nationalists, even if they are much better quality, as they were here, and the Republican air force is ineffective.
[Paragraph and diagram deleted as in error].
I'm also sure I'm guilty of over analysing the system, and looking for something that is intentionally not there. In the game played above I deliberately did not make any Republican movements through the town from East to West, as I couldn't see any terrain rules for town movement. North/South isn't an issue, because of the road, but I'd have thought that in the absence of a road there should be restrictions on movement like for woods. This might be the case in other versions, and is simply an oversight here. I can't recall what we did in the game in February, which had buildings, and I can't find that I made a note either way.
The other thing that did strike me as odd was the way troops that are in trucks are treated. Getting in and out of trucks takes a whole turn, and it looks like you can't fire or close assault having done so. That's not a problem. What feels odd is that if your trucks are destroyed, you lose an SP and are pinned but you effectively can open fire a turn earlier than if you got out of the trucks normally. It's the same with artillery. Being shot up effectively unlimbers your (admittedly damaged) guns, which can then Unpin in their move phase and open fire at the start of next turn. Don't get me wrong - you are better off not being hit and unlimbering normally, but it made me think. I went back to FWTDR to look at what happens there, and it is somewhat similar, with hits being passed on to the towed bases (or the troops in the trucks). However the result of Pinning is more severe, and you can't fire if you survive, so the outcome of being caught limbered or in trucks is more catastrophic. However, the multiple activation per phase system means it is extremely rare for anyone to have limbered artillery shot at, as you can avoid it fairly easily unless you are badly surprised. Having said that, it is unfair to compare the two systems as they are doing different things with different levels of granularity. My recollection of playing in the PW game at VCOW was that limbered artillery were not particularly vulnerable - they survived being close assaulted in the flank with little or no damage - but that was for an earlier period with an umpire who wasn't Bob. There may be a rationalisation that effectively they can gallop out of trouble, but I don't know.
In conclusion I don't know what to think. The rules are simple, but not too simple, and give a quick game that can easily be played solo. I think if I was to have them as my main SCW rules I would already be attaching house rules. I see from the chat about playing the other versions of TPW that basically everyone is adding chrome or mods to get to the game they want, so perhaps I'm not an outlier after all.
* I hadn't. See comment from JF below.
Interesting. For now, I think "adjacent' encompasses the nine surrounding squares and not only the orthogonal squares. That would mean that arc of fire is into the NW,N,NE squares relative to RED. BLUE could be targeted. Figure 24 on p21 of TPW confirms this interpretation.
ReplyDeleteThat figure isn't in the SCW version. In fact there are no diagrams at all. However, that would improve things.
DeleteImprove things but not help the Nationalists since the Republicans could fire upon their attackers without having to move first!
DeleteIt makes things a little less contrived. Not arguing that it is still a tough ask for the attackers.
DeleteI'm already pondering some chrome for these. As I view the units as battalions, a whole turn to debus just seems wrong, so I'll use the same mechanism as my other rules - a whole turn to load up, but units can debus for free at any point. Really the SCW PW rules need to be read in conjunction with the others as they are only included as a short appendix to Arriba Espana.
ReplyDeleteI don't think a turn to debus is unfair, but I would allow them to shoot, counting as moving. I don't accept your last sentence. The rule book clearly says it's a full set of rules. Not only that they're also "more complex". No mention that they need to be read in conjunction with anything else.
DeleteGood report Trebian. I asked Bob about moving in villages and his response was "Villages (in fact, all built up areas) provide cover to troops. Troops can move into them without a penalty on their movement."
ReplyDeleteSo the only thing they add is -1 cover bonus. Woods also give a +1 in close assault but apparently villages don't. I think I'd be tempted to treat villages the same way as woods.
Cheers Simon
I had missed that woods give an extra modifier over and above the modifier for providing cover. Really, the location of modifiers is a bit of a jumble. They should all be together in the same place. I agree with treating the villages as woods. My issue at the moment is that if you regard a set of wargame rules as a model of the conflict they're written for, the writer is telling me something about their understanding of the period. Currently the rules as written say that moving in built up areas is easier than in woods or olive groves (which is a point you could argue) and furthermore that woods or olive groves provide better cover than buildings, so you are better off attacking a village or town than you are an olive grove. I'm less convinced by that as an argument.
DeleteI guess it might be a case of what state the village is in. Undamaged and more open urbanisations would probably be easier to move through than bombed ones with rubble all over or villages with tightly packed houses and narrow streets?
DeleteOn balance would you rather defend buildings or trees? I'd go with buildings everytime, I think.
DeleteMovement in BUAs is agonisingly slow if units are moving in and out of the buildings. If they are just marching down the roads, fine, but then they are effectively bunched up in the open. At an operational level, advance rates are typically 50% slower in BUAs than other terrain types according to Dupuy. I rather like the Neil Thomas approach of making units spend a turn to occupy a BUA.
DeleteI would too! My previous comment was about difficulty of moving. I could imagine a village reduced to rubble being more difficult to pass through than a relatively open wood. Personally, I just like to categorise terrain as cover/no cover, blocks/doesn't block LOS and good/difficult going.
DeleteMartin: I differentiate in FWTDR between units that have just moved into a BUA, who get a cover bonus and units that have taken an activation to occupy them and get double the benefit. It means that when fighting in multiple BUA zones you need to allow for consolidation in your plan, or get evicted fairly easily by a prompt counter attack. Actually, I do that in IGABC as well.
DeleteSimon: I agree that sometimes you have to differentiate between terrain areas that are ostensibly the same. I tend to put in s descriptive section in most of the rule sets about what I mean with the terrain terms I use. My feeling here is that there is certainly a need for a house rule or two with TPSCWW.
I think this is just a pretty hard scenario for the Nationalists to win; given they are attacking and do not have any significant advantage in numbers or troop quality, that seems realistic ? Determining whether domestic buildings or woods are a better defensive position opens up other cosiderations, like to what degree inability to see the occupying troops provides a defensive bonus....brick walks give more physical cover than trees, but once you know a building is occupied, it is easy to target with fire, whereas troops concealed in woods can relocate unseen....although there is also an argument that if you fire HE into a wood, it should be MORE effective, not less, due to the shrapnel effect of splintered trees etc....and my final comment re movement is it would be easier to march a column of five hundred men through narrow streets of a village than to move the same unit through a dense wood...
ReplyDeleteAll good points. The scenario with the force levels should be winnable for the Nationalists. Attacking Republican forces which are stronger with SFL & Regulares should be fairly straight forwards, and without reading the rules I would back them on the basis of the force lists every time. The inability to find a winning strategy has been a bit of a surprise, tbh.
DeleteAs for the effect on formations moving through woods/BUAs, TPSCWW doesn't differentiate between different types of troop formations, which is in line with the aims of a simple quick play set of rules.