Hi everyone,
Doing some cleanup in my old 3¼" disks, I found this really cool wargame from the early '90s: <i>Gary Grigsby's War in Russia</i>.
Basically in this turn based game, you had to set your moves (including attacks) by litterally giving orders to your units<b><font size="5"><font color="red">*</font id="red"></font id="size5"></b>. When this phase was ready, you could launch different sorts of airstrikes (interdiction, AA, etc.), artillery barrage and then watch your units perform like you had set them to. Some times, your brigades would advance exactly the way you had set them to but at other times (with the fog of war option), they could be stopped by ennemies that you were unable to see during the setup phase.
Did anybody ever tried this specific game (or any other game that used to work this way?) I think this way of splitting the orders to your units and how they do perform on the battlefield addresses many problems that the BG and HPS engines have.
One of those problems is the possibility for any players to coordinate attacks in some kind of "chirurgical" way. You can melee unit A and if succesfull, melee unit B and if succesfull again melee unit C to eliminate the ennemy by ZOC. If one melee fails, no problem, you can hold the attack until next turn. I am afraid this is not the way napoleonic leaders used to conduct battles.
Many threads on this board mentionned the possibility to launch some kind of blitzkrieg by rushing commandos behind the front line to take control of roads, capture leaders and supply. There are also many many other flaws that make HPS and BG games ahistoric (to say the least)![:I]
The feature that makes "issuing orders" and the "movement/melee" two different phases allows many advantages over the old systems. Some that I could think of would be the possibility of the game engine to "manipulate" your orders according to different factors (quality of units, fatigue, LOS, quality/proximity of leadership, morale etc.). Thus, in game terms, your units could simply not receive your orders and stay still; receive orders but obey it partially; receiving the wrong orders. They could fall in ambushes (wich is almost impossible to set at the moment because after sending some skirmishers, someone can always find the "interrogation marks" telling the exact locations of the ennemy before moving the rest of your troops)
It could also add the possibility of stragglers when someone would push his units too strong (example: disordered skirmishers would pop out of the advancing formed battalion).
There would be no need for fixed units or worst (as I read in a previous thread) re-fixing units after a couple of turns. Moves would always be "uncertain".
I speak for myself but, as a French player, have the tendency to launch all-out attacks in hope that I will catch my allied opponent off balance at some point and rush every units available through a gap in his defense line. I know this not napoleonic in spirit. Not being sure on how exactly each and every individual units would obey my orders I would certainly make me think twice about throwing everything in the battle.
Any feedback on this?
<b><font size="5"><font color="red">*</font id="red"></font id="size5"></b><font color="yellow"> In fact, the orders given are quite similar to those of the BG system. Using the keypad, you would "dial" the movements (8, 9, 6, 2 would mean North, North-East, East, South); as opposed to the Command Control feature that orders a unit to attack or defend a position). Once you have launched the execution of what you had set, it gets like watching a BG replay.
This kind of system also allows multiple melées. Thus, if facing a units at the North-East, you would "dial" 9, 9, 9, 9 to make (almost) sure that you don't get upset by a smaller opposing force. </font id="yellow">
[url="mailto:pyguinard@hotmail.com"]Lt Pierre-Yves Guinard[/url],
6e Division, II Corp
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