Colonial Campaigns Club (CCC)

I have already offered my observations (alas, mostly disputed or rejected) regarding:

1) OOB's with more use of units that can use Extended Order; and
2) the unrealistic game penalties for disruption, leading to a desire to leave the Disruption Option OFF (which of course, does not eliminate disruption - it just keeps it within more constrained bounds).

But I have started this thread to deal with the issue of game "speed".
As one member pointed out, the movement allocation for units is not about speed, but about the time it takes to keep a line in good order, or to return one in a disrupted state.

Technically speaking, with 5 minute turns, this is absolutely correct. Of course, that should suggest that at the end of the next turn, my DISRUPTED unit should be completely UNDISRUPTED. After all, after 2 whole turns, (one to get disrupted and the 2nd one to get UN-disrupted) a unit should be able to restore its organization after up to TEN MINUTES! And it should happen without the captain as well!

There were sergeants and line keepers and so on. Thus, to reiterate my conclusion from another thread, since DISRUPTION in this particular game system has *so many* negative consequences, and not really consistent with historical realities, it would be best to keep the disruption option OFF (and/or use OOB's where the Extended Order is widely available)!

But this thread is specifically intended for those who don't think it is good for units to race across the field. In some ways I have to agree with this - - but in another way, I have a suggestion for reducing that problem.

One of the challenges that Tiller had to resolve was how to make a historic rendering of a battle PLAYABLE. He had to accommodate the historical range of geographical scale AND time scale.

We have hexes that are 125 feet wide, and game turns that are 5 minutes long (for the most part). Having established this, it allows for FAIRLY REASONABLE game play. The maps don't have to be impossibly large. And the games don't have to be impossibly long.

However, the interaction between map scale and time scale has created a most interesting anomaly:

units can move from OUTSIDE of musket range to melee range in a single turn and without the opponent able to make any compensating adjustments.

Frankly, this is largely unavoidable for the HISTORIC scenarios. But I think it makes for a particularly UNREALISTIC competive (balanced) tournament scenario.

Naturally, we have all learned how to compensate for this problem. It's a fundamental aspect of the game, and if we didn't learn to compensate for it, the game would be a terrible place.

But let's imagine what this would translate to on the historic American battlefield. Since volley fire (by competent untis) could be expected every 30 seconds or so, enemy lines had to get about 30 seconds away from the opposing line of infantry, looking for the best time to charge forward, and melee BEFORE a devestating volley could be unleashed at close quarters (volleys infliected at the 10 or 15 yard range were vicious).

But the advancing line was under fire anywhere from 150 yards to the approximately 50 yards that would represent about 30 seconds distance from the opposing line. And as the advancing line changed directions, there was time for the other units to refuse a flank, counter-charge, or withdraw (quickly or slowly).

But what if an advancing unit could move from 100 yards to melee-ing your butt off with only enough time to fire once, and no time to make compensating moves? **THAT** would be a TERRIFICALLY FRIGHTNING thing!

And yet, we use a game engine that, in REAL TIME, makes us fight like this day in and day out.

Again, for the sake of not abusing sensibilities on this list, the game designer didn't have much choice. To RE-CONSTRUCT historical battles..... compromises have to be made. And the scale of American battles achive an ideal compromise at 5 minute turns with 125 feet hexes.

Designers of Napoleonic battles arrive at a DIFFERENT balance point. Instead of hexes that can only fit 200 men.... hexes represent HUGE chunks of real estate that can hold THOUSANDS OF MEN! This is necessary, in order to recreate the vast scale of Napoleonic conflicts!

But I would suggest that the Napoleonic scale is the best scale to put in a pdt file to represent linear combat in competitive or tournament play!... nor the scale commonly found in our game engine.

The point of this thread is that the BEST design for competitive or tournament play would change the "balance point" in hex size and turn time so that the opposing general cannot POUNCE into the melee without allowing you to withdraw, turn, or change formation. This was the reality of leading troops back then, and it would be enviable to be able to create tournament games that bring this basic feature of battlefield tactics to today's warrior generals.

But here's the downside with such an approach. Let's suppose you set the pdt file so that hex size and game turn balanced out so that a person could only move at the pace of a "30 second charge" (constantly, all during the battle if he wanted to), so that the unit would still be under musket fire even while hovering just outside of the 30-second charging distance?

This would mean having a musket range of, say, 10 or 12 hexes, with maximum number of hex movements of 3 or 4. As we know, under the usual pdt format, when a unit is right next to the hex occupied by another unit, this actually represents some 125 feet or roughly the 30-second charging distance. So by moving to the adjacent hex AND THEN opting for a melee charge, the game provides for units to, essentially, get one more hex of movement under melee circumstances! (I like that feature).

ADVANTAGES:
So, while hovering at the 30-second distance, units would take fire that would disrupt and demoralize them slowly, but are still outside the vicious killing range of musket volleys. And once one side or the other disrupted or became sufficiently demoralized, the other side could melee WITHOUT expectation of a LETHAL close range counter volley (assuming the game engine reliably diminished a disrupted unit's firing lethality - I believe this game does, right?).

DISADVANTAGES:
These modifications cannot be applied to most historical scenarios, because turns would essentially become 30 seconds long and maps would have to become HUGE. These modfications could only be conceivable for tournament games, where the constraints of history need not be applicable.

But an even greater disadvantage is that by creating a more "realistic" pre-melee and melee situation, you have created game play where units travel at half to 1/3 their current speed! Ugh. As generals looking at our computer screens, we are looking at our men (our "ants") moving around the field, and action where units are moving 3 or 4 hexes per turn would hardly seem like action. From the distance of a weather balloon, our battles would look like "slow motion" - - because that's the realistic scale of movement obtained from looking down on a battle field from that distance.

And if you throw frequent unit disruption into the mix, units would "appear" to practically CRAWL!

But if you and your opposing general (in their onlooking weather balloons) could fight a battle where the men were unusually tough and hardy, and they literally RAN all day long, the battle would take on a faster feel, and would still be subject to all the tactical considerations we expect from our valiant men in arms.

CONCLUSIONS (about time, ay?):
The above discussion, I suggest, brings us to consider a NEW balance point!: speed of play vs. a realistic handling of the 30-second charging distance.

Alternate Tournament PDT Factors & Assumptions:
1) units are hardy and can literally RUN all day long;

2) units can still be disrupted and demoralized by fire,
but not by running;

3) firing ranges (and lethality curves) are increased in order to keep units at a 30-second distance away... by creating disruption
at a greater distance - maximum range of 10 or 12 hexes, with
a vicious lethality curve applicable at 3 hexes and less;

4) undisrupted units can move 4 (or 5?) hexes per turn;


After all these changes, what we will find is that melees will be more rare, and units will withdraw or stay at a distance more often.
And units will have more time to react or respond to enemy movements... instead of simply waiting for the charge, and getting, at most, one "automatic defensive fire" in before the melee.

[ Apologies for how long this post is. But as you can see, pdt factors are all inter-related and it is very difficult to write a SHORT post that comprehensively treats all these factors. ]

Warmly and in hopes I'm not labeled a heretic,

George Brooks
Tampa, FL