Colonial Campaigns Club (CCC)

When I was first contemplating how to organize an OOB and a PDT file in order to make a historical scenario, I spent a lot of time studying the accuracies and hit ratios of various weapons.

What I realized over time is that unless the battles were going to be "real time" (which in a turn-based move is actually SLOW MOTION TIME), the calibrated firepower (ability to incapacitate the enemy) was going to be a relative calculation.

In other words, the real-world accuracy of a weapon was less important than how it compared to other weapons.

For example, one might conclude that whatever power you assign to muskets, rifles would have double the musket's effective range (disregarding the rifle's ability to get a few accurate hits at longer range).

The question becomes how to calibrate the power of a musket.

In a five minute turn, where you are only allowed to volley once, this becomes a very "approximate" calculation!

Line vs. line, you have to ask how many REAL volleys are likely to be fired in 5 minutes..... allowing for an "average movement time" .... EVEN IF THE UNIT NEVER MOVES!

At 50 to 60 yards, historical data might tell us that 500 men vs. 500 men might incur 2% to 3% (a little high, but acceptably high) casualties - - (1% = 5 men, 3% equals 15 men). And so with a company of 50 men vs. a company of 50 men, a single volley might incur anywhere from half-a-man to 1.5 men per volley). And if your "firing mode" represents (on average) two volleys in a turn, that would be 1 to 3 men killed for each 50 man company.

The point of this discussion is to see how pdt files (which includes firepower factors) can be built and calibrated around historical casualty rates applied to 5 minute turn calculations.

When I design a scenario that involves different time scales or hex scales, I start with adjusting firepower factors to achieve desired casualty rates at 50 yards, and then continue on from there.

Regards,

George