Napoleonic Wargame Club (NWC)

I don't see how supply wagons add any value to these types of games. These games are tactical in nature and supply is more of a strategic concern. Napoleon never sent any orders out regarding supply wagons and as a tabletop wargamer, I've never seen supply wagons in any rules set.

Even regarding Low Ammo, it was never really a concern except in prolonged firefights (Hougoumont, Le Haye Sainte are well noted, but these were protracted fights for strongpoints).

I'm all for some kind of efficiency penalty for units that are in the line for sometime, but it seems supply wagons are an unecessary overhead that provides more incentive for roving bands of skirmishers and cavalry than anything else.

Discuss

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Rob Hamper
General der Kavallerie Robert Prinz Hamper von Lusatia
2. Kavallerie-Brigade
Reserve-Kavallerie-I. Armee-Korps
Königlich Preußische Armee

Supply trains and artillery columns have to be protected and that does mean that units needed at the front line need to be held back for that protection.

So, there is a tactical component to this. It also adds flavor to the game and makes you think about how and where to best use the supplies.

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Ernie Sands
1ère Brigade of 2ème Division de Grosse Cavalerie, Réserve de Cavalerie
de la Grande Armée
President, Colonial Campaigns Club

Indeed, combat units only would make a rather strange setup as the whole train of the formation would be missing.

Most table top games I played and that was for ten to fifteen years no table would be big enough for supply trains. Not even in ACW games. Now I specking of Baltimore and Washington games.

The supply train would be huge on the map as would the collection of horses and limbers for the rest of the artillery train.

The game wouldn't look strange at all. In fact the real supply train was located to the rear along the lines of communication (retreat). I've played many table top games and they weren't ever missed. Some games would use the artillery limbers, but that was for road column movement. Any supply or other odd unit (forges, ambulances) models were for show and usually designated the rear.

Also, front line units were not stripped to provide guards for the train. Units were assigned before battle to guard the train and were usually cavalry in any case.

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Rob Hamper
General der Kavallerie Robert Prinz Hamper von Lusatia
2. Kavallerie-Brigade
Reserve-Kavallerie-I. Armee-Korps
Königlich Preußische Armee

Supply wagons are a bit subjective - one of 300 occupies as much space as one of 500 "points". They do fulfil a function however - units in constant supply would simply blast away all day at one another. And in strategic-focussed games they are a significant factor in limiting rapid advances and attacks.
Yes they do need to be protected, moreso in Peninsular War, where they actually have a point value and it rewards an opponent to raid an enemy's baggage.

Good points Andy. Perhaps one day the other games could be updated assigning a point value to supply wagons. It might end their use as screens, etc. which many, if not most, players use them for.

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Feldmarschall Jeff Freiherr Mathes von Krain
50th (Stein) Infantry Regiment
Dritte Brigade
Austrian Korps

Yes. Whilst the main ethos for wagon points was to encourage guerilla raids and thus protection of them, it also discourages gamey tactics such as using them for a screen. And at least in spain the number of wagon units has been cut down so as not to bias a scenario too much in terms of supply raiding.

All the other games have been modified to accomodate points for wagons. It's just a case of assigning a value. The problem is that scenarios were playtested and balanced without that feature, so suddenly introducingf a new points-source could unbalance a scenario.

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C.N.Matthews

If it is an easy fix then JTS should have no problem updating all the games in future updates. Perhaps a consensus of club members is needed to make the point.

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Feldmarschall Jeff Freiherr Mathes von Krain
50th (Stein) Infantry Regiment
Dritte Brigade
Austrian Korps

Well I'm certainly all in favour but I don't know who would actually do the work; it's easy to do but somewhat time consuming. I think one stock 1813 scenario does have a points-value for the things.

Indeed with exception it surely wouldn't change the balance of a scenario but besides the time factor I guess JTS prefers to have the original designer do the changes although it's nearly impossible to achieve this with so many scenario in all these games.
But a club wide effort could be the solution, if we find just some volunteers for each title the work would be done in an expectable time.
And if they take a quick look on each scenario to see if the supply units are exposed and so could really shift the balance of the scenario, well these scenarios could be "flagged" and the original scenario designer could hopefully work on these one day.

@Clint
Could you post what has to be changed?

It's straightforward. You modify lines 4 and 5 of the .scn file which list the point values for inf/cav/guns for each side; the fourth value is 0 and that is the supply wagon value as it currently is in all games except PEN. In PEN the value is set to 1 (that is 1 point per 10 wagons).

Hope that helps.

or you can just modify the scenario via the editor that comes with each game.

bring up the scenario in "editor" and go into the "header" drop down under "scenario".

point values are listed and can be modified.

remember to "saveas" before closing...

just rename the scenario ....add "modified" to the title.

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C.N.Matthews