Speeding The Game

IN my biblical dry-run battle we, ie I and my regular wargaming opponent, felt the melees dragged on too long.

And generally speaking I think it would be good to resolve all combat quicker.

Under Neil Thomas's rules in Ancient & Medieval Wargaming a unit loses a base after suffering four hits, which means 16 hits are needed to destroy a unit (all units start with four bases).

My plan is to speed this by removing a base after a single hit.

This will also do away with unsightly markers used to record how many hits a unit has suffered.

However I will water this change down by ruling that a die score of 5+ is required, rather than Thomas's 4+.

And I will further mitigate the effects by adapting an idea from Bob Cordery's Developing The Portable Wargame.

When a unit has suffered a hit (assuming it remains a hit after a saving roll), throw a die to determine the effect of the hit.

Unit Quality....Lose a base....Fall back 3cm*

Elite                      1-2                   3-6

Average               1-3                   4-6

Poor                     1-4                   5-6

*A unit that cannot fall back 3cm, eg if it has impassable terrain behind it, is surrounded by enemy troops, or has friendly troops not in open-order directly behind it and preventing even retreat diagonally, loses a base. 

When an enemy unit falls back in a melee, the victor, if it has not lost a base in the same turn, may choose to follow up by advancing 3cm and immediately instigating another round of hand-to-hand fighting.

These are quite radical changes to the rules. Only testing in a battle will determine whether they are for good or bad.