That which is old becomes new

I recently was throwing a lot of crap out of the basement and came upon a notebook from 1989, believe it or not. In it were the sad scribblings of a youngster, and several game design attempts– some of which have seen the light of day in subsequent years, albeit greatly modified. One of these that didn’t was called “Rifleman and Voltigeur”.. a clumsy attempt at a man to man skirmish set set in the Napoleonic time period. As I read the outline, I thought, hey, there’s some good stuff here– some of it’s stupid and obviously designed to be overly clever, but I like some of the ideas a lot. I’m tossing out the combat mechanics and will come back to it– it was too tedious. But here are some things that I will try to add back in.

Italieri Box of 54mm plastic Riflemen figures

1. Time being simulated is roughly 15 seconds a “segment”– so many segments make a “turn”. The number of segments per turn is standard with exceptions listed in number 3, below.

2. All actions on both sides occur simultaneously.

3. Some individuals are faster than others, depending on training, morale,
physical strength and dexterity. These individuals have “ur-segments” that can be added on to what can be accomplished in a turn.

4. Actions take place in a segment. Some of these are generic (as in “move 15 feet, running” “move 10 feet, walking” “bind wound” etc. Some of these are based upon the national drill of the soldier (e.g., the rifleman’s loading and firing drill was different, and slower, than the voltigeur’s musket based firing drill). Some actions build on others– it takes several actions to fire a musket, for instance– which can be modified by situation (moving, prone, etc). So the faster or better trained individual should have his weapon ready first.

5. Combat will be primarily black powder weapons, and I mean to condense the rifle drill somewhat for both sides (e.g., it’s not that much fun to game ALL steps). When actions are taken to load a weapon, status of the weapon will be tracked on a card off the table so if a person is interrupted (say, during melee), he will know where his weapon is in the sequence. I also will write in “emergency tap loading” for both sides, as it was done in stressful situations.

6. Combat damage will be specific– as in hitting an area of the body with all that entails. Graze, light wound, heavy wound, bleeder, etc. I think the scale of the game requires it.

7. I mean to make decisions happen fast, so will be moderating the game with a stop watch. Players will receive a serious of order cubes which declare their intentions– some are neutral, some are national army specific (mostly those that deal with weapon drill). They will have 15 seconds to place their cubes. Then we execute, with all action assumed simultaneous. Players will have limited information about the opposition. They can SEE that another soldier is reloading, they can SEE that a weapon is pointed at them. They should have very limited information about the other side other than that.

HaT Voltigeurs, plastic, 54mm

8. I am wrestling with a little chrome section, like adding officers that can
check morale levels and form men into lines for added hitting power (using line fire rules). Also heroes that make wonderful melee fighters and random events like a cavalry charged moving through your area or an artillery bombardment landing nearby. Still very much in work.

Anyway, that’s what I had in mind. I am painting up 54mm British Rifleman
figures (Italieri plastics) and 54mm French Voltigeur figures (HaT plastics)
with an idea of running a playtest one of these nights. I’d be interested in
any comment or suggestions.