I know a lot of you are wondering how can I be so quite then slam out a bunch of blog entries! Well, it has been raining a lot at work and when it is raining, I can't do much of anything. So, I will type a couple of paragraphs when I can and when I get enough done and have free time to get on my computer, I post them.
Well,
I am looking forward to this new game system to be put out by Too Fat Lardies: Chain
of Command. Chain of Command
will have a major change from the other TFL games with the loss of using cards
for the sequencing of events in a turn.
There is a six part video on YouTube (see the links for them below - I could not get them to imbed on my blog) where
Richard Clarke of TFL gives us a very good review of the game mechanics. Mr. Clarke also has a nice breakdown demo of
a game on the official TFL blog that can be seen by clicking on this link or go
a find it on my list of blogs that I follow on the right hand side of this
screen. If you look around also on the TFL blog, you
will see some more entries on Chain of Command. There are several other bloggers on my list
to the right that have been involved in play testing the rules, but as there
are quite a few, I will refrain from listing all of their blogs here.
The
ground scale is 1:120, according to one of the videos and from the TFL’s blog,
which means it is between 12mm and 15mm (1:144 and 1:100 respectively). So using either scale will get you every
close to having everything in scale. But
I know some will prefer to use 20mm or 28mm (1:72 & 1:50 respectfully)
instead. I guess if you want to be a
scale purist/Nazi, just double the range & movement would work as that
would make the ground scale 1:60.
Personally, I don’t think it will matter too much to what scale that you
use between the four of them.
Speaking
of ground scale, this will work nicely for the theoretical frontage for a WWII
platoon for a gaming table. Since most gaming tables tend to be 6’x4’;
that means the table will represent about 220m x 150m area. In theory, during WWII, the average area that
a platoon was expected to cover in defense in Europe was 200-300m and in rare
cases up to 500m. A platoon attack
frontage was normally around 100m with some exceptions (British did reduce it
down to 50m in some cases in the desert and the Germans increased it up to 200m
according to the US War Dept’s documents). Also according to the US War Dept’s documents,
the typical German frontage for tank platoons was to have an interval of
90-110m between tanks. So as you can see, the 6’ edge fits within the theoretical
frontage of an infantry platoon on defense (200m) and up to two platoons on a
deliberate attack (2x100m). Both sides
can also field a couple of tanks on the board (2x100m) means you can keep to
small number of vehicles needed for most games.
Even if you go with my 4’ table (about 150m), you can scale down the
defenders’ platoon to a depleted platoon of two full size squads/sections or
three squads at 66% strength vs. platoon attacking, plus one tank each if
staying to the ratios for theoretical frontages. Solid!
Now,
Chain of Command is for WWII, but at its core it should work for the
early Cold War, Post-Colonial Africa, the First & Second Indochina Wars,
and even the Falklands. It might even
work for some current conflicts between Second and Third World armies, but not
First World. I am more looking at it for
the Falklands and my ‘Anarchy in the UK’ projects for platoon level actions and
a couple of vehicles. Once I get the
rules and have time to digest the fire combat rules, I probably can alter it to
cover the various weapons up to the 1980’s for my periods. Only making vehicles stats might be a
problem. But since I am more looking at
light tanks or APC’s vs. main battle tanks, I think I can knock them out
without too much of a hassle.
So I
am eagerly waiting for this game’s release and looking forward to using it to
storm the Top Malo house with the Royal Marines or to have the Paras trying to
wrinkle out the Liverpool Collective’s rebels on the outskirts of the city.
Be
seeing you
Sapper
2 comments:
Having re-discovered the Winter of '79 blog, I'd be happy to help with attempts to take CoC into the eighties, since I want to get into it myself.
Hello, that is great news! I am a bit under the weather this whole week and hope to be up to do some reading and blogging this weekend. Be on the look out for an entry soon.
Sapper
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