Putting together generic multi-period scenarios

[Norm S]

I am having a go at making up three or four basic scenario’s, you know the sort ‘capture the bridge’, capure the village’ etc, but making them short and fast for a typical mid-week play and also making them usable over different periods. Anyway, here is a link for the first one one the blog. LINK

http://battlefieldswarriors.blogspot.com/2022/11/generic-multi-period-scenario-creation.html

[willz]

Cheers Norm, great idea and fantastic inspiration.

[Not Connard Sage]

Nice. Lovely figures too.

That rekindled memories of the Table Top Teasers series from Battle/MilMod and the book, Scenarios For Wargames, both by Charles S Grant that we played at the club back in the early 80s.

My only criticism of generic scenarios is that many of them don’t work very well for post-19th century armies. When you introduce armour, indirect fire artillery and aircraft it becomes bit more complicated.

Obvious contrarian and passive aggressive old prat, who is taken far too seriously by some and not seriously enough by others.

[Guy Farrish]

Hi Norm, great idea. Like NCS I used to enjoy those Tabletop Teasers by CS Grant and similar scenarios in various magazines. This is a useful reminder that not everything needs to be geared to a particular rule set as well as not a particular period. The hobby is wargaming and a tactical or strategic problem should be capable of playing through using any decent set of rules.

Two caveats:

One – I’d echo NCS’s thoughts re post C19th armies in some scenarios.

Two – I don’t think a battle for a single bridge over an impassable river is a good starting point for newcomers to the idea.

Love the basic idea of designing a bank of tactical teasers, but perhaps better to introduce the form using a situation where the players have more choices in how they go about fulfilling their victory conditions? Seizing a vital crossroads, a ridgeline to establish as a defensive position, a bridge for vehicle/artillery transport but with other crossing options for infantry or cavalry, protecting the line of march for a supply column etc. Something where the players can believe their deployment and orders will make a difference to the fighting. It will probably still come down to a firefight or frontal assault but give them at least the illusion there are options of how and when that happens rather than having to march up to a stop line and blast each other across it.

[Norm S]

Thanks all,

Guy, the forces include cavalry so perhaps for this scenario, putting a discoverable ford in, using an abstracted form of the cavalry unit, could bring in another distraction. The flank march combined with variable forces was supposed to do some of that, but more options to explore is always good.

I ran a similar scenario last year and the need to control both ends of the bridge for a win brought about a nail-biter of a last turn – though of course there is no certainty of a repeat performance.

I plan to run the scenario at 1:1 with ACW, 3:1 with Epic napoleonics, so that each unit is a three battalion brigade and a tactical WWII at 1:3 with each unit being a platoon, so the action would be a couple of campanies up front.

I mean what could go wrong 🙂

 

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