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An Army Level Game for One (or more Players) by Martin Rapier
1. Introduction
Many, many years ago, in an issue of Airfix magazine (or possibly the Airfix annual) I saw a photo of a World War
One game where the author had assembled a number of Airfix Mark 1 tanks that were busily advancing on a
reproduction of the German trench system around Hamel modelled out of Plasticene of all things. The tanks were
supported by British infantry in caps and the Germans all had pointy helmets, (all that was available then) but it was
an image which has stayed in mind ever since, and I thought that, one day, I too would put on a game with masses of
rhomboid tanks poised to crash through the mud and the blood to the green fields beyond. That day finally came last
year when I realised just how many W.W.1 tanks the redoubtable members of Sheffield Wargames Club had
between them. Time for a game ...
2. Design Concepts
After reading around the subject, I decided there were a number of elements of the battle I wanted to capture:
The sheer mass of armoured vehicles employed (almost 500 in all);
The key tactical role the tanks played in the destruction of German wire obstacles in lieu of a long preliminary
bombardment;
The limited endurance of W.W.1 heavy battle tanks and the limits that posed on their operational significance.
Having decided to put a modicum of complexity into modelling the armoured side of things, then clearly the infantry,
artillery etc. were going to have to be heavily abstracted to make a playable game, but these elements needed to be
present and have the capability to play a significant role as W.W.1 armoured operations were most definitely a
combined arms event. One element I made very abstracted was the creeping barrage, in the end allowing British
field guns to fire fairly freely (although only able to hit the first two rows) as it wasn’t worth the extra complexity of
specifying barrage or rates of advance etc.
The basic game elements were drawn from my various grid based games (most of which were in turn inspired by
Peter Pigs ‘Square Bashing’ and Ian Drury’s ‘Storm of Steel’ and ‘Sands of New Stanhall’. I kicked around some
designs for a two or three day battle which would include some of the German counter attacks but in the end decided
to concentrate purely on the first day. This in turn meant that all players would play the British, as running the
Germans on the wrong end of the initial attack would be a dismal job at best! The game then fell into place fairly
rapidly, the mechanisms used in Operation Uranus being obvious candidates, the main things to note being:
1. Dice rolls are required to enter particular terrain types, this made wire especially a formidable obstacle to
infantry and cavalry.
2. Rolling dice for movement meant vehicle reliability could be simply modelled by making low scores a bad
result for tanks (losing vehicles to breakdowns etc).
3. Whilst infantry, guns and cavalry were modelled as one base = one battalion (or cavalry brigade) and they
fought as a single element, the tanks were represented as strength points assigned to each vehicle model so
the attritional effects of movement and combat could be modelled without requiring truly immense numbers of
toys. The available tank SPs were just distributed over the available tank models and recorded with little dice.
The game was designed with twelve tanks in mind, but in the event we managed to assemble no less than
eighteen!
4. Artillery barrages attack everything in the square, this makes the defending artillery pre-registered on no mans
land extremely powerful indeed if the attackers try and march through with massed infantry. This in turn means
that reaching the enemy gun line is a high priority for the tanks and that infantry attacks against uncut wire are
essentially doomed to fail (as there is very little chance of crossing the wire and the defensive artillery will
destroy units stuck in no mans land fairly quickly).
5. Similar command and control limits as in Operation Uranus apply i.e. units can generally only move straight
forward once committed to combat.
3. Playsheet
A very simple set of rules, British move and then Germans move. Squares are attacked by ‘assaulting’ them i.e.
trying to move into them. Those units which make a successful move roll are shot at by the defenders, the survivors
then engage in three rounds of close combat. Stationary units are hit by fire on a 6 but moving targets on a 5 or
more, which makes assaults extremely bloody. Only some units have a ranged fire capability, the rest fight by
assaulting. Move distances and ranges are in terms of squares, orthogonal only.
Turn Sequence
British move, declare assaults.
German move, declare assaults.
Artillery fire.
Ranged fire.
Assaults.
Rally (4+).
Units
Unit Move Assault* Fire Range
Infantry 1 1D6 - -
Machine Guns 1 1D6/2D6 1D6 1
Mortars 1 1D6 1D6 1
Tanks 1 1D6 - -
Cavalry 2 1D6 - -
Guns 1 1D6/2D6** 1D6 3 (direct fire)
Pillbox*** - -/3D6 1D6 -
* Dice per SP or base, Number after / is defensive fire only.
** 3D6 if Anti-tank gun vs. tanks.
*** Pillboxes can only be destroyed by hits from artillery or by assault, all other ‘kills’ just disorganise them.
Move rolls (to enter/cross terrain). Use worst type in square.
Terrain Inf/Cav Wpns/Guns Tanks*
Open 1 3 2
Woods/Town 3 4 4
Bridge 2 4 3
Canal 4 5 6
Wire 5 6 2 (destroy wire on 3+)
Anti-tank Trench - - 3 (lose SP on 1-2)
* lose 1 SP on a '1'.
Stacking maximum 6 units per square.
Ranged, Artillery and Defensive fire
1D6 per unit/SP.
To hit target: Stationary 6, Moving 5, Moving Cavalry 4.
Score = killed/1SP loss for tanks.
Heavy Artillery and barrage fire hits all units in a square.
Field artillery barrage disorganises if roll one less e.g. 5 disorganised hits on 6 vs. stationary. This is supposed
to represent suppression from the creeping barrage.
Distribute hits randomly. Disorganised units may not move, conduct ranged fire and in assault shoot once and
defend with 1 dice with no fortification benefits. Tanks are never disorganised.
Units may rally on 4+.
Assault
Units which make a successful move roll enter the square.
Defender fires twice using assault rating (unless disorganised).
Then fight three rounds using assault rating, 6 to kill.
Defender gets one extra dice for wire and one for trenches/cover (not pillboxes).
Attacker pushes out defender by rolling 6+, adding surplus troop bases, tanks and defenders in fortifications
count double.
Guns and pillboxes are captured if the defender is pushed out, assaulting infantry are disorganised if they win.
4. Game Notes
6 x 4 squares battle area, along with a further row of squares for no mans land and another row further back
for reserves etc. No mans land is at the top of the battlefield (not shown) with a further line of squares behind
that. The Germans have continuous lines of trenches across the first, second and fourth rows, the first two
lines being covered by wire as well. The gun line is the third row. Each square represents approximately
2,000m, Cambrai itself is off the table at the bottom of the map.