Thursday, August 26, 2010

Hm, a rules thought...

Howdy all,

Well, I am currently playing some Brigades and Bearskins (my homegrown 10mm Napoleonic rules) and have found something I am not sure about.

Basically, battalions take damage.  They can take up to four points of damage.  These points don't destroy the unit.  Instead, when units are engaged they take "Steady!" tests, which are basically morale tests.  If they fail once they are shaken; fail twice, and they rout.  Damage subtracts from that roll.

So... if a French line battalion in column (3+ to pass the steady test, modified to 2+ for being in column) is engaged in combat, it has a 1 in 6 chance of becoming shaken.  If it has taken 2 points of damage (halfway to max damage) it has a 1 in 2 chance of being shaken.

Now the question is this:

At the end of each turn, a battalion which is basically safe (far from enemy, unengaged, etc) can attempt to recover.  On a roll of a 6 (or sometimes 5+ or 4+) it regains one lost damage point.

AS IT STANDS NOW, a unit CANNOT recover "Steady" status.  Once a unit has failed a "Steady!" test it stays shaken for the rest of the battle, making it a bit fragile.

I am wondering if I should say that a unit can recover EITHER damage points OR Steady status, if it was already Shaken.

Should units be able to recover their steady status?  If a unit is shaken, should it be able to compose itself and return to fresh, ready-to-rumble condition?  Or should it still remain somewhat fragile... while recovering damage points make it less likely to Rout in future steady tests, it is still a somewhat fragile unit?

Thoughts?

4 comments:

sonsoftaurus said...

Maybe change Steady to "Fresh", which cannot normally be regained. Also since it's more morale based, use a different term than "damage" (though I can't think of a good one ATM...)?

So maybe goes:

Fresh (0)
Steady (1)
Shaken (2)
Wavering (3)

Once routed, can rally and recover to Wavering, then Shaken, Steady, but never to Fresh.

sonsoftaurus said...

Ah, thought of term. Call it "disruption" instead of "damage".

SpeedyFrenchy said...

seconded. if you can regain damage, then maybe make it more difficult to regain 'steady' morale than to regain damage: two turns to regain it instead of one perhaps?

Author said...

Hey all!

Thanks for the comments...

The Steady/Shaken/Routed bit is actually independent of the damage (although I like disruption, I think I'll use that term.) More disruption makes it more likely a unit will be shaken or routed.

I don't want to add any more levels to that set of three, however, as I use the stands to represent them:) You turn one stand backwards when a unit is Shaken, and both (and set them up running) when Routed...

I think maybe what I can do is that units can recover disruption, and then once they have recovered all disruption they can then recover from Shaken to Steady. It seems simple enough, and effective, and it makes basic sense.

Thank you for the suggestions!