Tinkering with 'Volley & Bayonet'

Some pics from a re-fight of ACW’s  Champions Hill again with Volley and Bayonet. The idea in this case was to get players enthused for a future BIG game. 

High ground results in a mod for the MORALE roll - interestingly positioned in the turn sequence - and a natural 6  is not always a fail - therefore you can get your troops into the situation where morale is sold and unbreakable, but this is rare.

The turn sequence is everything here as ever: command, move, rally, morale, combat, exhaustion…

Reb defensive positions on Champions Hill

 One key of course is the morale phase, where there is always a chance of a unit becoming disordered – with mods for flanking, support etc. …but if passed then combat can be a 50/50 or better; if failed however, one disorder can become a rout very quickly in a melee situation. The game also quite succinctly brings home the value of sustained musketry on one half of the battlefield, with close range melee on the other. Just like 'Piquet, Field of Battle', it plays as battles read.

Union attack

  Key design elements include:

·         Scale and Movement: The default ground scale is 1” = 100 yards with a time scale of one hour per turn, enabling units to march at realistic sustained rates (2.5–3 mph) while accounting for battlefield friction.

·         Unit Structure: Armies are organized into brigades (1,500–3,000 men) to keep command and control systems austere, focusing on player decision-making rather than complex mechanical modifiers. 

·         Simplified Formations: The rules omit traditional infantry formations like line, column, and square; instead, these are modeled through mechanics like morale, stationary status, and unit training levels. A 'faf' to make things simple, or actually genius design?

·         Sequential Action: The game uses an alternating activation sequence to capture the cyclic nature of command and counter-command, avoiding complex simultaneous resolution systems - although defensive fire can be activated if the attacker fires at same unit - a genius little mechanism, that makes tactical play very interesting.

·         Merit-Based Performance: The system rejects "national modifiers," arguing that unit performance is determined by training, leadership, and combat experience rather than inherent national temperament (and leadership mods are not there - relying instead on the temperament of individual players).

·         Scenario Flexibility: The rules support both historical re-fights and fictional battles through an innovative scenario system, with specific period hacks available (of note is J.D. Glasco's fantastic AWI stuff).

 

…and to quote Frank Chadwick and Greg Novak themselves (these design notes are considerably expanded in both editions of the rules):

‘One of the first things new players notice – after the large movement rates – is the lack of the familiar column line and square infantry formations. In the original edition of these rules I said that you don’t need them because that is not the job of corps and army commanders; the decisions on formations are handled at lower levels, and the game assumes that troops are in formations appropriate to the tactical situation in which they find themselves – or perhaps not, in the case of less capable troops, which in part accounts for their lower morale ratings. ‘

20mm artillery with some old 'Minifigs' gunners - supplied by 'Steve the Wargamer' many years ago

 

 This game is for big battles – yes, there have been concessions made to ‘playing with toy soldiers’ – no commander ratings, no formations at the micro level, BUT much is made of the big corps movements, division exhaustion, and putting yourself in Lee or Napoleon’s seat…and even enabling a scale-less approach to big basing, and big battles - that’s what I want for my toy solders.

Union troops close on the Confederate positions on Champions Hill

 

More interesting is the fact that multiple scales are available for differing levels of battle – yes, of course the game is designed for big battles, and sensible games with toy soldiers – that notwithstanding, tweaks and hacks are always there to use same system across multiple sizes of battle – does it work at reduced? Well, we shall see, as I have several AWI re-fights in mind…as example consider (taken from recent ‘Storm in the Valley’ supplement::

Regiment Scale

• ·         100 yards per inch
•  1hour per turn
•  500 men per strength point
•   6 guns per strength point

Battalion Scale

• ·         50 yards per inch
•  30 mins per turn
•  200 men per strength point
•  4 guns per strength point

Wing Scale

• ·         25 yards per inch
•  15 minutes  per turn
• 80 men per strength point
• 2 guns per strength point

2nd edition - some changes to light infantry / skirmishers, and clarification that 'combat is sequential, not simultaneous' - this is actually quite pivotol, especially so with low strength units

 

The seminal and groundbreaking 1st ed. I always loved the fact that AWI units on the cover have a very economic three figures per base...outstanding!