I want to tell everyone about the game I created, Command Combat: Civil War.  Since this, and the next few years are the 150^th anniversary of the war, I wanted to commemorate it with the war game I’ve always wanted to do.  It’s based primarily on three principles:

General Tyler leads his men to battle, crossing Bull Run Creek.

Principle #1:  Personalities of the generals.  What got me interested in the American Civil War, and history in general, for that matter, was the personalities of the people involved, and how that affected their choices and leadership.  I also find it interesting to watch war gamers and see how their own personalities are revealed in their game play.  I wanted to find a way to meld those together; to give players their own choices on how they played the game, but at the same time to encourage them to make choices similar to what the real generals would do, or at least reward them for doing it.  What I came up with was a system where not only do the generals get statistics based on their skills and limitations, but also special rules that reflect their style of battle and talents.  So, for instance, “Stonewall” Jackson has a special ability where all units under his command get better morale.  This special skill changes, however, throughout the expansions, so in the 1862 expansion, his special ability will be “foot cavalry,” giving all units under his command extra speed.

Principle #2:  Limited command control.  I’ve always found it odd that in war gaming, players can control any of their units anywhere on the board in any way they like.  Though this makes sense when they have radios, it doesn’t make a lot of sense when generals are relying on messengers.  Though many other rules have been developed for realism, this has always seemed to elude rules systems.  So I created a system by which a corps general sends one of three colors to their division generals, red, white, or blue.  Red is for attack, white is for maneuver, and blue is for defense.  Each color has its own benefits and drawbacks.  These orders travel at 15” per turn from the corps general, and when they reach the division generals, their entire divisions are subject to the drawbacks and advantages of the color coded orders.  For instance, defense allows units to hold their ground a little better, but limits how close they can come to the enemy.

Principle #3:  Simplicity and speed.  Let’s face it, none of us have a lot of time anymore.  There are so many games out there that we all say we’re going to play “some day” but we never do because we don’t have time.  And even when we do finally get around to it, no one wants to put down their video games to come join us.  So probably the most important aspect to a game is simplicity and speed.  Some war gamers resist these qualities because historical accuracy and realism are often lost because of them.  However, there are ways to streamline rules so they don’t take too long to play without losing realism and accuracy, or at least to give a flavor of those qualities.  Command Combat allows players to play entire battles in just an average of four hours.  Quick battles can be as fast as two hours, and full day battles played out to the last man take about six hours.  The scale also allows players to pit corps against corps on an average sized 4’ by 6’ table.

The game premiered on the 150^th anniversary of the Battle of Bull Run, and has played at Strategicon, Smackdown, Fort MacArthur Days, and the Model Kit Expo.  We will be having regular games at Game Empire in Pasadena every second Saturday beginning November  12^th.  We will begin with historical scenarios, such as Wilson’s Creek and both Bull Runs, but will soon move to tournaments where players will build their own armies from the core rulebook and the expansion pack.

Everyone can download a sample PDF copy of the game by going to:

www.commandcombat.com

On the left side are two free scenarios to download.  I’d be really interested to see players try it out and place up battle reports.  If you have any questions about how the game plays, you can contact me at:

jeff@commandcombat.com

Command Combat: Civil War - 1861 (The Core Rulebook)

Bill witthans and Doug Kendrick develop their clever plans!

I have always had a love for things Japanese, the “structure” of life there with its “codes” and rules of conduct fascinated me. This has carried naturally over into Wargaming. Years ago I bought a “Twin Dragons” boxed 15mm Samurai army after playing in a Killer Katanas battle at one of the Southern California conventions. I never sat down and “did” the army at one time but added units over the years as the painting Samurai bug hit me. I also never really played with them as opponents where hard to find. Samurai battles was a real “niche” game and then the 3 or so basing schemes for the different rules sets made it even tougher. I would still get a KK2 game in every couple of years and then paint for awhile afterwards. I became involved several years ago with the Bengal Club and met Doug Kendrick who also had a love for the Japanese warring States period. We soon got together for several battles using KK2 rules but were not that happy with them. Any rule set you try to play without having the help of players already well versed in the game or having a support page to ask questions or get rules clarifications is more than likely going to be tough. Most KK2 games left many questions unanswered.

Doug then played in a Demo game of BAW (Battles in the Age of War) at Brookhurst Hobbies and was quite enthused about the rules. I had 2 Killer Katanas 15mm armies based already and was hardly looking forward to rebasing for a new rule set. We decided to play a game using “counters” of the appropriate size to represent our forces and try it out. BAW does not use figure count, rather each stand represents a number of “real” soldiers and whole stands are removed for losses. This is also nice since you can build your armies “bases” and add the painted figures later while playing and learning the rules immediately. There is a big “before game” section with a chance to do the things so common in “feudal state” period Japanese battles, like Treachery, Battle preparation, weather, family ties, ninja, and more. You get 60 “Koku” dice and “spend” these dice trying to influence the outcome in these different categories. You and you opponent then go down the category list and using the number of dice each has allotted for that category roll against each other, 4,5,6 indicating success, the player with the most successful rolls wins that category and depending on how much he won by consults a chart for the result. These results are very entertaining and help to simulate the maneuvering and fate that effects real battles but is mostly missing in “wargames”. For instance Doug beat me at “treachery” by 3 dice resulting in;

“We must not trust Lord Ishonawa! His troops are not yet mustered”. Doug then gets to pick one of my flanks and force me to roll to see if some of my clan generals troops have not come to the battle as a result of the enemy making a deal with one of my vassals to be “late” to the battle!

I beat Doug in the “Weather” category, for a result of;

“The weather has been good to us my lord. The roads are good. Lady Shinoba has sent many bales of rice!” That resulted in good supplies for one of my clans and the good roads made the journey to the battlefield easy, so each of my units on that flank got +2 activation points on turn 1.

The game has a lot of these types of events that go beyond the scope of most wargames that end up being a straight up “dice roll offs” and make for a very interesting and unpredictable game that lends itself well to repeat playing. The rules for fighting themselves are fairly well organized and complete with no questions left unanswered if you are willing to look! The end of the game also has a point system that when added up gives you a margin of victory result, something else sadly missing in many games.

So the end result is that I spent 10 hours completely rebaseing TWO 15mm armies, about 150 bases! I think it will be well worth it,

Battle report:

News that the fool Dougashika and Mattosan’s armies had invaded my province had reached the castle only days before, I quickly sent messenger out to “Mikkeo” my trusted vassal to rush to the pass of “harmony” to defeat the enemy. Treachery however was used by the enemy and many of our “trusted” men were “late” to the battle! We had hoped to attack the enemy at dawn but were delayed having to wait for most of our troops. We were forced into a defensive roll and picked the “Hoen, Million Doors” formation that gives an army a balanced structure, sort of a wait and see style.

“Dougashika” and “Mattosan” lost no time in moving into meet our troops in the center since both flanks were weak or “missing” and hoped to defeat us by using all their forces to crush my center. We held back awaiting those missing troops. The enemies dice gave them only average movement and that coupled with a “mistake” in setting up the deployment (an extra foot of battlefield was included! This made Doug and Matt take longer to get to us) prevented them from being able to fully close with us before the end of the game (each turn the defender rolls a D6, when the total adds up to 20 its game over!). This coupled with good rolls to bring our missing troops on and a disastrous charge by “Dougashika’s” samurai cavalry against my foot Samurai led to a draw do to a blinding early snowstorm ending the battle. We will meet again!

Do you have a 15mm samurai army gathering dust on your shelf! Give us a shout! Let’s play!

Yours in Gaming!

Bill Witthans
President HMGS/PSW

PS: I know some of you are playing games over this Thanksgiving holiday, lets see those Battle reports here!

Mike's late arriving Samurai and Ashigaru cross a stream threatening Matti's flank attack!

Matt adds his troops to the center attack

Doug's Samurai cavalry close with my samurai!