"Lasalle review - long" Topic

This was a great review. He has his biases, as we ALL do, and this is reflected in what he likes and doesn't like. If you don't agree with his interpretation, you've still learned something about the game, because you will apply your own biases to what you like and don't like.

His review is comprehensive and for those of us who don't want to put out a lot of bucks for a set of rules, this certainly helps.

At the same time, the review stimulated some great discussion, where we saw the biases of other people. All in all, after reading the review and the thread, I think I have a pretty good understand of the rules…..

[today's high production value, glossy paper, full-colour rulesets are becoming just to expensive to buy 'on spec'!]

And yet if you *don't* produce at that level, most potential customers won't consider you anymore. There's a reason that the writers/publishers are going to all that extra time and expense.

Out of curiosity, though, I can't help but wonder if game prices have really "inflated" that much over the years.

What did Bowden's "Empire III" cost, back in the day? Wasn't it about $25, back in the mid-1980s? I remember "Tactica" and "Fire and Fury" were at least $20, twenty years ago. I know I paid $25 USD for "Napoleon's Battles", twenty years ago. I'm sure I paid at least $30 USD for second-edition Warhammer, and about $20 USD each for each of the second-edition AD&D books.

Is an increase from @ 25 to @ 40 over the course of a quarter-century really such an inflation? Especially now that you get full color and a hardback binder?

I'm pretty sure that I'm spending a smaller percentage of my disposable income on the hobby now, than I did back then.

Fair point!

Back in the day, I paid more for all the three versions of Empire and Napoleons Battles I brought than I've just done for Black Powder!

I would suggest this is all about how gamers are perceiving value in what they buy.

I suggest there is also a generational effect – caused by the standards of production of [say] GW products from the early nineties onwards.

Wargaming is a cheap hobby compared to most, you can spend as much as you like – or as little – and still have a fulfilling time.

I'd agree with the sentiment that this is a review of a the book, not the game.

My copy of Lasalle arrived on Wednesday…

Wargaming is a cheap hobby compared to most

(Chocks on morning coffee)
Only if you don't count the cost of unpainted lead. :oP

I'd rather pay the extra for nice pictures and illustrations. If the ascetic wasn't important we'd all play with pencil and paper.
regards
Max

Max,

Think how much you can spend for other hobbies to get yourself started. You can wargame cheaply and still have a good time. If money was tighter you wouldn't have so much unused lead.

I now have the rules and they look very nice indeed. However…

My first impressions on reading through the rulebook are that they have brought absolutely nothing new to the stable of Napoleonics rules already available. They are just a re-packaged version of existing mechanisms and rules?

I loved Grande Armee (and FPGA) since it introduced interesting new concepts and focused on important things, whilst streamlining others. So I had high expectations for these rules, which I don't think will be met. A lot of the great stuff introduced under GA has in fact been dropped. And instead the new rules have gone back to more "old school" you go-I go rules with loads of modifiers. Unfortunately, innovation seems to have taken a back seat to presentation IMO.

I'll give them a try anyway…just to confirm my suspicions if nothing else. Otherwise, keep your eyes open on eBay for a new rulebook, read once only ;)

cheers

bish

They are just a re-packaged version of existing mechanisms and rules?

How so? Try them, you might find that your initial impressions are off.

Midpoint.
I agree with you. The mounting costs are through me buying figures faster than I can paint them, not the hobby itself.
Max

Lasalle looks a great set but can't comment on the game until played … cost wise wargaming is cheap even with the cost of the lead … a new surfboard just set me back 700 quid (get a new one most years or two at most) new wetsuit for winter 300 odd, assessories throughout year probably 100 and then the friggin cost of travelling to the beach (unless you live on the beach which is unlikely in England) even being a 'local' involves travel and in summer parking fees – so that one is open ended – total cost for year at least one and a half thousand. Another hobby climbing … don't even go there with cost …. wargaming which I do about 2-3 times a week probably 4-700 hundred a year plus maybe a 150 on related books … see it is cheap BUT I will still willingly spend 30 quid on a set of nice looking rules if I have any chance of playing them. My resurgence into the Nap game has seen me get Lasalle (my copy still not arrived courtesy of royal mail!) Black Powder (a game a night at moment), LFS III and RtE … only really likely to play BP but the others may add something (the game generator from Lasalle looks good from what I have seen) … support the people trying to make it a better hobby is what I say :)

as our club president says, 'my wife is just thankful I don't have drinking and football as a hobby' to which I would add golf.

those will keep the kids out of a college fund …

I was going to point out golf. If you want a fair comparison of hobby costs..try golf…..and anything R/C related.

HI

As far as pricing goes … well, IMO £30.00 GBP is a lot of money and there seems to be an increasing amount of people that are inclined to release such glossy expensive fare of what mightotherwise be a £5.00 GBP downloadable PDF or cheaply printed card fronted booklet @ £7.50.
Let's not forget that many people work a half day for such an amount (in the west, that is).
The problem is not exclusive to Lasalle – it has been developing for a few decades now.
Empire was a serious package that is incomparable to anything mentioned here although it was likewise expensive.
The point really is this: who would spend £30.00 GBP on a set of rules in the hope that they like them?!#
A £5.00 GBP downloadable PDF as a tryout would make a lot of sense to me.

As far as the 'review' goes, I have looked at (and NOT played) many sets of rules in the past, I think as time goes by and you get a firm idea of what you like, you can get a pretty good handle of how a rule set may play – perhaps not the kind of end result you may get (as in: will the column beat the line), but rather the amount of ENJOYMENT you may gleam fron a game.

I hate finishing battles with a HEADACHE, because the rules were the MAIN focus: not the game.

Many of the glossy rule sets that have appeared over the last 25 years are just a constant regurgitation of what preceeded them … what a shame!

Many of the glossy rule sets that have appeared over the last 25 years are just a constant regurgitation of what preceeded them … what a shame!

Not Lasalle or Black Powder, though.

Hi David
Nice review.
I have a copy of "Lasalle" and I'm keen to have a play with them.
Thanks for providing your insights to what I think will prove to be an excellent set of rules for the period.
Having said that, I'm also keen to play REPUBLIC to EMPIRE and will be purchasing a PDF of LFSIII, (I already have LFSII).
Cheers
trailape.blogspot.com

How does Lasalle compare to GdB?

#1) I have no problem with a "first look" review where the author has not played the rules. I have no where near the time to play all the rules! So long as the reviewer makes clear he has not played them, I still appreciate the input.

#2) I did have some trouble telling whether the reviewer liked or was endorsing the rules.

#3) Overall an extremely detailed and well presented review. Im sold and am going to try out the rules for the action at Plancenoit. They sound perfect for my (beginners) needs. I look forward to getting the rules in my hands.

Thanks for the info!

PS. I wish there were many more "long" reviews at TMP ;-)

Any thoughts about the possibility of using these for AWI, or is that too far back to reach?

Give it a try and see if it works for you. They're very clean set of rules, and the author explains he'd like to extend the basic rules to cover other historical periods as well as scale of game. For the larger American Revolution battles they should play quickly; and let a basic unit represent 100 men instead of a Napoleonic battalion. For smaller actions my preference would be for some more detail in the role of light infantry and irregulars vs. formed infantry.

I had my first game of Lasalle this week. That's not really enough to tell you how good they are, but in the kingdom of the blind the one-eyed man is king.

As has been said already, the rules are well crafted and clear. Both me and my opponent are sticklers for rules (we like writing them ourselves) but found nothing that couldn't be resolved quite quickly – and that's unusual. We weren't tempted to fiddle with them, even when we didn't like them; too much respect for the careful engineering.

We played using 6mm figures on 3cm x 2cm bases, on a table of about 3 ft by 4 ft – quite enough space.

The game did take us quite a long time – we didn't finish in fact. I don't place any store by this – at the start we were both double checking everything in the rules. And the French player(er, me) had a pretty stupidly attack strategy – on a broad front using the whole width of the table – guaranteed to maximise a lot of relatively indecisive combat. Enough people have told me that they are very quick once after the first couiple of games (if that); and the mechanisms are simple enough for me to believe it.

There is a lot of dice throwing, so outcomes are unpredictable – this will help replayability. This may not be to everybody's taste, but I don't subscribe to the idea that wargames should be like chess.

The combat itself resolved mainly around DISR markers – it was a race to inflict them and recover them. A slow attack means that your opponent can recover the damage as fast as you can inflict it.

Rules are designed to produce clarity and speed, so feel quite gamey, and distinctly un-intuitive at times. Hardened Napoleonic fans will certainly find things to disagree with. The thing I most disliked was that it seems to encourage big columns of two attack columns side by side to gang up on a line. Not a favoured historical tactic. The artillery rules didn't feel right, and the representation of skirmishers is a cop out.

So my main worry with them is a lack of Napoleonic feel that you would expect for anything calling itself "petit tactical". It seems designed to be a game rather than a genuine representation of period warfare. This is reinforced by the scenarion set-ups – where defenders deploy in a narrow area on the baseline, so can't occupy key terain features at the start. The army builder system, on the other hand, is an excellent balance of historical feel and the needs of a game.

I'll use these if a want a quick and enjoyable game with my little men. Not to explore history, though.

Matthew

Actually as the number of dice thrown increases, so does the predictablility.

Well what I meant was that here are a lot of different throws to determine outcomes of a combat (discipline tests, firing, close cmbat and recovery) – many of which use only a single D6. This gives a very wide spread of possible outcomes, and some extreme/unexpected ones. Cavalry combats, for example can be over decisively very quickly (as happened to my opponent in a previous outing of the game) or be interminable (but absorbing) thrust and counter-thrust, which happened in our game.

Matthew

Matthew, I'd be curious to hear you give an example of a rules system where skirmishers are well-represented, in your opinion.

Knowing what rules you've enjoyed in the past would help me understand the lens through which you're viewing LaSalle.

JCBJCB. Well the truth is that I haven't found one. But I live in hope, as well as trying to explore methods when I have time to write my own rules. Usually I play grand tactical rules (like Grande Armee), where I find it quite acceptable to give skirmishers a relatively minor role beyond being part of general offensive/defensive capability.

Deploying skirmishers was a distinct tactical option, and, we are told, a very important part of Napoleonic tactics. In Lasalle skirmishers are used to boost ordinary line firepower when formed bodies are only 200 paces or so apart. This is certainly not how they were used historically.

Of course it is a far from easy rules challenge. Skirmish attacks could take some time to mature – which is difficult to represent in a quick-fire wargame. It's very easy to write fiddly rules that don't have much impact. But I was hoping for some attempt to represent it as a tactical optionin a game that is meant to be "petit tactical".

Matthew

[ In Lasalle skirmishers are used to boost ordinary line firepower when formed bodies are only 200 paces or so apart. This is certainly not how they were used historically.]

In Lasalle, skirmish-capable infantry is also used to create irregular units, to fight in towns and rough terrain, or they can be broken up to bolster the skirmish line of other units in the brigade. They lessen the effects of enemy canister fire, since presumably their proximity to the gunners is causing the gunners to aim short, or to be harassed by the skirmishers.

But all that aside, obviously a set of game rules needs to decide where and how to represent the net effect of something. In Lasalle, skirmishers were placed within the "shooting" process. That seemed a better decision than to create separate units for them, or to allow them to devolve their own little mini-game, which can easily become tedious and distracting.

I fully understand the need for the compromise, but the cost (to me) is to take away from the Napoleonic feel of the game. I would have preferred some kind of mechanism that allowed a special skirmish attack to be delivered at longer ranges, allowing units to inflict DISRs or neutralise artillery. Now doubt Sam Mustafa considered this and rejected it for reasons of game flow. My point about Lasalle is that for me too much has been sacrificed at that altar. It's a matter of personal taste. I have a huge respect for Sam.

I know I am a late comer to this dance – but I fully agree with most of what was said on this review. The rules are fast and furious – but I didnt like the turn set up – the out of sequence movement and shooting really rubbed me the wrong way. Also the lack of command and morale based rules put me off even more.

I did, however, enjoy ease of casualty resolution and the Skirmisher rules. I thought the additional fire power simplified what has been a sore spot on a few systems.

All in all – it had too much of an overly long beer and pretzels type feel to it. Not to toot anyone's horn, but I will stick to my General de Brigade rules – Thanks David – great rule set.

I'm looking for a new set of Nap rules.

How has LaSalle fared since this thread?

Speaking for myself, the rules are disorganized. They don't follow the sequence of play. They are all over the place. I had to use post-it notes sticking out the top of the rules with the section written on them to look up a rule up. Out of our club only one person liked them.

Instead of posting on a six year old thread you may just want to start a new thread and provide a link to this one.

Our group loves LaSalle. Unusual sequence of play, but makes the game flow. Gives a Napoleonic feel to the game. Mechanics are simple.

I think it has fared well. Rallynow's complaint is not really justified in my opinion. The QRS in the back is quite clear and easy to follow. When the rules are explained at the beginning it does not start with the first action in the first turn. Sam expalins why he does this because his rules are different then typical ones. They are quite linear though in the explanation.

The biggest critique that i have seen of them and one that I agree with, is that multiple columns can attack a single line and the line is of course doomed. Quite a few house rules have been talked about that address this. The one I employ is to allow the line's fire to affect both columns. Others have just put a ban on allowing 2 columns to assault a single line.

Other than that they are still EASILY my go to rules for petite tactical Napoleonic. Great balance of period flavor and playability. The rules are also a pleasure to read. Also the army lists and terrain set up aids make it a nicely complete package. (And just to pre-empt the Sam Mustafa haters/whingers there are no cards involved)

After our first game of Lasalle one player who is not a Napoleonic buff said:
"It's nice to play a set of Napoleonic rules I can understand"
I don't find the rules disorganised at all. Quite the contrary; very clear and easy to follow. As the rules explain, they are in a logical sequence to make them easy to understand; had they been in the same order as the sequence of play I can imagine the howls of protest.

Very nice, playable rules.

"It's nice to play a set of Napoleonic rules I can understand"

LOL! Surely that is the most damning criticism possible for Napoleonic rules. Did anyone call him out? :-)

- Ix