"Warhammer "Great War" multiple battalions" Topic

Hi, looking at playing larger games of this and was wondering how people get or got round this issue of lack of speed, by which I mean everything moves 6" with the obvious exception of cavalry.

was looking at bicycle mounted infantry or trucks/buses etc but obviously there are no rules/points etc for these.

thanks
jon

We never preceived lack of speed as a problem, usually playing on long (6-8 feet) and not very deep (max 4 feet) tables.

Troops usually start a foot out from the table edge and therefore take 3 turns to cross the centre of the table. This leaves some (but not much) opportunity for maneuvering. Heavy fire of course slows this down because the troops need to move from cover to cover, but that only adds to the period feel.

Great War infantry rarely crossed No-man's Land at a sprinting run, after all. The load the average ground-pounder carried with him prohibited everything but a brisk walking pace.

So when you make your games larger, I'd recommend making the table longer, but not deeper.

What rules is Great War based on? The universal 6" move sounds like it's based on 40K, in which case, there are a couple of options you could look at;

1) the Run move – if a unit doesn't shoot, it may move an additional D6" instead

2)40K includes rules for transport vehicles and bikes as a unit type. You could probably work something out.

Of course, this will affect points values, game balance and period feel, so follw my suggestions with care, if at all!

If you think 6" moves are slow in GW, then you'd hate Great War Spearhead….

Anyway, as Pijile says, the trick is not to make your table too deep. Units operated on very tight boundaries in WW1, so at a company level it really is essentially a matter of setting the company frontage and depth, then getting everyone up and walking slowly towards the enemy. There isn't a lot of fancy manouvering, apart from better trained units using ground cover and fire & movement, an dobviously rolling up trench lines, but even that is quite a linear activity and slooooow.

Thanks the answer seems longer and not broader. I was trying to represent maybe one or two battalions engadged ie. starting at 24" appart, then bringing up the rest which is where the idea of cycles or buses etc. came from.

jon

It sounds like you're trying to play World War II with World War I figures. As Martin says, there was not much room for tactical manoeuvring on the Battlefields of the Great War. Not until 1918 anyway. Look at the footage of the time, from the film the Battle of the Somme you can see an actual attack on the Hawthorn Crater (filmed from White City), the lads are all grouped together as they advance. Partially from the amount of equipment they are carrying (hey, those trenches won't dig themselves…) and partially because of the difficulty of moving large bodies of men about without adequate communications. So the progress would have been slow and steady. I mean, come on, imagine trying to drive a London Omnibus over shell damaged land?

Hi, should have been alittle clearer looking at the last 100 days mostly. Not trying to run WW2 as can do that already, maybe trying to do something that the rules aren't meant to though.

thanks to everyones input

jon

I think the run rule would really speed things up, or you can simply just do like FOW. Double Move is alright, but your opponent gets +1 to hit. Just an Idea =)

taking from 40k ( which tgw rules are based on ) on roads trucks move up to 12 inches off road 6 inches, and d6 inches for rough terrain.
armored cars are fast vehicles and move up to 18 inches on road,12 inches off road and d6 in rough terrain. a roll of 1 in rough terrain means your stuck or broke down and immoble. None of us have bikes or motorcycles so we havent figured them in yet.try this and see if you like it ,it works for us.