"Muskets &Tomahawks capture rule and other ideas" Topic

I enjoy Muskets and Tomahawks, but am considering trying a few things:

1. Allowing civilians to be dispersed. As I set out a very large table for a very large raid game it seemed odd to have to have mobs of people when they should be spread out attending to their business. Naturally if a raid occurs the tendency would seem to be to join others, but I would not expect it to start that way. The only rationale I can see for treating them as a group is for morale purposes, and as they represent people with no business fighting except as a last resort it seems to me there is no need for morale for them, they are trying to preserve themselves, not engage the enemy.

2. I am going to allow unarmed male civilians of the proper age attempt to reach a building to arm themselves and then become militia men. This is more problematic in the morale area. Perhaps until they form in a unit of 4 or more they have to make reaction tests whenever any ally in their range of site is killed?

3. I would like to introduce a capture option. Accounts of the period are full of stories of men, women and children being taken prisoner. I would like another option related to the slaughter mission where instead the raiding force can take prisoners. I know this complicates things quite a bit, but could also add make things more interesting. Maybe treat it as a melee, but before resolution attacker declares intent to capture not kill. Defender decide whether the intended victim fights or flees? This could be determined by player decision or a die roll. If flight is chosen the intended victim's winning the melee simply means getting to run away and evade for the moment and losing means becoming a prisoner.

Anyone have any thoughts about these ideas? Anyone ever try any like them?

All good thoughts. I was surprised, given both the period flavor in the rules and their comprehensiveness,
that they did not come up with "capture" rules. Of course, once one captures, there should be rules about guarding prisoners, escape and rescue.

I imagine that is why they left capture out, to keep the game simple. I am thinking maybe after capture there is base to base contact. Maybe prisoners can be tied to each other (reflected by base to base contact) so only one guard is required although more could be used. If something happens to the guard the prisoners can move again without direction from a captor, but at a reduced rate to reflect the ropes.

I don't think you need get too complex. Base to base contact is best, perhaps one soldier/Indian can guard two prisoners, two can guard four? Then one need determine how one can "free" them. Is there a risk to the prisoners if shooting the guard? A roll of one kills the prisoner, not the guard?
I would also say that guards must keep their weapons loaded, and cannot participate in combat. If the guards are meleed, maybe allow the prisoner(s) to run away?
Roll one D6 to see how many inches they go?
I have an AWI scenario I've been working on that requires loyalists to capture a number of militia leaders and get them off the board. Based on areal incident in 1779 NJ.
So I have definitely been thinking about this.

My rule set Buckskins and Rangers includes capturing, civilians, escaping, scalping, etc.

Check out my website for more information:
battlefieldgamedesigns.com

I've run a similar game scenario several times based on a real life raid here in our local area – Ft Nealy

link

link

I had the civilians all start at their cabin and then did a random die roll to see if they were in the cabin, tending to the livestock, or out in the field. A few of the wives and could shoot but most could not, but a gave them the ability to reload if they were adjacent to their husband (or adult son). Which meant they could remove 1 fire marker per turn (this was to simulate them reloading a rifle\musket and handing it to the shooter, taking his fired weapon to reload etc)

If an Indian contacted a non-shooter (wife or child) they were automatically captured, to capture a shooter they had to defeat them in combat and then had the choice of capture or kill. An Indian could control up to three captives but could only move 1/2 speed and no combat. To free a captive a non-captive must attack and defeat the Indian in control, no shooting as you could hit a captive.

These all seem to work OK

Good ideas!

Yes, very cool ideas, thank you Razor78. The slower movement of guards makes a lot of sense, although in the case of a rescue scenario where people are trying to free captives being taken from one end of the table to the other I might be tempted to make the movement rate for guard and prisoner one inch further than the usual 3 inches to reflect a sort of forced march of the civilians prisoners.

Expanding on these ideas, I started using casualty figures or pieces of red felt under toppled figures so that once hit a figure would not just vanish, but become a casualty. This really changes the game as casualties can actually become obstacles. As I was having some provinicials withdraw it occurred to me that it would be pretty cold of them to just leave their seriously wounded behind. Has anyone considered a way to sort the dead from the seriously wounded? This could be done by a second die roll or simply determining that lethality rolls of a 5 or 6 equals dead. It is a bit morbid, and could further reduce a unit's fighting effectiveness, but this is not a game of checkers, it is a skirmish game.