"RFoF and crazy movement rates" Topic

I picked up Regimental Fire and Fury, and while it looks like a really solid game, I was surprised by how for a regiment could move up the table in one activation.

It seems like on a 4x4 table, the brigades will meet head on after 1 move for each player, is that correct?

I know that's on a totally open field, as opposed to something with fences and whatever, but that can move further than they can shoot in some cases, and that bothers me.

Any thoughts?

what scale re you using?

normally a 4 x 8 table for us.

10mm on the 1"x3/4 bases

It seems like on a 4x4 table, the brigades will meet head on after 1 move for each player, is that correct?

In many wargames, the units move ridiculously too slow given the time and ground scales.

Hmm … even with only 4' of depth (a fairly shallow table), you would have to start units 1' in and then have them advance over open ground towards each other to meet in 1-2 turns. If you are playing a straight up assault, then that works fine? However, most setups will allow for more space between the lines, and since this is the ACW you will be moving through woods and broken ground more often than not. Trust me – once you start playing – and especially if facing artillery! – the movement rates won't seem overly generous. They are set to provide a well paced game, but there is still plenty of game/turns to see the enemy coming and try to react to their movements.

The other thing to remember is that movement is at the rate of the worst terrain encountered. So if your regiment crosses a fence in an open field, then it moves at the broken ground rate. There is no prorating of movement.

Mike

Yeah, movement rates in games are always wonky. A decent unit can make 3 mph over decent ground. Not for 12 hours straight, but long enough. Put that in most game terms.

A turn = 20 minutes so movement is 1 mile/turn!

At 100 yards per inch that's 18" – at 50 yards 36".

Now naturally woods, terrain and the enemy all effect that. But even reinforcemetns at Gettysburg, in column on a road, and in a hurry when they can hear guns, rarely move at anything close to these kinds of speeds…

So, I should have more terrain than I put out? I'm ok with that.

I thought that changing everything to cms would work as well, though I was afraid if that would have any impact on the game down the line.

Thanks y'all

A foot unit could make 3mph on a well graded road across level terrain in a loose march column under decent weather conditions. Advancing cross-country in a close order battle formation, we are IMHO probably talking about 1/2-2/3 that rate. Then come the obstacles, brush, ploughed ground, slopes, soft ground. crop stubble, fences, ditches, etc, etc, etc, etc.

B

True – but find me a rule set that lets a loose road column make 3mph under any conditions….

Volley & Bayonet has by far the most generous movement rates of any rules I've played – of course, the turns are very long, about one hour, so the moves are meant to be grand maneuvers. Infantry move 4800 yards in road column, 3600 in cross-country road column, and 1600 in normal movement. That's slightly less than 3mph (which would be around 5200 yards), but pretty close.

Idk, I just got these rules, so I'm not a pro at these. I can't shake my dislike of units hauling ass across the table. Even with rough terrain they still move pretty darn fast…

I just don't think these are the rules for me, something more like Longstreet might be more up my alley. (waiting on the cards now…:(

Advancing cross-country in a close order battle formation, we are IMHO probably talking about 1/2-2/3 that rate.

Test that out. One of the best documented times is Pickett's charge. The three division covered 1400 to 1600 yards in line under artillery fire in 19 to 20 minutes, with two halts to dress lines and multiple wheels diagonally during that time. Lee instructed them to march at quick time is what is reported during the advance.

That is about 80 yards a minute or 4,800 yard in an hour, or 2.74 miles per hour.

Most any movement you can calculate from 1750 to 1870 achieved that rate cross country.

F&F and RF&F have troops moving at half that rate--or less even at quick march. Pickett's Charge requires over a scale hour to cross the same distance. There are a number of reasons for the short march rates, but the solution that most scenarios in both rules sets is to begin with at least some of the enemy units within one move of each other.

We've played it on 4' deep table and didn't have too many problems. Remember messy terrain for ACW battlefields slow down the moves.

You're worried about realistic movement rates and your alternative is Longstreet? You do know that the rules force you to choose (for your whole army) whether or not you move or charge each turn, and that playing certain cards can double movement or stop it all together?

Game-wise, I like movement distances to be large enough for the situation to change significantly each turn and give me as a player some new decisions to make. From that point of view, F&F / RF&F's move distances are a virtue.

'Realism'-wise: the difficulty is that a game system needs to allow for not only the troops' physical ability to march a given distance in a given time, but also – at least as importantly – the whole decision process to decide upon, initiate and execute whatever maneuver is concerned, with a dose of Clausewitzian friction thrown in. A column of troops on a route march on a road, with no tactical issues to worry about, and where the route is known from the beginning, can sustain 3mph for hours. Pickett's charge as cited by McLaddie comes close to that, for a short and relatively clearly defined movement – though perhaps someone can tell us how long it was from Lee issuing the order, to the start of the advance?

"find me a rule set that lets a loose road column make 3mph under any conditions": well, Bloody Big Battles! does – in some scenarios. In BBB, the timescale, ground scale and troop scale all vary from scenario to scenario. My Gettysburg scenario TMP link lets troops in column on a road travel 3,000m in a 2-hour turn. But as the scenario states, "The 2-hour turns reflect the fact that the dispersion of forces and the need to conserve artillery ammunition caused long lulls between attacks". Other BBB scenarios permit rapid movement, eg Kurudere: 6400m/hr, or The Alma (6000m/hr).

Chris
Bloody Big BATTLES!
link
bloodybigbattles.blogspot.co.uk

CAT, Longstreet is a total cop out.

It makes no pretence about ground scale. unit frontage, or ranges. Oddly I now prefer that up front nakedness to rules that have a pretence of doing it right and in fact do nothing of the kind.

The Pickett's Charge example above isn't new but it is accurate.

What's worse, a game where you move "x" inches that represnt nothing in particular, or a game where you move "x" inches that pretends to be tied to a ground and time scale but's really just something based on making the game work?

And come to think on it aren't they both the same thing?

Games where units inch across the table drive me nuts, you basically just line up and spend ten turns marching toward each other.

Large move rates actually give some point to flanking moves, reserves etc. and provide more interesting decision points.

Game-wise, I like movement distances to be large enough for the situation to change significantly each turn and give me as a player some new decisions to make. From that point of view, F&F / RF&F's move distances are a virtue.

'Realism'-wise: the difficulty is that a game system needs to allow for not only the troops' physical ability to march a given distance in a given time, but also – at least as importantly – the whole decision process to decide upon, initiate and execute whatever maneuver is concerned, with a dose of Clausewitzian friction thrown in. A column of troops on a route march on a road, with no tactical issues to worry about, and where the route is known from the beginning, can sustain 3mph for hours. Pickett's charge as cited by McLaddie comes close to that, for a short and relatively clearly defined movement – though perhaps someone can tell us how long it was from Lee issuing the order, to the start of the advance?

Lee issues orders that night and early morning. The actual order to start the advance took no time at all, a few minutes? Friction is a real issue. The question is whether that reduced 'real' movement to half the possible was 'normal.' Did friction--from all causes--reduce movement by one half or more?

It wasn't normal, typical or what the commanders expected. In most cases walking through the actual battle movement distances using F&F/RF&F movement, even without the maneuver table, rarely possible. In most cases I have found that the movement ends up with results like I noted with Pickett's Charge.

There were all sorts of reasons why units didn't move, often because they were being held in reserve, but to penalize all units for those that through friction didn't move, appears to 'not work' if you can't ever get units to move to where they did in the time they took historically.

Whether you like F&F and RF&F or not, play it alot or not [I have], this appears to me to be something that can't be rationalized in any way. The reasons for the short movement distances have a number of benefits for the game, some already noted, but that is another issue.

I second what Martin said 100%.

I think the key question is not so much whether a game's nominal turn length matches the distance troops can cover in a turn, as whether the decision cycle works. How much can my troops do before the enemy reacts? Can I exploit an opportunity swiftly enough, or are turn increments so small that he can fill a careless gap before I can smash through it?

There are many creative game designs that use different ways to achieve this: command pips, initiative dice, variable turn lengths controlled by various mechanisms, cards … Personally I like the F&F-style maneuver table for the way it introduces uncertainty into how far troops can move. It's a simple yet subtle mechanism, and it doesn't cause any of the brain pain that some more complex approaches do.

From some lazy Wikipedia research, I note that "Despite Lee's hope for an early start, it took all morning to arrange the infantry assault force", so some friction was involved. In my own Gettysburg scenario, once Pickett's men are on their start line, Pickett's charge would take one turn to resolve. Pickett can cover his 1500m in a single move. Most likely he will either be stopped/driven back by the defenders' fire, or if he does close, he will bounce off; if he is fortunate, he may take Cemetery Ridge and then exploit and swarm over Cemetery Hill in the same turn. Game turn over, charge completed, it succeeds or it doesn't, move on.

Chris

I chose longstreet because it is the same style game, something fun and easy to play, but I don't think moving 12 inches on occasion is that bad. 4 or 6 bw's is the norm, and that works well for me.

I'm not saying I want to snail crawl along in a game, I just play on a 4x4 and I don't see any tactics in two lines banging into each other at turn 2ish. For those with huge tables, I bet the game works better, and that's cool. I just don't have that option.

It seems like on a 4x4 table, the brigades will meet head on after 1 move for each player, is that correct?

It's ludicrously unlikely that both lines would simply meet in the middle on turn 2, unless you've deliberately engineered a massed charge across open ground like Pickett's charge. Terrain, formation changes, enemy fire, coordination problems, and all the other elements of battlefield friction that RFnF does so well tend to slow the brigades down quite a bit. You should look at the movement rates as ideal rather than typical.

A 4'x4' table does sound a bit small for an RFnF game, but I have to admit, that is actually about the maximum size of the combat space for one player commanding a brigade or three. I've played a bunch of RFnF games now, and it's unusual for any of my units to get much beyond 3 feet from my own edge, and even when I'm commanding a whole division, I don't believe I deploy much wider than 3 feet. I think you could fit some really fun 2-6 player games on a 4x4 table.

Lay out a congested early American terrainscape, keep the forces down to 2-4 brigades per side, define some tough objectives, and you'll have a riot. RFnF is a really good game.

- Ix

McLaddie –
Re Pickett's charge, see John M Priest's very fine volume, "Into the Fight – Pickett's Charge at Gettysburg", a painstaking moment-by-moment dissection of the event which draws extensively from primary and archival sources. Priest's analysis has the Confederate advance reaching the Emmitsburg Road at 2:45pm, breaking into the Union angle between 2:45pm and 3:00pm and finally collapsing by 3:00pm.

Measuring from the start points of the centers of the participating Confederate divisions to the Union main line of resistance, the greatest distance did not exceed 1600 yards. It is, of course, impossible to judge with anything resembling true precision, but, even allowing for the Confederate line to have been staggered at 200 yards by Union canister and musketry, their rate of cross-country advance in battle formation cannot have been greater than about 40 yards per minute.

FWIW.

B

I think the key question is not so much whether a game's nominal turn length matches the distance troops can cover in a turn, as whether the decision cycle works. How much can my troops do before the enemy reacts? Can I exploit an opportunity swiftly enough, or are turn increments so small that he can fill a careless gap before I can smash through it?

That is certainly a key question. So what is the decision cycle for a Civil War corps or division commander. What were the reasonable expectations? How did one get inside an enemy's decision cycle.

However, I can develop mechanics with twice as slow or twice as fast movement rates and answer those questions
"How much can my troops do before the enemy reacts?"
"Can I exploit an opportunity swiftly enough, or are turn increments so small that he can fill a careless gap before I can smash through it?"

Game designers have done it both way. The question is what historically was that set of dynamics in a decision-cycle?
Certainly Friction played a part, but what part and how much?

It is, of course, impossible to judge with anything resembling true precision, but, even allowing for the Confederate line to have been staggered at 200 yards by Union canister and musketry, their rate of cross-country advance in battle formation cannot have been greater than about 40 yards per minute.

Actually, there are several eye-witnesses that give the same basic time spans for crossing that distance. They advanced at quick time, which does agree with that 20 minute time to cross 1400-1600 yards. What Priest can't know is what time the Rebels actually began the advance, crossed Emmittsburg Road or what time they crossed the stone wall because none of the witnesses used the same starting times or ending times based on the same events--when they gave them at all. The only thing that they all agree on is the amount of time spent from the start [at whatever time they determined] to the time the Confederates stopped to return fire. [at about 200 yards from the Union front lines] Stuart's book is better in this regard.

In other words, Priest's dissection of the time ends up filling in gaps in the primary sources with calculations/ assumptions, not exact times. He then picks and chooses which eye-witnesses he agrees with based on that. He seems to ignore the time table all the eyewitnesses agree on because their watches don't agree on the same start and end times. That was a common issue of officers during the Nineteenth Century. Synchronizing watches hadn't become a military norm.

To clarify, Priest sacrifices coherency and source comparisons/analysis in an effort to use primary sources to move the story along, often jumping back and forth in confusing fashion. He does a good job describing the skirmishing that went on before and during Pickett's Charge, which has been ignored in other histories.

My opinion of course, and Priest's book does some things better than Stuart's older book, but I always go with the primary sources first. That is what any work like Priests relies on.

I've not read Stewart's book, but I'm surprised at your comment that Priest's effort lacks intellectual rigor (ref his appendices and footnotes). Consequently, it is very problematical for me to accept that Priest's basic time analysis can be off by a factor of 3x.

B

Hannibus,

Have you considered just scaling everything down to 50% or 40%, and using a half-inch or a centimeter as the basic unit of measure instead of an inch? That would in effect double the size of your table and could solve your problem.

Chris

I've not read Stewart's book, but I'm surprised at your comment that Priest's effort lacks intellectual rigor (ref his appendices and footnotes). Consequently, it is very problematical for me to accept that Priest's basic time analysis can be off by a factor of 3x.

Blutarski:

Priest's goals were fairly ambitious and I am not saying that his entire effort lacked 'intellectual rigor' for his entire book--only his conclusions on the time he decides it took to cross that 1400-1600 yards. I'm not sure he actually calculates the actual movement rate, only what he believes is the time it required.[I don't have the book here at the moment] but He attempted to put times to events that didn't have any evidence for such exact times and then found himself with a lot of time unaccounted for IF he accepted the reported time for crossing the open ground. He accepted his estimates for no good reasons I can see while basically ignoring all the reported times because they didn't 'fit'.

Appendices and footnotes are provided as a way to check his intellectual rigor. Their existence alone doesn't establish that rigor one way or another. I can't tell you the number of times I have read books with lodes of footnotes that when checked fail to support the writer at all, or don't exist at all. Be glad to provide some examples of that too if you'd like. Whether that is true for Priest, I don't know. I haven't checked all his footnotes. Just that one point. I'd be glad to get down to details if you want. I can suggest you read Stuart and compare…

So, I am not applying that to Priest's whole book, just that one single point. It is very suspect when any author pastes together his own conclusions without direct evidence [which is why he or any author does it in attempting to fill in the gaps] and then rejects all the eyewitness reports because they don't fit his constructed timeline.

Quick time was 110 paces or about 90 yards per minute. Lee ordered the advance to move at quick time… covering the 1600 yards in 20 minutes is 80 yards per minute… quite reasonable. Why it would take them twice as long to cover that distance and then have every eyewitness, experienced soldiers north and south, fail to note that appears extremely improbable.

Knowing several more instances of troops crossing disputed ground in large numbers at the same rate, and the estimates experienced generals give that they expect, only strengthens my conclusion on that one point--again, not Priest's entire book.

I'll be more than glad to provide a number of other examples from the ACW and Napoleonic wars with the same basic times.

McLaddie – We will have to agree to disagree on this point.

B

So, as I'm still waiting on my Longstreet cards to show up, I went back to RFaF and loaded up my table with a metric ton of terrain. Fields and forests and walls and….it plays slower now.

There is essentially no open terrain anymore, which makes me wonder if I could just call all "open terrain counts as broken" now instead, but it's a pace that I can dig now.

Thanks to all that commented, made me give this game a second chance.

Hannibus – Just out of curiosity, did you take into account that F&F/RF&F is written for 15mm figures. Did you make any adjustment for using 10mm figures? Also, these rules do not guarantee that you will move as far as you want to. Between this and terrain (and every single battle East of the Mississippi always contains a lot of terrain) your troop movement should not cause them meet after only one turn.

William C Davis's book, "The Battle of Newmarket" has some good map/distance + time data. Breckenridge's small divisional advance from the Luray Road start line to just beyond the Bushong farmstead covered about 1500 yards in approximately an hour.

B

49Mountain, I base them on the standard bases RFaF calls for, so I didn't change anything. It was mainly the first few games I play I had what I thought was the correct amount of terrain (not nearly enough looking back) and had rolled well on the movement table getting doublequick for both armies. On a 4x4 with 6" to deploy with, and like…16" or 12" for the moves, they would just bang into each other too quickly for my taste.

I believe for now I will just treat all open ground as broken until I can work out a better way to get my table laid out.

Have to agree with Mcladdie on this.

I have done a lot of research on the time-distance of Pickett's Charge and the consensus is the average distance for the attack is about 3/4 a mile and that the Confederates were actually engaged in action in less then 20 minutes.

Here is a pretty good article on distances:
link

The whole attack, stepping off around 2pm was over and done, with men back at the starting point in about an hour.

Assuming you are playing a set of rules with 15-20 minute turns, then the whole thing would have to be done in 3 to 4 turns, start to finish. How many rules can reproduce that?

Kim

Kim – The article you cite has precious little to say about close order advance rates of large battle formations. The sole bit of information relates to an individual who walked (presumably alone) a 600 yard route and deemed it possible to do so with in about 7 minutes – not counting time needed to climb or take down fences and obstacles, not counting the need for a divisional formation to keep order and alignment and not counting the effects of casualties in forcing continual dressing of the lines.

To argue that a deployed division of infantry in close order lines can move cross country at a pace equivalent in speed to a route column marching along a good level road at 3mph (abut 85 yards per minute) strains credulity.

I pay no attention to quick march rates set down in the manuals. They have no relationship to the real world outside of the parade ground.

B

Re: Pickett's charge. The distances weren't that great. The brigades on the wings moved about 1,000 yards, and those towards the centre about 700 yds.

To argue that a deployed division of infantry in close order lines can move cross country at a pace equivalent in speed to a route column marching along a good level road at 3mph (abut 85 yards per minute) strains credulity.

Then all the eye-witnesses reporting the advance speed should have strained the credulity of the thousands of participants and then later readers…and they didn't. Yours and my credulity really is of secondary importance here.

I pay no attention to quick march rates set down in the manuals. They have no relationship to the real world outside of the parade ground.

Then you are ignoring something that ALL military men of the time paid a great deal of attention to. That isn't what the officers and men of the period wrote, reported and practiced. The real world as described by those men saw the parade ground as where battle maneuvers and paces were practiced.

If Lee believed that march rates had no relationship to the real world, why would he specifically order the three divisions to advance at quick rate and all the commands work to comply with something that even enlisted men reported doing?

Hannibus – Just out of curiosity, did you take into account that F&F/RF&F is written for 15mm figures. Did you make any adjustment for using 10mm figures?

I would think that any adjustments would depend on the base sizes being used rather than the size of the figures.

Still playing games as Longstreet is taking his time to arrive. Been basing for Altar of Freedom as well, though I've cut everything in half, from base size to movements and even down to 3mm minis so I could play the battles in my apt.

I have a bit of trouble with the FaF rulebook sometimes, but it just takes a bit of flipping through to find what I'm looking for.

Wargamers like to micromanage their units, so ridiculously short turn lengths and movement allowances have become the norm.

A grand-tactical set of rules should make turn lengths – and therefore movement allowances – proportional to the amount of time it takes a command to receive an order and execute it to show both the amount of time committed and the inertia of the action. That's what VnB does.

Wargamers like to micromanage their units, so ridiculously short turn lengths and movement allowances have become the norm.M

From what I understand [and have experienced], the short movement allowances have a lot to do with IG/UG systems and what can happen within a turn, regardless of the time that turn represents. With long movement rates, too much can happen, not only within the time allotment, but just within the number of mechanical resolutions required.

The other problem is artillery fire. If units move too fast, then the scoot right through artillery fire and there are no attritional losses. Thus regardless of the scale, 9-12 inch movement for infantry is the standard.

I do know that regardless of the movement rates or scale, players will want to micromanage as much as possible… eeking out any piddling advantage they can. That is human nature with any game… Even Volley & Bayonet and Black Powder, with its possible infantry moves of 36 inches.