"Squad leader ,avalon hill." Topic

Broke out the old game and was pondering,early americans….certainly not ther 6-6-6 rating…As the japanese were later rated as high morale versions of Roumanians…shouldnt early us springfield armed troops be 3-5-6 or 4 6-6 ?.Just a thought lads,every good hex game is a miniatures in action.

Yes, I always thought the firepower from the 6-6-6 was out of whack. But, I don't recall if the Americans had separate LMGs like the other nations did. I think they just had MMG & HMG counters. So what would the BAR be?

John Hill just made the numbers up based on 'gut feeling'.

In fairness the internet did not exist and a lot of what we take for granted now just was not possible then.

SL has come a long way into ASL and still has a large following – but the basic squad numbers have not been corrected, which I think is a pity. Now it has 'come too far' to be changed so debate is academic.

Many players now think the US basic infantry should have been a 5-5-7 which makes more sense. It's NONSENSE the British infantry have a shorter range than US infantry too.

John Hill had some very strange ideas about modelling infantry firepower, he was interviewed in The General shortly after SL came out. In principal, US squads had Garands, maybe a BAR, while standard Germans just had K98s, the LMG was extra. This was clearly rubbish, as the scenario countermixes showed, he was more interested in have different types of squads for an interesting game, and later on various weasel words appeared to do with integral MGs.

Anyway, if want to do bolt action armed US squads, based on his original logic, 4-5-6, maybe range 6 if you think they are better shots with rifles than the British…

It was a very long time ago so I try not to be too hard on the designer[s] of SL.

But I wish they had fixed the blatant errors when ASL came out – by then they had more information. It's funny cos they fixed the AFV armour factors and gun data to be in line with available data, but left the infantry squad values – the absolute heart of the game – as they were.

Oh, I have nothing but praise for SL, especially compared to its contemporary, Tobruk. I used to think those 666 squads were actually quite funny, and the US Para mini scenarios were some of my favourites. Once Cross of Iron and Crescendo of Doom came out, I spent most of time on the eastern front or early war, so the silliness of the US units ceased to bother me. I only bought GI for the British counters, the US units got even more silly then.

Martin I have not played tobruk for 30 years so remember it as a great game. what was wrong ewith it? Have thought about digging it back out.

Owen

The PTO expansion has counters for Springfield armed marines.

The early war USMC were 4-5-8s. A little odd given the MLE plus Bren gun armed British are 4-5-8s [if elite].

Maybe they rationalise it by saying the USMC are 10-12 man squads while the UK&C 4-5-8 would be 6-8 [allowing for losses and LOOB].

Good to see i am in good company…Tobruk however…thats set in stone ,a great and my first real wargame.