"Step Loss and Reduce Firepower & Armor to Give Depth" Topic

Hey Fellas,

I started playing the "Panzer" rules for my Micro Armour Mini's. I made each single tank on a stand represent a "Battalion same held true for infantry on a stand. I realized to give the game more depth I wanted to make it that when a "stand" takes a hit it would take a step loss along with the unit having their firepower and tank armor to be reduce. It only makes sense because a unit at full strength should have more firepower over a unit with one or two step losses left.

So what i did to achieve this was to times the firepower and armor on the Panzer cards by "3" if the unit is at full strength. If a unit takes one step loss i would then times firepower and armor by "2". If a unit has 1 step loss left it would be considered a "Company" and the firepower and Armor would be times by 1.

Again, a one step unit that is a company should not have the same firepower or armor

How do you guys handle larger games with battalion and company units???

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It depends what you view a 'step loss' as representing. irl unit firepower is not proportional to losses – heavy weapons are conserved at the expense of riflemen, subunits are kept in reserve, most weapons operate at a fraction of their theoretical capabilities etc.

There are various models around, at one extreme you have that used in e.g. Memoir 44 or AHGCs 'Russian Front' where units retain full firepower until they reach their step loss maximum – the justification in RF is that most firepower comes from the div and corps artillery and that infantry/tank losses just make the unit more brittle.

At the other extreme you have the proportional loss/effectiveness model e.g. Megablitz or Victory Games 'Hells Highway'.

An interesting approach is taken int he 1956 British Army Tactical wargame, where the 1st 'hit' has no effect on combat power at all, the second reduces it to half effect and the third renders it combat ineffective (at losses of around 50%).

I find a two or three step approach works quite well, if you conceptualise the first 'hit' as effectively meaning the unit commander has to commit his reserve, and it is only on the second hit that frontline combat strength is unduly affected. so e.g. in both NATO Brigade Commander and Drumfire (company and battalion stands respectively), the first hit has no effect on combat strength as conceptually it is a platoon/company being destroyed, and the reserve moves up to take its place. On the second hit the unit is removed as it is then reduced to platoon/company strength and no longer combat effective.

You may introduce the same sort of mechanism as in Command Decision and allow such 'eliminated' stands to be reorganised by combining them with another of the same type to produce a single operational stand.

In other games I just take whole battalions off at a time, effectively using them as strength point markers for brigades. There may or may not be some sort of unit recovery mechanism, depends on the depth of simulation you want.

If I'm running a massive participation game(like my Cambrai game with eleven divisions deployed and 14 players), I don't want lots of depth in the simulation.

When you say Panzer, which game are you referring to? Jumping up penetrating power is always a bad idea, giving weaker tanks the ability to penetrate heavier tanks that they just would not be able to defeat. One possability is to allow full strength stands 3 shots, 2 shots for the second, and 1 for the third. ONLY use a single hit as a resolution though. That way armor penetration is not messed up and combat losses are kept more or less in line.

Dynaman8789,

I like that idea as well with the 3 shots or 2 shots.. I'm using a 3 step loss mech:

3 steps = Full Battalion
2 steps = weak reduce Battalion
1 step = Reduced down to company size

The reason why i increase the firepower and armor was because if you look at hex & counter games, the larger the stacked unit the more strength and defense points they have against a weaker stack unit. I wanted to replicate that with Micro Armour mini's.

good idea. I have a rules set i invented. It is based on the platform that all units have two actions.( move twice, fire twice, move and fire ). Once it takes a penetrating hit. it is reduced to one action. Let me know what you think? Ilike your idea also.