"IABSM Questions" Topic

(Sorry, I had to start another thread because after the glitch, it seems I can't post to the original thread)
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For those who play IABSM

When the Big Man gives a platoon order to tanks, I'm not sure of the timing of when those orders are given. The example on page 17 says:

"Lott issues a Hunt Order and his platoon moves forward cautiously. On his next activation Lott's platoon advances with one Action per tank and then spots, identifying a force of Renault tanks.

Lott now issues an Engage order which halts his tanks and on their next activation will allow them to fire and spot more effectively."

The timing of these activations is confusing me. Does it work like this (I've included the tank cards for completion sake):

(1) Lott's card is drawn (1st time), he orders the tanks to Hunt and they do just that…
(2) The tanks' card is drawn (1st time), so they hunt, spot the enemy, and fire on the enemy
(3) Lott's card is drawn (2nd time), so he orders the tanks to engage – this halts the tanks hunting and ends their turn
(4) The tanks card is drawn (2nd time), now they will fire and spot enemies more effectively due to the engage order

Is that how the timing of it works?

Yes.
Orders issued on the big man's activation.

Thanks James

> Can a PAK40 or similar type weapon fire on infantry?

> Can infantry fire on a Big Man that has become separated from a unit?

> Can a unit in Overwatch, fire in the opponent's turn?

> Can a PAK40 or similar type weapon fire on infantry?

Yes, using the HE rules for the caliber of gun.

> Can infantry fire on a Big Man that has become separated from a unit?

Yes, though I don't know if it is specified that you still do the separate roll to see if the Big Man actually gets hit (my group has said that BMs by themselves do not get a separate roll and suffer whatever hits they get)

> Can a unit in Overwatch, fire in the opponent's turn?
Yes, they can stop a unit at any point during a move to shoot at them, they can also fire AFTER an enemy unit fires.

Thanks Dynaman

How exactly does the 'Hesitant Troops' card work? The way I read it, once it is pulled out, the next unit drawn out, hesitates.

So regardless of if the allies or the axis draws it out, it will affect whichever unit is next activated.

The hesitant troops card is specific to a force.

For example the British in the game are described as hesitant but the Germans are not.

So the next British card drawn would suffer the effects of the hesitant card and a German card would not.

Thank you Kiltboy

When you calculate kills, do you take into consideration single bases/stands as you go along, or to the unit as a whole?

I ask because this is what occurred just now:

I fired on a unit of 3 stands, and each stand was an MG42 with a crew of 5. However, I could only draw line of sight on one stand.

I delivered 2 kills so does that base/stand get reduced to a crew of 3 or do I apply those 2 kills to the unit as a whole?

Or in other words:

A US rifle squad is 10 men strong and is comprised of 3 stands. So is the rifle squad 10 strong or 30 strong? If the squad suffered 2 kills, would it drop the squad from 30 to 28 or from 10 to 8?

In your example above the squad is 10 men in total and could be 3 stands such as 3,3 and 4 men.

The rule for spreading fire on multiple targets within 2 inches would be to spread the casualties between the squads with attacker and defender alternating where the casualties occur.
As you can only fire at targets in your line of sight (assuming this is not an indirect fire) I would say only the target you can see would take the casualties.

kiltboy: "In your example above the squad is 10 men in total and could be 3 stands such as 3,3 and 4 men"

Something isn't clicking for me here.

IABSM Page 7: The Infantry Section or Squad
"Generally starting with between **8 and** 12 men, the section or squad operates together throughout the game."

IABSM Page 83: US Rifle Platoon One
"3 rifle squads of 10 men"

So going by the rules above, if a squad is between 8 and 12 men, and the above platoon has 3 rifle squads of 10 men each, isn't that 30 men in total, moving around and operating together?

And if the above squad takes 2 kills, isn't that a reduction of 30 to 28 men?

There are three squads to a platoon

Squad 1 is 8 men
Squad 2 is 10 men
Squad 3 is 10 men

The platoon is 30 but each squad is 10
the squads can spread out if they wish

xxx --- xxx – xxx with each X being a base with each – say 2" distance between them. What keeps them together is the need for the leaders to remove shock, so if a leader is far away from one squad and the squad takes shock it will start to become less effective.

After 2 kills a 10 man squad becomes an 8 man squad and the platoon would be

Squad 1 is 8 men
Squad 2 is 10 men
Squad 3 is 10 men

Ok just so I know I have this right (sorry, I really am new to all this)

Even though I might want to base my figures on a gaming table like this:

[4 figure on a base]-[5 figures]-[4 figures]

Even though there are 13 actual figures in that squad, the actual squad number is 10 men. The actual figures present on the bases represent a personal preference.

And 2 kills reduces that 10 men squad to 8.

That it?

Sounds correct. You can base however you like as long as you keep track of the actual number of figures left in each squad. In your case I would remove the 5 man base when you are down to 8 left in the squad.

What I normally do (in 6mm) is bases of 3 men and take away a base after three casualties. EDIT – and I have "spare change" individuals for less then three figures.

Correct,
What I do is I have collected various loose figures and based them singly so I have teams on bases and some loose figures to use as "change". This way I can move between different rules i.e. FoW, IABSM and CoC

David

Thank you.

Due to not being able to paint, and wanting to play something, I've been using rectangular pieces of card with the relevant info on those cards.

This is how I have been fielding a US Rifle Platoon. Keep in mind there's no actual figures on the rectangular card bases, it only has the printed info on them (for example "Rifle Squad 10 Men"):

I've been setting up like this:

But should I be setting up like this:

Again, ignore what's printed in the rectangle. The point I'm getting at is, if a single 'squad' is represented on the table by 3 bases with various figures on it, and I have 3 squads, shouldn't I be setting up as depicted in the bottom pic, not the top?

Yes,

The bottom organisaton would be correct with 3 bases for each squad.
It fits in nicely with some of the FoW blister packs.

Thank you kiltboy – much appreciated

This may be a daft question but…

Why 3 bases? Why not 2 bases or 4, or 5 even?

I understand that the actual number of figures on a base doesn't necessarily have to matter, but why 3 bases?

3 is just a handy way of breaking it down.

A battalion usually has 3 companies, a company has 3 platoons, a platoon has 3 squads and so forth.

More realistically, a squad would have 2 elements (rifle and gun group), but it really won't matter too much. They're just strength markers really.

Thanks Weasel

It makes sense from a historical perspective, but I think it's an important abstraction that could impact the rules too. Even though a 4 base squad might still have 10 men, the extra base means there's more target to be hit.

It doesn't have to be 3 bases; IABSM is completely agnostic as to how figures are based. For instance, I base my infantry 2 figures to a 25x20mm stand. So 4 stands make a German squad, or 5 for an American. My normal gaming buddy bases his troops for FOW, and we use a piece of pipe cleaner to show kills on his stand. You could also use a micro-die, but those tend to get lost or jostled.
BWW

I use 6mm for IABSM and I have 3-5 figures on a penny as a team within the squad, usually two such bases/teams making a squad – a maneuver element and a gun (LMG) element. Plus a Big Man if called for, on his own base.

Plus, like the others above, I have some "change".

Chris,
While you are learning the rules you might like to take a look at the Junior General site. It provides downloadable paper soldiers you can print out and use. In particular you can get some excellent top down images which you can print out to provide the bases of the figures you need. The US Armoured Rifle Company is a particularly fine example.

Just click on the Paoer Soldiers button in the top left, select Top down and WW2 and you will find a selection to choose from.
juniorgeneral.org

John

Thanks John

They do look good but they're stand up figures. I'm wondering how they'll work as top down figures. Literally just print them out and place flat on the table.

I'm getting a bit hung up on the whole force organisation thing. I'm not sure what or how many of what to place on the table.

For example, in Platoons 1, 2, and 3, aside from the 3 squads of 10 men, which we've discussed, there's also the following in the American force:

1 Bazooka team of men, so I assume a team here is one base of two men?

The Company HQ has 3 Bazooka teams of two men each. So three bases?

The Weapons Team consists of 3 2 MAN 60mm mortar teams, so 3 bases?

Also 2 0.30 MMG teams, 4 crew each, so 2 bases?

There's a few support platoons too, for example:

The Machine Gun Platoon has 4 M1917 MMGs with 5 crew each, so 4 bases?

The Mortar Platoon has 6 81mm mortars with 5 crew each, so 6 bases?

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Also (updated)

Incorrect Setup

Correct Set Up

Greetings

As noted above IABSM is agnostic about bases – some people base singly, others in groups. It doesn't matter. So don't get hung up on the bases.

As regards the US rifle company organisation what you deploy on table would be (per the rulebook):

CHQ: 2 big men (singles), 3 2-fig bazooka teams
3 rifle plts each: 1 big man (single); 3 squads of 10 men on whatever multiple of bases you want
1 weapons plt: 1 big man (single), 3 2-fig 60mm mortar teams, 2 4-fig .30 cal MMG teams

The support platoons from battalion would contribute a few individual weapons if that – so maybe 2 MMG in defence, a 57mm ATG in defence, mortars generally off table.

Suggest the TFL yahoo group or forum for more information.

Edward

@kustenjaeger – thanks for the info, I'll be joining the Yahoo Group soon, if approved.

Chris,
While most of the figures on Junior General are stand up figures, if you click on 'Top Down' in the list you will be directed to that part of the site where the soldiers are presented as figures on bases looked at from above.
Like game counters really.

Better on the eye than blank pieces of paper.

John

Ok thanks for the tip archdukek

It's me Chris68 from IABSM forum by the way. At the risk of driving you mad with my questions I decided to share my madness with TMP :D

No problem, I'd already worked that out! : )

@archdukek – cool :)

I have 3 rifle squads of 10 men each, and they are pretty close together as they are moving en masse.

They suffer 4 kills

Do you differentiate between the squad that took the damage and the squads that didn't take any damage, or do you just remove a 3 figure base and plonk down a red marker dice showing a '1' for the fourth kill (assuming you use dice to mark kills)?

I feel it might be important to know which squad is which due to the accumulation of shock and kills and how that affects firing, movement and Action dice. Or doesn't it matter?

In addition to the above post:

For example, seeing as I had all 3 squads close to each other, if/when one 'loses bottle', does that mean all 3 squads retreat or just the squad that has taken the damage?

Let me rephrase that

You have 2 rifle squads of 10 men each, close together on the battlefield. One rifle squad takes 4 kills.

Does it matter which squad you apply the kills to?

Considering 'Loss of Bottle', retreating and reduces action dice it seems to.

A related question, if you have 2 rifle squads up against a low war like this:

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[ 3 ] [ 4 ] [ 3 ]
[ 4 ] [ 3 ] [ 3 ]

And your opponent inflicts 4 kills, can I remove the [ 4 ] base from the squad in the rear or does it have to come from the front squad?

Also, if one of the above squads is forced to retreat, do both squads retreat because they are so close together?

The above question has been resolved

Thanks all

"2 MAN 60mm mortar"

Does the MAN stand for anything or is it supposed to be read as man as in 2 males?

Just 2 blokes.

Thanks Weasel

Rule Number One with TFL rules
Do what ever seems the most logical.

No really. I've gamed with Rich, and he is clear, if what seems right clashes with the rules, its what seems right that counts. (These are not his words, they are mine. I feel this is the strength of IABSM. Rules lawyers think it is the weakness. They are wrong.)

1) regarding base sizes. Relax. When me and SJ play it is usually NWE (occasionally Seelowe) We use 2 bases to the section. 1 stand = 4 men. We mark the losses in a teeny die. the only problem we have is I mark men remaining, and he marks men lost!

When we do Burma etc one side is 10 man sections, the other is 8 man. As long as both sides know what 1 base equals (ie 4 or 5 depending on side) it isn't a problem. So Japanese 5 men = 1 base.

With IABSM it is the men remaining that count. You could have just 1 base a section, as long as your opponent is happy you know how many men remain.

IABSM is all about the men remaining in a section. How you represent that section is down to you, as long as the right amount of action dice are applied. The rules literally don't give a flying blue #### about the toys, as long as the actual strength is known and used.

Remember, the rules say 8 for UK/German, 10 for US. They assume no section is full strength, for whatever reason, which is realistic – casualties don't stop the section, and Platoon and Coy HQ 'borrow'men. This is why they are lower than historical

1 Big Man per Platoon – 3 sections plus support.

2nd rule (directly implied by the first)
You can do what you think is right.,
So if you want to show there was high discipline, add the platoon sergeant, so 2 Big Men for that platoon.

THIS IS AN IMPORTANT LESSON

IABSM is very very moddable. You can muck about with the TOEs to your hearts content.

eg, if you want you can represent an elite force as
10-8 men – 4 AP (dice)
7-4 3 AP
3 men – 2 AP
2 Men – 1 AP

As long as the scenario works. The 'book values' are theor suggestion for bog standard.

Re the multi unit kill.

If a section is within 2 of another, any firing is at +2. However results are spread between all of those- if you are close enough to give the +2, then you get the 2nd kill/shock- Remember Shock and Kills are distributed independantly

Example

Unit X fires at unit A
Unit A is in 2" of unit B
Thus X fires, and adds 2 (for unit b in 2")

Result is 2 kills, 3 Shock
1st kill goes on A (as the target)
2nd Kill – firers discretion A or B

Then
1st Shock goes on A (as target)
2nd- firers discretion A or B
3rd – Defenders discretion A or B

Thank you for that in depth reply