"General D'armee mods" Topic

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Amicalement

This is mainly directed to those familiar with the rules but feel free to weigh in if you have an opinion.

I don't feel the need to change very much at all of these Napoleonic rules.

However, there are a couple of areas I'd like to consider.
1.Moving in column. The rules differentiate between Column of Attack (or Column of Divisions) & Column of Companies. The former mostly for the battlefield, the latter mostly for manoeuvre. However, both sorts move equal distances. Is it OK to give a Column of Companies a slight movement bonus (it gets all sorts of negative features such as unable to charge etc)?
2.Rocket firing. I love my British rocket battery and the rules make no mention of this moderately useless weapon. Any suggestions as to possible rules I could graft on?

A column of companies should be able to move faster because it can squeeze through smaller openings. Most of the time this difference was very real and ubiquitous.

Put it into your terrain.

Make a column of divisions or a line stop for a moment to move part of the line to behind the clear part of the unit and back to its position. Not the full penalty of the movement, but maybe a quarter of it.

Best Rocket Battery Rules I've ever read were in Legacy of Glory I. I'm sitting in an airport and cant check them but IIRC they involved standing back from the table about 9 feet and firing an elastic band at your target to simulate the accuracy, or lack of it.

+1 nsolomon99. I remember that, too.

My understand for that level of play.
Column of company would be quicker through terrain and used for charges through/in a defile or BUA road entrances or in the case of British tactics, move quick to a position then wheel the companies to form line quickly ( same or less penalty than how the rules address attack column change to line).

That right I have LOG and building Rocket team- will need to revisit the rule book. Like that idea of the rubber-band method!!!

MG

Here's the rocket rule I use for my Moghul and Hindu armies in DBR. Throw a D10 dice, with 9 or 10 being a hit and 1 to 8 being a miss. If it's a miss then roll a directional die ( the one with arrows ) adjacent to the target and also a D10. The rocket travels along the arrow for x times whatever you choose —we use element base widths. This system can have the rocket turn back and hit its firers! The strength it hits with is up to you but you might want to disorganize horse units that suffer a hit or a near miss. It certainly adds spice to the game.

"A column of companies should be able to move faster because it can squeeze through smaller openings. Most of the time this difference was very real and ubiquitous"

I do not think Napolonic units squeezed themselves anywhere, I think this belief is the cuase fo many of the strange battlefields we see in wargames, where the table is wall to wall with units.
Most commanders in cuólumn would hesitate to place themselves in a position wher they did not have deployment room. Not allowing columns to close to each other witout negative modifiers forces players to act more historically.

But in a game we have to abstract certain things because our bases cannot expand or constrict frontage, and in the timescale of a turn a lot of smaller scale manoeuvre could happen.

For the British Rockets. I'd fire them just like light guns but only apply the DT and FC results. No casualties.

Thanks for the replies.

I would think you must have *some* differentiation between to 2 column forms or why have them? Billfan's idea of penalising the column of divisions seems very workable.

And thomalley's rocket rules aligns well with the ethos of "G D'a".