"Blown Infantry?????" Topic

I have seen rules that include "blown" cavalry that must either rest/regroup after a charge or suffer a penalty. I have never seen it but has anyone seen a rule set that covers the same thing for infantry units, involved in extended fire fights or more likely, extended melee?
I also am curious from those that have read more, know more than me is that something worth representing(on the battalion level)? It seems logical to me that if an infantry unit(regardless of quality)is involved in 10-20 mins+ of hand to hand combat the unit is going to get tired, out of formation, etc and if they see they are about to be charged again, with out time to recover, might not be as willing to "go another round".
BUT, may be the troops of this time were conditioned and trained to be a meat grinding machine that could keep on fighting for an extended length of time with out getting tired or greatly disorganized?
So, thoughts, opinions, anyone seen a rule set that covers this for infantry as well as Cav??? Sorry if this has been talked about in another link, but obviously was on my mind. Thanks. Happy gaming!

Does it have to be called "blown"?
What if a post melee morale test makes it "Disordered"?
It can still fight, but at a lesser value. It cannot declare a charge. It can recover full effect (minus losses), but only by doing nothing, or by taking another morale test.
I've seen a lot of similar states, but going by different names in different rules.

Same as Winston … I have seen "fatigued" and "disordered." If a disordered infantry unit is charged, it will roll to stand and, if it stands, will fight at a reduced effectiveness.

Yeah – another vote for 'Disordered' – covers a multitude of sins…

Well, obviously a different name can be used, honestly fatigued stands out to me in the context of the question I asked, I just used "blown" cause I have heard it so much but only about Cav.
However, more to the point, sounds like you guys agree that it makes sense that an infantry unit would get tired/disorganized "Fatigued" and if forced into another or a continuing melee(in the next turn) that they would begin to suffer in both morale, and ability to affectively fight? Seems realistic to me for the battalion scale but wanted to ask.
As a side note, a friend of mine that's a police officer told me he was taught in the academy that the "average" person has an adrenalin rush and can fight "full out" for 30-60 seconds before starting to get tired. While a trained soldier would obviously be in better health I would think after 10-20 mins of continual "hand to hand" fighting even they would be tired, out of breath, somewhat disoriented, etc. Thanks all.

My feeling is that "blown" refers to the fatigued state of the horses, rather than a generic disorder/morale failure of the troopers. Indeed you can force infantrymen to attack even if they are fatigued. Try to charge with a fatigued horse is simply pointless.

I think the distinction is different in that a tired man can recover to a certain extent even over a short period of time to rest… but a tired horse can not. Forcing an exhausted horse may even kill it. Except in extreme weather, or very extended physical exertion without rest, men don't reach that state of exhaustion.

So "blown" cav really means horses in a long state of fatigue and practically useless, "disordered" is probably more accurate for infantry in a more temporary, perhaps recoverable, state that may be fatigue, disorganization, or failing morale.

no expert advice from me, just a point of view :)

Chalfant

As an ex-equestrian sport rider, I'll say Chalfant is
correct.

There's a reason why some equestrian events are 3-days.
The Dressage usually is day 3, while the cross-country
is usually day 1. Overnight, the horses will be rested
enough to do the stadium jumping event on day 2.

Generally, events not requiring intense effort (like
ride and ties) are not as hard on the animals, but the
effort and athleticism necessary in a cross-country or
roads and tracks event are very wearing on a horse.

So 'blown' is appropriate for cav, while 'disorder'
is appropriate for infantry.

BTW, mules are smarter than horses and generally will
not exert themselves to the point of exhaustion, although
there can be exceptions. No mules in the cavalry, though,
unless Wilder's Lightning Brigade counts (some were
mule-mounted).

guess it depends on the "scale" length of turns your rule set uses I believe our rule of choice used a 10-15 minute time frame and only nearly matched melee had a chance of being a "stand " about a 3rd of the time meaning another turn of being occupied other wise a winner and loser happened

Armati, counts number of fatigue points concurrent with rounds of melee.
Once the unit has reached its break point number it is fatigued. EG: a unit in melee with a break point of 3, fights in 3 turns of melee loosing 1 and winning 2. It is now fatigued and fights all subsequent melees as fatigued.
To remove the fatigue it must not move or engage in melee for one turn.

A "Blown" horse, will become difficult to control, will "fight the bit" (the metal bar in the mouth used for steering.) Essentially the unit is done until the horses are back under control. It's more than a temporary state of disorder. It's not quite being 'routed' in the sense of the unit dispersing, although there are elements of this. It does mean that the unit is probably done for the day.

Again, thanks for the info, as of now I place a disordered ring on Cav after one charge/contact melee and the turns do represent roughly 15min. Sounds like that is realistic and perhaps not worry about infantry.

We have used "disordered", "shaken", and up to "rout/retreat" for morale. We keep is simple and standard across the board. We use it as a step process where each negative reaction, for instance, the cavalry moves full distance, which would make them disordered or even a -1 penalty. It

I think there are a number of rules where you must spend some time rallying after a charge, or perhaps not charge two turns in a row without penalty. And so on.

WRG's 7th edition ancient rules had a detailed system that recorded 'fatigues' that could be accumulated by fighting and the act of making some charges and moves.

IIRC the scale went 0-4 Fresh 5-14 Tired 15+ exhausted (which was v bad). From memory cavalry could make 2 charges as fresh, assuming there were no combat hits.

I've heard dark-age (and similar) re-enactment people say that 'combat' was often lines 10 metres or so apart hurling insults and weapons followed by periods of joining together for hand-strokes before the lines separated back to their 10 metres gap.

It all happens a bit organically rather than ordered – but it gave time for rest. The more confident / proficient side tending not to be the one backing off and after a while they just kept engaging until the other line broke up.

Which is a long way of saying that the time scale of your game is important if you want to measure such things.

David F Brown

Didn't "Empire" use fatigued and blown for all units that had lost 20% and 40% of their initial strength? I seem to remember that from many years ago…