"Skirmish vs Downsized Scenarios" Topic

Per Ochoin's expressed interest. (Thank you Ochoin.)
We're getting into types of scenarios lately, and into turning rules under which we maneuver squads or platoons into rules in which we command individual figures. A few thoughts:
1. The point at which we probably can't "downsize" rules meant for larger units is probably the point at which at least one figure in the game has to represent an individual. Of course, most of these, were there not a war in progress, would be criminal offenses--
Assassination
Kidnapping
Jailbreaks
Robbery
Sabotage
Hunting people for sport
Flight to avoid prosecution
Duelling

Yeah, I know: we don't see them that way. But who of us would hesitate to
Command four or five castings to do in Reinhard Heydrich?
Lead Delta Force trying to capture Mohammed Farrah Aidid?
Command Paras to steal a German radar set?
Spring Princess Leia from her cell?
Blow up the Bridge over the River Kwai?
Make a game out of "Rogue Male?"
Escape from New York? (Or LA, Constantinople or Troy?)
Play arena combat (or Chess or Jetan with figures for pieces defending their squares?)

Those, I think, are the most obvious and defensible cases. A little hazier would be
Ambushes
Seizing and holding very small bits of key terrain
Trying to sort out guerillas from civilians, and
Very small last stands.

And there you go: an even dozen for skirmish/RPGs. And now you have a use for those half dozen figures you bought at a convention because they looked so nice which don't belong with any of your armies.

Now, tell me what other possibilities I've missed--please!

RP, reconnaissance is the big omission. Not fighting to destroy the enemy, but to find out something and get home with the information. A good one would be French Marquis reconnoitering a Nazi V2 site.

Courier or messenger missions? Getting a person, document, codebook, relic, or diplomatic packet from A to B while someone else tries to stop you. Three Musketeers evading the Cardinal's Guards whilst taking a letter to Milord Buckingham.

Exploration. Finding the source of the Nile, crossing a mountain range, mapping an island, entering a lost city, exploring a derelict spaceship or simply seeing what's over the next hill. A tribe of suspicious natives and wild animals would be a challenge for European explorers in Darkest Africa.

One other observation: you've listed several scenarios by method ("ambush", "last stand") and several by objective ("kidnapping", "sabotage"). The list gets even longer if you separate the two. A reconnaissance mission, for example, might end in an ambush; a rescue mission might become a last stand; a sabotage mission might require infiltration. Mixing objectives and methods is often where the most memorable skirmish games come from.

I hope this helps.

Yes, I am interested in that sort of thing! Just a single scout or two, creeping up to a house or barn, and the dog starts barking.

All interesting possibilities, thank you. In my own defense, I had thought of intelligence gathering. But it's a problem from a wargame standpoint: if you do it right, there's no combat. A GM can intervene, of course, but it tends to create bad feelings. Might work well for solo, though. The same applies to couriers, who I hadn't considered at all. Exploration, though, is just recon against people who don't know they're foreigners yet.

And fully agree about mixed forms. But when I was counting the options for full-scale battles, I was counting Grant's pure forms, so I used the same standard here.

The usual blow up or capture the radio station, derail a train, ambush a supply column, There's some interesting stuff you can do with watercraft.

I used to work with a guy who was a force recon marine in Vietnam. If they had to fire their weapons, that meant something went wrong.

Those scenarios all seem more like adventures or film scripts. If you want a someone scouting for information, the classic that is so often referred to in memoirs is a tank commander scouting out the terrain and potential opposition on foot. Sometimes a couple of them will go.
I read about an instance just yesterday in Brothers in Arms by James Holland.

True, BillyNM--but what we do on a tabletop isn't warfare. In real warfare, you very seldom see nice balanced scenarios. We want everyone to roll lots of dice and stand a roughly equal chance of winning. I'd shoot any general with such ideas. What they should want is a battle in which the enemy never stood a chance.

Same thing with recon: in an ideal recon, you collect the necessary information and come home without your presence even being suspected. Excellent warfare but not much of a game for the side being scouted.

I've been a wargamer for 60+ years, and I spent 40+ of them in and around the military. There are many important differences.

I usually run "no shoot" games as a gm with multiple players on the active side. 0200 i haven't played but sounds that way or at least set up for it. SOE is one I have but haven't played yet. Usually nobody but me would want to play the "target". I probably could make it more gamey where either could win but find it easier to just gm it.

robert piepenbrink Your comments on reconissance are massively oversimplified at least for some countries. They have such things as reconnisance in force which is aimed at obtaining information by force. it is expected that the units will fight for the information. The US has such a policy in addition to stealth reconnisance.

Stealth reconnisance is ideal in some cases if it is long term and is most commonly done by night. Well up to the arrival of large numbers of drones and satalite reconnisance. The SAS spent far more time watching roads in the desert un-detected counting passing traffic. |Indeed we had a scenarios where this was vital as it supplied data on which routes had large forces stationed along them by watching the volume of suppies going down them. However such information does not show where the forces are in detail just what is bejond some point. Even we found this dat vital in some long games.

in a shorter game its about fining where the enemy actually is and is not. One of our friends noted a relative who was in an armoured car unit, said if you drove through a village and somebody fired it was occupied. If they did not then it was either unoccupied or occupied with good troops who did not want to disclose their presence. All good grist to the sccenario mill for game oriented players.

Lots of die rolling is certainly not our idea of an enjoyable games, so agin it depends on the audience.

Many reconnisance forces have a a screening mission aimed at eliminating enemy close in reconnisance before it gets to see the engagement area in detail. Such scenarios for us make for fertile ground for scenarios as they often start with light mobile forces which makes for intereting games if not visually very spectacular, but being players not painters this is of no concern.

I like to game and run small unit games. Rogers Rangers, Nam LRRPs, SOG, SAS, SEALs, navigation. Avoidance of contact. Etc.

I like getting stuff on the table but often the more jntersting stuff is how you get there and what happens after…