These rules are slated as skirmish rules for the French & Indian War.
First off, I have read through the rules, but have not played them yet, so this review should be tempered by that fact. I always find it amazing how many games seem straightforward until you play them, which is when you start to notice the subtleties.
The rules are 1:1 scale, but they are best termed as "quasi-skirmish" – sort of like "The Sword and the Flame". Each model has three characteristics: Marksmenship, Valor, and Courage. Fortunately, models have standardized statistics by model type (i.e. all Indian Warriors have the same values, all Indian Leaders have another, etc.), but it leaves the door open for special stats for personalities. By the way, Valor is your melee stat, marksmanship your shooting stat, and courage your morale stat. The stat values are 1-10 and is the number required (or less) in order to pass an associated test. So, Rangers with a Marksmenship of 6 essentially have a 60% of getting a "hit" (see Firing later).
This game alternates between each side moving one unit (not model) at a time. However, there are several twists to their sequencing. First, both sides roll 1D10 and add their leader's Courage; the highest side has initiative. Having initiative means you get to choose one unit to act next. But, here's the twist: you can choose one of your units OR one of your enemy's units. (I can't wait to see that one in play. It feels like it will have a significance someday.) If your unit is called upon to act it cannot hold its action; it must either do something for the turn or lose its chance.
Once a unit activates, it resolves movement, firing, and melees before the next player gets to choose a unit to activate. You may fire before moving (i.e. fire and run away), or after, but melee always comes last. Here is twist #2: the inactive player may opportunity fire against the moving unit and that fire does not count as their activation (i.e. you can still take your turn if you haven't done so already and you can do it if you have already activated). Understand, there are some penalties to firing for taking this free action, and it can only be done against Marching or Double-Timing units (i.e. faster moving), but it is a good way to handle reactions in You Go I Go games.
Movement is interesting in that you have movement "steps" (speeds) which affect firing. You can Hold, which is not really a step, as it assumes you are not moving, Displace (small adjustment movement), March (most common speed), and Double-Time. Which "order" (my term) you choose determines: how far you can go, and how much you can fire.
It is in the Hold rules that I found the first "hole". The unit does not move, but it allows individual models to move up to 2" – the idea being that it is "to adjust the position of a few models" – but it never defines "a few". So, it is possible for the unit to "not move", but for all of the models "to adjust" up to 2" each. The reason this is important is that a "unit which does not move" may perform volley fire. Clearly, a unit on Hold orders can Volley, but how many models adjusting does it take to be considering unit movement rather than model adjustment? I wish they had simply limited the unit's move to 2" and said that a unit on Hold could Volley.
A unit can Displace by moving up to 3". This order is important because the unit cannot change facing unless it Displaces, thus denying it the ability to Volley. A unit can March up to 6" and can still fire. Note however that a March can trigger opportunity fire from the defender. Finally, Double Time allows the unit to move 9". All of this movement, of course, is modified by terrain.
A unit also has a leader with a Command Radius (equal to its Courage stat), which all other models in the unit must stay within. A model outside of the radius can do nothing other than run to catch up to its unit.
Firing is interesting and very unique (at least I have never seen it, but I don't play a lot of quasi-skirmish rules). The basics are that you measure range from unit to unit (i.e. closest model to closest model); if they are in range then all of the models in the unit are eligible to fire. (By the way, to compare firing to movement, muskets fire with a 15" range, or 2.5 turns of marching. I consider this upside-down for Horse & Musket games.) In order to "hit", you roll 1D10 and want to score less than or equal to your marksmenship stat. When you get a "hit" you have to determine if it is a "wounding hit" by rolling against the weapon's damage rating. A musket, for example, wounds on a 8 or less using a 1D10.
Sounds pretty standard so far, right? Twist #3: the number of models that can fire is determined by the "volume of fire" the unit chooses to unload with. Volley firing allows all models to fire, whereas a simple "Fire!" allows 1/2 of the models, and "Fire at Will!" allows up to 3 models. Each of these volumes represents the percentage of the troops that are firing and thus what percentage are currently unloaded. Thus, volleying allows you to get one big bang!, but it leaves you unloaded for the longest time. "Fire at Will!" is a constant stream of fire (less time waiting to reload), but the volume is reduced, as is the morale impact upon the target. "Fire!" assumes that you are firing by sections, ranks, files, or whatever and is a compromise between the two.
So, reloading is very abstracted. Although all of the men should be reloading at roughly the same speed, each of the fire volumes represents the percentage unloaded. It does this with a cute little gimmick of using cotton balls to represent the amount of smoke: four balls (Volley fire) means no one can fire; 2 balls ("Fire!") means you still have 1/2 of the men available; and 1 ball ("Fire at Will!") means pretty much most people can fire.
It is important to understand this concept. If you have four smoke balls, you cannot fire. Firing produces 4, 2, or 1 (once*) smoke balls depending upon the volume of fire (Volley, Fire!, or Fire at Will!). Each turn that you do not fire or move more than 6" (i.e. Double-Time) you can remove 1 smoke ball (reload). So it is possible to Volley, Fire! twice, Fire! then Fire at Will! forever, etc. * Note: Fire at Will! only adds 1 smoke ball if the unit currently has NO smoke balls. You can effectively Fire at Will! forever, as long as you don't have four smoke.
When a unit is fired upon, even if no casualties were taken, it must check morale. (The exception is that skirmishers which inflict no casualties do not cause a morale check.) The advantage to firing at the higher volumes – besides having more models firing – is that a unit will check morale with a penalty when fired upon (-2 for Volley and -1 for Fire!).
Melee is fairly standard except that, unlike many skirmish games (at least the ones that I used to play), morale plays a part. The charger must check morale (roll Courage or less) in order to charge. If successful, the charge unit must roll Courage or fall back.
Here is hole #2: a unit can fire, then charge, but if you fail your courage roll, it is unclear as to whether you can fire or not. (I assume you can; failing the courage charge means failing to move the rest of the turn.)
The interesting things about the morale checks – and most die roll modifiers in this game – is that pluses do not increase your chance to succeed, they only reduce the penalties. In other words, if your Courage is a 6 and you have a +1 modifier, you still need to roll a 6 or less. That means that stats are the absolute best a model can achieve. I sort of like that.
Again, like firing, melee is fought unit to unit, so if one model contacts, all models are in the fight. Models fight in initiative order, which is 1D10 plus modifiers due to the weapon. If you kill a model with a lower initiative, it cannot swing back. Melee is resolved until one side is wiped out. (Yes, it is VERY bloody!)
Fixed bayonets have an advantage in melee: first, they boost the morale of the charger; second, they lower the morale of the charged; and third, if the defenders have fixed bayonets they strike first. These are interesting rules in that they never give exceptions if the other side also has bayonets (i.e. if a bayonet-to-bayonet fight, defenders with fixed bayonets still have a less chance of standing their ground, but if they do, they strike first, not the attacker with bayonets). All in all, I like the effect that it reduces the chance of the defender standing around to get stuck, but I think overall the chance for a melee is probably still too high.
When it comes to morale, the rules are fairly standard. The unit rolls morale using the highest Courage in the unit (I think it should always be the leader's). A "1" always succeeds and a "10" always fails (yes, there are units with a "10" morale!). The most common modifier will be the "-1 for each casualty suffered" and those giving for firing with Volley or Fire!. Essentially, failing a morale check causes a Disruption to the unit. Disrupted units in the open must move towards cover if it is within their Command Radius. (This part is strange, as units with lower Courage – and thus a lower Command Radius – will tend NOT to go to cover than will units with higher Courage.) A unit Disrupted twice will Fall Back and once Disrupted three times will Rout!.
Possible hole #3: Disrupted units strike last in melee, which is strange as Disrupted units also automatically fail the Courage check to stand against the charge, so I am not sure how you can melee a Disrupted unit.
Units remove Disruption by rallying at the start of it activation (by the way, a unit which has not activated and gets Disrupted automatically loses that turn's activation – ouch!). You basically roll an unmodified Courage roll. If you have more than one Disruption marker, roll for each. You can't act until you remove them all.
The last part of the rules are the unit formations. This section actually clarifies statements in the earlier sections, so read it thoroughly. The three formations are: Formed, Loose, and Skirmisher.
Formed units have a lot of negatives (can't use light cover, can be flanked, limited fire arc, etc.) and only have two benefits: can Volley and increased morale (but for European Regulars only). In fact, the increased morale benefit is so big, it provides the player with enough incentive to get them to use the historical formations.
A Loose formation has a slightly better fire arc, but its volley firing does not add the -2 morale penalty to the target and it has no benefits to morale.
A Skirmisher formation has a 360° fire arc and cannot be flanked in melee. It also has no movement penalties from terrain (except impassable). The big difference is that fire from skirmishers which do not inflict hits cause no morale checks.
The booklet also includes about 10 pages of background history and scenarios for the Delaware War against the English and 4 pages of stats for the combatants. Finally, there are a few design notes and optional rules.
Overall, I like the rules. The "holes" are very minor and I think players can easily come to a gentleman's agreement on how to handle those three areas I identified. I like alternating activations and I think the ability to force your opponent to activate first – at the expense of having one of yours activate later – is a novel approach.
I like the idea of handling reloading and allowing the player to choose the method of firing. Do you want to be like British Regulars and fire a full volley, then lower the bayonets and charge? Or would you rather fire at 1/2 firepower, then continue to send a stream of fire as the men fire at will? Or perhaps even start out at firing at will while continuing to maneuver your units (firing on the move)?
The rules are ripe for all kinds of additions like cavalry (touched upon the optional rules for mounted officers), canoes, ambushes and hidden movement, etc. If you look through the scenarios you will notice rules for torching the old farmstead too, so you can get an idea of the possibilities.
I think these rules would make for some interesting quasi-skirmish games in other Horse & Musket periods too, like Napoleonics, the American War of Independence, and the Seminole Wars. All in all, they look to be very fun.
paints brigs for the British fleet.