Today, I'm having a look at Pickett's Charge, a set of rules for the Anerican Civil War written by David CR Brown and published by Reisswitz Press.
And that is because after the summer game, Tin Soldiers of Antwerp are running an ACW mega game and I'll be joining in, using this ruleset.
While I have played quite a few rulesets over the decades of wargaming (the ACW remains by far my favorite historical period) with Johhny Reb 3, Altar of Freedom, Black Powder Glory Hallelujah and Crusade's rules, I never looked or played this one. Well, time to have a first glance and study then!
The book is 84 pages, and I obtained the digital version from Too Fat Lardies. And the first thing I went looking for is that most important thing of historical rules: basing conventions! Years ago, I made the mistake as a by origin Warhammer player to base individually, and currently while restoring my Union army I'm rebasing on 40x40 with 4 figs a stand. So let's see how these rules, made for divisional up to corps level gaming, like the models based. And the good news is, there isn't really any! Base sizes aren't essential to the game, and a game unit should just consist of three to six bases on average. Which is great, as I usually go for 5 bases, or a unit of 20 figures as such, because that looks the best in my opinion at 28mm scale.
Your army starts with a C-in-C to be selected, the highest ranking general in your force who commands the army through the use of his staff officers to relay messages to his brigade generals, and he will be Auspicious, a West Pointer or a Politician, which influences how many Staff Officers they have to command their brigades. You will have one Staff Officer for each brigade, modified by the quality of your C-in-C. The brigade generals on the other hand are the ones doing the actual "on the ground" actions with the said brigades, whom also vary in quality and ease to order around and get things done. Every brigade is made up of a varrying amount of regiments, each with a varrying amount of bases.
For example, the Iron Brigade at Gettysburg would have 5 regiments, of which 2 are 4 bases strong, 2 have 5 bases and 1 has 6 bases, ranging between Elite and Veteran quality.
While the standard game unit regiment is 5 bases, this as can be seen above can vary as such, and the very large ones of 7 or 8 (or more!) bases can be split in 2 batallions, done before turn 1, but you can have small units as well. The game offers basing SUGGESTIONS, not must do's, like for cavalry a frontage of 20mm or 30mm per figure. The units range from Elite to Green, and the system works with a Unit Casualty system, or "hit points" that are inflicted.
Depending on the size of the starting unit, they gain levels of casualties as they are hit, and this influences the morale of the unit until they decide to leg it of the field of battle (or wiped out, or stopped becoming an effective fighting unit, whatever you like to call it). They can move in the classic ways, Line, Double Line, Attack Column, etc etc. As you deploy, you can either put units at the front as Commited or at the back as Reserves, and they are not allowed to overlap or intermix at that point, pride of the officer in charge is a thing!
The game itself runs on the use of Staff Officers, to see if they are available and can do the things the C-in-C wants to be done on the field of battle by relating the orders to the Brigade Generals. Things like Charges, Movement etc are all relayed this way. They are the most important pieces in the game, forming the connection between your plan as C-in-C and the fact if your units actually do what you want during the turn. But then you also need to roll to see if the brigade actually interprets the orders, which becomes harder if the brigade is dispersed over the course of the game. Like in real war, and especially the American Civil War with hastily (or polically!) appointed generals, it can become a chaos of brigades not doing what you want!
The rest of the rules are pretty common practice for a rank-and-file ACW game system, nothing to spectacular or new in the rules that seasoned players or even new ones wouldn't pick up swiftly. Movement that impedes firing skill, charge restrictions, supports to the charge and the likes. There are modifiers for combat depending on the skill level of the opposing units, and this all amounts to the number of casualties inflicted, as well as how the morale of the units hold up.
Further rules include the impact of terrain on movement and the likes, and the changing of formations, as well as skirmishers.
Morale of course is the big decider in this game, together with the ability to order your units in the first place is where battles are won or lost. Take heavy casualties, and your force might melt as snow under the sun as units start to rout or retreat. Sometimes, but unlikely, they will go "above and beyond", but more often then not units under heavy assault will start to fall apart and your line might risk to collapse, spelling disaster.
Some larger game rules are also included, as is some introductionary scenario's, but this covers about the contents of the book and in large lines what the game is about on an "engine" matter of affair. It also has a points values system, but in historicals I feel you must aim to scenario and narrative play actually, so just let this thing lie to your left.
A good looking set of rules for certain, and I'll be having a hand at them as I said later in the year, so expect a big battle report in september!
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