Colours, Pipes, Drums, Whistles?and Bugles were all about command
and control. The introduction of radio nets improved the battalion/company
co-ordination but not the Platoon/section situation.
The
use of musical instruments by the British is symptomatic of their Regimental
structure, platoons from different regiments would probably want to fight each
other rather than co-ordinate an attack against the enemy.
The
German army was used to forming ad hoc fighting groups from all arms that fought
as a co-coordinated unit without the need of the dreaded MkVI alpine horn or
it's paratroop equivalent the airborne airhorn, incidentally the tactical symbol
for this elite support platoon is often confused with the Army Post
Office.
As to
the Gurkha's, the thing that scared the shit out of their opponents was that at
night you couldn't hear them coming and when you could see them?they all
seemed intent on cutting your head off with a large knife.
Assuming our rules reflect the various command and
control?characteristics of the different nationalities it seems appropriate
to include the factors that contributed to them.
?
Alan?
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However
getting into national characteristics is what
the rules are about.? We
use a number of factors to
differentiate each nation, giving certain
bonuses,
using different numbers of Big Men to reflect the
effectiveness
of their command and control.? Indeed
certain cards are unique to
specific nationalities, so
why come to a sudden stop when we come to the
pipes.?
These Scots troops will already have better factors
as
they are good troops, but I still feel that the pipes
should receive
some benefit on the tabletop.? Indeed
if you show me another musical
instrument that was
used in a similar fashion then I'll apply it to
that
as well.? In fact on D-Day there were plenty of
officers who
took hunting horns along, not just for
some show of bravado, but because it
was an effective
way of communication.? Major Howard at Pegasus
bridge
being a classic example.?
I am less bothered about the
pluses in melee than I am
about the co-ordination effect, all that will do
is in
lessen the chance of the attack bogging down by
allowing an
officer who is leading an attack by his
Platoon to use the pipes to move
all of that? unit.
He could use this for no actions other than a
general
advance, and only if all of his Platoon was in a
fairly tight
radius.? Equally I would say that this is
not something he would be
able to switch on and off.
Rather like the old "It's a Knockout" Joker it
should
only be used once, i.e. for the main attack.???
Again, with Ghurka's these would have the bonuses of
being elite
troops (a bit like the aggressive troop
bonuses that the White Russian
Officer Regiments get
in TOW) but they would lack the co-ordinating
benefit
that musical accompaniment brings. As such they would
only move
en masse when their Platoon card was played,
and not on any Big Man
card.??
I like the idea of Nick's comments being
well
researched.? He probably got that quite from this
week's copy
of The Victor in which his latest fish
supper was wrapped!??
Rich
--- mikeqchromeuk@... wrote: > Lards
>
> I tend to agree with Dazza, getting into national
>
characteristics is a
> minefield. We can find similar descriptions
for
> other troops eg Ghurka's who
> didn't need pipes for the
bad guys to be panicking!
> Nick's well researched
> descriptions
are classic descriptions of aggressive
> troops going into action,
> so aggressive troops bonus would seem correct.
> Mick
>
>?
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