Civil War for the hexagonally challenged
...
With the resurgence of point-to-point movement systems proliferating
everywhere at WBC, everyone thinks they are looking at something
original with each new offering. Sorry, grognards, but A
House Divided was there first, and this year was the 20th
anniversary of publication. The tournament attendance was up
i, as people were looking for a quick game to get under their
belts before their afternoon semifinals took place. Attendance
was 18 in 1999; 12 in 2000; and back up to 16 in 2001. Thanks
to all who voted the game back into the century this year, and
we look forward to seeing you next year.
We
began this year with a one-hour introduction to the game at Café
Jay at 9:00 am Saturday. Much to my surprise, several people
actually attended, from novices who wanted to learn about an
excellent system to veterans looking for a refresher course after
many years. After that, the tournament began with a review of
rules and policies, as well as a democratic vote on which options
to apply.
One option proposed was a duplicate system, whereby all boards
operate on the same roll for marches. This was quickly vetoed
by the masses, who showed no interest in having to rely on someone
else's luck! On the other hand, another proposal, known as the
rule of 7, was implemented in order to minimize the luck
element regarding moves and recruiting. This simple rule states
that the sum of your marches die roll and your recruiting die
roll in a month is always seven. There were some concerns that
this rule would penalize the Confederates, who never seem to
have enough troops to recruit anyway, but as it turns out that
wasn't the case.
As in previous years, the tournament started off with the
1861 scenario, but unlike last year, players chose to retain
that scenario throughout the day due to the imbalance of the
others. In most of the games, the Union player was forced to
aggressively invade the south in order to take cities, and the
avenues of approach were usually the same. The three routes,
from east to west were Northern Virginia, through Kentucky, and
down the Mississippi. All three of these are subject to march
rolls, and it was a fortunate player who was able to pull off
two successfully, let alone all three. Of course, a die roll
of 6 on marches means the Union player can conduct an invasion,
which is a cheap way of picking up one or two point cities.
For the Union, in the east, a successful assault at Manassas
can lead to quick hopes of getting the Union player to Richmond,
or, at the very least, preventing the Confederate from getting
to Washington. In the central, Union troops try to get Louisville,
build up some cavalry, and stop the rebel cavalry from scurrying
around the Midwest. The last option in the west calls for a
Union buildup in Cairo, Illinois, then leapfrogging down the
Mississippi to Memphis, Vicksburg if possible, and Baton Rouge
and New Orleans if you live right.
Unfortunately for the Union player, the Confederate has his
own agenda, and is more than able to cause disruption to the
Union plans. In at least one game, Washington fell, causing
an immediate win for the Confederates and horrible shame for
the Union. Baltimore was taken in several games, which can cause
real headaches for the Union, as it is a Confederate recruiting
city. Of course, this would be a good time to point out that
city control is the last thing that occurs in a turn, meaning
that the Confederates had to hold Baltimore (or in the West,
Cairo) for at least a turn before they can rebuild troops there.
But that was not the worst! In several games before the finals,
Confederate forces captured Philadelphia, Atlantic City, and
even New York.
What started out as a double elimination format actually ended
up being run as a Swiss-Elim tournament, since a couple of the
games ran longer than planned, disrupting start times for later
rounds. Advancing to the 9:00 pm Saturday semi finals were Rick
Young, at 3-1; David Metzger, at 3-1; Robert Mull, at 3-1 and
Phil Rennert, 4-0. After some scheduling compromises and arranged
times, the two semifinal games were completed late Saturday night,
with Confederate wins, as usual. With respect to battlefield
luck, your beloved GM probably fared worse than most, going into
battle and having five hits inflicted on five units in the first
defensive fire!
The Sunday morning final had undefeated (5-0) Phil Rennert
facing off against 1999 champion, David Metzger (4-1). Both
sides wanted the Union, but the die roll found Phil taking his
usual position as the rebels. Early in the game, the Union invaded
Charleston and entrenched, a tough proposition for the south.
On turn 6, Lee moved west and north to Franklin, supported by
cavalry galloping from Decatur to Roanoke, threatening to walk
around Washington and into New England. The North rolled 6, brought
in all available forces (even forgoing the invasion), and amassed
a larger army. Then the South rolled 2, and could only evade
west to Chillicothe.
The next turn the North rolled 6 again, and the big army went
by rail to Pittsburgh; but due to rule of 7, the North couldn't
raise its new April draftees. In its turn, the South rolled
6, took the Ohio River cities (Cincinnati, Louisville, and Evansville)
with a force in Columbus, slowed the Pittsburgh army with skirmishing
cavalry in Wheeling, and cavalry-jumped into Baltimore. The North
again rolled 6, squashed the Baltimore raid, recalled the Memphis
force to Cairo and with draftees, built an anvil to match the
hammer now in Wheeling. However, the South rolled 5, just enough,
and spread out from Columbus to grab Fort Wayne, Cleveland, Canton,
and Pittsburgh; this put the South's army maximum over the North's
by one, resulting in an automatic win for the undefeated champion.
Even if it hadn't exceeded the North's maximum, they would
have had difficulty retaking eight points on turn 10 of the final.
The tournament revealed that the 10-turn scenario rewards strategies
that would be suicide in the campaign game. In terms of balance,
it seemed that the Confederates won most of their games, but
almost half of those wins were under the command of Phil Rennert,
the only undefeated player. A possible addition to next year's
tournament would be a variable ending chit for the scenario,
preventing the Confederate player from end-gaming the situation
and picking up easy cities with no chance of retaliation, as
the Confederate always has the last player turn. In this possible
tournament addition, the Confederate player rolls to end the
game on turn 9 (33% chance) then again on turn 10 (67% chance)
and finally on turn 11 (100% chance).
In spite of the rule of 7 there were again several
complaints about die rolls, and another system under consideration
is the use of a fixed pool for die rolls for marching and recruiting.
In this system, all the march and recruiting die rolls for each
player are placed into two opaque containers. Each container
(one for marches and one for recruiting), contains two 1s, two
2s, two 3s, etc. Each turn for marches or recruiting a die roll
number is drawn and not replaced. This system, while not necessarily
eliminating bad luck on crucial die rolls, would at least reduce
it! The drawback is that this could possibly be even worse than
the die-roll modifier system, in producing rolls known in advance,
once the container gets low.
As usual, the GM will put proposed rules modifications to
the vote of all players before the 2002 tournament starts. If
you have a favorite rule you would like to see added, let me
know! And for all those gamers looking for a real wargame that
they can set-up and finish in two hours, see you all next year,
for the return of A House Divided, who turns 21 and is
ready to drink.
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