- The matter of the positioning of leaders. With hexes it is immediately obvious if a unit moves through or onto a hex containing a leader stand - this is important.
- I had an issue when attempting a cavalry charge past a battery - with a hex you can see clearly where the cavalry can move (a unit cannot move through a hex occupied by and enemy or friendly unit). With DU it is far more open to interpretation, this is a problem.
- When attacking with DU's the approach path is not as obvious as with hex moves, and the final facing of the unit seems to be less clear. If a unit moves into an adjacent hex it can battle (melee). There seems to be no provision for 'flank' attacks as such (?) so 2 units side by side still battle as normal. I stand to be corrected on this of course, but I don't see it in the rules which does not seem an issue with hexes but is more so with DU's where conventional rules would add a bonus for flank attacks and various factors.
In short I am less convinced now of using DU's than I was last night! Once you get into close combat with units attacking, retreating, employing combined arms combat and carefully positioning your generals the advantages of hexes become more apparent.
Conclusion.
I'm glad I tried it for myself. In the early move stages it is not a problem, but becomes an issue as the game develops. The 'feel' of the game is not the same as 'pure' C&C, probably goes without saying, but it feels a completely different game. It is now clear to me that I must now seek to find a way of building realistic terrain but incorporating a hex grid somehow. My conclusion therefore is to stick with the rules as they are - I love the way they play - and put aside any thoughts of non hex.
May as well add a few more pics to keep the blog lively! Some of the cavalry action.
Lee - this is very interesting indeed - thanks for setting this out. In some of the cases you mention, the difficulties are where I thought they might be, though of course there were some additional things which came out in the play.
ReplyDeleteI'm probably up a blind alley here, but bear with me a minute - the game would work (in theory) if each unit stood on a circular sabot 1 DU diameter. Leaders could squeeze onto a friendly unit's sabot if they were attached, otherwise the sabots can't overlap - as long as the movement and ranges was in strict DUs it would just be a hex game, but the units would carry the hexes around with them, which is a very awkward way of getting round the overhead of having hexes in the first place! I then thought, would it be possible just to *imagine* that the sabots were there, so that units could not approach within a distance of each other which would have meant that the sabots would have overlapped (if they had real ones...)
This is getting too complicated - sorry! - but it must be possible to leave space between units so that it works like a virtual hex grid.
I feel this comment probably hasn't added much to your investigations(!), but do you see what I mean? If you stand 7 identical circles together, with one in the middle and 6 round its edge, all touching, it's exactly the same as a block of 7 hexes.
I'll get me coat...
Lol. I'm confused now. ... I'd stick to hexes Lee. If it's not broke, don't fix it thet's what I say.
ReplyDeleteLee, I'm sure there must be a subtle way you could introduce a hex grid on scenic terrain boards by using stones, clumps of grass, single trees etc?
ReplyDeleteIan