Symplicity Squar'd

I played another ECW game last night, but rather than use the Portable Wargame I had a try with a variant of Simplicity in Hexes. Obviously the biggest variation was switching it to a square grid, which obviously creates some differences in the way movement is handled. Otherwise I tried to stick to the original rules as much as possible, but with a pike & shot slant.

I'll write up what I came up with another day - a lot of the movement rules are still in my head (as in I made them up as I went along), and the combat and firing still needs tweaking, but what I played worked OK for a quick game.

The main thing I wanted to try was the initiative system. This time I decided to abandon cards altogether, but base it off one of the ideas suggested in my earlier post on initiative for games like this. Here's what I went with.

Each side has an Initiative Value (IV) equal to half the number of units in their force, rounded up.
Each turn, both sides roll a D6. The side which rolls highest goes first, then the other side takes their turn. The number of units a side can move is based on their roll - if it's 1 or 2 they can move IV-1 units. On a 3-4 they move a number of units equal to the IV. On a 5 or 6 it's IV+1 units. In the event of a tie, the side which moved second in the previous turn goes first, with both sides moving a number of units based on the number rolled as above.

Example: Both sides have six units, so their IV is 3. On the first turn Red rolls a 2 and Black rolls a 4. Black moves first, moving 3 units. Then Red moves, but can only act with 2 units. On the second turn Red rolls a 6 and Black rolls a 4 again. This time Red goes first. moving 4 units (IV+1), then Black responds with 3 units. On the third turn, both sides roll a 2. Black acted second in turn two, so goes first this time, and can activate 2 units (IV-1). Then Red moved 2 units.

On with the game. I gave both sides 6 units, and made control of the village the objective. Both sides had three horse - the Royalists rely on a charge with sword and pistol, whilst the Parliamentarian horse is more reliant on pistols. Each side also had three foot. One of the Parliamentarian foot units was predominantly shot, whilst the Royalists had one at the other extreme - all pike.

The Royalist left attacked with their horse, driving back the outnumbered Parliamentarians, who had also stacked their horse on the left.

Both side's foot advanced on the village and surrounding fields.

There was an exchange of musketry along the main street of the village, with both sides trying to weaken the opposition before a charge. Meanwhile the Royalist pike unit was driving hard against some Parliamentarian foot in an adjoining field. Despite fighting across a wall, the Royalists gained the upper hand.

The Royalists were also dominating on their left, routing the Parliamentarian shot and scattering their horse.

Parliament tried to gain the initiative on their left, but the terrain was not suited to action by their horse who had to content themselves blazing away with pistols.

The village was still contested, but Parliament had no support.

Despite that they went on the offensive, driving the Royalists out of their end of the settlement. But the pike pushed in along the side-streets, and broke them.

With just some units of horse left, Parliament were defeated.

The game played quickly, as I suspected it would. The changes I'd made to combat made some of it less decisive than the original Simplicity in Hexes, but even so units degrade pretty quickly. However it felt right and worked well, and was happy with the flow produced by the initiative system. I'll be giving it another try.