Poor Bloody Infantry

No not the game of the same name, which I have never played, but my musings on how to represent that fine body of men (and sometimes women) in my draft set of WW2 rules.  In keeping with Charles Grant's set 'Battle' which were my inspiration I wanted  a one to one figure scale but with infantry based as the small manoeuvre groups that went together to form platoons.  So for the British that would be the two component parts of an infantry section the rifle group and the gun group as separate bases. I'm not sure how I will base them yet, squares or oblongs seem to be the obvious choices.

I have the basic infantry combat mechanism sorted out.  These are based on weight of fire creating pinned or suppressed results with suppression also having the potential to destroy a target group.  Units can choose to use rapid fire which creates a higher weight of fire but that is balanced by a higher risk of ammunition depletion which dramatically reduces firepower until resupply occurs.  A pinned result represents that target unit being unable to safely move while suppressed means unable to move or fire.  I have some basic concepts for lifting pinned or suppressed status and also for the effect of a lower weight of fire on continuing to keep a unit pinned or suppressed.  Weight of fire is calculated by adding together the value of all weapons firing at the target and it is randomised by a pair of opposed D6 dice rolls which gives a range between plus and minus five but trends towards zero.  I'm not such a masochist as to want to count all the rifles and machine guns so each base will have a pre - calculated factor for rapid fire and sustained fire

Close assault will also use the same weight of fire data although automatic weapons and grenades will have a bonus to represent a mad minute.  The results will be decisive with units more likely to be destroyed in close assault.  Again I have a basic set of concepts but need to test them.

Fog of war comes from the use of blinds and a spotting system.  I want to keep spotting rules as simple as possible so once units are spotted they stay spotted by all enemy units unless line of sight is totally lost.  Firing units will have to have LoS to the target though, apart from tripod mounted HMGs where pre set defences will be able to use a limited type of indirect fire on pre plotted choke points if a spotter has a communication link to the HMG section.

Some of this stuff will work some won't survive solo playtesting.  Time will show which concepts will need to be dropped or improved.  I'm in a rush to get these done as I have a pile of 1940 British and German kit looking to get onto the table!  I'm not trying for commercial levels of consistency just something to let me get the toys on the table and roll some dice!