The decision to create Great Battles of World War Two came from the fact that if fit three criteria of CWG's miniatures rules series. First, the battles presented were small enough to be accurately represented on an average wargaming table. Second, its was an area we felt had not been adequately covered. Finally, the subject was Canadian. The feed-back from our other projects indicated that gamers found the scenarios the most attractive part of our wargame packages and so this is where the research started. Very soon it became obvious that the existing tactical armour rules on the market, both miniature and boardgame were not going to be suitable for the battles presented. The research continually contradicted two premises of all armour rules. That a day's fighting during World War Two was fast and bloody.
A day's fighting in World War Two was confined to an extremely thin strip of territory. The fighting over "the gully" in front of Ortona lasted 14 days. The distance covered was about two miles, or about 250 yards per day. The operation to capture Falaise (a distance of 17 miles) took 13 days. Even Guderian's "lightening attack" from the Ardennes to the Channel ports (a distance of 270 miles) took fourteen days - an average of under 20 miles a day - most of it unopposed. Most gaming rules allow vehicles to move at their "technical speed"; 20 to 40 m.p.h. or 200 to 500 miles a day. Gaming rules also allow weapons to be far too lethal. Most games I have played have few units left on the board or table, after the smoke has cleared. Historically, units would "go to ground" or even withdraw and re-group long before a platoon (much less a company) was eliminated. In front of Agira, the Hastings and Prince Edward Regiment lost 80 killed, wounded and missing out of an original strength of 400. This was the worst day's losses of any single unit in the whole campaign. In the Battle of the Scheldt, the official historian, C. Stanley, thought the casualties serious enough to mention; the 7th Canadian Infantry Brigade (three regiments totalling about 2000 men) lost 111 killed, in 7 days - an average of about 5 men per unit, per day. The fact that units stayed in the line day after day, for months at a time, caused great casualty rates but only over a protracted period of time. The existing games have all these casualties pile up in half a day or less.
Obviously some mechanism had to be put in place to reconcile these technical speeds with the historical stagnation of the front and at the same time reflect the low intensity, but constant grind on the front lines. The result was the "go to ground" rules. Units do not disintegrate. At about 20%-30% casualties battalions simply stop. They still fight and hold their ground, but the fire has become too intense for the officers to convince their men that they should stand up and advance forward. This presents the player with a set of interesting and historical decisions. Does he activate new units to "leapfrog" his units that have "gone to ground" and continue the attack? Are the objectives worth the activation points lost? Or does he wait for nightfall, reform his troops, acquire reinforcements and plan a new artillery program? For the defence, opportunities also present themselves. When are you strong enough (and the enemy weak enough) to launch a counteroffensive? Will the activation points lost be made up by the objectives retaken? Often a day's fighting will only last a couple of turns, followed by a few days of inactivity, as battalions build up their strength, husband artillery and wait for a break in the weather. When a breakthrough comes, a lot of ground can be covered in a short time, but it usually takes many days of grinding to set up the situation. All very historic. Gamers are required to think of a battle in terms of days (maybe weeks) instead of from sunrise to sunset.
The adoption of the above framework, inevitably led to a number of other game design decisions. The first was scale. One inch equals 150 to 200 yards. This was necessary to fit the historic battlefields onto a reasonably sized table. One of the most unique features of Great Battles of World War Two is the simple combat mechanics and simplified vehicle characteristics. Most WWII games focus on the technical aspects of modern armour - vehicle speeds, armour thickness, muzzle velocity, etc. We wanted to simplify this level of decision-making and emphasize the command decisions at the brigade and division levels. Therefore the abstraction of vehicles into fast, medium and slow speeds - light, medium, heavy and super-heavy armour and guns. As a brigade commander you should be more interested in the condition of the unit (casualties and suppressions) than its technical abilities. Trucks were eliminated from the game almost entirely. This was partly to simplify the game, but also because the way gamers used trucks on the table was quite ahistoric. Trucks have been used for cover, as combat vehicles or even battering rams - all very innovative, but ridiculous. They are in the game, of course, but they are delivering supplies, equipment and reinforcements, at night. By morning the trucks are a long way from the battlefield.
It was also in an effort to get players to focus on the grand-tactical and operational aspects of the battle situation that compelled us to introduce battalion formations to the game. Battalion formations are more often thought of as a characteristic of the Horse and Musket era, but in fact they were and are a major consideration of modern commanders as well. Troops still manoeuvre better in march and fire better in line and attempt to assault in some combination of the two. Too often on the miniatures gaming table battalions move about in random, confused groups. Our sources continually referred to the Canadians manoeuvring in columns and assaulting in reinforced lines - two companies forward and two back. The same sources often referred to the stretched German defensive line or the Canadians deploying into defensive line once their objective had been achieved or they had gone to ground. The use of ridge formations in a WWII game means the player cannot narrow his attention onto the location and condition of each individual stand, but must consider the whole battalion as a single unit. Formations also led to a framework to which AT guns, armour, heavy weapons and command stands could be attached. This is true grand-tactical planning and the general's role is what we wished Great Battles of World War Two to concentrate on.
The original draft of Great Battles of World War Two had heavy weapons, anti-tank companies, mortar teams etc., broken into fire team sections of three, each with one fire strength and able to absorb one casualty. Infantry and armour stands had triple fire and could get three casualties. The resulting game was complicated and tedious. There were too many stands for the table space and players fretted over the minor tactical situation of each and every stand. By combining the anti-tank sections into company stands (consistent with the rest of the stands) and reducing each stand to single fire and single casualty we were able to reduce the number of stands, on the table, by one third and greatly streamline both the rules and the flow of play.
A difficult decision was what to do about the heavy machine gun sections, battalion HQs, anti-tank teams and mortar sections. All these units represented a significant feature of battles in the Second World War. They do much to give WWII games their colour, feel and texture. The first draft of Canadians at War had separate stands for machine guns, HQs etc. that could all move, fire close combat on their own. There were extensive rules on attaching these stands to battalions. However, the mechanics were clumsy and it required the player to lower his level of decision-making right down to the minor tactical level. "Do I put the machine gun behind the garden wall or in the graveyard ?" It also meant that the whole heavy weapons company was sited in the same location, which was very ahistoric. Anti-tank teams, heavy machine guns, mortar teams etc. are now abstracted into one modifier which is deployed for use or in movement mode. Thus we were able to reduce the number of special stands needed and eliminate a whole collection of awkward and special-situation rules, as well as more realistically represent the deployment of these support weapons through out the companies of a battalion. Heavy weapons now act in support and in conjunction with infantry companies, not separate from them.
Players will also readily note the lack of modifiers, for cover, in the Fire Charts. In fact, cover from fire is a very important consideration in Great Battles of World War Two and is reflected in a number of ways. Inactive battalions are considered to be taking advantage of all the cover available - even cover too minute to be represented on our operational map - stone walls, hedges, small out building, small folds in the ground, etc. To the individual soldier it makes little difference what material he has taken cover behind, as long as he has taken cover. Active battalions are advancing and so cannot take advantage of the cover as effectively. The quality of cover determines how readily stands will recover. When fire hits, everyone ducks (i.e. is suppressed). Those in secure or well prepared positions will recover more readily than those in soft cover or hastily prepared positions. The quality of cover also determines how likely a battalion will be to evacuate its position. A battalion is less likely to abandon a position anchored by a number of prominent covered positions.
We feel that Great Battles of World War Two is a significant step in expanding the scale of WWII miniatures. A step necessary if games are going to reflect the history of entire battles - the battles we read about in history books, ones that cover days of fighting and divisions or even corps of troops.