Shrapnel Games Blog

Last week I got Avalanche Press’ Austerlitz 1805, designed by Rob Markham. Nice system (leader activation, bucket of dice combat resolution as usual with an AP product) but what really impressed–and frustrated–me is the map.

Maps in wargames (traditional, not computer) tend to fall into four categories: grid, hex, area, or point-to-point. Sometimes you may have a combination. Generating a new map style is tough because really, you don’t need to go outside the types I just listed.

Austerlitz 1805 uses an area movement system. Nothing new there. What is new though is that the areas are broken down in such a way that not all your counters will fit in them, unless facing a certain way.

The game uses a combination of long counters representing infantry divisions, and smaller counters for other units. So, if you want to put your units on the slope overlooking the village of Welatitz the counter must be parallel with the slope, not across it.

What this does is turn a traditional two-dimensional map into a three-dimensional map. Much like playing a miniatures game, the player cannot only think in terms of movement cost, but whether his units can actually occupy the physical space.

Beautiful! Granted, outside of linear warfare this type of map won’t make a difference, but for Nappy wargaming, it’s a really cool idea.

Now for the beastly side. Visually, the map resembles an old school AP map, so it’s nothing to get excited over, and the muted color scheme definitely doesn’t help.

But the worst thing about the map is the fact it’s printed on what appears to be the same type of paper used for posters! I think your average magazine is printed on thicker paper. Within five minutes of opening the box I had already put a four inch long rip in the map, just by trying to unfold it! And once open expect to spend quite some time trying to remove the creases. I never thought I’d be one of those wargamers investing in plexiglass, but it looks like that’s about to change…

The 18th and 19th Century Battlefield

When I walked out my door yesterday morning I was immediately greeted by a thick haze covering the landscape, accompanied by a pungent odor one associated with burning leaves. I thought the neighborhood was on fire, but it turns out that it was simply the smoke from the wildfires in the southern part of Georgia. Living in north Georgia, hundreds of miles away from the fires, it was a rather amazing experience.

That got me thinking about the battlefields of the 18th and 19th centuries. Can you imagine what the air must have been like with thousands of men lining up and blasting away with muskets?

One thing that is rarely addressed in wargaming is the sensory experience. Battlefields are full of sights, sounds, and smells, and yet all those factors come into play only occasional. Now true, I don’t know how some could come into play, such as smell, but when you hear stories of pilots in the Pacific smelling the rotting corpses of the island dead below as they flew over, it seems like it should at least be noted.

Or what about noise? In the typical game units follow orders in clockwork fashion, but how many orders have been mistaken in the din of battle?