The Loose Association of Wargamers

As my eye turns (for the moment)from SYW to ECW, I'm reading some accounts of battle that touch on two battlefield occurrences that aren't really covered in our rules: fall back & tactical pauses.

Fall back is the orderly movement of a unit away from an enemy, whilst facing them.
This seems to happen after a firefight (ie not melee) when one side thinks it has had enough but is not ready to rout.

In Field of Glory:r, this action would mean a turn of 180 degrees before moving away. The unit "falling back" thus would offer its back to its enemy and, at best, be fired into and worst charged into with disastrous effects.

A Tactical Pause comes with what I think are the more leisurely ECW battles, where sides would stop to re-order in mid battle whilst both sides seem for a while to halt all aggressive activity.
Currently, re-ordering, testing to improve morale etc all takes part during frantic & action-filled game turns in FoG, and is not allowed if the enemy are in proximity etc.

Would allowing a turn or two in a game for units to reform etc unmolested by the enemy just prolong the game?

I would like to hear the views of others on these ideas.

I think, if I used them, I'd add them to the 20+ Event Cards I currently use. Thus they would not at best a periodic tactical choice in a game. ( I'd add 2 cards of each mechanism, I think), given a single card is chosen per 8-10 turn game.

donald

ochoin wrote: ↑Sun Aug 30, 2020 4:52 am Fall back is the orderly movement of a unit away from an enemy, whilst facing them.
This seems to happen after a firefight (ie not melee) when one side thinks it has had enough but is not ready to rout.

In Field of Glory:r, this action would mean a turn of 180 degrees before moving away. The unit "falling back" thus would offer its back to its enemy and, at best, be fired into and worst charged into with disastrous effects.

Short answer/bottom line: your game, your rules.

For "fall back", I think this is an(other?) area where FoG:R betrays its roots, which are very much TYW/ECW-oriented. For most of the period covered (1494-1698, IIRC), armies were not that well drilled or disciplined. and certainly not enough to risk "stepping back" which could easily led to disorder and panic, which is why it is not included (bizarrely, it is available in the FoG:A/M rules, I believe). It was hard enough to get the buggers to move forwards (and stop when/where you wanted them to), let alone employ reverse gear!

I don't have any great views on the other matter - I think "natural re-grouping" phases occur within games anyway (in my case, usually once the routers have got out of the road); sometimes they are mutually convenient, sometimes not. As someone who I think may have been famous, once said: are you feeling lucky, punk?

Thanks. It's good to bounce such things off of clear thinkers like yourself before I take it to my pals. We have vested interests & not necessarily backed by historical knowledge.

donald