How is it that I've owned this game for eight months and am only now appreciating the genius of the random scenario generator? My friend Shawn came by over the weekend and he requested a game of CC:E, so out it came. Last time we played Closed for Renovation, and I got spanked as the Americans (I need to work on my attack coordination skills.) This time, I got a crazy idea: TRY THE RSG. We ended up with Americans vs. Germans, 1943, recon posture on map #3. I won, but it was a tense game and the outcome was still in question right up until the end. I like that!

My first play with the RSG was a resounding success and I think I'll be using it much more from now on. I was intrigued that we rolled up such a well balanced and fun scenario. Do any of you CC:E vets have issues with the RSG creating unplayable scenarios? If so, do you just scrap it and re-roll a new one?

I'm another who tried the RSG for the first time very recently. It resulted in a fantastic game, and though we're trying to get through the scenarios, I want to include more RSG games soon.

I've only recently been able to pull out CC:E again, as I finally got a gaming table for my (very small) apartment. I've only played the first four scenarios so far, and our two sessions previous to trying the RSG were both scenario 4, which I didn't like that much (I think it was my fault though...I just didn't know what the hell to do as the US attackers.) But the scenario we rolled up Saturday really reminded me why I was so excited about this game in the first place. Just a fast, fun, bloody and tense game.

The first couple hundred (yes, hundred) games of CC were all done via the RSG. It's still my favorite way to play the game. Scenarios didn't exist until after GMT decided to publish the game. The RSG has some extreme playtesting behind it so hopefully it will continue to produce many more good scenarios than duds.

Glad you like it!

The Combat Commander RSG is one of the best of its kind. I used to play ASL and Up Front a lot, and I hardly ever used their scenario generators. Up Front in particular I played almost to death, and I rarely used its scenario generator (which was better than that of ASL) even when I could barely look at the official scenarios because I'd played them so much. The CC RSG is good because it's so simple to use, and because each and every decision you make has consequences, so that the RSG unfolds itself interestingly into scenarios which play even better.

My only complaint is that the changes between CC:E and CC:M, re. support rolls and artillery, simply don't make sense. Or, to be more precise, they simply take the 'problems' complained about in CC:E and turn them back to front. If the problem is real, this can hardly be construed a solution.

Mind you, the official scenarios too are very good. They typically enjoy that quality which makes you keen to try again, just to see if you can win this time.

Also:

The first part of the answer to this question Magnus is artillery smoke- there is pretty much no other way of reaching the chateau. The second part of the answer is exit VP. Your left flank is covered by the treeline, plus you've got a gully, a fence and orchards to further screen your manoeuvres. The closest I've seen the Americans come to victory in this scenario (and they've lost some 6/6 times!- see what I said about the replayability of the challenging official scenarios) was when my opponent combined these 2 tactics against my Germans.

I'm picking up CC:M as my next game purchase (I've promised my wallet only one per month!), but you have me a bit concerned here. What problems are you talking about?

I'd like to know as well.

First, the change to being able to purchase multiple items with a single support roll was an intentional improvement to the system, not a response to some sort of complaint about single purchases being wrong. Up until now, everybody I know who's used (not theorized about) CC:M's updated RSG has been pleased with this particular change.

Second, the change to allowing only the Attacker to purchase a radio was only partially in response to the "complaints" in a long ago thread about how only the Defender would ever end up with a radio: it was mainly to tie it more closely to that which is coming in CC:P -- another improvement, in my opinion -- where radios are no longer part of each nation's Support Table but instead have their own table and their own separate means of acquisition. Another reason was so that the player making the support roll didn't have to choose between a unit and a radio: he can now choose one or more units and, if assigned as the scenario Attacker, know that he'll get a second chance later on to acquire a radio.

Is their another change that I am forgetting that is making the improved system not to your liking?

I honestly can't remember if I played the RSG before buying CC:M and playing through its scenarios. No matter, I've always really liked the 'multiple purchase' option. It opens up a whole new range of options to the player making the first support roll, albeit at a price- namely that their surrender level is fixed no matter how many units they buy from the Support Table. This is just more of what I've always celebrated in the RSG- 100% successful revision in other words.


Chad, the issue of who thought what first and when has long since been proved to have been awkward enough in the days of the penny post, let alone in our internet age, when designers like yourself find themselves made available for public scrutiny in respect of products not even yet available on the open market. In any event, there is no doubt that I didn't make explicit my complaint about the CC:M revision in the RSG rules re. calling on OBA support. I have given an exhaustive account of my thoughts over at "Roll dice and kick ass!", my gaming blog.


My specific complaint about the CC:M revision to the RSG is that the denial of OBA access to the defenders during random scenario generation breaks a good rule so that the RSG remains exactly as broken as it was when the RSG denied OBA to the attackers, as it did in CC:E. That is to say: you fixed a bad rule and broke a good rule, with the result that the CC:M RSG is no better overall than the CC:E RSG, despite your other good changes. That's it really.

Great! Thanks for the feeback, John.


To be clear, in CC:E a radio wasn't denied to the Attacker, it was just more likely for the Defender to have it (and usually exclusively). My take on history is that, at the tactical level portrayed in CC, it was more likely for the aggressor to have available artillery support than the defender -- so the aforementioned unintended consequence was indeed "fixed" with the new arty mechanic in CC:M's RSG and now works as intended.

Game on!

I really like the RSG, and have only played the CC:M version. Having played all the published scenarios, sometimes more than once, we nearly always use the RSG. It usually makes for a butt-puckering close game.

However, my father really hates the unlikely availability of artillery to the defender, not because of any historical complaint, but because he usually plays defender, and LOVES to call in artillery on me.

I've read the rules for CC:P and think my Dad will be thrilled with the way artillery is handled in that system. Very elegant. He is certain to enjoy plastering me with airstrikes as well.

Chick

One of the best things about the RSG is that if you follow the steps exactly, you get a really good random game.

On the other hand, I think if you want to control any of the steps at any point to tailor the game and try things out...that works too. Sure, you might end up with an unbalanced game, but it doesn't hurt to try things and test them. I'm usually one to go "by the book" at every point, but I like the RSG's ability to have flexibility at any given point in the process.

My point is this: very often, my buddy and I feel like blasting each other and will simply both roll for Off Board Artillery, regardless of how the scenario ends up generated. You know...you CAN do that.

Not that folks don't have every right to complain and Chad doesn't have every right to state his case for how he did things...but you can just both roll for artillery or even just each take some arty and have fun with it!

My previous comments about use of the ASL/UF scenario generators might've given a false impression. I never used a Squaddie scenario generator at all, because I always had more than enough official scenarios to keep me going. My uses of the UF scenario generator barely amount to 1% of all the SL/ASL/UF games I ever played (as many as 1000). So, at as many as 10 games out of some 110 or thereabouts, the CC RSG is already the most successful scenario generator I've ever used, my criticisms notwithstanding.

Even if you let the defender roll for artillery, he would only succeed 1/3 of the time. So it's going to make no difference at all 2/3 of the time. It's thoughtful of John to post his detailed thoughts on his blog, and I found them interesting, but to call the system "absurd" and "outright nonsense" seems rather over the top.

Chad, I have no problems with your argument that local artillery superiority would've been more likely to have been enjoyed by the attacker. My problem is that the revised CC:M RSG rules for OBA availability poorly reflect the historical realities. Taking the Germans as an example, I crunched a few numbers, and came up with the following:
- Chance of rolling OBA on the Support Table= 50%.
- Chance of rolling OBA as a Reinforcement= 0.2%.
That means that Germans on the attack are 250 times more likely to enjoy OBA support than Germans defending. In the face of statistics like these I can only restate my contention that there is an inherent problem with a CC RSG which only allows a radio to be taken as a routine support option by one side or the other, be that attacker or defender.

Sticking my neck out a bit, I'll say that if you, or your development and testing team made your decisions based on a concern that the RSG would be less enjoyable than it is if both sides routinely took OBA, then I would wholeheartedly agree with you. Players being the beasts we are, if radios are available, of course most of us would take them as often as we could. I mentioned this in passing in my original blog article. It was this thinking which led me to raise the notion of 'jeopardy' in my blog article, and to conclude that the VP cost of radios simply aren't enough routinely to enforce thinking twice about making an asset request.

As I said in my article, CC has other parameters which could easily be varied to create this effect if that's what you're after. Here are my latest thoughts on this:
- The defender may choose a radio on their support roll.
- If the defender chooses a radio, advance the Sudden Death marker 1 space further up the time track.
- If the defender chooses a radio and other units, advance the Sudden Death marker 2 spaces further up the time track.
- If the defender buys fortifications of any kind, then (and only then) the attacker may make an asset request.
These suggestions are untried, and I won't get a chance to try them until xmas, but I hope it is immediately clear that they'd be easy to implement, and that they bring in precisely the dimension of decisions with tactical consequences that is one of the RSG's strengths.

By the way, you mentioned previously that the CC:P RSG changes OBA access completely, so that the foregoing might prove to be obsolete early in the new year. Time will tell. In the meantime, I hope these comments are of some value.

There's some good ideas there, John. If both players agreed to use them before beginning a random scenario, I don't see any of them being too detrimental to the balance of game and very likely quite fun.

However, one thing I've talked about before and I'll mention again here: CC maps are 450 meters by 300 meters. That's it. This .135 sq kilometer of space is a tiny footprint within the greater scheme of an ongoing larger battle. The chances of indirect artillery fire of any kind being utilized in that close proximity to friendlies was altogether rare. In CC terms, artillery would generally have been done prior to the first play of the game or, once battle is joined, at targets further away off map (the preparatory bombardment, harassing fire, counterbattery fire, etc).

So let me reemphasize that artillery at the scale depicted in CC should be RARE. I include artillery in CC because: (a) it did sometimes occur when ground forces were at engagement ranges; (b) it's doable without adding voluminous rules (unlike vehicles); and (c) it's fun.


I'd be very much interested in knowing how you came up with this tiny figure. You'd have to know the nomimal number of die rolls made per game in order to figure out the average number of Reinforcement events per game. How did you determine this?

For example, your .2% figure assumes that a German player will only make an average of 7.2 die rolls per game. This is obviously incorrect. While I'm not saying that the chance of receiving a radio during a reinforcement event will be close to 50%, it's certainly going to be a much more meaningful percentage than .2.

So coupled with what I stated above, the chances of getting a radio at the start of a game should be greater than getting a radio mid-game. At the start of a game, there is far less chance of an errant SR landing amongst your own troops -- this representing perhaps the final volley of preparatory bombardment. The smaller the gap between you and your enemy (read: mid- to late-game), the less likely it is for off-map artillery to be raining down in your vicinity. At that point, friendly artillery is likely either being moved forward (if the attacker); limbering up to move further to the rear (if the defender); engaging in counterbattery fire against enemy batteries far off map; engaging in harassing fire against retreating units off map; etc.


Indeed they are. Fun discussion, John.

I don't think he has a problem with OBA being rare Chad. I agree that if OBA was availible to both sides most of the time it would be a detriment to the game.

I think his problem is that the attacker gets a much much higher probability of getting it than the defender. And before that it was that the defender had a much much higher probability of getting it than the attacker.

I see where the attacker might be more historically able/willing to use artillery than the defender, but i agree with him that such a striking difference (attacker has 50% chance of having OBA at start, defender has 0%) is a bit off.

And regardless of the chance to get OBA as a reinforcement event, both sides have this option don't they? So whatever the chance it is (be it .2% or 5% or 10%), it would be added to both sides, and would still remain something like:

Attacker 55% chance
Defender 5% chance

I guess he and I are just not satisfied with a RSG that is 90% of the time not going to be random on this issue. Attacker will almost always be the only one to have a radio if there is going to be a radio in the game.

Perhaps something where if the Attacker has a radio, the defender gets a single reinforcement roll to try to get their own. This would significantly increase their chances of starting with one, but would not allow the defender only to have a radio.

Correct; which is my intention. So how do you manifest this in game terms? Choose a more expensive OB than your opponent and you'll most likely be on the attack and therefore more likely to get arty. That means choosing a company over a platoon -- and, if you think about it, a company commander is far more likely to get the attention of a battery commander far behind the lines than a lowly 2nd Lt. platoon commander....

But as I've said if both players agree there's nothing wrong with a house rule allowing either player more ready access to arty. Jesse's idea above, for example, is a good one in this regard.

To model the situation where artillery fire was completed prior to the first move of a CC scenario, it might be interesting to see some RSG options (or scenario setups) that would include random distribution of smoke or HE hits on the map prior to scenario start but after the initial force deployments.

This would be easy to implement as a house rule. For example, in scenario 4, players could agree to start with 3 or 4 smoke hits distributed randomly to give the Yanks a leg up on getting into the chateau. Maybe the smoke would have hit exactly where they want it, and maybe not. At the micro-level represented by a CC map, it's hard to believe the artillery would be much more accurate than that, anyway.

I've had a busy weekend's gaming and some time to unwind, so now it's back to this discussion. I'm going to go through your comments point by point Chad.


I'm pleased you like the first draft of ideas just off the top of my head. I'm going to work them through more thoroughly so that Badger and I can try them out a bit at xmas.


The design implications of the small maps is a strong point Chad, but you are aware that it's a double-edged sword, aren't you? I mean to say, what you have written here mitigates equally against both the attacker and the defender being able to purchase a radio during RSG setup.


I accept these points too. I write to dispute your design decision that this rarity should be achieved by denying at-start radios to the defender; or even that the results you seek will be achieved via the current rules. As I have tried to argue, the attacker has every reason to make an Asset Request, and no real reason not to. This is what prompted my attempts to find other scenario parameters the changing of which could impose costs on players sufficient to make them think twice about choosing radios.



Yes, those statistics aren't the best. The reinforcement percentage is the chance of getting a radio from a single dice roll (ie. dice roll triggers an event, which is reinforcements, which generates a radio- all based on the assumption of a full deck), so that obviously the chances of a German player getting a radio through a game is much higher than my 0.2%. I guess the probabilities associated with the reinforcement event might even raise the chances of the defender getting artillery to a level equivalent to that of an RSG attacker. In any case, it was a poor use of statistics on my part.


These are all good points, but are at a bit of a tangent created by my poor use of statistics to demonstrate how much more likely an attacker is to start with a radio than is a defender to gain one.


Some strong points again Chad. In the end, the matter at issue here is that it simply sits badly with me that you have designed the RSG with the explicit intention of allowing at-start radios to only one side. I feel that this is neither historically valid, nor a successful implementation of your stated design goals. You've given generous insight into your design decisions, and to the extent that you've generated some serious second thoughts, but I can't concede that you've proved your point.

This is where i sit too. I understand the reasoning behind the attacker being "more likely" to start the game with a radio, but that implies something like attacker chance to get radio 50%, defender chance to get radio 20%. It's not even close to that though. It's 50% and 0%. Why couldn't it be closer but still have an edge to the attacker?

I'm trying to think of a way to do that. Maybe a simple D2 (coin flip) to determine if defender gets the oppertunity to buy a radio. Even if he has the chance, his roll might not have a radio in the right year for him to get it. So it would probably be around 25% chance for defender, 50% for attacker.

And I disagree; it is nowhere near an auto decision. You may be missing something fundamental here: when the Attacker gets a radio during an RSG setup he has to pay VPs for it. Acquiring a radio during a Reinforcement event is free. So before a scenario Attacker decides to roll for a possible radio during step RS.11.1 he needs to think long and hard about whether the further loss of anywhere from 2 to 7 VPs is going to be worth the value of the radio for that particular scenario.


In a larger sense, yes. However, within the context of an average CC scenario, it IS only the Attacker that would likely be dropping shells -- he's chosen the "when" of the battle, after all, and so things are likely to go his away before battlefield friction and the everpresent enemy begins breaking down his well-laid plans -- and much more likely to be doing so at the beginning of the scenario when the forces may not yet be at engagement ranges and thus friendly fire is mitigated than at the middle or end when opposing forces are more intermingled.


Fair enough. Every person who has ever played CC has an issue with at least some part of the game. This particular mechanic is one of yours. I have no problem agreeing to disagree with you, John.

Let me ask a few questions now: What I've been hearing is how wrong it is that only the attacker can acquire a radio at the start of an RSG. So tell me why should a Defender (or Recon) player be allowed to have a radio at the start of the game? In a similar vein, why shouldn't an Attacker be allowed to Bore Sight? Why does only the Defender gain 1 VP per turn? Were the Russians really the only country capable of No Quarter (and the Germans when fighting against them)? Didn't countries other than Britain and Germany have sharpshooters capable of good Marksmanship?

Or are the answers to these questions -- as well as "why can only the Attacker acquire a radio?" -- more in line with giving a player the feel of small unit tactical combat without pretending that every rule or mechanic is an absolute?

Have you ever noticed that Artillery Requests/Denieds generally share their card with Defender Only actions? That's no coincidence: this game was designed from the get-go with my opinion -- and thus my design philosophy -- of "artillery availability being rarer for a defender than for an attacker when at or very near infantry engagement ranges". So a Defender with a radio dilutes the power of his Defender Only actions when he also has to use those cards to call in artillery strikes.

Or perhaps some of these decisions have to do with game balance? (I'd love to see an American Defender sitting on 1 VP roll for a radio and have to pay 7 VPs for a 155mm -- the German Attacker could take his own sweet time about things when he begins the game with a 6 VP lead....) How effective is that radio going to be when the attacker is on the map edge and the defender occupies most of the map? Most drift would either see the SR fall off-map, useless, or back onto the Defender's own troops. One can also surmise that with a 6-card hand as opposed to the Defender's 4-card hand that it will be much easier for the Attacker to eliminate that radio sooner rather than later.

In light of these last several points, the lack of a radio for the Defender in the updated RSG ends up being a Design For Effect decision, where the net effect of a radio on the Defender's side vis-a-vis one on the Attacker's side has been boiled down to its simplest expression: "no" or "50% chance". Then, when we factor in the odds of either player acquiring a radio for free during the course of the game -- 1-n-648 rolls overall, or approximately once every five games* -- the overall odds of an RSG Attacker having a radio is 60% and for the Defender 20%. Those numbers look about right to me.


* The six nationalities have an average of 8 Event triggers, an average of 2 Reinforcement events, and an average 50% chance of rolling an available radio. "Every five games" assumes each player makes about 130 rolls per game (a net four cycles through the deck with approx 40-50% of the cards being used for rolls).

Alright chad, you've sold me.

Well Chad, we've marshalled our arguments, hammered away at each other's key points, and have reached that moment where agreeing to disagree will render further exchanges a mutual waste of effort. So I'm just going to run through one more time, and then leave you to the last word, should you wish it.

Nope, not missing that. My article over at RD/KA! shows that it was in my analysis right from the start. And I'll grant that I've played far fewer RSG games than yourself. Even so, the decision to make an asset request or not might come down to playing style as much as anything else.


This is where agreeing to disagree really kicks in. Your analysis here is logical and underpins your design decicions more effectively than I'd previously allowed, but I have to confess that I'm still just not persuaded that it's historically well-grounded. I will admit that that's at least as likely to be down to my part than anything else.

So far Chad, this mechanic is the one for this grognard!

I think radios for Defender or Recon players makes sense because of my understanding of both the use of these postures in CC and of the use of artillery in WW2. It makes perfect sense to me, based on my reading, that forces other than the immediate attacker should enjoy direct battery access as an engagement opens.

In CC terms, forces attacking out of long-established positions could easily be allowed to boresight via a SSR. In history AFAIK, few attacks moved off of startlines where lines of fire were sufficiently well measured to justify use of boresighting bonuses. That is to say, attacking infantry usually formed up and/or made an approach march, which negates boresighting opportunities. In CC terms then, the attacker will have moved out of positions from which boresighting would've been possible.

The 1 VP/turn for the defender strikes me as more of a system metarule than anything else. All the same, it could easily be explained as a rule which drives the game so that the Attacker and Defender postures work properly in relationship to each other. This is more important in CC than it is in most other games because of hand-size and card-use variations for the defender.

Everyone in WW2 was capable of giving no quarter, a well known example being the bitter battles between the Canadians and the Hitler Youth of 12th SS Panzer in Normandy in 1944. The point of the CC No Quarter action is that it was only on the Russian front that no quarter can be said to have approached the status of an objective, ie. something that could be worth VP in a wargame.

I didn't think that the Marksmanship action represents mere sharpshooters. I thought it was about superior general training and/or experience across the board. In this context, it makes perfect sense that other nationalities don't enjoy this action.

If you like. I mean to say, that's a perfectly reasonable idea. But I'm still left with the feeling that the RSG rules re. radios just don't fit history.

Again, I addressed this point directly in my blog article. I think that this dilution of defender only actions is another double-edged sword.

I'd love to see that situation for an American defender too- it'd be an absolute hoot (I suffered a similar reverse thanks to objective chits in a game I blogged back in September). In other words: it'd demonstrate CC strengths. And the points about drift and radio elimination are more double-edged swords, in that they could act to force defenders with the option to buy a radio to think twice before they do.

Those numbers add up, so I guess I have to concede that you've achieved the design for effect you're after. But is it the right effect you're trying to design? That's where we're back to agreeing to disagree, and where I'm still looking to develop alternative rules based on radios being available to the defender at start.

And that's it Chad. Like I said, I think we've exhausted the usefulness of this exchange. You've certainly made your design intentions quite clear, and thanks for that. Meanwhile, don't lose any sleep over the fact that there is a corner of some foreign land that is forever looking for a tweaked RSG! All the best with the future of CC, and with the already eagerly awaited Fighting Formations. Cheers

PS. I forgot to mention some recent comments over at the CSW FAB: the Bulge forum. They are quite germane to our discussion here.
EDIT. 10/01/2009: No, not the 2nd SS Panzer.
EDIT. -"-: And not the 12nd either!

The easiest way for a Defender to get a radio at start is to just give him one. Chad designed things for a certain effect but I don't think even he would mind if two player mutually tweaked the RSG process to get particular aspects that they want.

I'm with the OP: the RSG rocks!