Monday 25 June 2012

Expanding Charles Grant`s "Battle" rules

In Charles Grant`s original rules he organised a rifle company thus -

3 x 9 figure platoons each with -
Officer/NCO, 2 SMGs, 5 riflemen and a support weapon (Bazooka or light mortar) with 2 crew

Thus a rifle company had 27 figures.

We quickly concluded this missed out one very important weapon - the light machine gun (LMG), we also realised that 9 being an odd number doesn`t split well for fire-movement infantry tactics, so our company evolved -

3 x 10 figures with -
Officer/NCO, 2 SMG (or Grenade throwers), 6 riflemen + support weapon (LMG or light mortar) with 2 crew

Company strength now increasing to 30 figs; you will also note we dropped the Bazooka (or Panzershreck) as these migratedn to became part of the Battalion HQ company's anti-tank platoon. The new layout allows you split your platoon with half covering, whilst the rest advance an leapfrog fashion.

This worked for a while, but we felt the command/control element was missing (at company level), we then tacked a company HQ on -

4 figures - CO, NCO, RTO, driver/runner

Your company strength now increasing to 34 figs! But gains, a central command element and communications to higher level units/support.

At this point we started tinkering with national variations and period changes:

Late-war Germans
Platoon strength - due to loses late-war platoons loose a rifleman and drop to 9 figs
Panzerfaust AT weapons - we doled these out 1-2 per platoon as one-shot weapons.     
Extra LMGs - replace 3 riflemen with another MG42 team (reduced strength, increased firepower) 
Drop Light mortar - replace with MG42 team

US infantry
BAR - replace 1 rifle with BAR
Support weapon platoon - US infantry units changed massively -
HQ
3 rifle platoons - officer/NCO, 2 SMG/Grenaders, BAR, 6 riflemen
Support platoon with - .30cal team, Bazooka team, 60mm mortar team, 4 rifles (ammo bearers)
US company strength now 44 figs! 

4 comments:

  1. cooool! i`ve been thinking along the same lines as i have two imagination armies brewing up and i`m using Battle rules. yes and your work is truely stunning.. the number of period and armies you have is awesome

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  2. Very kind of you :-)

    My late-war German Volksgrenadier Regiment is virtually finished now, I`m now seriously considering re-vamping my Yank/Free French.

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  3. My first rues and still my favourite. Sadly, the book doesn't have rules for the Blacker Bombard or the Smit gun, so my SeaLion British troops are struggling! Easy enoug to tweak as required, though. Great blog - any chance of more details of your changes to to te original rules [please...]

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