+Erik McGrath
The core goal of any wargame is to defeat the enemy and Boots on the Ground is no different. What victory means can vary considerably based on the scenario and the objectives the game encourages. For BotG victory means achieving your objectives while denying the enemy theirs. Often these two things are one and the same due to the most common scenarios having objectives that are directly opposed.
A favorite for our playtests is capturing a specific piece of terrain for the attacking force. Bridges, hills, railheads and factories were common in the first tests which were drawn from battles in Western Europe after D-Day. The latest objective was to hold a the seawall in our first Pacific theatre game set on Day 1 of the Battle of Tarawa. The US Marines did manage to hold the wall for the price of 6 men KIA and 11 WIA. The next game will be the second wave and the marines are expected to take the beach up to the dunes.
The other thing all wargames have in common is the two precepts of maneuver and firepower. At the scale of BotG this means the majority of the movement on foot and the bulk of the fire is from man portable weaponry. There are some vehicles used, mostly halftracks and the occasional tank, and we also make use of off-board artillery but due to the distances involved it tends to matter most in the first half of the game to disrupt maneuvering. By the time the assault is under way its simply too close in to use big guns.Maneuver
Speed is life in any battle. You have to get your troops to where they can actually attack the enemy before you can hope to prevail after all. In BotG that means the attacking force has to get their infantry up close to the enemy so they can assault and push the enemy off their objective. No matter how much artillery you pound the enemy with in the end you only control what you are standing on so riflemen have to take the last few yards.
Like all the other stats of the average infantryman his movement rate is 4. This rating in inches is the tactical speed of the model. This is a cautious pace that hugs available cover while still making progress. At this speed infantry are extremely hard to affect beyond 24" with infantry weapons. If there is hard cover they are effectively immune to enemy fire and in the open, provided its not a man-made surface, they are still very resilient.
Units can also choose to go faster or slower than this speed in multiples. At half tactical the unit is crawling and scooting as low as they can. They won't go far but it could be enough to get from building to building or across a narrow path. In this state the unit uses the 'go to ground' rule and improves their cover and concealment by one step up to heavy cover and heavy concealment (the levels are light, moderate, heavy, total).
At double tactical speed the unit is rushing. They are sprinting and diving to cover distance. The advantage of course is distance covered with the trade off being a reduction in concealment (but not cover!).
After a unit finishes a rush move it may opt to push on and sprint. This allows an additional rush move (8" normally) at the expense of further loss of concealment, reduction of cover (due to more time spent upright) and forcing an Endurance test. Failing this test has all the effects of a failed morale test and uses the same tables. This means units can be disrupted and individuals can even be injured due to sprinting.
The terrain can also make movement dangerous or impossible. Broken ground increases the chance of disruption or injury by making the test Unlikely (re-roll all successes once) while rushing (or forces one that would otherwise not be needed while moving tactically) while dangerous ground gets its attack improved (whether this is a swift stream, a minefield or an area of suppressive fire the rule is the same). Some terrain simply can't be rushed (marsh, wire) or sprinted (mud, snow) through at all.
At the end of the active player's movement the opponent conducts reactive fire and at this point targeted units can choose to go to ground. If they do they get the normal advantage of improved defenses but they give up their active fire for that turn. Units that crawl can't go deeper to ground but they can still conduct active fire.
Firepower
Shooting attacks are conducted in three phases during each turn. Two belong to the active player and the middle one to the reactive player.
Suppressive Fire
This is the beginning of the active player's turn in many ways. The command phase is first but its mainly administrative. Suppressive fire is when decisions are made. Any unit can make attacks in this phase provided they are not disrupted. Crews need to have a number of disruption counters equal to their members to be disrupted. this can be a combination of broken, disrupted and good order members as only the total number of counters matters for this. Additionally a unit that conducts suppressive fire may not normally move in the active movement phase. An exception to the movement rule exists for vehicles that have separate drivers and gunners but even they have speed restrictions depending on weapons fired.
A unit that has set up an area-fire zone must conduct an attack to maintain the zone. If they choose not to continue or are forced due to losing good order or going to ground then the zone ends immediately. Units maintaining the zone must make attack rolls but normally only a fumble matters.
Reactive Fire
This phase exists to show that the enemy never stops shooting when they have clear lines of fire and targets. It occurs immediately after active movement and is followed by reactive movement and active fire.
Just as in the suppressive fire phase all area-fire zones must be maintained or removed in the reactive fire phase as well and doing so normally forbids reactive movement with the same exceptions as above.
Active Fire
The last fire phase of the turn belongs to the active player and allows all those units that moved a chance to fire and all units that conducted suppressive fire attacks to do so again. Unlike the other phases area-fire zones do not need to roll to be maintained in this phase because they have already done so. Originally we did require maintenance in this phase as well but we decided we could dispense with the extra rolls required to save time without really affecting the game. The main thing is that you roll once per phase in which the opponent has a chance to move so that you can cut off likely avenues.
Wrap Up
One important thing to keep in mind is that in BotG nearly all attacks are area attacks. When infantry exchange fire they aren't usually shooting a point targets because an aware enemy is taking cover. Only snipers and ambushing troops make direct fire attacks during the shooting phases and both follow the same rule. In effect the sniper's training and optics allow them to always make use of the ambush rules.
Vehicles and anti-vehicular weapons are more likely to make direct fire attacks since the higher profile and more limited cover available to vehicles makes them more vulnerable. But even so a tank isn't likely to expose itself to a known AT gun or approach a position where the infantry have portable, short-range AT weapons. So many direct attacks are due to ambush or the sniper equivalent of anti-tank fire: bore sighting.
Hewing to my philosophy of of minimizing subsystems is that when a target has its concealment reduced to below none by movement any unit shooting at it counts as ambushing. So don't sprint in open ground without first using smoke!
