HPS NB vs. Battleground

[rahamy]

I've played them both and have the opposite opinion. I think practically every design change made for HPS was a step backward, and the net effect is a much more boring system. There are also numerous places were the design decisions are stark raving mad. (E.g "batteries" for every 1-2 guns in some of the ACW titles, because Tiller wants each specific field piece type modeled separately - while ignoring the lousy effects this has on the ammo system, player micromanagement, etc).

I would contest you on many points. First off, you confuse John Tiller with the scenario designer - the scenario designer is the one who will make OOB choices and the like inside any given title.

Skirmishers are not really fixed. You can instead have huge stacks in skirmish order - just silly.

If the strength of stacked skirmishers exceeds a certain amount, 250 men I believe, then they loose the benefits of skirmish order and are treated like a formed unit.

The effects of villages are crazy.

In what respect?

Cavalry melees horribly unless charging, but now can't charge from anything beyond point blank.

Really? What game are you playing, because its certainly not the ones I have been for the last 10 years...

The idiotic high point values for cavalry are still there - loss of a regiment of horse is about 10 times worse than having Napoleon captured (lol).

Of course the loss of a trained war horuse should be simmilar to a foot slogger, silly me, what was I thinking? -- If you disagree that strongly with the value change it! Its editable!

The single man loss system is more like a "there aren't any losses" system. There are maybe 2-3 things that can touch a stack of infantry.

LOL! My goodness what are you playing? During the course of a battle losses are always higher than historical, primarily due to player styles. And why would you get firing range results on a battlefield, when none of the conditions are the same?

The worst side effect of the move and fight all you want new unphased sequence of play is that it encourages "panzerblitz" thinking and tactics. Instead of ranks and reliefs that fail through morale issues or disorder, we get instead the choreographed sequence on a tiny stretch of front when all is in place for it. You can hit here with the left regimental column then there with the right one then through them with the next rank then charge with the cavalry after seeing what happened - in one 15 minute turn on 500 meters of frontage, while the defenders sit there and at most get off a volley if you close to point blank.

Several changes have been made to the system that reduces this, and ZOC elminiations was far worse in the BG system than it is in the HPS one. Again though, this has something to do with player styles - so milage will vary, and I will agree with you that some people take things to extreame. With that said, the old phased system still exist - even with manual defensive fire if you wish - so players have options as to how they play.

The tendencies to micro-tactical giantism and mindless mashing of stuff together is worse than ever. The net effect is to make tactics out of Guderian not out a Napoleon viable.

Again, more of a function of how a player chooses to play, than a fault of the system. The overriding design philosiphy is to punish players for unhistorical tactics, not make them impossible to do. There's a balance between "game" and "simulation" that has to be addressed.

The old BG games had problems as many people played them, because many players turned on all the morale enhancing and rout limiting optional rules, which results in US civil war style tactics of continuous lines, completely wrong for the Napoleonic era. But it was easily solved just just turning the optionals off (other than cavalry countercharges and VPs for leader casualties). That made formations want to spread with intervals to prevent rout contagion, and made shots and attacks for the purpose of inducing morale failure a major, viable tactic.

Again, you place the fault on the system when in fact it is squarely at the feet of the player in most instances.

Are the HPS titles perfect? Definitely not, but they are far better than the BG system. You are of course welcome to your own opinion, but please don't falsely represent something you obviously disdain. That's just wrong.