Question on combat values and fire values

[Jeff Conner]

Hi guys, I'm completely new to Squad Battles series, and to more complex wargames in general (I've only played Panzer Corps/Battle Academy/Unity of Command. I just recently  learned about John Tiller games and I'm loving them. I have trouble with the manual though, some stuff I just cannot find in it, like opportunity fire rules and such. Also in the firing formula it mentions unit Strength but nowhere in the manual is defined what unit Strength actually is?

The opportunity rules are not really discussed.  From experience, I believe that the chance of a unit firing during the opponent's turn is based on the range and the unit's morale.  The closer the triggering unit is, the more likely it is to draw opportunity fire.  Likewise, I believe that the higher the morale of a unit, the more likely it is use opportunity fire.

The strength is the number of weapons of a single type that a unit is carrying.  An infantry squad usually has several rifles, a light machine gun or two and perhaps a submachinegun or two.  The strength can be found in the unit tray at the bottom of the weapon icon.  For example if there is 8X there, it means that the strength of that weapon is 8.

Reading this thread I understood that it's the actual number of firing units ? Is that mentioned anywhere in the documentation?

Also what is Strength of the weapon ? Is it its base fire value, like fire:3 ?

As mentioned in this thread previously, the fire value is found by multiplying the strength (number of weapons) times the lethality (how well does this weapon affect the enemy) times the effectiveness.  The effectiveness declines by a random amount each time the weapons fires (including opportunity fire).  So if you have a squad of infantry with 8 M1 Garrand rifles with 90% effectiveness, then the fire value would 8*14*.90 or 100.8.

How are combat loses distributed?

To the best of my knowledge, this is completely random.  If there is a total of 20 men in a hex (not a good idea in most cases), than there is a 5% chance of any single man being a casualty.  If a unit has multiple weapons, than the weapon carried by the casualty is also randomly chosen. 

One more question while I'm at it, how do undermanned (for example) machine guns work? Is it possible to make them manned again. Also can I and how pickup dropped enemy weapons?  Sorry for tons of question, thanks :)

Heavy weapons have a crew size.  If the number of men in a unit decrease below the crew size, than the lethality and the movement of the unit is modified by the ration of number of men divided by the crew size.  For example, if you have a machinegun with a crew size of three and only two men in the unit, then the movement and lethality values would be multiplied by 2/3.  By adroit use of the Pickup and Drop commands in the Command menu you can transfer the crewed weapon to a unit that has more men.  You can also use these commands to pickup dropped weapons on the battlefield.

The best way to learn how to play the game is play an experienced player and have them explain and critique your play.  I'd be happy to do this for you if you are interested.  My email address is jefferyconner at suddenlink dot net  Send me an email and I'll walk you through how to set up a PBEM game if you are not sure.

Jeff