FWWC & Alt Fire/Assault Resolution ORs

[Sir John Cope]

Yes you are correct, these rules that are part of the optional rules list for the PzC series are on by default in the FWWC series.

This combined with high soft attack values for MG, Field gun and artillery units plus a much higher stacking allowance can make losses in FWWC very severe if you stack your battalions when in range of such weapons.

I have to admit I thought this was discussed in the designer notes, but a quick check and I cannot find any reference to the fact, however one big clue in the FWWC manual is in the firing section..........

"Fire Against Soft Targets
When a stack of soft targets is fired upon, then one randomly selected target in
that stack receives the majority of the fire while the other units in that stack
receive fire proportional to their strength relative to the total stack. The
exception to this is when only Field Guns (non Indirect Fire Artillery) fire on a
stack of soft targets, in which case Field Guns can choose their primary target
due to their high level of accuracy."

Thanks, Mr. G.  I remember reading a more direct and clear statement, but that passage of the manual seems pretty clear. 

Trying to grasp the full implications of the alt-direct-fire rule, I see from your pinned OR summary that it scales "the standard firepower either up or down so that it is higher for large stacks and lower for small stacks", which jibes with the PzC manual's description that fire is "applied against all units in the target hex, proportional to their strength". 

The text you quote from the FWWC manual is a little more ambiguous on this point: is fire not scaled by size for the targeted unit but is scaled for other units in the hex? And then there is the field arty exception.

I guess it works both ways? You point out that scaling fire effect by size increases impact for densely packed hexes, so that a hex stacked deep can expect to take heavier casualties than would be the case under standard PzC rules.  But it looks like the opposite is also true: a hex occupied by a single small unit can expect fewer casualties than under PzC standard rules?