Re: Scouts.....

>3B^2 said:
>
>This is one of the few major gripes I have with most ground combat
>games, 
>especially large-scale.  Recon units are not as useful because you have
>to 
>assume some level of recce or intel has already occurred in order to
>justify 
>having both forces on the same table.	Makes it hard to recreate a need
>for 
>scouting forces.

To see the value of a recon force, you really need an umpire, a map, and
a lot
of removable terrain.

First thing you do with the defenders is give them a realistic amount of
ground
to cover. This means there is no way on God's Earth they will have
enough to
defend everywhere.

Next thing you do is to leave the attackers a choice of routes to
travel. BUT
their maps are not completely accurate, and they have no idea where the
enemy
is, apart from "somewhere over this line. We think."

This can be greatly simplified by having, say, 3 or 4 roads that the
attackers
can travel up, to either of 2 possible objectives. Attacking scouts
should be
used to get some idea of where resistance is, and either a) by-pass it
or b)
neutralise it depending on what the mission is.
Defending scouts (listening posts et al) should be used to determine the
main
axis of attack, frustrate the ability of attacking scouts to find out
the strength
of defenders, and if OUDF or other sneaky bastards, infiltrate behind
the attackers
and take out divisional artillery, hqs, engineering vehicle parks,
logistics
etc.

Once the two forces have clashed, then set up the wargames table with
appropriate
forces, defenders who haven't been revealed by scouting efforts omitted
until
they reveal themselves.

This can lead to a min-campaign, several "delaying actions" by defending
recon
units to force the main attackers to deploy and give time for reserves
to move
up, or if the attackers are silly enough or in too much of a hurry to
deploy
scouts, a nasty ambush, all before the Main Event.