[House Rules] Retreat (Panic and Preservation rules)

[larry marak]

As Matt indicated in a recent posting on the Avalanche company support forum, retreat only becomes a factor when playing linked scenarios, where losses in one scenario cripple you in the following scenarios. (Or scenariones, as the Romans would have said) I'm only aware of one scenario in Heroes that requires retreat to score victory points, reflecting a general withdrawl on an operational level after the scenerio had begun.

As assaulting force that takes heavy casualties (that still has leadership) does one of three things in order to preserve combat effectiveness; 1. dig in and wait for reinforcements (Russia, Germany), 2. call in heavy artillery or airstrikes (U.S.A.) or 3 conduct a fighting withdrawl (U.K., Italy, Russia). Provided the retreat was authorized by Stavka, the Soviets gave medals for conducting successful retreats.

PG doesn't really reflect or reward retreat, and I'm not sure how to introject that into a smoothly running machine. S.P.I. incorporated Panic and Preservation levels into their tactical games in the mid 70's We'd probably need to award v.p.s for exiting units to the rear after losses of a certain percent. Sounds clumsy though.

[Matt W]

Perhaps a VP condition for the percentage of force maintained in good order might be in order. Such a condition could be used to alter the level of victory one in the preserver's favor. Say, for example, you have lost to a minor victory but you have preserved 50% of your force in good order (either on board or off board) thereby earning a draw.

This gives units that flee off board a chance to still affect the outcome as they can recover off board and count towards the preservation benefit. It also forces the "winner" to consider trying to deal with the demoralized forces to destroy them rather than permit them to recover.

[rmakowsky]

For a campaign this makes good sense. For a one off game, the balance is tricky. Might make sense for the defender to swiftly move to the rear to prevent any damage!