Simple Method for interpolating combat values

[RLW]

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BTW, what I found this (that is the method that only can bump up the original combat value (CV) total and nt the second method that can bump a CV up or down)   tends to do is make it more profitable to spread out units. For the potential killing power of a lowly 2 or 4 combat factor goes up a notch (or can with a good roll) and thus they can better  hold ground without having to be staked. This tends to reduce some of the bunching that happens otherwise of super dense  gaggles of stacks and spreads out the combat a bit more, which for me makes the game noth more fun and perhaps more realistic as well.

One other thought here.  increased lethality may not men greater combat losses per se in that it might instead cause units to employ more caution and thus affect game play.

Still one more option that employs a hybrid of the two methods I described above. to further add subtle factors that might not have a huge impact on the game outcomes  but give the game extra  crunch, albeit at the expense of a bit extra work.  The idea is to  use these two methods to employ  less  dramatic effects than a hole column shift, which may be too much of a benefit can use  the plus only  in some situations to give the unit an extra  benefit.  to give to some  effects. The idea is that one  might employ the  use of the two interpolation die (plus and minus) option normally but  may use  the plus only as a reward fro certain situations or the minus only die as a penalty.

BTW, in this hybrid method one probably would be best off to treat the maximum roll not as a zero but use that maximum value when  rolling against  listed values.  Thus a 7 roll for a 7 sided die would be read as a 5 and not a 0 if applied to say an 11 on the DF table so that it would have  a chance to be bumped up to a 16 by rolling a 5. This  then would give all CVs a chance to be bumped up (the down side is that the listed value and the  CV one greater would have equal probabilities of getting a bump up..



 Alternatively  when rolling for a listed  CV one could use  the next highest  sided die, such that instead of a 4 sided die, roll a  5 sided, and still treat the maximum roll as  zero. That would make rolling for one higher Cv a bit better. For say rolling for a 9 assault  instead of using the 13-9 = 4 sided die one would use  a 5 sided die (with 5 being read as zero). That way a 9 would have a 1/5 chance of being bumped up but a 10 would have a 1/4th (slightly better than the 1/4 as it should with  10 being greater than 9).  The  other firt mentioned method would cause both the 9 and the 10 in this example to have a 1/4 chance of being bumped thus offering no advantage of the  10 over the 9 , thus i think this  second method to be the better of the two. 

No, I am thinking even better one need not roll at all  for the  single die case when the original CV total equals a listed value on the CRT. The advantage it gains is that  not having to roll the negative  die roll it can never ve bumped down, even if it neither can ever be bumped up as well. So am am striking out the other two options above in that this  one is both the simplest to employ and  seems to work the nest as well. 

For example  the  special leader benefits  rules that  give leaders additional powers such as rifle, MG, night fighting, urban combat and such could be  backed down a notch from giving a  full shift to  just giving a plus interpolation with no minus. 

For example if a leader is  in an assault and has urban combat special ability rather than that giving  the assault a full +1 shift instead would relax the requirement for the negative extrapolation die roll. Say the original combat factor is 14. Without that special power the assault would roll both the plus extrapolation 5 sided die (18-13 =5) and the negative 4 sided  die (13-9 =4) which could bump it up to 18 with a 4-0 roll or bump it down to a 9 with a 0-3 roll of each, or just round it down to 13 for most other  rolls. 

But if that leader has that urban combat special power then it would only need to  roll the  5 sided additive die and not the  4sided  negative and have a much better chance of being bumped up and no chance of being bumped down to a 9. And if the original CV for that assault was say a 13 (which is a listed value in the assault CRT, and the leader had that extra power then  it still would have a 1 in 5 chance of being bumped up if it rolled a 5 (where as per the rule above) that 5 would then be read as a f5 on the 6 sided die and not as a 0 as in normal extrapolation rolls for non listed original CV. This could give nuance (i.e  more crunch) to the game (albeit at extra work) without giving it too much, as the original rules seems to do.

So one could use this hybrid method as a way to add resolution to combat rolls without adding to the over all lethality using the add/ subtract two die roll option but  also provides a way to give a smaller bonus than a  full +1 shift  for things that might add nuance such as special leader abilities and such. One I might consider adding is that if an assault has a turreted AFV it gains in addition to the +1 (given the  plus only  extrapolation advantage but not if it only has non turreted AFV, thus giving  turreted  AFVs a slight advantage over non turreted ones in assaults. Another  such bonus could be given to units that fire on moving units using OP Fire  that if that unit moves more than one hex one gets the  plus only benefit. And there are many others I am sure one could dream up and add if they wnat more crunch and nuance and don;t mind the added complexity that goes with them.

So  I am suggesting three variants here for  using the method for interpolation, 

1. the single additive die roll option that is the simplest and easiest to use but does up the over all lethality of the game a bit,
2. the two die roll additive/subtractive that adds another bit of complexity but shouldn't  affect the over all lethality too much, and
3. the hybrid method described above that  employ both methods  using the single  die roll option as a bonus (but less than a blanket full +1 shift) for having certain leader  skills or equipment or tactics or such.

I have only tested option 1 above so I am not sure if there might be a few bugs in options 2 and 3 that might need to be further ironed out. But I might do some testing of these to see how well they work and if they are worth the additional effort to employ by either raising the  realism, crunch factor and/or fun level of the basic game enough to justify ever using them.