Night movement/disruption rule

[Brett Nicholson]

My first question concerning night-time disruption/movement is if a unit has already become disrupted from movement does it next become demoralized if the disrupted unit moves again before recovering?. I have read one AAR where it suggests that it does become demoralized. The second question concerns assaults. An assault is a fire activation that requires movement but does it count for night-time disruption?. Then, if the assault does count for disruption do the units become disrupted prior to the assault or after the combat? I don't know if these questionfs have been addressed elsewhere or if 4th edition covers this in detail so any takers?

[vince hughes]

Where are these night time disruption movement rules ?

[Brett Nicholson]

Where are these night time disruption movement rules ?

Mostly in 'Guadalcanal' SSRs but also in some others like 'Afrika Korps'

[vince hughes]

Oh OK. Never played Guad.

When Wayne and I played an AK scenario when units become disrupted, we did not compound it. For a starter, they are reduced to 1 hex movement afterwards and all the rule said (AK #2) is that if a unit moved at night it became disrupted at the END of the move. It then gets a harder time recovering than usual with the SSR. Nowhere does it mention about getting into DEM thereafter and therefore anything beyond DIS is reading more into the SSR than is written (IMO only).

If a unit was DIS before the move, I would keep them as DIS because their 'MOVE' is merely 1 hex anyway.

As for assault counting as a move, I would hazard that that is your call. I would bet my house that the assault being a FIRE action was not even considered when the SSR was written. However, in its defence, I would add that it does not say "MOVE ACTIVATION"......... It simply says 'moves'. So I would suggest going into assault counts as 'moving' but not a "MOVE activation. Translating that to what it is representing is a platoon moving 10-200 yards into assault in the pitch black, so I can see why it counts as 'moves' for this SSR.

Again, IMO only and with no recall to the person that devised the scenario, I would say that the unit, if not DIS by the assault becomes DIS after the assault as it says "At the conclusion of the move".

Once again, this would all be easier if the SSR's were written in the language we use, such as adding the word "activation" instead of move or if they wanted to be specific and only refer to Move Activations and not Fire activations ...... Then use those terms instead of the 'full of holes' paragraph used.

To be honest, this is all the sort of thing that I am getting a bit sick with in the 'system' !

[Brett Nicholson]

Thanks Vince, have never compounded the disruption to demoralization in the past but an AAR from 'Jungle Fighting' seems to suggest that units do -maybe a different SSR in that game? The assaults are a bit puzzling though, especially for the Japanese as night assaults were standard practice for them. I cannot see them becoming disrupted prior to the assault but perhaps after. Some of the earlier 'Guadalcanal' scenarios only hinder the Americans at night this way but in this one it applies to both sides. So I guess I will take the middle ground and let either side assault at full strength until after the combat results and then apply disruption to any of the remaining good ordered attackers afterwards.