Cult Of Games XLBS: Can Logisitics Win Wargames?

I think with logistics in the skirmish level game we’re talking about wither or not something turns up on the table. So a tank or APC with low fuel or ammo just isn’t there (the crews wouldn’t deploy forwards unless their supplies would give them a fighting chance). Mechanical reliability forms another possible reason for things not turning up.

With larger scale games, I remember playing a company level game in 15mm back in the 90s (where the figure ratio was 1:1), things like HMG/LMG and on table heavy weapons were counted as “low ammo” unless they were deployed as fixed position (then you couldn’t move without losing that benefit for full rate of fire), or if you use “ammo runners” (as single figure) running between the heavy weapons and an ammo truck/supply dump (hopefully parked hidden and out of sight and not too close to the firing unit), with the ammo runner carrying enough ammo for one round of full rate of fire. The ammo was represented with small ammo crate or shell counters, if no counters then you fired at “low ammo”. Granted infantry squads carried extra ammo for the squad LMGs, but as the author said trying to resupply a squad LMG is a bit difficult if the rifle section is off try to flank the enemy target. Those rules were quite fun and relied on players showing a bit of self restraint when building up army lists (no wall to wall or tank car parks here akin to World of Flames). The campaign rules on logistics were more based around AFVs and off table Artillery and they were done before you put any troops down on the field (basically you paid the points and then rolled a dice to see if they appeared during the game. The worse the logistics, the harder the dice roll). Infantry always turned up, so they were a safe bet for your points in game. I do wish I could remember the name of those rules, they are long OOP and were released in the UK back when the main source for rulesets were individuals or Wargames clubs self publishing.

I think part of the issues as to why we no longer see logistics appearing in miniature games (board games still use the mechanic, in fact some board games are ALL about the logistics) is the “simplification” of rules these days. A lot of wargames are skirmish level games in 28mm, whereas the larger scale games (company/battalion) were usually in 6mm or 15mm to fit on the table. Skirmish level games have always assumed that troops have full ammo (and have usually simpler rules, although there’s no good reason as to why this is the case), and logistics is almost always left out. To try and put logistics mechanics back into games, rather than trying to find OOP rules from 30 years ago, perhaps looking at some board game mechanics might be a way to go?