Commander series company level rules

 One of the joys of the Commander system is its maravelous flexibility. Recently, I've been playing at company level, where each unit represents 10-15 vehicles and 100-200 men. This is what I've discovered needs to be done to adapt the rules to that level:

1) Divide all measurements by ten: this is the new range, move etc. in inches. Each inch represents around 250 meters.

2) To make things easier, I base my vehicle stands at 1x1 inch and the infantry at 1x 1/2 inch.

3) The basic increment for command range is 4 inches.

4) FAO and FAA are presumed to be in the CO and HQ stands themselves. Add 1/2 the value of the FAO and/or FAA to the cost of these stands if they have them attached.

5) For Artillery and Air Strike purposes, spotting can be traced from any unit within one command increment (4 inches)of a FAO/FAA equipped HQ or CO.

6) Artillery and airstrike drift dice totals are divided by five and rounded up. This is the number of half-inches they drift.

7) Command can be measured to congruent groups (adjacent stands) by tracing it to the closest unit.

8) Artillery and air strike aim points are the center of their respective targets. A unit is only hit by an artillery or air strike if the template covers its center.

Here's some eye-candy from yesterday's game. Here, a Krasnynorad Tank division takes on a mixed Azurnerreich task force in an assault scenario. I let the game run 10 turns, due to the map being so big (a 2ft by 2ft map in company scale is the equivalent of a 2.4m x 2.4m map at regular scale), but by turn 8, it was obvious that Big Red wasn't going to take the prime terrain objective (i.e. the village), in spitee of shattering most of Great Blue's armor.

 

The game at start: Blue occupies the woods, the village and is poised to put most of its armor on the ridge. To the east, Red masses two tank and a motor infantry regiment.

I'm very proud of this terrain feature. It's a piece of cloth, glued to plastic with silicon caulking, then painted and flocked with more silicon caulking. Finally, bunches of flocked bases are placed on top (along with the water tower), to illustrate woods terrain.

Here's the village: Red needed to ocupy this by turn 10 for the win. Blue has placed the better part of an infantry battalion here, along with a close-support company of Centurions.

The situation at the end of Turn 5. Red has engaged all along the front of the ridgeline, bringing on a third tank regiment from the right flank. All of Blue's armor has rushed to meet the attack and is in danger, now, of being flanked.

Turn 7, the turning point. This airstrike saved the day for Great Blue. A squadron of F-100 Super Sabres bombs Red's flanking regiment, following a devastating artillery barrage. This attack killed half a battalion of armor and disrupted the only in-range HQ. The next turn, the Red CO rolled an "11" right off the bat, attempting to move the whole division in for the kill. A short range knife fight then developed to the right of the ridge, with Blue's Centurions taking out an entire regiment of T-54s while the rest of the division sorted out its command problems in the confusion following the airstrike.

 End game, beginning of Red Turn 8. Blues' armor is almost spent and another company will be destroyed this turn. However, Red has little chance of getting enough infantry into the village before Turn 10 to win the game. When the Red CO blew yet ANOTHER command roll on his first attempt to activate, Red threw in the towel.