I listened to Meeples and Minaitures today.
They had a very interesting interview with Richard Clarke from Too Fat Lardies.
He clearly does a great deal of research for his rulesets. I was particularly struck by the observation that the type of wheat grown in Normandy in 1944, would have allowed a tank to adopt a hull down position within the field. He gleaned this by attending an agricultural exhibition.
In itself it is a minor point.
But I have often come across situations when playing wargames that people will say things like, 'that bog shouldn't slow my troops down,' or 'there is no way that I can't see through that wood,' etc. Indeed it is a common sentiment that terrain should just be ignored.
But then much of the friction of war is ignored by wargamers, if it stops them doing exactly what they what when they want.
peace;)
Years ago at one of my old clubs we ran a wargames writing weekend, which included a trip out into the country to survey real terrain from the wargames perspective. Finding out how much flat ground really undulates, how tall rural hedges actually are, how long it took the younger and fitter amongst us to march 200m and so on. It puts gaming in remarkable perspective to do little things like that. It's one reason why I'm a big fane of the Warhammer random charge rule, as it allows for the variance of terrain the board never represents. I'm less of a fan of their all other terrain is either scenic or dangerous rule, or True line of Sight; but hey ho, no rules are perfect...
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