From: Doug Murphy Subject: Review: Main Battle Area Remember this game? The recent thread on chem warfare set off bells that made me dig it out as the highest level of play contained fairly detailed rules for chem. Designed by a Bill Gibbs (and a group of USA officers), published by Omega Games, contains a 30x21 map, 600 2-sided counters, 2 CRTs, 2 unit planning chart pads, 4 rules booklets (one for each level of play); 4 scenario cards, TRC and TEC charts, Tact Notes card, 4 page glossary and 2 d6. whew! This game sim'd a confrontation between a Sov regt and US battalion TF with a focus on command / control doctrine and preplanning. As tac games go, it was not a highly technical dissertation on every weapons sys available to both sides. The Sov fields T-80s, BMPs, ZSU & SA-9s, SAU 122 arty, tac air and helo and off board arty vs. US M1 tanks, M2/3 APCs, M901 and Stingers, 106 mm mortars, and various abstracted, off board support. Both get special engineering vehicles and HQ counters as well, but most of the 207 combat units represent relatively few unit types, with the balance other info markers. The map is glossy and interesting in squares (@ 250 m ea) rather than hexes, and relatively simple: green for woods, black for roads and urban areas, contour lines, against a white background. There are four levels of play: 1 includes move/observe/combat/prepared def positions & indirect fire; 2 adds the real heart of the game: a preplay planning phase to specify mission, organization and formation orders...needless to say, this game is difficult to play solitaire (I've done it by prewriting Sov orders on a series of cards and randomly picking them but it wasn't satisfactory). Also at level 2 is command control and Sov/Ami doctrine. Level 3 adds air & helos, engineering and nights; level 4 adds chem/rad effects, variable equipment capabilities and leadership. This game posits the USA view of things in the mid-80s. Sequence of play is simultaneous activity in four phases of fire/move. A single phase goes: check unit eligiibity & commo; indirect fire; Sov move; US non-missile fire; both fire; US move; Sov non-missile fire; both fire, remove smoke. Losses are individual vehicles or squads...each turn is 10 min. The scenarios run 9-12 turns and are each playable in an evening between two players who know the system. This game shows the difficulty in attempting to change plans mid-stream and the importance of careful planning. The fog 'o war is very high. The 4 scenarios cover the "typical" view of Sov ops: initial assault; 2nd echelon assault; hasty US attack; prepared US attack. Victory depends on exiting units and taking ground objectives. The Sov gets weight of numbers, fragile 1 vehicle Hqs, a 3-tier command structure (co-batt-regt); US struc is more flex (co-batt) with 3 vehicle Hqs and more cross-mixing between kampfgruppes. The great virture of this design is the different levels of play. It would be interesting to compare to GDW's Assault series & VG's MBT... Doug Murphy