Over the Top: Marne variant, S&T #186 (very, very un-official) by Lars Silver About the system Over the Top is a system for WW I battles by DG. It is a relatively easy system, somewhat akin to Napoleon at War in complexity. There is, however, a certain intensity in the battles as ZOC’s are of the rigid sort. You do not have to attack while in ZOC, but you can not move from ZOC to ZOC, and friendly units do not negate them. It is possible to retreat through ZOC but this is very costly. The end product is a game where you find yourselves locked in by an enemy advance and then have to decide whether you will leave your encircled units to their ultimate fate or if you can save them by a counterattack. This works very well in most cases. A negative aspect about Over the Top is the virtually meaningless ”breakthrough” phase. This is good for getting your units in position to defend, but do not expect any breakthroughs as lowly headquarters and artillery units suddenly block your way, they have ZOC’s themselves. Another rather irritating point is the artillery system which is far to die roll intensive for my taste. It can also be said that every little canal feels like crossing the river Rhine (or Dnepr in Eastwall), I am not entirely convinced by the historical wisdom in this. The system does give some suspense, however, so it is not a complete waste of time, it just takes a lot of time. The suspense comes from the fact that artillery fire suppresses the opponent, which often enough is the difference in combat. Unfortunately, the defender gets to return fire which often enough negates any offensive bombardment. All this happens before combat, which takes place on a table were 2-1 is the odds you usually attack on. Below that the tradeoff between advance and losses is pretty poor. The key to winning is locking up the enemy in ZOCs and then killing them off later on. Command is another important aspect, and encircled units are picked off primarily because they lack command, which also is stopped by ZOCs. All in all, a tense little system with a lot of die rolling... The problems with The Marne My first purchase in this system was Mons and The Marne in Strategy & Tactics # 186. Mons is a cute little battle, where the Germans are on an almost impossible time limit and have to push the British back as far as possible. The Marne could be even more fun but is severely hampered by the completely un-historical set up and a mess in the reinforcement instructions. In the game the Germans march onto the map on September 5th, and have to face a huge number of British and French units ready to thwart the Germans hope of even getting across the Marne. Let’s face it, this is not even close to the actual events. The Germans were across the Marne on the 3rd and only faced determined resistance on the Grand Morin River, well South of Marne, two days later (not much of an river in real life). If anyone doubts this, take a look in the article in S&T 186, page 6, where a German situation map shows how the Germans were positioned around the Grand Morin at the end of September 4th (the abbreviations 4.9, means September 4th!). Not often do you find a design whose fundamentals are totally contradicted in the accompanying historical article! Unfortunately the designer of the Marne scenario forgot to look at that map. What to do? As Ted Raicer points out it is not sufficient to just move the timetable back two days as the Germans still hardly would get past the Marne. Thus something more had to be done. One easy solution is to take the set up presented in the map on page 6 as the starting line for the battle on the 5th. The drawback is that the battle would have little replay value as the Germans would be fixed into position. In my view it would be far more interesting to go through the German advance and let the player try to find his own way across the Grand Morin. Therefore my solution starts with the Germans entering the map on the 3rd, while the Allies scurry back across the Grand Morin. Suddenly the Allies will be released, which in real life would occur when the Allied commander Joffre had his little chat with Gallieni from the 6th Army and was convinced of the opportunities to counterattack. Upon the release the Allies may do anything they like, and they do return with a vengeance! Remember, all my additions are used so that as many of the rules in Over the Top and The Marne scenario instructions as possible remain untouched. Therefore some of the fixes are not completely historical, but they work for the purpose. My comments are supplemented below. The changes (all in the scenario instructions) Set up, Allies: B.E.F., 5th Army and 9th Army set up in their respective areas. (1) Reinforcements, Allies: As in the scenario instructions. There seems to be some extra French counters, I just disregard those that are not included in the instructions. The French reinforcement zones (there were none on my maps) have I interpreted as; 6th Army 2118-2718, 5th Army 1039-1048 and 9th Army 1053-2352. Reinforcements, Germans: A mess in the instructions. Disregard all instructions in the rules. Instead; Sept 3 A.M., 1st Army enters in column on any road in or adjacent to the 1st Army zone (3525, 3528 and/or 3535). The actual units are 2, 4, 4R, 3, 9 & 2 Cav Corps, exclude the 10th and 11th LW Brig/3rd Corps.(2) Sept 3 P.M., 2nd Army enters in column on any road in or adjacent to the 2nd Army zone (3535 and/or 3548). The actual units are 12, Gd, 7, 10, 10R, 19 Corps + Gd Cav Div. Sept 4 A.M., 3rd Army enters in column on any road in or adjacent to the 3rd Army zone (3551 only). The actual units are 8, 12R Corps + 1 Cav HQ, 5 Cav Brig. Sept 6 A.M. 10 LW Brig/3rd Corps, 16 J, 43 RJ & KR enters anywhere in 1st Army Zone. Units that can not enter on the turn of arrival await their turn in column. Rule changes: - German units may not move or attack into the 6th Army set up zone for the duration of the game. (3) - No units on either side may move within three hexes of the 6th Army setup prior to the 6th Army release, exception: all units starting in the 6th Army set up zone or reinforcements to the 6th Army. (4) - Until the Allied release all Allied units, with the exception of the French 6th Army, must retreat as soon as possible to a position South of or on the line; Marne - Grand Morin R. - 1844 - 2045 - 2048 - 2450 - 2453. Behind and on this line the Allies are free to move anywhere they please as long as they remain out of enemy ZOC. (5) - Before Allied release all units starting in enemy ZOC must leave, if possible, and remain out of ZOC for the remainder of the movement phase. No Allied units may enter ZOC before they are released (6) - Allied release are rolled for on the following table. 6th Army is released either alone or in conjunction with the rest of the Allied forces. On release all movement restrictions cease to apply. When an ”All Allied units are released” result is rolled for, no further die rolls on this table are necessary. Note two things, the 6th Army will probably be released before the other Allied units and that there is a variable ending to the scenario depending on the turn in which the 5th and 9th Armies are released. (7) Roll 1d6 starting September 4th: Sept 4 P.M. 1-4 No effect 5-6 6th Army is released Sept 5 A.M. 1-2 No effect 3-6 6th Army is released Sept 5 P.M. 6th Army is automatically released 5-6 5th and 9th Armies are released (scenario ends Sept 11th A.M.) Sept 6 A.M. 3-6 5th and 9th Armies are released (scenario ends Sept 11th P.M.) Sept 6 P.M. 5th and 9th Armies are automatically released (scenario ends Sept 12th A.M.) 4-6 BEF is released Sept 7 A.M. BEF is automatically released - On the turn of the release the 6th Army gets a +2 shift on their attacks, while the rest of the Allied forces get +1 on the turn of their release (only assault combat, not for artillery bombardments). In addition the Germans may not use Morale points defensively in a combat containing just released units. (8) - German first turn movement bonus is canceled (8.3), no need for it any longer. - There are no replacements on either side until Sept 5th P.M. - Finally, I give the Germans the advantage of letting all German units have a minimum movement allowance of 4 until they are within 3 hexes of enemy forces. (9) - Victory conditions: Either go with the old ones (9), or change to the following. The German player gets 1 VP for all of the towns and 2 VPs for all of the cities South of and including; Dammartin - Crecy - Coulommiers - Rebais - Esternay - Sezanne - Etoges - Vertus. The Allied player gets 1 VP for all of the towns and 2 VPs for all of the cities North of and including; Nanteuil - Meaux - La Fete-s-Jouarre - Montmirail - 2446 (Montmort) - Chouffly The player with the most VPs win, fair and square. (10) Historical comments on the changes: (1) While not entirely historical as an set up it is an efficient way of forcing the Allied player to reach the approximate historical line without much fuss, it also serves to create some disorder in the Allied lines (probably historical). For those wanting the Allies to be able to set up more freely, then start them on the Allied release line specified above, not that I think that they deserve this treatment. (2) This was another design for effect as it worked real well to have them enter by road. It gives a certain distance between the units that appeared historical. If you want a more historical reinforcement schedule just look into the official documents and send them to me. It will work for the overall effect. (3) This does not represent a Berlin wall, just the fact that the 6th army could easily have retreated into the Paris fortifications just beyond the map, and attacking those fortifications with the Germans would be totally out of the scope of the game. Furthermore, I did not want the Germans to gang up on the 6th and eliminate them before the counterattack. The 6th Army was a thorn in the Germans flank which could not be easily removed. (4) Yes, the 6th Army will have to be covered by the Germans, and they will be an unpleasant surprise when they are released. All with history in mind. (5) This will enable the Germans to reach a line on the other side of the Grand Morin R. quite easily will also enabling a fight around the St. Gond marshes around 2047. (6) The B.E.F. still felt that the French were rather unreliable and would certainly not have counterattacked until Joffre gave an explicit order for all Allied units to do so. The French were likewise quite unwilling to engage in full scale combat without proper authorization. Until Joffre makes up his mind the Allies continue to retreat, albeit if doing so more slowly South of the Grand Morin (design for effect, otherwise the Allies would fall of the map!) (7) The decision to counterattack emanated from a discussion between Gallieni, who noticed the opportunity presented when the Germans advanced past Paris, and Joffre, who apparently needed someone else to push him into action at this stage. The timing of this attack depended on their meeting, thus a quite random event. By rolling for the release the Germans can not prepare for the counterattack, but will have to take some risks to advance as far as possible before the counterattack begins. The 6th seemed to have jumped the gun a little, at least Gallieni’s forces were the ones von Kluck reacted, or overreacted to. As the German player you will soon learn to do the same...As for the BEF, Paul Dallas was kind enough to give me a timeline for the release of the Allies. Apparently BEF reached the battlefield just in time for the award winning ceremony. That is, the French did the dirty work, while the BEF did just enough to make every British historian claim that the ”old contemptibles” in fact won the battle for the Allies. (8) Just to get the guys started properly... (9) This means that the artillery and the headquarters can hang on to the infantry. This is solely due to my dislike for games were non-contested advances are penalized too harshly. Besides if the headquarters would have the movement allowance provided them in the game, they would just about have crossed the French-Belgian border at the time of the Marne battle. If you insist on having the headquarters bring up the rear, fine with me... (10) Someone asked on VWHQ if the rail line really is supposed to go North like that, giving the German such an golden opportunity. The answer is yes. On the other hand, I doubt that the comments that cutting the rail lines would isolate Paris from the army should be taken all to literally. There are other lines to the South, even if they are a little bit longer. (11) These victory conditions have not been properly playtested yet... Concluding comments: At least I had a lot of fun playing with these rules. It became a very tense game in which the Germans must make some heartbreaking decisions whether to retreat and leave some of his units isolated, or take battle however costly that may be. Keep in mind, that the thing that more than anything else will beat the German is the replacement ratio of four to one. One historical deviation is that the Germans will quickly march across the bridge at Crecy and be able to advance further down the Grand Morin. I did, and eventually got trapped between the French 6th Army and B.E.F. Not a good move... I hope that you will let me know if you like this variant (or what you don’t like). Thanks Paul for your comments on BEF. Learning from history This is actually a very good game if you want to learn more about the Marne (providing you fix the set up that is). It is all to apparent that the Germans hardly could have won a decisive victory at the Marne. As soon as Joffre got his act together the Germans lost the battle. It was really a psychological victory, as soon as the Allies regained their confidence it was just a matter of time. And the two corps that von Kluck sent to the East would not have saved the situation, perhaps they would have stabilized the situation, but they would hardly have won the battle. The key to Allied victory remains Paris, and Verdun. As long as the Allies controlled those fortresses, any advance South would have been flanked. In my opinion, the decision to not take either of those two complexes doomed the modified Schlieffen Plan. In case you disagree, let me know on the Virtual Wargamers Headquarters board for WW I discussions.