Modern Rules

I'm looking for some rules for the modern stuff im painting up atm. The best two options for a platoon size games seems to be either Force on Force or an adoption of Chain of Command. From what I have read the guys tend to be a bit more autonomous in Force on Force compared to Chain of Command where the Officers and NCO's play a much bigger part. What are your thoughts on it?
Cheers
Ben

There are two modern versions of CoC in the pipeline. One's a specific set for Afghanistan and ones a more general one for anything post-war. No idea when either will be out though.

Bought some Modern 20mm plastics myself last year, though only got as far as sticking them on coins and undercoating them.

Reading around the web on rules to play with them (personally love FUBAR rules which are free on the web, and although I use them for sci-fi are actually designed for modern, but was looking for something fresh) and came across 'Skirmish Sangan' rules which looked really interesting. I think there is a free 'lite' set on the web. Seem to be oriented to very small actions but could be stretched to platoon size. Seems to get the whole 'suppression' aspect right - figs take a morale check when fired on regardless of whether they are hit or not- and a key feature was that the western forces have all the advantages weapons-wise but tend to forget their mission in favour of evacuating their wounded as soon as they take casualties. Full ruleset looked good value as it seems to have a lot in it, and the guys who developed it have some very inspiring pics of scenery on their website and I guess in the books.

As far as I could see Force on Force is a rip-off of the Sci-Fi 'Stargrunt' rules (also free on the web at the GZG site), and although I've not played either was not especially taken with the mechanics enough to buy a set, but they might be fine.

Chain of Command is a great set of rules, but as written at the moment is heavily geared towards the interaction of 'rifle squads' and weapons squads (especially MGs) which is based on WW2 infantry tactics, where as post the introduction of automatic weapons, infantry tactics as I understand them revolve around 'fireteams which is a bit different.

I did take a look at the Sangan rules. From a very small scale perspective I think they would work really well but to be able to play a platoon level game in a night would be a challenge with them from what I have seen.

If you've bought the 'Force on Force' rules fine. In fact. would be happy to give them a spin.

They just didn't seem that special and with all the supplements seemed to me to be spinning out an OK mechanism into something I didn't want to shell out lots of cash for.

If you just need something to get started with check out FUBAR. Never had a bad game with them (in fact quite the reverse, always been fun) and generally got a game finished in a night. The whole activation system makes it fun and unpredictable and very easy to set up one side, say, as well-trained elite forces vs more numerous less well-trained troops, which is a common modern warfare set-up. The way suppression is built into the rules in a clever way makes them work very well with modern. Basically the defender gets to chose between taking a 'hit' as a 'suppression' or a casualty. Suppression hits are recovered so you can keep your forces intact by maximising the hits taken as suppressions, but suppressions count against you on the activation roll. Losing an activation roll is a big deal as you also lose the initiative, and if you keep the initiative you can keep activating units. So its a trade off between taking cover and staying safe, or taking casualties so you can keep taking the initiative, and co-ordinate an attack. Elite and Veteran can be activated much more easily and also take more suppression hits before they have to take casualties. The 4 different morale ratings (elite, veteran, trained and green) give you a lot to play with especially if you mix them up within forces (eg. some elite forces trying to rescue green civilians, or some green militia stiffened by some veteran fighters). Add in options like making aimed fire for more accurate hits, rules for personal armour, grenade launchers, rpgs, mortars, vehicles all squeezed onto a set of rules on one page of A4, and you've got an interesting game with lots of possibilities.

Might benefit from adding some more elaborate hidden movement/spotting rules (easy to do). Also a nice aspect of the Stargrunt rules (which I'm not sure got incorporated into Force of Force) is the 'cascading orders' system (basically each time you activate a unit you get to do a couple of actions, but higher command elements get to 'butt kick' a unit in their command for one of their actions, and they can use this on other officers who can in turn activate multiple squads. Easy to incorporate into FUBAR. Have command units which if you activate them give you a bonus on activations during that initiative. A good way of simulating how higher level command tries to co-ordinate attacks, particularly if you built in things like air-strikes, which of course all breaks down if the command unit fails to activate or is otherwise engaged and most units are just trained or green.

Also at the other end of the scale ie. 'johnny of the spot' leadership easy to build in the 'Big Man' aspect of Chain of Command (and all Too Fat Lardies Rules) just by having some officers/NCOs with higher morale rating you can move between units (raising level of units morale rating for reaction purposes but not shooting etc.).

They also don't have any rules for medics/casualty evacuation. But easy to add-say if a unit takes a casualty you put down a marker. Medics could try and treat them (say on roll of 6 full recovery, 2-5 stable but need evacuation, 1 Dead). Western forces take casulaty evacuation and not leaving a man behind so seriously it might be worth building it into game/victory conditions.

Basically FUBAR a a set of rules with a really good core mechanic, which is easy to bolt other stuff on it. Might be being unfair to Force on Force but from what I read of it didn't have this spark.

Had a good look at the FUBAR rules and they look very interesting. They have already created a page for Afghan games as well. I only brought one of the FoF source books, not the rules themselves as I was a bit dubious about them.

Me and Simon played through a game with the FUBAR rules last nigh and it worked out pretty nice. There is a couple of adoptions to be made but on the whole it felt right for the period. Also discovered that trying to play Taliban and not rolling a single 6 (or 5 or 4 for that matter) is a very good ticket to getting tabled