SQUAD

LEADER

WITH

MINIATURES

Our 15mm WWII games using A modification of the SQUAD LEADER IN MINIATURE rules

I have wanted to play a miniatures version of Avalon Hill's SQUAD LEADER boardgame for years. Sane people do this with 6mm (1/295th scale) miniatures on a mildly enlarged hex grid. Naturally I did this with a grossly enlarged grid sheet with each hex being 4" across, and 2.25 inches on the hex faces. The troops are in 15mm scale. Our game table which is 6' x 8' is about 1.5 times the width of a scaled-up Avalon Hill game board, but only about .8 of the length of what a game board would be with 4" hexes.

Naturally in our games we usually overload the game with too many units and ran these games with lots of players. We do not get as many turns in as the boardgame because it takes more time for 6-8 players to move and fire and do defensive fire... So a LONG game for us might get 5 turns played.


Photo by Ed Sansing

We have had to make some changes to the rules to allow games to be finished in 3-5 turns. Some of these are:

Jay Stribling is the author of this page unless otherwise noted.


Photo by Jim Pitts

One of Robert Whitfield’s Panthers under ineffective American artillery fire. It was also later destroyed by a British sherman Firefly tank. This was in our "Three Villages" gane, played on September 3, 2007.


Photo by Jim Pitts

Jim Pitts, as the German armor leader is advancing on the extreme German Left flank. Note the combined arms. Jim had the three Panthers. Sean Pitts commanded the two StugIII assault guns in the background. The American Shermans could destroy the assault guns frontally but not the Panthers. Their success against the PzV tanks came only from the flank or rear.


Photo by Jim Pitts

At the end of the game, Fred Diamond, the American armor leader tired of fighting at long range and advancing quickly, his Shermans over-ran many Germans on the American left, taking the two FLAK guns that were the American objective.

This photo shows many of the "unit types" in the game. The Base with 3 German infantry is a Squad. The single figure standing with the Red and White label on his base is an officer of Company A which is composed of 9 squads with various supporting weapons, operated by the Squads, in addition to their integral rifles. The prone figure with the "50mm" label is a marker showing the position of a weapon - in this case a 50mm mortar. This has no integral crew, it is operated by the squad.

The Tank is an AFV which is over-running all of the German units in this hex. The Germans had to retreat very quickly to a new hex. They were broken and dropped the 50mm mortar which was destroyed by the tank.


Photo by Jim Pitts

A continuing melee on the German left-center resulted in this hex being in close combat for two turns with no clear winner in our first game on the Hex grid. We have now changed the rules slightly so that continuing melees are muchmore rare in close combat.


Photo by Ed Sansing

More changes have been made to the physical components of the game.


Photo by Ed Sansing

In our first game we played for almost 6 hours (not counting a 45-minute lunch break). This time also included a tutorial at the start of the game and some time researching the artillery firing rules, and the vehicle movement rules during the game. During this time we completed 3 complete turns.

In Squad Leader with Miniatures, each complete turn consists of a complicated phase something like this:

Sequence of action (somewhat simplified)

Items in COLOR are changes made to the sequence of action used in previous games

RALLY Phase

PREP FIRE Phase

MOVEMENT Phase

DEFENSIVE FIRE Phase

ADVANCING FIRE Phase

ROUT Phase

ADVANCE Phase

CLOSE COMBAT Phase

After all of the above is complete, the defending player becomes the attacker and all of the above is repeated. After the second player has done all of the above, the turn is over. It all then begins again with the second turn.


Photo by Ed Sansing


Photo by Jim Pitts

American artillery fire impacts in the center of a German position. Jim Pitts' 88mm FLAK gun, two infantry squads, and a Sturmgeschutz III self-propelled gun were destroyed by the accurate American fire. This photo shows the newly constructed "Fire for Effect" markers. Each marker shows the impact of one round of 105mm howitzer fire.

These markers replaced our older method of a puff of cotton. We used cotton for spotting rounds, fire for effect, to designate burning buildings and for the result of smoke grenades or rounds. This just did not work. The new markers are garish but there is little doubt as to what they represent.

More To Come!

It is my intention that any modifications caused by playing "Squad Leader With Miniatures" games will be posted here. I will have a link to the full rules set.

Updated through our game on 9/03/2007

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