Combat has been a main sticker for most players, and for a game taking place in a very war heavy period, it’s in our best interests to have a working combat system, which is balanced but can also tell a good story.

Part 1: War Plans

Aside from a civil war or an NPC war, all wars triggered by players must go through the procedures laid out in the War system.

Now for the war plans themselves, since players have had a hard time going through it, here is a possible template for those who are unaware of the system, or aren’t confident on their strategic prowess. This is purposefully designed to be open ended, where the player acts more like a General making orders rather than a divisional commander micromanaging their troops. Micromanagement of course is still allowed, but for those who thinks doing so is to their detriment, you don’t have to do it:

First, divide your war plans into fronts or sections. For example, between the Dominion of India and Afghanistan, we have the Balochistan section, the Pashtun section and the Kashmir section. You can divide your fronts up into similar sections elsewhere. This is mainly for clarity sake.

For each individual sections, here’s how the war plan should look like for ground combat. The example taken would be a Commune of France war plan against the German Empire.

BELGIUM SECTION

Total Forces

Army

[Insert the units that are in this section]

Air Force

[Insert the number of planes dedicated to this section, and which airfield are they operating out of]

Navy

[Insert the naval detachments involved, only for coastal battles]

Objectives

The objectives will be comprehensive but also clear. \

Main Objective: Cutting off German Forces in Belgium from the rest of Germany

Main Thrust: An armoured spearhead crossing the Meuse through the Ardennes, not stopping until it reaches the Dutch border in Limburg

Side Thrust: Diversionary advances in the rest of Belgium to draw their forces away

Air Force Objectives: Bulk of the forces will be committed in Flanders and Wallonia to convince the enemy that this is the main attack, only a few combat patrols will be taken in the Ardennes to protect our armoured columns from air attacks.

Supporting Operations: This could be a mass suprise air assault on enemy airports to deny air superiority, etc.

Variants

Defense plans often involve variants, which are situations that need to be accounted for. In this case:

Bastogne - Rochefort Variant: If the advance is successful, however the armoured forces are too far ahead of the infantry, we will stop at a line between Bastogne and Rochefort, take the two towns to secure our flanks before continue the push. Since by that point the threat of cutting off Belgium should be clear to the Germans, most of the aircraft will now instead be dedicated to this sector to protect the armoured columns.

Charleroi Variant: If the advance is successful and reaches its objective, but the Germans have managed to reinforce the west bank of the Rhine, motorised and armoured forces will swing to the south to Charleroi, threatening encirclement to the units in Wallonian Luxembourg

Trier Variant: If the advance is successful and reaches its objectives, but the Belgians have reinforced the line between Charleroi and Liege in time, armoured forces will advance to south to Trier before the Germans can redeploy their forces, threatening encirclement of Luxembourg and the Saarland.

Maubeugen Variant: If the Germans somehow manage to blunt the Ardennes offensive by relocating the forces in Belgium, or by pulling them back to prevent encirclement, the full force of the ___ Army will attack near Maubeugen seeking a breakthrough as the lines get weaker, seeking to encircle the units west of Brussels and preventing them from withdrawing.

You get the point, make a lot of variants for different situations, just note how in all of these, I’m being rather specific with the objective, but not micromanaging which division go where, etc.

Operation

This part isn’t mandatory, it’s simply for those who want to micromanage your divisions. Anything goes in this part, as long as it is:

• Structured

• Not in a wall of text

• Uses bullet points for ease of reading

Part 2, Combat

This one is for mods mostly, but for player interests you could also follow.

Now in this reform, combat is done through very weighted rolls, and a large portion of mod discretion, similar to the GMs in Kriegsspiel.

Firstly mods will resolve the war in sections at a time.

If the players aren’t micromanaging, the mods will RP as the divisional generals, and allocate forces within that section in a common sense manner (no rolls). For example if the Indian player includes 4 division for the Pashtun section, the mods will divide those 4 divisions between certain points of that section in a common sense fashion, from the eyes of the commander on the ground

Next, once both sides have their force disposition, the mods will work out the combat.

The following order is the seniority order of the combat procedures:

• If any sides have planes in the area, Air Superiority always first. The procedure will be a weighted roll. The roll will be a 1d16 4 (1d20 with a base of 5) standard, however if one side has a significant technological or training disadvantage, the dice may be smaller, such as 1d9 1 (1d10 with a base of 2), or bigger, such as a 1d23 7 (1d30 with a base of 8). After the base dice, we also add in any additional modifiers on top of that, so at the end we will have dices that look more like (1d16 4-2 5). After we get the roll for both sides, they will be divided and inverse to get the casualty ratio.

• After that it’s CAS effectiveness. This will only be available if you bring CAS planes to the battle. The roll will be a weighted roll in similar manner, with a weighted base roll and additional modifiers added on top of that. The CAS effectiveness roll will determine the bonus each side will get from CAS, and the effectiveness roll will also be divided in similar manner to gain the casualty ratio for the CAS planes.

• Artillery combat effectiveness on both sides. This function in a similar manner as stated above with weighted rolls and modifiers. The end result effectiveness will affect the general combat effectiveness roll

Finally, general combat effectiveness of ground troops (which is a roll that includes all of the modifiers due to the effects above).

The combat effectiveness is not only used to determine the performance of the armies, but it’s also used to calculate the casualties, as once combat effectiveness rolls for both sides are completed, they will be divided and inverse to get the casualty ratio. For example:

France rolls 6, Germany rolls an 8. The casualty ratio will thus be France:Germany = 4:3.

Lastly, we have the morale roll on the side of the defender to see if they will retreat/surrender or not, while for the attackers it will be for the available options for them after the battle (high morale, can storm a city, continued assault, etc; low morale, must stop the attack and halt, bypass or retreat). Note that this doesn’t need to be done after general combat, but could also be done after any of the previous steps if it was particularly effective

Mod discretion will be mostly in the way the war will be conducted by the belligerents in the battle, if it’s not addressed by the players in their war plans. This could include the decision to siege, attack or bypass a settlement,