by Jim Owczarski, 6 February 2025
Having selected a scale and a rule set for a mad run into the world of Star Wars wargaming, the time has come to select a scenario and build a table. One would think the hard lifting done. After all, on the tabletop or within the Workshop of Tabletop Simulator, the miniatures and scenery for this most popular of universes are legion — no pun intended.
Alas, this is not so.
Starting at the very beginning, I used the first scenario offered in Quadrant 13 (Q13), viz. “The Prepared Attack”. The description is simple enough: “Force A will make a prepared attack on Force B. Force B must defend.” I list bill drafter among my trades and will confess to having briefly entertained the thought, “well, what other options did Force B have? What if it did not want to defend?”, &c. That to the side, I turned to the force briefings which, again, are short. I felt the Imperials were the logical aggressors so assigned them the role of Force A.
Its briefing states that the battle begin with a preliminary bombardment that comprises “1 + Tech Level fire boxes.” Tech Level is a significant part of Q13, modifying quite a few die rolls and having other effects. It is one of the ways the author hopes to shape the tabletop experience to resemble the universe being portrayed. Taking only one example, all fire rolls are modified by +(2xTL), a not insignificant increase. Fortunately for our purposes, he courteously mentions in a side note that Star Wars takes place in a Tech Level 3 universe.
Thence on to forces available where, if the wheels did not quite come off, they started to wobble. The scenario briefing first states that Force A will receive a full infantry company. I have played an awful lot of I Ain’t Been Shut, Mum! (IABSM) I have also played my fair share of 1914+ wargames. I pride myself on having at least a decent sense of what a company is in modern warfare — at least on the tabletop. The first time I read this briefing, though, I realized I had never once given thought to what a company of Imperial soldiers was. Admit it, unless you are a pretty hard nerd (I am looking at you, Ron) you can conjure images of Stormtroopers skirmishing in a strength that probably most resembles squads, but a company? Even running about under the speeders and AT-STs on Hoth, were those platoons? Were they something larger? If so, how could you tell? Dialogue in the movies suggests they adhered to some form of miliary organization analogous to that in World War II — what in the best of these movies was not borrowed in some way from World War II? — but details are scarce.
When I first attempted this, I used a free modification for the Too Fat Lardies’ well-regarded platoon-level World War II rules, Chain of Command (CoC). (NOTE: Most courteously made available, for free, here).
The unsatisfying results of this experiment may be found here
Therein I was told that Imperial platoons have three squads, each of which is composed of five line troops and what amounts to a two-man SAW team. I was further informed that Rebel platoons also have three squads, but they have six line troops with a two-man SAW team. Given my experience with IABSM, I knew that the SAWs would be abstracted out and I acted accordingly when I took my first crack at adapting Star Wars to Q13. I did not, however, expect this nicely-done modification to be directly contradicted.
According to my much-worn-yet-never-played copy of 1994’s Star Wars Miniatures Battles Companion, however, done by the same folks that crafted the ancient and best Star Wars role-playing game, an Imperial platoon is made up of four squads, each of eight soldiers. Here the sourcebook weasels a bit. We read that the “historical” strength of a platoon would be 32 of other ranks plus officers. As we shall shortly see, however, the strength of a rebel platoon is given as four squads, each of 10 men. The text suggests the difference is made up by the quality and training of the Imperial forces while leaving the door open to 10-man squads, should the player wish. I will not here give insult to the skill, training, and marksmanship of Imperial forces. That provokes all manner of ugly debates both in our Discord chat and during streams. As I am on the ground floor of all this and hoping to keep things simple, I have opted to give both sides 10-man squads.
I will not here give insult to the skill, training, and marksmanship of Imperial forces.
The Companion indicates that each platoon is commanded by a lieutenant, assisted by a sergeant major. This works brilliantly with Q13 which, like many Lardy games, makes a great deal of “Big Men”, i.e., leaders. Those who have played IABSM will be familiar with the lesser officers and NCOs of those games. The book also provides elaborate escutcheon for squads, platoons, companies, regiments, and even divisions. (Author’s Note: Divisions, you say? Hrm.) I presume it derived all this wisdom from the production canon of the movies, but, having struggled as much as I did with the earlier modification, this old friend brought welcome knowledge, whatever its source.
Force A, therefore, will have a full infantry company of four platoons, each composed of four squads. Each squad will have 10 Stormtroopers. Two of these will be depicted as having a “SAW”, but that will have no effect on gameplay. And they will be commanded by an appropriately-named lieutenant. Quality matters mightily in Q13, determining, among other things, how many actions a certain number of men will have. Quality ranges from “Rabble” to “Elite”. In the interest of simplicity, I will make both the Rebels and the Imperials “Regular”, but will be monitoring how well this works, particularly over against the Imperial’s aforementioned “historical” squad size.
As to armor, it is evident the Imperial forces are wearing some and, in most cases, the Rebels are wearing a bit less. Therefore, entirely arbitrarily and subject to later revision, I have assigned TL 3 armor — state of the art — to the Empire and TL 2 armor to the Rebellion.
So, there are the front-line Imperial troops sorted.
Then the scenario briefing says they may bring up to three support squads. I see.
If you have read my previous work or seen just about any of the broadcasts over on the YouTube channel, you know how much I hate point systems in historical games. They are created out of an ugly, impossible quest for balance in conflicts that far more often than not had none of it. Worse, they first lead to pick-up games (which I generally dislike as a waste of time) and, placing horrors on tedium, they can cause tournaments which are an abomination in the eyes of the Featherstone. I have always acknowledged, however, their worth in science fiction universes and in those fantasy settings where we have only the vaguest notion of the size of the forces engaged.
How many gathered at the Battle of the Five Armies?
How many at Istvaan V?
It is often a whole lot of hand-waving. Not everyone, after all, can be David Drake or, frankly, wants to be. As a Lardy-adjacent game, Q13 eschews points. Admirable and fair, but it makes figuring out how to balance support items difficult.
Diving back into the CoC modification helped me clarify my thinking. It offers a great list of possible supports and CoC support point values for each. Some of these are pretty obvious: minefields, a barrier, a section of entrenchment, a sniper team, or an extra leader. What about the really interesting stuff, though? What, after all, is a T-7 Ion Rifle team? What is A KX-series Enforcer droid? And an E-Web Heavy Repeating Blaster sounds positively nasty. I might have despaired, had I not quickly begun to Google each of these names.
Fans — nerds — I love you. You never disappoint.
Each of these arcane-sounding things is lovingly depicted on multiple sites, and many of these sites include dimensions and battlefield roles. You will likely decry the statistics I am about to share, but you gave me an irreplaceable first step on this portion of the journey.
Three support squads it is, then.
Shopping on lists like these is great fun, I will admit, especially when I looked up the item in question and had several moments of, “oh, yeah, that thing! Yes, I would like that for the Imperials!” I therefore chose:
- HH-12 Rocket Team (2 troopers)
- T-7 Ion Rifle Team (2 troopers)
- Mortar Team (2 crew)
By the count of the CoC modification, this is six points. However, their numbers, if not their points, must be increased to scale with Q13. Therefore, following an old principle for moving between the systems, each of these teams will be tripled. Each of them will be available to the Empire as a separate support squad or may be attached and move with a squad within a platoon.
As to their statistics, Q13 asks the designer to think about the weapon, what its role is on the battlefield, and how it performs when used. This can be tricky in a world like Star Wars where such views are often fleeting, but what follows are my best guesses.
The first statistic is “Strike Value” (SV). Here, we have good guidance from the rules as it suggests a rocket launcher with no anti-tank role would receive an SV of “3”. So be it. The second statistic, more of a rating I suppose, is whether the weapon is “Boom”, “Bolt”, or “Both”. “Boom” weapons are area effect. “Bolt” are those intended to strike a narrow point. “Both” are those that load, well, both. It seems pretty easy to define the HH-12 rocket as a “Boom” weapon. Finally, there is the question of whether the weapon fires directly, directly, or both. It, again, seems easy to classify the HH-12 as a direct-fire weapon. Applying these same principles to the remainder of the supports, I conclude:
- HH-12 Rocket Team: 3 SV, “Boom”, Direct
- T-7 Ion Rifle Team: 2 SV, “Bolt”, Direct, Reduces cover by one level
- Mortar Team: 3 SV, “Boom”, Both
Here, then, they are, in all their glory. Such as it is:
click images to enlarge
I have written little so far about the Rebels, in large part because building them tracked closely in this early stage with the process used for the Imperials. I was tempted to give them something a bit mad — a platoon of Wookies came to mind. I resisted. They receive two full platoons and two supports. I chose:
RPS-5 Rocket Team, 3 SV, “Boom”, Direct
Mark 2 Medium Blaster Team. 3 SV, Autogun, Direct
I also chose, because I could not resist, to give them an additional Big Man in the form of a Petulant, Brooding Youth. He will be able to command no one, but adds close combat dice to any unit to which he is attached. He is also able to deflect bolt weapons under certain circumstances. And his name is not Skywalker.
This is not the last time I intend to visit the question of how to “stat” particular troops or vehicles. For the moment, I just want to get some troops on the table. Having selected a desert planet that is most definitely not Tatooine, rolling up the necessary terrain was very simple following the rules provided in “Q13“. All that is really left to us is putting the soldiers in their place, gathering the players, and seeing whether all this was a colossal failure.
“Sir, the possibility of successfully navigating an asteroid field is approximately three thousand seven hundred to one!
Never tell me the odds.”
Until next time.
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