The Recon system is divided into three phases: Movement, Shooting, Close Combat

and Morale. The phases are done in a alternating system, i.e. player A moves, then

Player B moves, Player A shoots, Player B shoots. Determination of the order one

plays is by scenario or roll off in the case of Pitched Battle. The system is best used to

represent small unit battles, the section or squad being the standard combat unit.

Units:

Any army is made up of units, these are the basic logistical units on the

battlefield. However the basic tactical unit can sometimes be much smaller. Most

units of any professional army can break up into smaller tactical units, known as fire

teams or sections… etc. Units that can break up into what will be hereafter referred

to as detachments have certain rules regarding movement; Detachments can be any

distance away from each other, so long as they have line of sight. If line of sight is

broken, the detachments must move towards one another until they regain line of

sight. A detachment’s members must remain within 2” of each other.

Movement:

Movement can be divided into two sections, first the acting player choses his

unit’s stances (overwatch, covering, moving), then the player moves the units which

are able to.

Stances:

Stances are the positions a unit maintains in regards to the enemy. There are

two principle stances: Overwatch, and Moving. Overwatch is when a unit is in a

prepared ambush or given a specific section of area to defend. As such a

Overwatched unit may not move, however the unit receives an additional +1 to its
accuracy, in addition to whatever other bonuses it might have received plus a +1 to

the rate of fire of the squads weapons to represent the better fire position. Moving is

the simplest stance, it simply means that the unit intends to move, even if it also

intends to fire.

Moving:

Most Infantry models may move up to 12 inches. However the more an

Infantry model moves, the more his aim is affected if he intends to fire. For our

example we will take an average rifleman, because the rifleman carries a battle-

ready rifle the ratio for his movement is good. If the rifleman moves between 1 and

6 inches, the range is reduced on a 1-inch movement to 1-inch range ratio, i.e. if

Rifleman tommy moves 6” his range will be reduced from 24” to 18”. However if our

Rifleman moves more than six his aim suffers much greater, the ratio being moved

from 1:1 to a 1-inch movement to 3-inches range ratio; i.e. If tommy moved 8” his

range would be reduced from 24” to 12” and if he moved his full 12” his range would

be 0” and he would not be able to fire at all. Most if not all rifles have this

arrangement. Other weapons will have different ratios, usually given in the

following format:

Lee Enfield Rifle: 0-6” = 1:1, 7-12” = 1:3.

In addition to changing the effective range of a weapon, moving also reduces the

potential accuracy of an Infantryman. Accuracy is only reduced if the ratio for range

is worse than 1:1, in other words a rifleman may move 0-6” and suffer no penalties

to his accuracy. However if the ratio is worse than 1:1 then he suffers a -1 to his
Accuracy. In some cases this could mean an infantry model could move the

minimum possible distance and still receive a -1 bonus to his accuracy.

Vehicles and Moving:

Vehicles move at much greater speeds than infantry and the only real determining

factor on how fast a vehicle moves is the terrain in which the vehicle desires to

move through and the vehicles Terrain skill. Vehicles are divided into two broad

groups in regards to moving: Tanks and other vehicles. Tanks include halftracks,

tankettes, and other tracked vehicles. Other vehicles cover the mostly wheeled

vehicles such as armored cars, jeeps, motorcycles and such.

Tanks

Tanks are divided into three subgroups: Heavy, Medium, and Light. These effect

their speeds while traveling in cover.

Note, Roads:

While being counted as open cover for the purposes of infantry, Tanks have

different move properties on roads. All tanks may add an additional ½ their total

movement speed when traveling on terrain that is meant to represent a road

(determine which terrain pieces, if any, are roads with your opponent before the

game.) with no penalties.

Heavy, Medium, and Light tanks may all move their full distances when crossing

open cover. Heavy tanks suffer a -1/2 movement penalty when crossing partial

cover, Medium tanks suffer a -1/4 movement penalty and Light tanks suffer no

penalty at all. Heavy tanks suffer a -3/4 movement penalty when crossing complete

cover, Medium tanks suffer a -1/2 penalty and Light tanks suffer no penalty.
Heavy and Medium tanks both have a special rule called “Nothing can stop me”. This

allows Heavy and Medium tanks to simply barrel their way through intervening

cover instead of taking the penalty to carefully move around such obstacles. This

comes with a price, should the tank fail its “Nothing can stop me” test, the tank is

then stuck, placed just in front of the terrain the tank tried to bulldoze, and may not

move again for the entire game. Turreted tanks may move their turret even when

stuck, and heavy and medium tanks still count as giving complete cover to

supporting infantry. However destroyed tanks or tanks that have lost their main gun

cease to grant this bonus. To determine whether or not a tank has become stuck,

one simply rolls a dice and subtract the number of inches the tank moved through

the terrain (its usually best to declare how far the tank will move through terrain

before taking the test) if the number is greater than 2 a medium tank will succeed its

test. A heavy tank need only have a total greater than 1 to beat the test.

Shooting:

Shooting is the phase in which attacking units determine the effects of their shooting

on an enemy unit. Shooting takes place immediately after the movement phase,

except in the case of overwatch units, which takes place outside the phase system.

Overwatch.

An overwatched unit first declares a facing or ‘field of fire’, this is a 45 degree arch in

the direction the unit is facing. Any Enemy unit entering this field is immediately

fired upon as it entering the field of fire. This fire takes place immediately and

outside the general phase system. This also means that a overwatch unit might fire

multiple times in a turn. There is no limit to the amount of times an overwatch unit
may fire, though some unit types may not be placed on overwatch. An overwatch

unit may fire in its shooting phase, even if it has already fired before; however, an

overwatched unit may fire outside its field of fire during its shooting phase, whereas

only units entering the overwatch field of fire may be fired upon by the original

overwatch unit.

Shooting:

A shooting unit declares on which unit it intends to fire upon. Next the players

determine if the defending unit is within range of the shooting units weapons, if they

are they proceed to the next step, if not then the unit has wasted its opportunity to

fire. Once a unit has a enemy unit in sight and within range, the defending unit takes

its defense score and adds a d6, this number is what the firing unit must beat in

order to achieve a hit and is called the ‘true defense score’. To determine the ‘true

accuracy’ of a unit, the firing unit adds its normal accuracy score to any bonuses it

has (overwatch, scopes, trained, etc.) and then adds a d6. If this total beats the true

defense score of the enemy unit, then a hit has been achieved. After the firing unit is

done rolling for hits, then cover is factored in.

Bonus Type Bonus

Trained +1

Overwatch +1

Target is in +1
the open
Enemy has +1
not moved
Firing unit is +1
in cover
Firing unit +1
has been in
overwach
for more
than one
turn
Enemy has +1
moved more
than 6”
Enemy has +1
moved in
the same
direction for
more than
one turn

Cover is divided into three general types: Open, Partial, and Complete.

A unit fired upon while in open cover receives no benefit. Every hit is counted. This

encourages players not to send their units into the open too often. Open cover is

usually represented on the gaming table by lack of terrain, it’s the open spaces on a

table. The exception to this would be roads. If playing on a very detailed table which

has no bare spaces, Open cover should be fairly easy to determine, if a standing

model is viewable from the firing unit from the knees upward then the defending

unit is in open cover.

A unit fired upon while in open cover may discard ¼ of the total number of hits the

unit received from a unit firing on it. This discard is taken every time a unit shoots at

a unit in partial cover, in other words if three units fire on a single enemy unit in

partial cover, then each unit must determine their hits and discard ½ of them.

Partial cover is usually represented in forests, ruined buildings or small barricades.

A model that is viewable by a firing unit from the waist up is considered to be in

partial cover.
A unit fired upon while in complete cover may discard ¾ of the total hits the unit

received from a unit firing on it. Complete cover is usually represented as fixed

fortifications such as trenches or bunkers, though extensive rubble might also serve.

A Model is considered to be in complete cover if the model is viewable from a firing

unit can only see the model from the middle of the shoulders up.

Line of sight and cover is determined from an infantry models head, it may be

helpful to use a laser sight to help determine what a model can see, though simple

dropping ones head to the height of the firing model is often enough. Tanks

determine line of sight from the commander’s copula.

Pinning:

A unit may become pinned, where advancing towards the enemy is impossible and

returning fire is also impossible if the number of hits, after cover has been factored

in, equals a unit’s moral score. Typically this number will be about as large as a

squad, though very determined squads or specially trained assault units might have

a larger number. A pinned unit may not fire in its phase, a pinned unit may also only

move backwards relative to the unit that pinned it, though if it does so it counts as

broken during the moral phase.

Wounding:

Once hits have been determined and cover factored in, the owning player

distributes the remaining hits around the squad. All hits are assumed to wound

however a d6 roll determines the effect of the wound. A roll of 1 results in a

miraculous near wounding, the bullet bounced off the helmet or passed through a

bulky jacket without hitting the man. A roll of 2 results in a minor wound, which
prevents the unit from moving in the next turn, though they may be placed on

overwatch, while they tend to their wounded comrade. 3-6 equals a fatal wound and

the model is immediately removed. If a squad loses ¾ of its original strength in a

single shooting phase, the unit immediately falls back towards the ‘fall back point’

12” and counts as being broken in the moral phase.

Shooting at Cover:

It should be noted that some weapons can ignore cover of almost any kind. To

determine if a weapon ignores cover, simply compare its damage rating against the

cover’s toughness rating. If the number is greater then the cover is downgraded one

level, i.e. a unit in a forest (toughness 2) granting partial cover, is fired upon by a .50

machine gun (damage 4) then the unit would be counted as if it were in open cover

rather than partial.

Shooting at vehicles:

Hitting a vehicle is exactly the same as hitting an infantry unit, except that vehicles,

due to their size, may not add a d6 to their defense score. All vehicles get an armor

rating, this determines if a weapon has any chance of penetrating the armor of a

vehicle. If a weapons damage rating is greater than or equal to the armor rating of a

armored vehicle, then the weapon has successfully penetrated the armor. After this

roll a d6; on a roll of 1 the weapon was unable to inflict any real damage to the tank,

the tank may continue as normal next turn; on a roll of 2 the weapon has caused

minor damage, the tank must take the next two turns to repair the damage but may

act as normal after this; on a roll of 3-6 the tank has suffered catastrophic damage

and must be evacuated.

 Damage rating may increase or decrease based on a number of factors.

Firstly is range, a number of weapons dramatically increasing their damage rating

based on range, this is indicated in their profiles. Secondly certain weapons can use

different amo to achieve different effects. The exception to this is weapons with a

damage rating of 1 or less, these weapons are the limited small arms of most

infantry and are designed to be lethal at almost any range they can reach and are

about as effective at any of those ranges.

Artillery:

Artillery is the king of battle, the big destroyers. A 10” blast radius plate measures

all Artillery blasts, with concentric circles drawn ever 1” from the center. The effects

of a blast on a model are determined by two factors: firstly which circle the model is

under relative to the center of the blast, and secondly what terrain surrounds him.

The closer a model is to the center of a blast, the more likely he will be wounded

fatally. If a model his hit with a blast and within close quarters the strength of the

blast will be increased. If a model is within the first 5 circles and has walls in his

terrain and the 5th circle is not fully within the wall, then the model is counted as

being one circle closer than he actually is, if there is a roof over the model then the

model counts as being an additional circle closer. The strength of the blast is

represented in infantry wounding by a +1 on the to wound roll, though a natural 1 is

always a failure. In testing on vehicles the strength bonus increases the damage

rating of the weapon.

Artillery comes in two major forms and all forms can use the standard High

Explosive (HE) Shell. Most can use other forms of shells but those will be dealt with
in the weapon profiles individually. Most of the Artillery you will meet on the battle

field will be field pieces, however some forces may call in barrages from larger

support Batteries, these being many miles away from the battlefield are not needed

to be represented on the actual field of play, however designate a 12” line of the

appropriate board edge as the general direction the shells are coming in from.

Normally an Artillery piece counts as having no Accuracy score, the roll to hit

if missed is then ‘scattered’ 2d6 inches. Draw an imaginary line straight from the

Artillery piece, or from the designated board edge if using a support battery, before

rolling the 2d6 scatter, designate one die to represent forward motion along the line

and one to represent tangential motion (left or right if the line is forward and back).

Roll a d2 to determine if the motion is forward or back, left or right; this will require

two rolls total, one for each direction. Further if the unit being fired upon has moved

in the last turn, than the artillery have a -1 to their accuracy score, reducing it below

zero simply means subtracting the bonus from the die to hit. However if a unit has

not moved in 2 turns than the artillery may claim a 1+ bonus to its accuracy if a

friendly unit has line of sight to the stationary enemy unit. The Artillery will gain an

addition +1 bonus for each turn the enemy unit does not move. Further another +1

bonus may be gained if more than one friendly unit can see the stationary enemy

unit, though both units must have greatly different angles of sight on the unit. Note

that friendly units that are either pinned or broken may not be counted for these

bonuses, they’re too busy trying to survive.

Artillery is counted as being infantry when being shot at. The armored

portion of the Artillery piece itself will protect the crew to some degree, Artillery
always counts as being in at least partial cover, unless the damage rating is double

the Artillery’s armor.

Tanks:

Tanks are the Queens of battle, the mightiest form of modern combat. Tanks form a

unique part of any army; they are both the mighty fist and the Achilles’ heel of any

force. Tanks possess armor that protects them from even mighty cannons, they have

cannons of their own which deal death to infantry and enemy armor alike; Tanks

have machine guns to aid in the destruction of enemy infantry. Yet Tanks have great

weakness as well. The heaviest and deadliest of tanks are slow moving and have

limited cross-country potential while the faster and lighter tanks are easier to

destroy. Further Tanks have limited visibility, a weakness happily exploited by the

poor bloody infantry. Tanks are large targets, and their noisy engines make

ambushes difficult. Further, with the exception of the American forces, all tanks

must stop in order to fire their cannons to full effect.

A tank is a catchall term, meaning any fully tracked vehicle and most partially

tracked vehicles.

Sight:

Tanks have very special forms of vision; tanks have a danger zone in which they

have almost no ability to see what is surrounding the tank if all the tank crew is

safely inside the tank. The class of tank determines the size of the danger zone.

Heavy tanks have the worst visibility and have a 12” inch square around the tank;

Medium tanks have much better visibility with only a 6” inch square around the

tank; While Light Tanks have the best visibility of all with a mere 3” square. It
should be noted that the Tank Commander can always rise out of his commanders

copula to observe his tank’s surroundings. If a crewmember is outside of the tank,

than the tank has no danger zone, though the crewmember is vulnerable and is open

to be targeted as a unit apart from the tank. Further a crewmember suffers a -1 to

his defense score.

A tank suffers a high penalty to its movement score in order to fire its main

cannon. A -1/2 penalty is placed on any tank wishing to fire its main cannon. No

penalty is placed on a tank that wishes to fire its machine guns. American tanks are

unique in that they suffer no penalty to fire, having developed special gyroscopic

controls on their cannons to allow them to fire on the move. Tanks may fire either a

HE shell like Artillery, or they may fire armor piercing ammunition. Firing armor

piercing ammo is a single shot weapon, fired exactly like a normal weapon.

Weapon Profiles:
Weapon Range Damage Rate of Fire Ratios
M1 Garand 30” 1 2 From 1-6 1:1
From 7-12 1:3
SMLE 30” 1 1 From 1-6 1:1
From 7-12 1:3
K98 30” 1 1 From 1-6 1:1
From 7-12 1:3
.30 Cal LMG 30” 2 10 From 1-4 1:3
From 5-12 1:4
MG42 30” 2 10 From 1-6 1:3
From 7-12 1:4
Thompson 12” 1 3 From 1-8 3:1
From 9-12 1:1
MP40 12” 1 3 From 1-12 3:1
Mosin-Nagant 30” 1 1 From 1-6 1:1

Ppsh41 15” 1 3 1-12 3:1

Vickers MG 24” 2 10 1-4 1:2
5-6 1:4
37mm – AT 45” 1-15” 6 1 NA
16-45” 4
7.5 cm - AT 45” 1-20” 6 1 NA
21-45” 4
37mm - HE 30” 4 at center 1 NA
7.5 cm - HE 45” 5 at center 1 NA
Bren gun 30” 1 7 From 1-6 1:1
From 7-12 1:4
Bazooka 15” 1-12” 6 1 From 1-6 2:1
13-15” 4 From 7-12 1:1
Beretta 38 15” 1 4 From 1-12 3:1
.50 Cal 30” 3 10 NA

Vehicle Weapon, Weapon, Armor, Speeds

Primary Secondary front/side/rear
Jeep .30 cal 1/1/1 24”
M8 37mm 50. Cal 5/4/3 15”
Hanomag MG42 MG42 4/4/3 15”
Panzer IV 7.5 cm cannon MG42 6/6/5 15”
Bren Carrier .50 cal Bren Gun 4/3/2 24”

Unit Movement Accuracy Defense Moral

US Recon 12” 4 2 12
SS Infantry 12” 3 3 14
Soviet Infantry 12” 2 2 10
Spetznaz 15” 4 4 14
British Tommy 12” 3 3 12