Non conformst companies

[Stewart 46A]

I agree with John,
Keep them in, unusual armies can be fun to use.
I also vote to keep all armies at 400pts for simplicity,

My Volkstrum can be a normal 400pts force or add a couple more platoons and they are a game winning non-conformist army

Stewart

[martin goddard]

You are right Stewart,
Volksturm do not fit into the non conformists rationale.
They have access to good AT and good vehicles.
I will take them out of non conformist.

We need to concern ourselves with the armies that are so poor that they would need to 84 bases as I listed for the French resistance.
No member here will ever paint up 84 bases for the French resistance.
To be considered for use, the non conformist forces need to have some attraction.
OR we need to exclude non conformist armies for game simplicity?


martin

[John Watson]

I beg to differ. I have Greeks, Partisans and Finns, all of whom could be or are non conformist. Also I can make a conformist force out of my Partisans (average) under the new rules.
John

[martin goddard]

Which bit do you disagree with John?

martin

[Colonel Kilgore]

Which bit do you disagree with John?

martin

Everything - he's a non-conformist     

Simon

[John Watson]

Excluding non conformist companies.
John

[martin goddard]

Thanks.
Got it John.


martin

[Nigel_s]

Is it worth questioning whether we need to include a chapter on non-conformist companies, with the associated special rules, in the general release rule book?

I understand the challenge of accommodating companies that can't call on support or veteran status to get to 400 points within the number of units restriction. While some expert PBI players here will have rarer, more unusual companies, most WW2 gamers will be more than satisfied with the significant list choices available within the Company Architect handbook.

Perhaps non-conformist rules could be a free download rather than adding pages and rules to the published rule book.

[John Watson]

Yesterday I pointed up Americans for North Africa in preparation to our Desert Day this Saturday. The average force was easy but when it came to doing the raw company I struggled with it. It became very hard to comply with the maximum of 6 units and use up all the points. I only managed it by packing the force with a unit of 4 Shermans. This made me wonder how an American force, which is bristling with lots of stuff, could be in this position. So I looked back at the existing edition of the printed rules and the unit limits then were 4 to 6 for vets and average and 7 for raw. I don't know why Martin has cut this back to 5 and 6 respectively in the current working set of the rules, but it would seem to make sense to me to leave the 6 and 7 limits in place then you wouldn't need the complication of non conformist companies.
John

[Moggy]

Would that be the same with other armies? I rely on the more experienced (long in the tooth) out there to keep me informed on this.

Derek

[John Watson]

I don't know as I haven't pointed up any of the other armies, but in theory it could. Any raw company is going to have lots of cheap infantry bases, so, if the company has relatively small platoons (say 10 or 11 bases), you are going to need more units than if the platoons are larger (say 12 to 15 bases). For example some Japanese and Russian infantry platoons are up to 18 bases strong.
A raw rifle base costs 4 points. Most platoons have 6 rifle bases each. Most companies have up to 4 platoons of infantry. That is 96 points of rifles. An average rifle base costs 6 points so the equivalent is 144 points. A difference of 48 points. That is only for the riflemen. When you add in other things the difference quick mounts up.
The Americans I pointed up had 11 base platoons. I used 4 of these for just over 200 points plus a mortar platoon came to 260 points. That allowed me one more unit costing 140 points! Average Sherman 75mm tanks are 35 points each so I took 4 of them.
If 7 units were allowed, rather than 6 for raw (7 as per the old rules) then the raw platoons would have more flexibility to choose a more balanced force.
John
 

[martin goddard]

This is all good stuff.

It is intended that a raw company would usually be 4 foot platoons, 1 support platoon and a trio of tanks.

PC rifle 3
6 rifles 24
3 LMG 21
1 weapon thing 5
= 53
4 platoons = 212
About half the company points.

Support platoon
PC 3
4 weapons 32
2 rifles 8
43

Total so far=255.
That leaves a lot of points for tanks  ie 145

4 average 7/7 tanks?

More points could be spent if a platoon has more  potential for foot bases, SMG etc.
The few  companies that cannot  easily "fit" the 400 are the ones I want to help by adding in the "non-conformist option".

I will chat about total number of units in a new chat.

martin