4X4 Leadership Ratings

What are we trying to model?

We want to provide conditions and ratings that try to model the actual "leadership" of the commands involved in a manner that reflects their historical actions given the conditions of the terrain and darkness.

My personal opinion is that we can use Leadership to model the darkness, confusion and caution. If this were a battle in broad daylight, I'd raise the Leadership values shown here and have different logic behind the ratings.

What levers do we have?

Field of Battle gives us two distinct levers:

1.       The Leadership rating of the individual commanders

2.       The Leadership rating of the Sequence Deck

What specific goals do we have for each command?

Confederates

For the Confederate force, I think we want to have an Average Sequence Deck. Other than caution, I do not feel that the Confederate command was particularly good or bad. We’ll give Johnson, the division commander a D8 Leadership rating. This may reflect his caution by providing the conditions for smaller differences in impetus points.

Steuart’s command made the most movement and progress. Let’s give Steuart a D10 Leadership rating. 

For the remaining Confederate brigades, we’ll assign a D8 Leadership rating. In the battle, these forces went in against the works and tied down the Yankees there for a bit, nothing spectacular. If the Confederate player wishes to use these forces in a different manner, the lower Leadership will help to model the caution and darkness.

Should any commanders fall and be replaced, all replacement commanders will be a D8.

Federals

The Federal army should have a Skilled Sequence Deck. The overall Federal command on the hill fell to Wadsworth: a capable man with a battered command. If we retain the notion that smaller impetus variances may model this action best we should rate him as a D8 Leadership. This may feel like a slight to the man, but let’s default on the side of the scenario design objectives. I feel we can justify a D8 rating based upon the condition of his command, the condition of the terrain and darkness and the critical importance of this sector of the line.

Greene’s men fought stubbornly, able to refuse the flank and hold on. If we give Greene a D12 Leadership rating, his men will be better able to maneuver and rally, giving the model soldiers an opportunity to repeat their actual performance.

Likewise, Cutler and Meredith had an elite force that was able to send some help to the other end of the line. Let’s give both of these commanders a D10 Leadership rating.

As for the Flying Dutchmen, I think a D8 Leadership rating for their commander will help them maneuver less and rally less.

Like the Rebels, all replacement commanders will be a D8.

Summary

Well, play testing will discover the truths of course, but for the starting point, here is what we have…

Commander	Leadership	Side	Command Level
Johnson	D8	CSA	Division Command
Steuart	D10	CSA	Brigade Command
Williams (Nicholls)	D8	CSA	Brigade Command
Jones	D8	CSA	Brigade Command
Wadsworth	D8	USA	Division Command
Greene	D12	USA	Brigade Command
Amsberg	D8	USA	Brigade Command
Cutler	D10	USA	Brigade Command
Meredith	D10	USA	Brigade Command

Next up? Special rules for the scenario. Should there be any? What are they? I think possibly, this is a key design element and can give conditions that the players must manage and enhance the challenge to them.