Cross of Iron rules Anti-Tank Attacks Questions - A Gauntlet Publication

[Mako]

I was reading over these last night, after getting a little confused over a newer, similarly named, Iron Cross, set of rules, and have some questions on anti-tank combat by the infantry, spelled out on page 22 and 23 of the booklet.

The Cross of Iron rules were produced by Mathew Sparkes, and it is a Gauntlet Publication, produced in 1998, and they are designed for squad to platoon level battles.

In the rules, it lists certain weapons doing a number of hit-points to vehicles, and the tanks take damage if a number is rolled that is HIGHER than a given number on 2D6 when attacking.  10, (so really you need an 11 or 12 when attacking a T-34, on 2D6), and 8 for a Panzer IV (need to roll 9+ to damage it).  Tanks have a "Panzer Factor" of 10 and 8, respectively.

That seems fairly straight forward.

Then, it goes on to mention other weapons doing a number of "hit points" to the vehicles, when they hit - 2D6 for panzerfaust and A/T gun attacks (again, presumably you just roll over the tank's defense factor - "Panzer Factor" for successfully penetrating or damaging the vehicle). 

This, and the number of hit points improvised weapons do to the vehicles, of 1 or 3 points, is the part that's confusing me, since the values for the latter are so low, and they mention the rolling of doubles when making these attacks, but not which dice to roll, or how for attacks with grenades.  For example, regular grenades do 1 point of damage, and grenade bundles, or A/T grenades do 3.  Damage is more severe if "doubles are rolled", but there's no info on how to roll dice, or which sized dice to roll for this (presumably D6's like for the rest of the rules).

Attacks on the rear of the vehicles do 3D6 damage - presumably for the panzerfausts and A/T gun weapons, since that is mentioned just after them.

There are no "points" listed that need to be reached to destroy a vehicle, so I'm not sure if they mean you need to perform one attack for each "hit point" factor available, or if there is something that was overlooked being mentioned in the rules.  I guess another option would be to reduce the "Panzer Factor" of the tanks by X number of points, for the various grenade attacks, if you can make multiple attacks on them using those weapons.

There is a 1D6 "Chart" for damage, mentioning the following results, for a successful attack on the vehicle:

1 - 2 = vehicle halts
3 - 4 = vehicle immobilized, crew bail out
5 - 6 = destroyed

Perhaps, for the grenade attacks too, you roll 2D6, and/or 3D6, depending upon the angle you are attacking the vehicle from, and then, if rolling over the tank's defense value, e.g. 10 or 8 on that, damage is done to them by the grenades.  That seems to make sense, with a grenade only doing 1 point of damage (no need to roll on the D6 for that - the result is automatically a maximum of 1), and A/T grenades or a grenade bundle doing 3 points (results in an automatic 3 result on the "damage chart", unless doubles are rolled in the initial attack success roll), so the vehicle can only be halted, and/or immobilized by them, with a lucky die roll. 

Ah, I suspect perhaps that is it, since that makes the most sense.

Still, would like confirmation on that, since the rules aren't very clear on the process.

Also, unless I missed it, there doesn't seem to be any rule for attacking tanks with thrown/placed antitank mines.  For that, I was thinking of perhaps a 33% - 50% chance of being successful if the figure carrying one of these can get to within a couple of inches of the tank(s) (10 meters, or so), and if so, then rolling on the damage chart above, if he succeeds with that die roll, meaning the tank's tread actually rolled over the mine and detonated it.

Might be useful to have rules for flamethrowers, and/or Molotov cocktails too, I suspect - open to ideas for that.  May need to look at the Panzerknacker rules to see how they handle those, if included.

Also, for the infantry rules, there's a "bigoted maniac" mentioned as a type of character, but no info about how his attributes are modified for the game, like for all the others.

Any info you can share on the above will be greatly appreciated.

A game play example would be really nice, if there are any for the above processes.

Thoughts?

[Mako]

Went back and re-read these again.

Apparently, the attacks with grenades, etc., do "hit points" of damage to the tanks, but it's unclear how that works.  Perhaps reducing the "Panzer Factors" by one for each hit point they suffer.

Not sure what happens when that reaches zero, or a negative number, since no explanation is given.

A grenade does 1 "hit point", and rolling doubles results in the tank having to halt (presumably when 2D6 are rolled, and you get above the vehicle's "Panzer Factor" in order to affect it.  Perhaps that's a bit more of a diminishing "morale rating" for the crew, as opposed to actual damage being done to it.

Multi-headed, and/or A/T grenades that are successful result in 3 "hit points" vs. the tanks.  If you roll doubles on the attack (again, presumably rolling 2D6 to exceed the "Panzer Factor" for a success), then you roll on the 1D6 "Damage Chart" mentioned in the previous posting for that.

Panzerfausts, Panzerschrecks, and A/T guns do 2D6 "Hit Points" of damage.  3D6 "Hit Points" if attacking the vehicle's rear, thought it's not specified how you do that, other than the obvious attack from a rear quadrant.

There's no mention of what happens when hit points accrue.  I suspect they are deducted from the "Panzer Factor" in order to make the crew less likely to want to carry on with their mission, and/or attack.  Presumably the vehicle may have to halt, retreat, become immobilized so the crew has to bail out, and/or is destroyed, like from a multi-headed grenade attack (if you roll doubles, and then get to roll on the 1D6 "Damage Chart". 

If anyone's come up with some home-brew rules for that, I'd appreciate hearing about them.

[Harry von Fleischmann]

I think, from what I remember of my copy, your ideas are going to work. Tanks were, I think, meant to be a huge problem.