GHQ 1/285 anyone?

[nils]

hi  anyone gaming GHQ 1/285 modernstuf ?(ore similer smal)
And if what rules do you use

[Hobbit]

Yes and rules largely depend upon who I play with.

Cold War Commander is very popular and has its own online forum and Yahoo groups. In many ways it is quite an abstract set with an emphasis on command and control rather than the absolute specific details of hardware. In uses a scale of one model vehicle equals about 3-5 real world vehicles. The rule system is essentially an evolution of GW's "Epic" and "Warmaster" games into something suitable for modern warfare. The system, as written, probably works best up to about 1990-ish but it can be used for later conflicts without too much difficulty.

I used to play a lot of Command Decision 2. This uses a similar model: real world ratio as above and whilst it does have a command and control system it is very different to CWC. It is much more focussed on very specific hardware details. I like it but it is clunky in many ways and doesn't always give satisfying results and is long OOP.

I also used to play WRG's modern rules for 1950-85. This set can be found as a free pdf now. Some hate it but I do think it is a solid set of rules; however it lacks a "modern" set of command and control rules and until you become quite familiar with it it can seem to have lots of info to try to work through (this is principally because it tries to allocate values to almost all weapon systems in the period covered); what you'll discover is that your army will probably only use a handful of these weapon systems. Equally within each section of the rules you'll discover that you quickly come to remember the key modifiers. HOWEVER this set is very heavily focussed on AFV combat and it can't really handle infantry battles (unlike the other two sets that I mentioned).

There's also a free set called BGMR (Battle Group Modern Rules) that is a sort-off successor to the 80s vintage Challenger rules. I've not played BGMR so can't really comment on it. Challenger tried to add more detail with regards to weapons like ATGW BUT the result was that it somewhat slowed play (and much like WRG lacked a recognisable "modern" command and control system).

I think a great deal comes down to what conflicts you want to cover and what your own preferred style of game is.

[nils]

thank you fore the overview

[julesav]

Hi Nils

In addition to the rules mentioned above GHQ themselves do a set of Modern rules and a supplement/variant to cover Vietnam in more detail. I've not played the 'Nam variant but I've played 1973 Syria vs Israeli (scenario in the book) the rules are interesting and certainly playable/serviceable but slightly 'old-skool' in feel.

The other set worth mentioning is Modern Spearhead available on Lulu I think? Great for playing large battles (we've actually fielded full Divisions on table using this system! It can be very one-sided due to the limited combat factors vs the variance in game stats for AFVs but I guess that might be 'realistic'? Biggest let down is lack of a points system or scenarios - both of which have been remedied online.

Cheers

Jules

[AngusPodgorny1969]

We've played a lot of moderns/near future with GHQ stuff. It's the most complete line of modern gear available with far more options than 15mm or 20mm.

We play primarily on a 4" grid. This makes life so much easier than trying to use rulers, especially for urban battles.

Unfortunately people seem to prefer larger figures so most of our recent gaming has been in 15mm. But I've been tempted to haul out the 6mm stuff again, especially our near future and sci-fi gear.

For rules we use something we built ourselves. Sort of a hybrid of the old Space Marine rules and Flames of War. Very simple and fast. Again, the square grid makes the scale even more enjoyable imo. 6mm troops can be sort of tough to move around with any level of precision. The smallest bump in the terrain makes them slide or topple. With a grid you can position them within the grid realistically relative to the terrain instead worrying about precise positioning for measurement purposes.