To Piquet or not to Piquet?

- By Terry Swain

For those gamers who are tired of 6 sets of rules for 6 different periods, salvation could be at hand.

Piquet is a master set of rules for wargaming, with specific supplements for differing periods. One learns the master rules for all periods and then the supplements bring the individual flavour to the periods. The Master Rules come in a box with the rule set, 2 player aid cards (have tables required on them), 2 decks of sequence cards and other miscellaneous bits and pieces. The period I tend to game is the Seven Years War which is covered by the supplement 'Cartouche' which covers 1690 -1790 period. To quote from the rules 'Piquet is written in a highly modular fashion. Each module and table is strongly interrelated, but also is easily 'tweaked' modified, and adjusted.'

So why change? My gaming group had been using Age of Reason for sometime, but was finding that as we increased our collections the games were getting long and unwieldy with as little as 15 or so units a size. Any attempts at larger games degenerated into unwieldy messes(and 25mm's can look real messy). As most games are played on a Friday night with midnight curfews(wives rule) we weren't getting games completed. So a set of Piquet was procured and away we went. At this point I have to be honest and say I hated them after first couple of games! After spending most of a Friday night sitting on a cold floor (dumb I know) and reading a book on Ottoman Turks (inspiring thoughts of next army) while my side won little impetuous (explain later) was ready to chuck them in. But, perseverance has paid off. Thanks to actually reading rules through a couple of times (does pay) and a few more games now have flavour of rules.

Basically (my style) the rules give you the make up of your army (troop types and quality), ability of your commanders, a deck of cards per side that allows you to do various tasks randomly (move infantry, reload muskets, deploy, move officers etc) and the randomness of die to drive you insane. The play mechanism is quite simple.

Player A rolls a D20, player B rolls a D20, the higher die deducts the lesser die, that provides the number of impetus points available to the winner. An impetus point is then expended to turn over a card, and then more impetuous to act on that card, if desired, or turn over a new card. e.g. Player A rolls a 16, Player B a 7. A wins by 9 . A turns a card , it is 'Move Infantry in Open'. A has 2 infantry commands , he chooses to move both. This will cost him 1 to turn the card, and 1 for each command, a total of 3. He has 6 left. The next card is a 'Dress lines', this costs 1 impetuous, but you can do nothing on it, it just uses up points. Down to 5, turn next card. The next card is an 'Officer Check' you may move your commanders. To do so costs 1 to turn card and 1 to move each officer. You can choose to do nothing, and turn the next card. When all 9 are used, roll the D20's again. Each phase is made up of 20 impetuous. After deducting the 9 above , 11 were left, if player B was now to win 15, he could only use 11, as that is all that is left in this phase. Phases continue until all cards in a deck are turned or a double on the D20's is rolled. At that stage the decks are reshuffles and a new phase kicks off.

The individual flavour is provided by the supplements. An example being in the 'Cartouche' where my Russians get to do a lot of 'dressing lines' and can't get a brilliant leader, while the dear old Prussians tend to be Brilliantly led and run around a lot while I'm standing still, historically correct. The fog of war aspect is bought in by the impetuous. This can have some huge swings as mentioned earlier. In a recent game of AWI, I marched my British Brigade up to American Militia, who were skulking behind cover (as they do), fired at them, and did nothing else all night. The Hessian brigade on my flank was getting beaten up, then ran away and then all our impetuous was getting spent on trying to stop them running, then rally, then throw in reserves to plug gap. While my lads stood, got shot at, and eyeballed the cowards behind the barricades. Some might think it was boring, but the 4 of us playing were on knife edge all night, would we get the impetuous we needed, would the abysmal Hessian commander rally his troops, would...

And that is the thrill and enjoyment of Piquet, there is always a chance things could turn around, and one bad die roll alone won't cost you the game. And it is FUN!

So if you want a change I and my gaming group, Paul Stairs, Peter Haldezos , Craig Watterson, Steve Sands, Roly Hermans, Brian Trott, and Paul Crouch can all recommend the rules set.

We have tried the ACW, Napoleonic and 1200-1600 supplements with equal enjoyment and would be delighted to answer any questions.

There is a dedicated website, 'The Piquet Mailer' full of information and a boisterous forum. I procured my rules from Wargamesworld in the UK.