The portable wargame: Terrain effects

In his most recent play-test of my PORTABLE WARGAME rules, Ross Mac posed some questions about the terrain effects that feature in the current version of the rules. He asked some very pertinent questions ... and I have been musing on them ever since.

My wife and I have spent most of this morning (and a large chunk of this afternoon) at my father's house making sure that it is neat and tidy before any potential buyers go to view it. Luckily my sister had already done quite a bit of sorting out whilst she had been staying there for the past five days, and we had done a lot of the heavy work before she arrived. I had planned to 'treat' myself to a play-test of my rules once I got back home ... but Ross Mac's questions preyed on my mind, and I have been trying to come up with some workable solutions that I can include in my play-test.

In the end, my solution is to replace the relevant extant parts of the Special Rules section as follows:

Hills:

• Units may only move up or down one hill contour each time they are activated.
• Units may not attack enemy Units that are more than one hill contour above or below them.
• A Unit that is attacking an enemy Unit that is one hill contour above it reduces its Close Combat Power by 1.
• A Unit that is attacking an enemy Unit that is one hill contour below it increases its Close Combat Power by 1.
• Hills block line of sight except when a Unit on a hill is looking at another Unit that is on a hill that is the same height and no higher hill blocks the line of sight between the two Units.

Woods:

• Mounted Cavalry Units moving through woods may only move 1 hex every time they are activated.
• Units attacking enemy Units that are in woods reduce their Close Combat Power by 1, even if the attacking Unit is also in the woods.

These are based upon ideas that I have used before, and are derived from Joseph Morschauser's original rules and my development of Richard Borg's BATTLE CRY and MEMOIR '44 rules, MEMOIR OF BATTLE.