Spanish Civil War wargames rules: For Whom The Dice Rolls

First, a caveat. I have known the author of theses rules for many years, and we have wargamed together on many occasions. When he first became interested in the Spanish Civil War, I encouraged him to pursue this interest, and even gave him some of the relevant books in my collection when I downsized it some time ago. I will therefore own up to a degree of conscious and unconscious bias in the following review. However, it must be said that the rules he has written are all his own work, and owe nothing to my input other than encouragement.

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FOR WHOM THE DICE ROLLS are intended for players who want to fight brigade or divisional-level action of a tabletop. They were designed to be used with 15mm figures and models, but will easily be used with larger or smaller scale figures with little or no adjustment.

The rule book is split into a number of sections and subsections. These include:

• Introduction
• The Basics
• What you will need
• Playing area
• Troop Classifications
• Training
• Motivation
• Troop type
• Will to Combat
• Army Effectiveness
• Weaponry
• Infantry Weapons
• Artillery
• Armoured Vehicles
• Aircraft
• Figures, Scales & Formations
• Basing Figures and Vehicles
• Aircraft
• Scales
• Unit Sizes
• Higher Level Formations
• Table Top Formations
• Command and Control
• Command Cards
• Turn Sequence
• Movement
• Unit Movement
• Movement Increments
• Multiple Moves
• Wheeling & Facing
• Troops in Vehicles
• Close Assault
• Interpenetration
• Terrain
• Ranged Combat
• Bombardment
• Armour Combat
• Combined Infantry and Armour Attacks
• Close Assaults
• Close Assault Procedure
• Resolving Close Assaults
• Close Combat Example
• Morale
• Off Table Assets
• Determining Off Table Assets
• Playing Off Table Assets
• Ani-Aircraft Fire
• Unit Organisations
• Peninsula Army
• Infantry Regiment
• Cavalry Regiment
• Artillery Regiment(Light or Heavy)
• Army of Africa
• Foreign Legion Infantry Tercio
• Moroccan Infantry (Regulares) Grupo
• Artillery Brigade
• Police
• Civil Guard Tercio
• Assault Guard Group
• Political Party and Trade Union Forces and Militias
• Pro-Republic/Anti-Fascist
• Militia
• Anarchist Militia
• Pro-Nationalist/Anti-Communist
• Carlist Requetes
• Falange
• Nationalist Regular Army
• Infantry Brigade
• Cavalry Regiment
• Artillery Regiment (Light or Heavy)
• Republican People's Army/Popular Army
• Infantry Mixed Brigade
• Cavalry Regiment
• International Brigade
• Armour Formations
• Popular Army Armoured Battalion
• Regular Army Armoured Battalion
• Legion Armoured Bandera
• Corpo Truppo Voluntarie (CTV)
• Infantry Regiment
• Artillery Regiment
• Tank Battalion
• Euzko Gudarostea (Basque Army)
• Infantry Battalion
• Higher Level Organisation
• Legion Column - November 1936
• Nationalist Column - Summer/Autumn 1936
• Republican Column - Summer/Autumn 1936
• Republican Militia Columns - Summer/Autumn 1936
• Republican Mixed Brigade - October 1936 onwards
• Nationalist Division - Late 1936 onwards
• Nationalist Brigade - Basque Campaign Spring 1937
• CTV Littorio Division - Guadalajara March 1937
• Resources
• Bibliography
• Figures
• Alphabet Soup
• And Finally

The back cover of the rule book has a QRS (Quick Reference Sheet) for the rules, ...

... and the book is illustrated with very useful and informative colour photographs.

Some notes about the rules:

1. The ability of troops to perform the tasks they are ordered to undertake depends upon their classification and effectiveness. For example, experienced and fanatical troops such as the Foreign Legion will have a higher Will to Combat than committed but untrained Socialist Militia.
2. An army's effectiveness depends the units it comprises, and this will influence whether or not it has the initiative at the beginning of a turn, how many Command Cards it receives, and how may cards it may play before passing play over to its opponent.
3. The ground scale is approximately 1:2400 (6" represents about 400 yards) and a pair of figure bases represent an Infantry Company or Cavalry Squadron. A single base represents two Artillery Platoons or an Armoured Squadron.
4. The Command and Control rules use a full deck of conventional playing cards (fifty-two cards divided into four suits [Hearts, Clubs, Diamonds, and Spades] plus two Jokers) and these are used to activate units. Interestingly, it is possible to get a more Spanish 'flavour' by using a set of Spanish playing cards (forty-eight cards divided into four suits [Swords, Cups, Coins, and Clubs]).
5. The rules reflect the fact that the fighting during the Spanish Civil War was very much a contest between opposing armies whose fighting strength was based around the quality and quantity of the Infantry and Artillery that were available. Armoured troops and aircraft played their part, sometimes decisively, but they did not dominate the fighting. Tanks often outran their accompanying infantry, and air attacks were regularly less effective than hoped due to inaccuracy and poor communication.

I thoroughly recommend these rules to anyone who already fights Spanish Civil War brigade and division-level tabletop battles or who is thinking of doing so. They are not a 'World War II-lite' set of rules nor an adaption of an existing set of rules to suit them for the Spanish Civil War; they have been written from scratch with the type of fighting that took place during the war at the forefront of their design.

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FOR WHOM THE DICE ROLLS was written by Graham Evans (AKA Trebian) and published in 2020 by Wargaming for Grown Ups Publications (ISBN 979 8 566468 72 3). It is available from Amazon for £14.99.