ow that oe ofthe mas boring US ee. yi ns to rang poof ‘he plat gamer KREMLIN. Forueacyjor Americans or periods mec eatersip are lest boo han was the casein he Sot thon The Revolton vars cords and pet scent the ates ore ovale for 5 acy fom The Aton Hit Game Core pons, 17 Haord Ras Banore MD 21316 eer th 1953, 2 74-year ot Sti ied of apa cay str ase alow any hve as peste foul pi) Th data he Soe Git for saned power ugg at eo te Senise oth: pecomplve lentoy whats diye The gover sugested for ater ee Yea, edly in complt onsolaton af We {og by Rimsice With @ few modifications to che basic KREMLIN game and the Revolution variant (which deals with the 1923 pasty congress), ‘you can try your hand at sorting out the polit cal mess left i the wake of Stalin's departure Use the rules from the normal game and the character cards from the Revolution variant Use the nonhistorical side (the regular game's cast of characters) except for the following people who should have the ages in parenthe- Ses put on them: Muranov (79), Stassova (78), Stalin (74), Yoroshiloy (67), Molotov (65), Khrushchev (55), Mikoyan (55), Bulganin (63), Beria (52) and Malenkoy (50). For his- torical flavor, these should be among. the ini tial twelve politburo members and candidates, but for play variety a completely random deal of all politicians may be used (remember to Soviet system of education His val 55 fadd the correct ages to the above characters ‘when they enter the “people” pool In addition tothe basic and advanced cules, the following special rules should be in force First, factions may put points on Party Chief Stalin at the beginning, but he has two crosses ‘As with Lenin in the Revolution game, he can not recover nor go to the sanitarium (he was hatching the docior’s plot at the time and ‘wouldn't trust himself ro any physician). Second, if Beria is head of KGB, he may purge using the Revolution rules instead of the normal game rules. On the other hand, any purges carried out against Beria use the Revo: lution rules as well. Beria worked closely with Ezhov in the purges ofthe 1930's and then ran the show himself in the 1940's and eacly 1950's, His bid for power was an all-or-noth ing affair. Ire had succeeded Stalin, he would have executed most of the competing leader- ship. As it was, the other leaders banded together 1 arrest and execute Beis, Third, add five new cards (see insert between pages 32 and 33) to reflect the politi- cal sitation of the 1950's—or any others thet ‘may seem appropriate ‘There you have it. With a few minor ‘changes, you can try out yet another round of historieal intigue in the Kremlin6 HYPER SNIPER...(Continued from pg. 18) becomes a briliant attack. No matter wat 1 ‘write here, someone will eventually rll a light mortar Critical Hit (CH) on your stone building location and KIA the Randomly Selected Rambo with the resulting 12(-3) Infantry Fire Table (IFT) DR. ASL is simply a great game! Other foolish shooting typically includes many Advancing Fire attacks we may roll “just fo see what happens” when there is practically no chance of anything happening, Granted, 4 leader-directed 4(+4) shot at Rambo or that one key enemy position might be worth the eis, but in most average situations there would not be ‘much point in such an attack One of the best times to avoid foolish shooting arises when the enemy target is already in such bad shape that its demise is assured. Maybe itis Pinned and nearly surrounded. You know your opponent will eliberately break and rout away, $0 wy shoot? ‘\ Pinned, Counter Exhausted (CX), surrounded enemy unit is facing Close Combat (CC) from Yyour concealed and leader-led overpowering Force. Avoid the shot (and any possibilty of a sniper). Instead, use your Ambush advantage to rail the wnit in CC and withdray into a more advantageous location, (On the other hand, there are also activities you can explore which might actually generate Itiendly SAN at no risk of enemy SAN opporta- nity, such as tossing. White Phosphorus. (WP) grenades on broken eneray units (heh, heh!). In this ease, you make no SAN-capable DR but your opponent does. RECOMMENDATION? Wate Your shots: avoid needless headaches caused by foolish shooting CY NON-TARGETS Just a6 it is vital to guard against mistaken enemy Sniper Activations, you must also be alert, to disallow sniper attacks against non-target This one is easy, Just read rile Al4.22, Some things simply are noe vulnerable to the sniper, ES, RECOMMENDATION: Read snd stick to the sues MOBILE SNIPER ‘Think how many times you or your opponent have rolled up an effective sniper stack and thea immediately, without really giving it another thought, automatically rolled the Ran {dom Location DR. This is potentially wasteful for as the tides of bate fluctuate across the playing area your sniper may find himsetf posi- tioned io hitonly enemy units of low value. Per- haps there is slim chance he could hit some- thing worthwhile (“Please, oh please, oh spirits ofthe dice, fet me roll "6.6", fat just how often will that slim chance occur? Would it not be better to move the sniper counter? Tus much easier to convinee yourself 10 move {your sniper counter when: 1) you have rolled a "2" sniper attack, 2) your SAN is 6 or 7, 3) iis early inthe scenario, 4) iis a large scenario or 5) your sniper has no worthwhile targets Careful consideration of these five character istics of your sniper environment will usually help you decide whether you should move your sniper counter, This need not be a process which requires more than a few seconds either, but the point isto sake the casual glance and the time 10 consider rather than automatically rolling that Random Location DR. RECOMMENDATION? Plain dnd Single take a quiek look before you rll ‘SCENARIO SIZE AND DURATION The size ofa scenario often warrants special sniper attention, Consider two extremes: one six-tum scenario With only a few units per side (a small scenario) and a scenario of ten turns svith ewenty or mare squads per side (a large sce nario), Because we can expect more SAN activ: ity in the large scenario, most aspects of this sniper analysis assume greater significance there tha inthe small scenario. Tn short, there should be more SAN-capable DR in the lagge seenatio and, therefore, more sniper attacks, Also, the large scenario is more ikely than the small sc nario to contain Ramboesque units, so a sing Sniper attack might be more likely 6 nail one of those guys in that encouater Allis not safe on board the small scenario cither, though. fora single sniper attack may nil the onfy valuable uni in your OB. Rambo may be olf in another pat of the war and not even on bourd for this small engagement, which only ‘means some poor 9-1 or 8-1 or such isin charge fand assuming, by default, attendant Ram- boesque attributes. The demise of this Ersatz Rambo at the hands of enemy sniper activity ‘might be an even more severe blow than the loss Of True Blue Rambo in large scenario, simply ecause Ersate Rambo is more desperately needed here, Meanwhile, in the larger scenario another Ersatz Rambo might be available to fill the void ereated by the death of old True Blue, Fanhermore, the sniper abatement tactics of piling on” and bait might be less usetul in the small encounter because your few units are already stretched with other commitments, Io this case, GEO and TEM assume greater signi ieance while Elusive Target and Fast (Ersatz) ‘Rambo attain paramount importance RECOMMENDATION: By ail means, ityou ‘are going to pay any attention at all to snipers, some ofthe most vital criteria are scenario size as well asthe game situation ofthe moment. CE OR BU—TO DARE OR TO HIDE? ‘Armored Fighting Vehicles (APV) deserve special sniper consideration because they can be so valuable and, when Crew Exposed (CE), so ‘ulinerable 10 sniper activity. Some players will simply never fight CE, preferring the invulnera bility of being Burtoned Up (BU), and for therm the following considerations may have no mean- ing. However, those of us who wish to eke out every last possible advantage will often employ four APV in CE mode {As [have said, sniper considerations ae not fry often the most meaningful circumstances which will determine our action, and the same holds trae for CE/BU status of properly wilized ABV. There are times when the henefits of CE are great enough to offset all sniper thoughts and other times when a general lack of meaningful CCE benefits ordains thatthe only profound result of fighting CE in close proximity 0 the enemy sniper counter could be a Recalled, or at least ‘Stunned, AFV. One of the most influential ingredients in my CE/BU decision-making process is the number of available AFV. In a scenario which fields six ‘or seven AFV for my force I will not hesitate to fight CE. Potential loss of one AFV due to CE saus is far outweighed by the advantages ined from six CE AFV, This will be most true je a strong_armor-o-armor confrontation in ‘which there is less chance that infantry fre ‘night harm the CE commander. [cis also more tue ifthe AV in question has a good Anti-Air- craft Machine Gun (AAMG) 38 we see on many American tanks. Against the Japanese who offer light firepower but Tike c swaem or Banzai APY, the “all-around” protection of that AMG demands its use ‘With all that said, and notice none of itso far even considers sniper activity, there will be limes when those few AY closest to the enemy Sniper might opt to BU. Rare, solitary or highly ‘aluable APV in particular warrant extra caution shen in the vicinity of enemy sniper activity RECOMMENDATION: Be aware of the ‘enemy SAN and the location of the enemy sniper counter when you have CE AFV. CE sdvantages can be tremendous, but they are sasually not worth undue super risk: Sereen any. rte [At this point, I think we would all agree that there are a great many ways to suppress enemy sniper activity and tenance our own. Much of ‘what has been discussed above at some length Epproaches the absurd, It is certainly not my Intention to endorse, merely by their mention, very tactic described in this tile, [ merely ‘wish to present as complete an account of sniper converns as possible, The most important matter to decide is jus exactly which techniques should be used and which ignored, and at what times. Like so much in the game, the answer will vary according 10 specific game situations. For example, I cannot affirm that a 10-3 directing a HMG-topped, 24 Firepower stack in a large scenario is always ‘more valuable than a 7-0 leading a lone half squad in a small encounter. ADVANCED SQUAD LEADER is so very complex that any unit at any certain time can emerge as the game ‘winner, thus assuming, even if only momentar- ily, importance far beyond any other Ram- hoesque pretender. “The entire panorama of snipers in ASL can be & bit involved snd a most iatiguing aspect of play. Yet, it isa segment ofthe game which does vot actually require much playing time, and usu ally not very much thought either. Though { yelieve itis vital for players to comprehend and sractice winning sniper techniques, these proce dures should become second nature. *