• I’ve been looking at some railway maps from the year 1939 because of an idea I had for the rail system house rule.  I use the rule because rail was important in the war.  I have a tone of acrylic markers for rail and rail stations from HBG and they almost never get used.  But… they could be, much more frequently, if they were already put on the map before the game starts.  I have a general idea of how to set something like that up, but I figured that I’d post here to find out what you guys think.  I use the second option of the custom rules the HBG provides for the markers, just f.y.i…  I don’t expect anyone else to use that option, I’m just stating where I’m coming from.

    So the main thing I’m trying to get at here is: how would you setup the board before the game starts with rail way systems?

  • Liaison TripleA '11 '10

    It would all depend on what kinds of rules you want to use for railways.


  • I agree that it would depend on what you want to use railroads for, and on how different aspects of military operations are simulated under whatever rules you’re using.  One way you could approach this would be to think of railroads as facilitating two things: 1) movement of combat units, and 2) logistical support.

    1. If you take tanks as an example, they move under their own power at the tactical level (meaning on a battlefield), but at the strategic and operational scales they need to be moved by rail (and by ship where applicable) because tanks, being tracked vehicles, aren’t designed to travel long distances on their own.  The same applies to various degrees to all sorts of military hardware, including troops.  Rail travel has the advantage of being more mechanically efficient than travel by truck (in terms of the amount of fuel needed to transport a given tonnage of cargo), but it has the disadvantage that it employs a static rail infratructucture that’s easy to attack, so your rules should reflect both the pluses and the minuses.

    2. If your house rule system incorporates a supply system model (something which is almost entirely absent from A&A), then your railways could be used for that purpose.  Moving tanks and troops to the front is all well and good, but if they can’t be kept supplied with food, fuel, ammunition and other essentials then their fighting abilities will eventually degrade to zero as their on-site stocks are used up.


  • I’m not really able to get any more creative than what the rest of my group will allow me to be.  They much prefer rules that are already written and tested.  I’ve resorted to just using the rules provided by HBG.  There’s a few different ways to do it, as you guys suggested.  I have a couple pdf files from the site (HBG) that I downloaded, which I guess many other people already have.  I’m just posting them here for convenience, if they’re needed for reference.  The first pdf has the rules a few pages down for rail.  I use option 2.

    HBG Marker RulesRev5.pdf


  • The second file…

    Railways.pdf

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