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The all seeing wargamer surveys a cardboard battlefield with such a total appreciation of the overall situation that any real sense of confusion and isolation existing for individual units along the battle line is often lost. During night, this 'appreciation' becomes even more pronounced, visibility may be down to say 20 - 25 metres, and the 'big picture' will practically elude everyone represented on the gaming board, but not the players, who at an instant can see every terrain feature and deployment on the map.

I don't have any particular understanding of tactical night fighting but I would imagine that in total darkness, movement would be slow and difficult. It would be virtually impossible to see the enemy (or perhaps more importantly friends!), and that while working to a widely understood battleplan might work, changing the plan or reacting in a co-ordinated way to the enemy would would be difficult to put into practice.

So how does Panzer Grenadier deal with night action? Seven of it's fifty one scenarios are night based - though surprisingly, there are none in the second module, 'Heroes of the Soviet Union'. Basically there are 3 rule mechanics that deal with night.

Firstly, all visibilty is down to a range of 1 hex. This means that units can move outside that range with impunity from opportunity fire and that combat is limited to fire between adjacent units or same hex combat (assault). When a unit fires, it does not give it's position away to an enemy more than 1 hex away (an area of ambiguity in 1st edition rules). The only ranged fire that can be used is indirect fire (mortars and onboard / off board artillery) but this requires a leader to spot the target, that is, the leader must be 1 hex away from the target. There are some inherent dangers to doing this as any friendly units next to the target hex may suffer friendly fire. This forces players to use their artillery (if available) thoughtfully.

Secondly 'direct fire' is modified with a -1 penalty for night action and 'bombardment fire' generally does not get the +1 modifier for 'target spotted by firer' since most spotting at night will be done by leaders. The overall effect here is to make firing slightly less effective.

Thirdly, units moving at night can only move into an 'enemy controlled' hex if they have been activated by a leader. This is a subtle use of the rules to limit the otherwise unlimited freedom (due to absence of opportunity fire beyond adjacent hexes) that units would have to move during darkness. Using the definition of 'control' at the start of the rules, players may wish to mark out each player's areas of control on the board after setup. This will help both players to instantly recognise when they are moving into an enemy controlled hex. During daylight, a similar rule exists that prevents units moving towards an enemy that could harm them, unless they do so by leader activation. This night rule broadens that concept to include any enemy, whether it has the capability to harm or not.

In addition to these game rules, individual scenarios can introduce special rules. For example scenario 32 (28th Tank Attack) in Panzer Grenadier, has a rule insisting that the Russian mortar platoon must spot for itself. There are some interesting special rules in scenario 15 (Siberian night attack) in which firstly, German units cannot move until a soviet unit has moved to within 2 hex range of any one German unit. Secondly, all Soviet units set up with a smoke marker on them so that their identity is unknown, the markers cannot be removed by the German player until the first Soviet unit moves to within 2 hexes of a German unit.

One of the special rules that I really like is from scenario 47 (The Snail Offensive) in which night turns to day during the game. This is handled by the visibility range slowly increasing over a number of turns, changing the fluidity of the game as it does so.

Taken together and in keeping with the games philosophy of playability, these rules cope quite well with night warfare. The problem of the wargamer having total knowledge of the big picture is curtailed a little by the restriction of movement on leaderless units and can be further restricted by using concealment markers as mentioned above (scenario 15), though this option is quite limited in solitaire play.

Whether these rules give a good feel for night action will be down to the individual view of the gamer. The design employs some interesting and subtle rules to maintain the balance between playability and simulation value. I like that and as such, I am hesitant to tinker too much with the game mechanics, though some ideas do spring to mind such as modifying the 'friendly fire' die roll (following bombardment) with a -1 modifier to better reflect the difficulties and dangers associated with using on-call fire at night, introducing randomised movement or linking a deterioration in initiative levels / morale with a relatively low number of casualties taken.

The following quotes are taken from 'Agony at Anzio' by William Breuer, published by Robert Hale - London, 1989, and give a flavour of the night fight.

'Front line Guards commanders reported Germans had infiltrated their positions, and in the blackness, a hectic hand-to-hand fight broke out. Streams of tracers ripped through the sky, orange bursts flashed into the air where grenades exploded. Artillery and mortars of both sides pounded the same area, killing friend and foe indiscriminately.'    page 87

'Suddenly the area was illuminated in a brilliant light. Nervous Germans, hearing movements to their front, had fired flares which hovered ghost-like over the huddled group of paratroopers. All froze in place, not daring to move a muscle.'     page 91

'Under the crushing burden of relentless crises and lack of sleep for more than 60 hours, the beleaguered regimental commander was on the verge of collapse.'      page 143

'In the confusion of the nighttime firefight that erupted, the column became split. Colonel Brown and the first half of the battalion column pushed on safely, but the others became scattered.'    page 156