Storming Towns

[GriffinTwoSix]

Was recently reading some discussion about woods and how they are modeled combat-effect wise in different games. I was thinking about towns in the Napoleonic wars and how the city/town terrain is modeled in different games. In Blucher for example, you see towns being very difficult to take, usually you really need 2:1 ratio of troops attacking to have a good shot at it. In the OSG series of napoleonic games, attacker/defender retreat combat results are changed to "shock" making the morale/shock rating of troops matter most when fighting in towns. Then there's the usual "troops in towns multiply their combat strength by 2" sort of thing thats out there.

I'm far from an expert in this time period but it seems like there's times often where a town changes hands multiple times during a battle. To me, this would seem like these are small regiment/brigade committed at a time actions? There are only so many buildings/streets to garrison and fill with troops. I think I like how OSG handles this with morale being most important.

It seems like in this sort of situation the ratio of manpower once past 1:1 is really not impactful because frontage is not an issue and the fighting is squads of soldiers in many places.

How do you guys envision fights for towns going down in the Napoleonic era?  What games have you played where you liked the way it was handled?

Edit: just thought of another, the Line of Battle series on the American civil war; line infantry in towns automatically disorganize, meaning they're easy to drive out. Or, you're putting sharpshooters/open order units into the towns. I like the way this game system does this.

[besilarius]

Personally, none of the systems I've ever tried have really grabbed me.
Fighting in towns is so disorganized that it almost seems to come down to luck.
If the fighting in Spaiñ is any indication, it came down to morale.
The spanish generally had abysmal leadership, but some towns held out for a very long time.
On another note, Griffin, you had ast about detailed information.
Brent Nosworthy has written some excellent tactical studies.  He is very approachable.  Brentnose1@gmail.com

Also, a great magazine that is out of print was Empires, Eagles, and Lions.
The magazines are reputed to be available on their Facebook page.