Historical Advanced Squad Leader module
Encyclopedia
HASL modules
Historical Advanced Squad Leader modules (HASL modules) are addons for the tactical wargameWargaming
A wargame is a strategy game that deals with military operations of various types, real or fictional. Wargaming is the hobby dedicated to the play of such games, which can also be called conflict simulations, or consims for short. When used professionally to study warfare, it is generally known as...
Advanced Squad Leader
Advanced Squad Leader
Advanced Squad Leader is a tactical-level board wargame, originally marketed by Avalon Hill Games, that simulates actions of approximately company or battalion size in World War II. It is a detailed game system for two or more players . Components include the ASL Rulebook and various games called...
intended to depict actual historical events using maps produced from actual terrain maps, and featuring linked scenarios (called Campaign Games). All other equipment from ASL is necessary for play, including unit and system counters, dice, the ASL Rulebook and in the case of the Historical Studies, the geomorphic mapboards. In addition, some extra equipment is included in most HASL Modules, such as extra copies of commonly used counters in order to prevent shortages of vehicle or infantry types, as well as module-specific informational markers. Finally, each module contains its own rulebook chapter pages (or pages for just part of a chapter, in cases where multiple HASL modules share the same rulebook chapter), which give rules for module-specific terrain and units, as well as campaign game rules, and a black and white miniature of the historical map (if included) which can be photocopied and written on during the course of campaign play.
The centerpiece of these historical offerings, aside from the maps, are the Campaign Games.
The Campaign Game (abbreviated CG throughout the rules and hereafter) allows for a wide variety of situations and nearly limitless possibilities. Each player, or team of players, is assigned a certain force, given in terms of Companies, Platoons and Batteries as well as a number of campaign Purchase Points (CPP) and Fortification Purchase Points (FPP).
Each Company...is composed of a set number of squads and support weapons. Further, each Company can be either in a full-strength or depleted state...The CPPs are used to purchase additional forces throughout the game.
Unit purchases are made during a Refit phase taking place between game days - instead of a set number of game turns, actions now take place in game days. A game day is of variable length...
At the end of a campaign day both players place perimeter markings along their front lines, or around units if they're isolated. The perimeter serves as your start line for the next campaign day. This will usually result in wild jagged lines penetrating into enemy held areas which show where your last major effort was made...After each campaign day in which at least one side had decided to go on the offensive, each day varies from a minimum of five (game) turns to an infinite amount (though likely less than eight)...both sides (then) refit and redeploy anywhere along their defined perimeter...
Opposing sides do not fight tooth and nail every day. At the outset of each campaign day each side secretly chooses a(n)...Initiative chit
Chit (board wargames)Chits are a type of wargame counter that are generally not directly representational but used for the following purposes:* Tracking, being placed on a numeric runner to indicate turn status, as in some rule variants for Squad Leader...
, outlining its intentions (Attack or Idle)...On all results except (both players choosing) Idle, another game day is played out with its varying length. If both sides are Idle, then a game day passes without being played out...(either way, at day's end) both sides again go through the Refit Phase...The Refit Phase features events like promotion, extinguishing blazes, AFV machine gun exchange and scrounging (as well as purchasing fresh forces with CPP and FPP).
Red Barricades: Squads at the Gates: Advanced Squad Leader does Stalingrad by Tom Zlizewski
Fire & MovementFire & MovementFire & Movement: The Forum of Conflict Simulation was founded by Rodger MacGowan in 1975, and began publication the following year. The magazine is devoted to covering games from a variety of manufacturers, specializing in wargames, both traditional board wargames and also computer wargames Fire &...
: The Forum of Conflict Simulation, August 1990 (Number 67)
Perhaps the only perceived drawback to the historical modules was a lessened replayability. By their nature, mapboards were small and focused on close-in terrain such as urban, forest or jungle. While new scenarios for play on the historical maps were occasionally found in ASL themed periodicals such as ASL Annual or ASL Journal, the limited scope of the fighting on these maps restricted the number and type of scenarios possible. However, the dynamics of the campaign games guaranteed that no two CG would play out the same, even with the use of similar forces and identical terrain.
Red Barricades
Red Barricades was released in 1989 and focussed on the fighting for the Krasnaya Barrikady ordnance factory complex in Stalingrad. Commonly abbreviated as RB. Special additions for this module include rules for new terrain types including debris, railway embankments, culverts, storage tanks, single hex two-story buildings, and modified rules for gullies, factories and cellars. As well, two new weapons (the Soviet Molotov cocktail projector, also known to Combat Mission players as an ampulomet) and the German StuIG (a 150mm infantry gun on a Panzer III chassis) are introduced. Three Campaign Games are included as well as 7 standalone scenarios. The Campaign Games include "Into the Factory" (17-29 October 1942), Operation Hubertus (11-15 November 1942) and The Barrikady (17 October - 15 November 1942). Multiman Publishing will return to the 1942 Stalingrad campaign with its forthcoming "Valor of the Guards" module, which will focus on the fighting around the central Stalingrad railway station.Scenarios: RB1-RB7
Additional scenarios were also printed in the ASL Annual.
Prerequisites included the ASL Rulebook and Beyond Valor.
This module was discontinued by Multi-Man Publishing
Multi-Man Publishing
Multi-Man Publishing, LLC is a game company formed by baseball player Curt Schilling and his partners to keep the game series Advanced Squad Leader in print. MMP operates some of the former Avalon Hill games under license from Hasbro, Inc...
but released as part of the 2nd Edition of Beyond Valor.
Kampfgruppe Peiper I
Released in 1993, this is the first of a two part module, focusing on the fighting by one of the SS armoured spearheads in the Battle of the BulgeBattle of the Bulge
The Battle of the Bulge was a major German offensive , launched toward the end of World War II through the densely forested Ardennes mountain region of Wallonia in Belgium, hence its French name , and France and...
in December 1944. Kampfgruppe Peiper is best known as the unit that perpetrated the Malmedy massacre
Malmedy massacre
The Malmedy massacre was a war crime in which 84 American prisoners of war were murdered by their German captors during World War II. The massacre was committed on December 17, 1944, by members of Kampfgruppe Peiper , a German combat unit, during the Battle of the Bulge.The massacre, as well as...
, but that incident is not portrayed in the game, nor is the Baugnez Crossroads where the massacre took place. The rules chapter for this HASL Module includes rules for Pine Woods, Slope hexsides, and barbed wire fences, as well as modifications of existing rules for stream-hex terrain, village terrain, hillside walls and hedges, and known minefields. One mapsheet, for terrain surrounding Stoumont, Belgium, is included as well as 1 campaign game ("Clash at Stoumont", 19 – 21 December 1944) and 4 standalone scenarios.
Prerequisites included the ASL Rulebook and Beyond Valor and Yanks.
Scenarios KGP1-KGP4
Kampfgruppe Peiper II
The second half of the Kampfgruppe Peiper module (commonly abbreviated as KGP II). Acting as a companion to the KGP I module, it depicts the fighting between Waffen SS forces of Battle Group Peiper near the Belgian villages of Cheneux and La Gleize. Three mapsheets are included; a two-piece sheet covering the terrain around La Gleize and a single Cheneux sheet. Additional rules for Chapter P of the ASL Rulebook are also included.Six standard scenarios using small portions of the two maps are included as well as one large or "monster" scenario using the entire La Gleize map.
Scenarios KGP5 - KGP11
Pegasus Bridge
This module depicted the fighting at the so-called Pegasus Bridge on 6 June 1944, one of the events famously depicted in the 1962 film The Longest DayThe Longest Day (film)
The Longest Day is a 1962 war film based on the 1959 history book The Longest Day by Cornelius Ryan, about "D-Day", the Normandy landings on 6 June 1944, during World War II....
and also the subject of a book by Stephen Ambrose
Stephen Ambrose
Stephen Edward Ambrose was an American historian and biographer of U.S. Presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower and Richard Nixon. He was a long time professor of history at the University of New Orleans and the author of many best selling volumes of American popular history...
by the same name. Released in 1996.
The module contains six stand-alone scenarios in addition to the requisite Campaign Games, two in number in this module. The mapsheet depicts the bridge and surrounding towns of Benouville and Le Port. Chapter Q of the ASL Rule Book is included. Additionally, Day 7 of the Chapter K training module is included (later released with the second version of the ASL Rulebook).
Scenarios: PB1 - PB6
A Bridge Too Far
Named after Cornelius RyanCornelius Ryan
Cornelius Ryan, was an Irish journalist and author mainly known for his writings on popular military history, especially his World War II books: The Longest Day: June 6, 1944 D-Day , The Last Battle , and A Bridge Too Far .-Early life:Ryan was born in Dublin and educated at Synge Street CBS,...
's famous book about Operation Market Garden
Operation Market Garden
Operation Market Garden was an unsuccessful Allied military operation, fought in the Netherlands and Germany in the Second World War. It was the largest airborne operation up to that time....
, this module depicts the fighting by Lieutenant Colonel John Frost's parachute battalion at the Arnhem Bridge in September 1944.
Prerequisites include the ASL Rulebook, Beyond Valor, Yanks and either the 1st edition of West of Alamein or the new edition of For King and Country.
The new rules chapter includes special rules for the Arnhem Bridge, the ramp leading up to the bridge, and a blockhouse located on the bridge, as well as new rules for factories and cellars, wide city boulevards, unit replacements, and partial orchards. Three campaign games are included as well as 9 standalone scenarios; the campaign games being "Block by Bloody Block" (17 - 19 September 1944), "A Dark and Fateful Day" (19 - 21 September 1944, and "A Bridge Too Far" (17 - 21 September 1944).
Scenarios ABTF1-ABTF9
Blood Reef: Tarawa
Depicts the landings at Betio Atoll in 1943 by United States Marines.Contains three campaign games and 7 standalone scenarios.
Operation Watchtower
This is the first so-called "historical study" which combined actual (or "historical") maps with scenarios played on the geomorphic maps released with the core modules. This HASL module depicts the fighting on Guadalcanal from 7 August 1942 until February 1943.Operation Veritable
Released in 2002 this historical study is the first official module to contain scenarios depicting Canadians (other than the Rogue Scenarios of the original Squad Leader game). A campaign game called "Riley's Road" is included with a historical terrain map, as well as scenarios using the geomorphic maps (and in one case using only terrain overlays). The scenarios all feature British and Canadian forces during Operation Veritable, the battles to clear the last German holdouts west of the Rhine, to the east of the Nijmegen Salient, as a preparation for the 21st Army Group's crossing of the Rhine River in March 1945.The rules feature several new terrain types, as well as the German Sturmtiger AFV.
Being dependent on the geomorphic mapboards, the prerequisites for this module are many, including the ASL rulebook, "all core modules" according to the official website, and boards 4,5,11,19,43,46,49, and 50.
Valor of the Guards
This module game, initially slated for a 2006 release but actually released in 2008, centers again on the fighting in Stalingrad. Early advertisements for this game were seen as early as 2002 in ASL Journal #3, stating that pre-orders would be taken beginning in 2003. Pre-orders for the game went onto the MMPMulti-Man Publishing
Multi-Man Publishing, LLC is a game company formed by baseball player Curt Schilling and his partners to keep the game series Advanced Squad Leader in print. MMP operates some of the former Avalon Hill games under license from Hasbro, Inc...
website on 21 December 2005; over 500 pre-orders were registered on the site by credit card in just four hours.
The game includes:
- Two 22"x32" full-color mapsheets
- Three countersheets
- One ASL Rules Chapter with all the rules required for both scenario and campaign games
- Four Campaign Games
- 10 Scenario Cards with 17 scenarios
- Three 8" x 11" Player Aid/Roster cards
The game simulates the fighting in September 1942 near the Central Railway Station and includes several famous historical locations such as Pavlov's House and the Univermag Department Store where General Paulus had his headquarters at the time of the surrender in February 1943.
The rules include, as is common for HASL modules, several new terrain types. In VotG, this includes burned out stone buildings, Plazas, and partially rubbled buildings.
This module was released in January 2008.
HASL periodical releases
There have also been Historical Advanced Squad Leader offerings not in Module form.Gavutu-Tanambogo
ASL Annual '93b features a GavutuGavutu
Gavutu is a small islet in the Central Province of the Solomon Islands, some 500 metres in length. It is one of the Nggela Islands....
-Tanambogo
Tanambogo
Tanambogo is an islet in the Central Province of the Solomon Islands. It is one of the Florida Islands.Along with the nearby island of Gavutu, it played an important role in the Guadalcanal campaign during World War II. In 1942 the Japanese attempted to establish a seaplane base on the island. On...
HASL feature with rules, scenarios, campaign games, and historical map insert. The module depicts the fighting for these two islands from 7 to 9 August 1942. These two small islands dominated the approach to Florida Island's deep water anchorage and were ordered secured as part of the invasion of Guadalcanal
Guadalcanal
Guadalcanal is a tropical island in the South-Western Pacific. The largest island in the Solomons, it was discovered by the Spanish expedition of Alvaro de Mendaña in 1568...
on 7 August 1942. The islands, garrison, and attack forces were small enough to be represented in their entirety in ASL format for this feature.
This HASL module does not include a stand alone map. Instead, it includes three new overlays for each island that are placed atop the Ocean overlays from Gung Ho!. The illustration at right is the version used in Virtual Advanced Squad Leader (VASL).
Both stand-alone scenarios as well as historical Campaign Games are included in the ASL Annual '93b issue.
The Road To Nhpum Ga
ASL Annual '97 includes a mini HASL game which consists of a fold out map, Campaign article and 4 scenarios. The game was designed by Chuck Powers and is set in Burma in late March 1944. The Campaign notes also refer to some scenarios (Orange at Walawbum / Last of their strength, etc) that deal with the topic and are included in the Winter '95 ASL Annual.Kakazu Ridge
ASL Journal #2 presents a Kakazu Ridge historical study which includes a full-sized HASL map, scenarios, counters and articles. This module depicts fighting on Okinawa in 1945.Primosole Bridge
ASL Journal #6, released in 2005, offers a Primosole Bridge HASL feature with Rulebook Chapter, campaign games and historical map insert. The Primosole Bridge battle occurred during the fighting on SicilySicily
Sicily is a region of Italy, and is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. Along with the surrounding minor islands, it constitutes an autonomous region of Italy, the Regione Autonoma Siciliana Sicily has a rich and unique culture, especially with regard to the arts, music, literature,...
in 1943.