CrossFire

Basic Cover Art

CrossFire is a set of wargaming rules created by one Arty Conliffe. The game was created when Arty's friend had asked him to design a historical miniatures wargame without (get this) rulers and fixed game turns. The end result is a fast paced and decisive game where the final outcome can appear out of a single mistake and the experience is not broken by long stops of counting dice.

Design

"Crossfire focuses on company-level, infantry operations by stressing three interrelated features: movement, firepower, and terrain."

– Arty

Movement and firepower are dictated by the initiative, if the player decides to move his units to an area that the enemy can see, the enemy will shoot reactively. Once the player has moved all his units the enemy will gain initiative and possibly keep shooting, however if the players units are not seen, they can move anywhere. CrossFire does not have unit morale and shooting is decided by hits (1 for pin, 2 for suppress, 3 for instant kill.) 2 suppressions on one unit is a kill. Initiative is maintained by performing consecutive successful actions.

Pros and Cons over other tabletop games

The dice are not required in bucketloads and rulers are completely gone, in addition if a game takes too long and cant be finished there is no question who could have won as all victories of CrossFire can be seen at a fixed point where one of the players gets his men trough the enemy line and sweeps out most of the board. The Terrain however needs to be extensive (See: expensive) and allow for cover and breaks in line of sight. Completely open fields lead to very boring games.