I Ain't Been Shot, Mum!

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I Ain't Been Shot, Mum! (abbreviated as IABSM!) is a World War II tabletop miniatures wargame produced by Too Fat Lardies.

Designers Richard Clarke and Nick Skinner started work on a set of rules for the Vietnam war. Feeling that the existing rulesets allowed to much control over their forces they set out to design a set of rules that would force a player to think as a real-life commander rather than a gamer. As such, IABSM! follows the Kriegsspiel approach, usually (but not always) utilizing an umpire to help decide points of issue that arise during the game such as modifiers for shooting, spotting enemies, etc. The rules are designed to force players to adopt realistic tactics, including scouting ahead for hidden enemies as the game system uses "blinds" to simulate the fog of war. The main focus is not on military hardware but on the men using that hardware, and on morale and command and control. Rather than giving the player total control over their forces every action, the system uses so-called "Big Men" to allow players to influence their forces behaviour. It also features a random, card-driven initiative system rather than the classic I-GO-U-GO system most turn-based strategy games use. This initiative system is designed to simulate the "friction" of war noted by Carl von Clausewitz.

The basic IABSM system provides a framework allowing players to tailor the game to specific situations or conflicts. Apart from it's main focus on World War II, it has been adapted to the Spanish Civil War, the Falklands War and the Korean War.

The rules are designed for Company level games, i.e. where each side fields roughly a company of troops at 1 man to 1 figure scale, with infantry combat being at the heart of the rules, but also includes a comprehensive mechanism for armour support, artillery, etc. The rules have been designed for 15mm scale figures, but can be easily adopted for other scales such as 6mm or 25mm. The system does not use a point-based method for constructing opposing forces, so most games are designed to be scenario driven.

1 Rules and Sourcebooks
2 Scenarios
3 Pros
4 Cons
5 External Links

[edit] Rules and Sourcebooks

The main rules do not contain any information about the armies involved. The armies are described in various supplements. Currently TFL has released supplements for several theatres and campaigns:

Blitzkrieg

Covers the period between 1939 and 1943.
Army information for Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Great Britain, Holland, Hungary, Italy, Norway, Poland, Romania, Czechoslovakia and the Soviet Union.

Gotterdammerung

Covers the period between 1943 and 1945
Army information for Brazil, Finland, France, Germany, Great Britain, Hungary, Italy, Romania, the Soviet Union and the United States.

In the Footsteps of Legions

Covers the war in the Mediterranean and North Africa.
Army information for British Empire and Dominion forces, Free French, Vichy France,Germany, Greece, Iraq, Italy, United States and Yugoslavia.

In The Shadow of the Rising Sun

Covers the war in the Pacific.
Army information for Australia, China, Holland, Vichy France, Great Britain, Japan, Thailand and the United States.

[edit] Scenarios

As well as supplements detailing various armed forces TFL also publishes scenario supplements for use with IABSM. The supplements contain historical background, maps, mission briefings and participating forces. As the forces involved are described as real world equivalents rather than point values conversion to different rulesets is relatively easy. Scenario/campaing packs published so far are :

West Front

The Defence of Calais
The Campaign for Greece
Operation Sea Lion
Where the Hell Have You Been Boys (D-Day)

East Front

Vyazma or Bust

Pacific/Far East

Fall of the Lion Gate
Bloody Burma

Africa

Call this a Ruddy Picnic?

Various

Cymru am byth (rather than detailing a specific operation or campaign this supplement follows the actions of one regiment during the course of the war)

Also, some free scenarios has been published in the Scenario of the Month section of the Too Fat Lardies page.

[edit] Pros

The play the period, not the rules motto, meaning the rules leave a lot of space for players to make subjective decisions about most situations, may be quite attractive for some players.

[edit] Cons

The play the period, not the rules motto (see Pros) may be unsuitable for some players.

Because the rules are open to interpretation (hence, the use of an umpire for most games), it is a difficult rule set for use in tournaments as there typically won't be umpires available for every game in a tournament.