One of the major design objectives for The Last Hundred Yards was to give players the feeling or sensation that actions are occurring simultaneously. One of the ways to achieve this was to break up the distance a unit can maneuver into smaller increments, a maximum of 2-3 hexes. So, for every 2-3 hexes a unit maneuvers, it will suffer at least one fire attack and possibly more depending on the initiative. In general, I deliberately chose to abstract as much as possible (including opportunity fire), allowing players to focus on fire and maneuver and tactics without getting bogged down in the details.
Opportunity fire at long ranges was rare. The engagement range during WW2 for the vast majority of the small arms fire occurred within 100 yards or less. Soldiers, for self-preservation, were loath to fire too soon for fear of divulging their position prematurely and drawing enemy fire or even worse mortar or artillery fire. Assuming the enemy unit was even seen, firing at ranges greater than 100 yards would at best only suppress an enemy unit. Allowing the enemy to get close before firing was significantly more effective, increasing the possibility of an ambush and pinning the enemy in the “kill zone”.
One must also consider real life LOS conditions. Typically, the posture of most defending units at ground level was either they were dug-in, prone, or kneeling behind a wall or window of a building. From this lower perspective, a unit’s LOS would be no more than 2 to 3 feet off the ground and when firing at advancing enemy units at ranges greater than 50 to 75 yards could be problematic, even across open ground. In addition, in the LHY it is assumed as in real life that even open ground has some undulation and vegetation unless it’s a beach, parking lot, airfield, etc.
From a game mechanics perspective, I wanted to avoid the typical opportunity fire situation when maneuvering where a unit must stop in every hex to allow the opposing player the option to fire, (i.e., “do you want to shoot”) and then wait for him to decide if he wanted to do so. Furthermore, you see the results immediately and then can base your next move accordingly. Not only is this disruptive in the flow of the game but with the increase in the number of die rolls it slows play. Most importantly it voids the simultaneous aspect of the game that I am seeking to achieve.
From a behavioral perspective and the reasons stated above, I decided that opportunity fire from small arms would not be considered at ranges greater than 100 yards. For 100 yards and in, the +1 DRM against a unit that maneuvered within two hexes was the simplest and best option for opportunity fire.
