Napoleonic gaming and using D3 dice

With a lull in the French Indian War campaign collaboration, it has provided some time for me to try out using the D3 dice for a couple of Napoleonic games. With these games I have been using a variation of the One Hour Wargames (OHW) Horse and Musket rules.

The different dice mean for the shooting and hand-to-hand combat rules, hits instead of being determined with D6-2, D6 and D6+, are translated to D3-1, D3 and D3+1. For target units in cover rather than halving the number of hits, I subtract 1 from the score. This does mean cover is not quite so effective for defending units.

For convenience of tracking unit hits (using a D6 dice placed behind a unit) they are eliminated on taking more than 6 hits. This is a reduction in a unit's resilience which I try and offset by allowing commanders to rally their troops and remove hits.

(Using a D3 it takes 3 average scores of 2 to have a unit at the verge of elimination, where the OHW rules would take 4 average scores of  3.5.)

To date I have played two games using the D3 variation, and it is so far, so good.

My Napoleonic games are not played on a grid and use free movement instead. I have been trying to figure out why I have a preference for avoiding a grid with my Napoleonic games. One thing I put it down to is my like of the old prints of battles with their lines of troops tightly packed at different angles, looking quite chaotic, and lots of musket smoke.

A Napoleonic game with gunpowder smoke used not just to mark units that have fired, but also to improve the look of a game.

An example of the type of print that captures my imagination when wargaming

A gridded game using squares in this instance has the disadvantages of spreading out the units and does not convey the aesthetic. This is all somewhat strange, the uniformity of a grid does not bother me for my French Indian War games, but does with my Napoleonic games. Anyway, given my like for using a grid I am wondering whether a hex grid many create that look for me and be a better option.

Similar game size using a square grid.

Making a hex grid might be on the cards this weekend. Although, I am also wanting to build a star fort for the French Indian War campaign, as I suspect their may be a siege game at some point.