boylermaker
Senior Member
As I have mentioned before in this forum, two-toned counters are terrible. They are aesthetically displeasing, and they increase the (apparent) mismatch between counter art and counter-die-cutting. At some point they presumably increased costs as well, although perhaps multi-color printing is so common nowadays that this is no longer the case.
The three arguments for two-tone counters are these:
In the case of #2 and #3, it seems worth looking to see whether scenario designers have actually taken advantage of these possibilities. The argument for two-tone counters is stronger or weaker depending on whether or not they have. Gung-Ho introduced the two-tone Chinese in 1992; Armies of Oblivion the two-tone Hungarians in 2006; Festung Budapest the two-tone Buda Volunteer Regiment in 2012; Forgotten War three two-tone nationalities (Post-civil-war Chinese, South Koreans, and UN forces). That's 50 nationality-years of two-tone counters; so, have scenario designers been using these capabilities?
I looked at all of the scenarios in my collection, which includes most MMP scenarios, all the free scenarios I could find online, and the DFTB scenarios. I invite people who are interested to do the tallying for products I don't own, and I'll add them here. I included scenarios in which two-tone counters were used for a different nationality, but I only found a couple of instances of this, in which GMD counters are used for the Thai army. I divided scenarios into 4 classes; a scenario can belong to more than one class.
1) Class A: The two-tone nationality shares concealment counters with its monochrome big brother in a way that could deceive the opponent. So if the scenario includes both German infantry and Hungarian infantry, for example, the scenario is class A. A scenario with Hungarian infantry and German armor would not fall into this category, since there is no room for confusion, as all-and-only the 1/2" counters are known to be Hungarian regardless of how they are concealed.
2) Class B: The two-tone nationality uses a SW, Gun, or AFV from its monochrome big brother as its own. I only included a scenario in this class if a two-tone counter for that SW, etc, does not exist.
3) Class C: The two-tone nationality uses a SW, Gun, or AFV from its monochrome big brother as its own. I only included a scenario in this class if enough two-tone counters for that SW, etc, do not exist in the core module. So if a scenario calls for the PRC to use 12 Russian LMGs, but there are only 8 two-tone Russian LMGs, someone can substitute 4 all-brown Russian LMGs as well. Note that this is only a benefit for physical play, not VASL, which is why I separated it from Class B.
3) Class D: The two-tone nationality's SW, Guns, or AFVs can be used by its monochrome big brother. Note that this is the original justification for two-tone counters given in Footnote G45. I didn't notice any of these scenarios, although they are harder to find just by scrolling through my binder. The obvious place to look would be WW2-era scenarios with the Chinese Communists, but I don't think I actually own any of those.
Note that the totals aren't always the sum of the rows/columns because the same scenario can be in multiple rows and columns.
* I wasn't sure whether to count FB14, a three player German-Russian-Hungarian scenario, as Class A or not. It is counted under Class B in both cases, however.
At first glance, this seems like an argument in favor of two-tone counters, as about 1/3 of the scenarios take advantage of the special characteristics of two-tone counters. However, a closer look shows a grimmer picture. Of the 22 scenarios that use two-tone counters, 17 come from Festung Budapest--only 2 scenarios outside of FB have Germans and Hungarians sharing concealment counters. The only scenario outside FB to use German counters in a Hungarian OOB is 115, and in that case, two German tanks are treated as Hungarian, but they enter from offboard, so they may never even conceal, vitiating the advantage. Even in FB, had MMP printed a mere 6 Hungarian-colored counters (3 MMG, 2 LMG, 1 PSK), there would be no need to use German counters in Hungarian OOBs in any scenario (although the campaign games are a different story; CG are not included in the above counts). Excluding FB, a mere 5 scenarios out of 39 use the advantages of two-tone counters, and only minimally at that.
So, what are my recommendations?
GMD: There is no reason for the GMD to be two-tone. In the 27 years since there release, I only found one scenario that took advantage of the brown edging, FT02, which uses the GMD counters to represent the Thai army. Future editions of Rising Sun should make the GMD monotone German Blue. Since no scenario designers are interested in giving Russian SW to the GMD, or GMD SW to the Russians/Partisans/Chinese Communists, we lose nothing. Sure, the Germans and GMD can't fight each other now, but who cares? And who knows, maybe the ability to use GMD counters in German OOBs could help portray backwater German units, although this seems like a stretch to me.
Hungarians: Before Festung Budapest, I would have recommended that the Hungarians be represented by Axis Minor Green, and the Bulgarians and Romanians transferred to Finnish Gray, which solves the Hungary-vs-Germany's-Ex's problem, and has the satisfying outcome that all the side-switchers are now in a nice shade of gray. Hungarians could no longer co-conceal with the Germans, but this only affects 3 non-FB scenarios, and it's not clear to me what the historical justification for this pair of allies--and only this pair of allies--being able to co-conceal.
As it is, @Bill Cirillo and the boys (apparently alone among scenario designers) have actually taken advantage of the possibilities of two-tone Hungarians, so if we care about backwards compatibility, the Hungarians should probably remain two-tone in the next edition of Armies of Oblivion.
Buda Volunteer Regiment: No reason for two-tone here. Any reprint of FB should have the BVR in monotone Russian brown. Give them a little insignia in the upper right corner of the counter and you're good to go.
Korean Nationalities: It's too early for there to be more Korean scenarios. However, based on decades of experience with the GMD and Hungarians, we can be pretty confident that scenario designers are going to stick to the provided OBs, and when they don't, it's unlikely that they are going to want exactly the right SW that would actually be useful. So, should Forgotten War ever get reprinted, here's how it should be:
ROK: Allied Minor Green. No brainer.
PRC: Finnish Gray, to suit cold-weather badasses without armor support. Alternatively you could make them Axis Minor Green, on the principle that all that Green-Green-Brown would be appropriate for a minor theater of conflict with more than a hint of civil war to it.
UN: French Blue, then you might even be able to use the counters to represent the occasional Free French OB. This will ruin the upcoming Critical Hit module in which Marshall Petain uses a time machine to invade the 1950s, but they'll probably print their own counters for that one anyway.
So, to go back to the beginning: I have now addressed all three of the arguments in favor of two-toned counters implicitly, but I'll do so explicitly:
The three arguments for two-tone counters are these:
- There aren't enough colors to make more monotone nationalities, especially if you want to be backwards-compatible with earlier printings, in which there was a lot of change from module to module in, say, the shade of brown used for Russians.
- Two-tone counters allow minor nations to use the support weapons of a major nation, and vice versa.
- Two-tone counters allow minor nations to use the concealment counters of a major nation, which prevents the enemy from distinguishing the two when they are allies. Note that this really only applies to the Hungarians, as all other two-tone nationalities have their own concealment counters. However, conceivably a designer could SSR use of a single concealment counter if US/UN/ROK or NK/Chinese or GMD/Communist forces were allies.
In the case of #2 and #3, it seems worth looking to see whether scenario designers have actually taken advantage of these possibilities. The argument for two-tone counters is stronger or weaker depending on whether or not they have. Gung-Ho introduced the two-tone Chinese in 1992; Armies of Oblivion the two-tone Hungarians in 2006; Festung Budapest the two-tone Buda Volunteer Regiment in 2012; Forgotten War three two-tone nationalities (Post-civil-war Chinese, South Koreans, and UN forces). That's 50 nationality-years of two-tone counters; so, have scenario designers been using these capabilities?
I looked at all of the scenarios in my collection, which includes most MMP scenarios, all the free scenarios I could find online, and the DFTB scenarios. I invite people who are interested to do the tallying for products I don't own, and I'll add them here. I included scenarios in which two-tone counters were used for a different nationality, but I only found a couple of instances of this, in which GMD counters are used for the Thai army. I divided scenarios into 4 classes; a scenario can belong to more than one class.
1) Class A: The two-tone nationality shares concealment counters with its monochrome big brother in a way that could deceive the opponent. So if the scenario includes both German infantry and Hungarian infantry, for example, the scenario is class A. A scenario with Hungarian infantry and German armor would not fall into this category, since there is no room for confusion, as all-and-only the 1/2" counters are known to be Hungarian regardless of how they are concealed.
2) Class B: The two-tone nationality uses a SW, Gun, or AFV from its monochrome big brother as its own. I only included a scenario in this class if a two-tone counter for that SW, etc, does not exist.
3) Class C: The two-tone nationality uses a SW, Gun, or AFV from its monochrome big brother as its own. I only included a scenario in this class if enough two-tone counters for that SW, etc, do not exist in the core module. So if a scenario calls for the PRC to use 12 Russian LMGs, but there are only 8 two-tone Russian LMGs, someone can substitute 4 all-brown Russian LMGs as well. Note that this is only a benefit for physical play, not VASL, which is why I separated it from Class B.
3) Class D: The two-tone nationality's SW, Guns, or AFVs can be used by its monochrome big brother. Note that this is the original justification for two-tone counters given in Footnote G45. I didn't notice any of these scenarios, although they are harder to find just by scrolling through my binder. The obvious place to look would be WW2-era scenarios with the Chinese Communists, but I don't think I actually own any of those.
| Nationality | Scenarios | Class A | Class B | Class C | Class D | Total (Classes A-D) |
| GMD | 18 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Hungarians | 29 | 15-16* | 9 | 0 | 0 | 19 |
| BVR | 6 | 5-6* | 6 | 0 | 0 | 6 |
| PRC | 8 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| ROK | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| UN | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Total | 58 | 16-17* | 12 | 1 | 0 | 21 |
* I wasn't sure whether to count FB14, a three player German-Russian-Hungarian scenario, as Class A or not. It is counted under Class B in both cases, however.
At first glance, this seems like an argument in favor of two-tone counters, as about 1/3 of the scenarios take advantage of the special characteristics of two-tone counters. However, a closer look shows a grimmer picture. Of the 22 scenarios that use two-tone counters, 17 come from Festung Budapest--only 2 scenarios outside of FB have Germans and Hungarians sharing concealment counters. The only scenario outside FB to use German counters in a Hungarian OOB is 115, and in that case, two German tanks are treated as Hungarian, but they enter from offboard, so they may never even conceal, vitiating the advantage. Even in FB, had MMP printed a mere 6 Hungarian-colored counters (3 MMG, 2 LMG, 1 PSK), there would be no need to use German counters in Hungarian OOBs in any scenario (although the campaign games are a different story; CG are not included in the above counts). Excluding FB, a mere 5 scenarios out of 39 use the advantages of two-tone counters, and only minimally at that.
So, what are my recommendations?
GMD: There is no reason for the GMD to be two-tone. In the 27 years since there release, I only found one scenario that took advantage of the brown edging, FT02, which uses the GMD counters to represent the Thai army. Future editions of Rising Sun should make the GMD monotone German Blue. Since no scenario designers are interested in giving Russian SW to the GMD, or GMD SW to the Russians/Partisans/Chinese Communists, we lose nothing. Sure, the Germans and GMD can't fight each other now, but who cares? And who knows, maybe the ability to use GMD counters in German OOBs could help portray backwater German units, although this seems like a stretch to me.
Hungarians: Before Festung Budapest, I would have recommended that the Hungarians be represented by Axis Minor Green, and the Bulgarians and Romanians transferred to Finnish Gray, which solves the Hungary-vs-Germany's-Ex's problem, and has the satisfying outcome that all the side-switchers are now in a nice shade of gray. Hungarians could no longer co-conceal with the Germans, but this only affects 3 non-FB scenarios, and it's not clear to me what the historical justification for this pair of allies--and only this pair of allies--being able to co-conceal.
As it is, @Bill Cirillo and the boys (apparently alone among scenario designers) have actually taken advantage of the possibilities of two-tone Hungarians, so if we care about backwards compatibility, the Hungarians should probably remain two-tone in the next edition of Armies of Oblivion.
Buda Volunteer Regiment: No reason for two-tone here. Any reprint of FB should have the BVR in monotone Russian brown. Give them a little insignia in the upper right corner of the counter and you're good to go.
Korean Nationalities: It's too early for there to be more Korean scenarios. However, based on decades of experience with the GMD and Hungarians, we can be pretty confident that scenario designers are going to stick to the provided OBs, and when they don't, it's unlikely that they are going to want exactly the right SW that would actually be useful. So, should Forgotten War ever get reprinted, here's how it should be:
ROK: Allied Minor Green. No brainer.
PRC: Finnish Gray, to suit cold-weather badasses without armor support. Alternatively you could make them Axis Minor Green, on the principle that all that Green-Green-Brown would be appropriate for a minor theater of conflict with more than a hint of civil war to it.
UN: French Blue, then you might even be able to use the counters to represent the occasional Free French OB. This will ruin the upcoming Critical Hit module in which Marshall Petain uses a time machine to invade the 1950s, but they'll probably print their own counters for that one anyway.
So, to go back to the beginning: I have now addressed all three of the arguments in favor of two-toned counters implicitly, but I'll do so explicitly:
- Lack of colors is not an argument in favor of two-toned counters. Since every nationality does not face every other nationality on the battlefield, there are plenty of schemes in which currently two-toned counters could be replaced by existing colors and we would be, if anything, better off.
- Two-toned nations sharing counters with monotone nations is a possibility, sure, but it's not a possibility that scenario designers have taken advantage of, with the exception of Festung Budapest. Apart from FB, I was only able to find 2 scenarios that do this. Eliminating two-toned counters will therefore have very little effect on anything.
- Co-concealment is only an option for the Hungarians, and it isn't clear to me what the historical justification for this is. It is also not a widely used option outside of Festung Budapest (3 scenarios), but it is used enough in Festung Budapest that I am willing to concede that Hungarians should remain two-toned.
