I haven’t often felt the need to paint civilians in wargames. They’re an awkward topic, if admittedly quite tactically significant. When engaging in urban battles, there’s always a risk of hitting the wrong person. This is… uncomfortable, but the Haywire campaign actually tracks it, with too many civilian casualties triggering “Retaliation Operations.”

The following models come from Quartermaster3D.

Originally, I was going to use abstract tokens for civilians. It feels cleaner, but also disingenuous and a touch “Board gamey.” I decided, then, to go ahead and paint a few civilians. Here they are. I’m… not sure how I feel about it.

As a project, I enjoyed it. Another interesting change of pace from painting military uniforms. I think they look great on the board and add to the “reality” of the laydown.

I think the other reason I’ve avoided civilians is they’re usually a bit of a pain in games. It’s another set of rules. It’s another table to roll on. It’s more overhead in exchange for an awkward tactical consideration.

I have to give Haywire credit—it makes them significant, but not cumbersome. They use the same movement rules as enemies (random direction, 6”) until things kick off, then they default to hiding in the nearest piece of cover. I go the extra step to let them take what appears to be the safest position within 12”. They are only relevant if you roll a one when shooting at an enemy within 6” of a civilian. This is very simple, but just enough to give pause.

My son and I actually had a moment where we chose to leave an enemy standing (and shooting) because of an inadvertent civilian nearby. It was a token, but this was the moment that convinced me I needed to put them on tabletop properly. It was a serious consideration which caused us to reposition to force that enemy to move. I could also see it being cause to throw a stun grenade, or otherwise suppress that enemy rather than risk the shoot roll that could lead to disaster.

I commend the ruleset for this, really. It’s kept simple but has the desired impact on my decision calculus. It’s a great little execution and, for better or for worse, has me convinced I should paint up more civilians. What a Cowboy has a fun set of civilian rules which I now plan on revisiting with this new perspective. There, the civilians might just turn on you. A fun bit of flavor, to be sure.

So, my kudos to Haywire. It’s changed my mind on an old sticking point for me and given me a set of interesting hobby projects. The game continues to make a positive impression on me.

More on that in our campaign playthrough posts. See the Haywire tag for more.