My initial setup on my right Flank. Hetzers lead the way, with a platoon of AA towed by Horchs and four Marder IIs on their left flank. Fallschirmjager infantry follows close behind the armor. 

Louis' IS-2s, initial setup. You can also see the trucks his Naval Infantry are riding in - just behind the woods, past the church. 

Doing the “Do Over” - a Flames of War After Action Report

Louis and I ran our Do Over game with the same rosters and troops and the same terrain; or at least as close as we could recall.

We began setting up, and my poor communication to Louis had him thinking we were going to imitate our initial set up as well. When I placed a unit in a spot different from where it had gone in our original game, he realized that I had miscommunicated and began changing his placement as well. As it stands, he only changed one units position – the IS-2 Heavy Tank platoon moved to my right flank instead of the center of the board. After all, that’s where my Marder II and Hetzer platoons were. In fact I heavily weighted that side of the table with troops!

To start with, the company commander Kampfgrupped – that is, he took a squad from each of the FJ platoons, then a single HMG from the HMG platoon. This gave him nearly a full platoon of his own. They, along with the remnants of the HMG platoon were to secure the left flank.

On the right flank, two FJ platoons, a light anti-aircraft platoon, and the tank platoons would move onto the objective.

The game started off quietly, but we knew it would turn bloody.

I marched my troops at the double (moved double) and parked them all behind trees or other cover so they couldn’t get shot. (Troops that move at the double take twice the hits when fired upon!)

Neither of us had much shooting in the first turn, and I failed to get air support. My demon die proving that I can’t roll what I need when I need it, once again!

Turn two saw a bit more give and take. I lost two AA guns and crews, as they were still “driving” up to where I wanted to set them up.

My HMG and the CO hammered a platoon of infantry on the left flank

The recon platoon moved to threaten his mortars.

On his turn, his naval infantry assaulted my Marders, but failed to accomplish a destruction. Instead one crew “bailed” on me. I also lost a Hetzer and a Marder II – death by IS-2. The monsters lumbered closer.

His platoon on my left flank moved some lads forward and covered their movement with some HMG fire.

His scouts appropriately attacked my recon platoon with some light arms fire, doing no damage. He moved a pair of AT guns towards those threatening armored cars, but couldn’t get a clear shot – plus, the guns were still limbered.

On my turn I retaliated on the right flank by moving my surviving Hetzers and Marders into cover so the behemoths wouldn’t see them. The light AA guns set up and fired on his naval infantry, along with some infantry who had just moved onto the objective. I now owned one objective! His naval infantry platoon was decimated from all the fire and decided to pull back.

My armored cars moved and shot some more on the right flank, killing his Artillery Observers, while the CO and his lads moved up under cover of fire from the HMGs on that flank, pinning the Soviet infantry platoon there.

On Louis turn, he hammered my HMG with his Heavy Mortars, but had no effect. His infantry remained pinned, and he unlimbered his AT guns. The IS-2s fired up some infantry and killed another Hetzer while moving closer yet.

The Hetzers and Marders made a sacrificial play, moving into the open to get a side shot against the IS-2s, while my infantry moved to assault. Unfortunately, the infantry failed their “tank terror” roll, staying in place instead. I killed his support vehicle and bailed out one IS-2 with the fire from the Hetzers and the Marder. The close proximity of two infantry platoons armed with panzerfausts caused him some concern.

I also was able to move the CO and his lads up onto the objective. I now owned both objectives and it was game over.

We both learned important lessons in support. Tanks can’t do it all by themselves. Infantry and tanks are mutually supportive. It was a good game, and as always, Louis was a great opponent.

Do Over!

Louis and I ran a Late War Flames of War battle last Friday night.

My force consisted of Company HQ platoon(plt), 2 full pltsof Fallschrimjager, 1 HMG plt, 1 light anti-aircraft plt (3 X 2.8cm Flak 38s with Horchs pulling them), 1 plt of 4 Marder Iis, 1 plt of 4 Hetzers, and limited air support.

His forces consisted of 2 Soviet Infantry plts (truck mounted), 1 anti-aircraft MG plt, 1 heavy mortar plt, 1 scout plt (very cleverly mounted in a “borrowed German half-track!), and 1 plt of 5 X IS-2 (Joseph Stalin) tanks.

The battle was purely ugly.

For starters, you have to realize that Louis and I are evenly matched when it comes to demon dice.

We both roll some terrible die.

With 5 heavy armored monsters prowling slowly across the board, my focus on the objectives of the game was lost. I focused instead on destroying the beastly IS-2s.

Louis very wisely chose to light up one of my infantry platoons, and even assault it with mixed results.

My poor Hetzers hid in woods and attempted to fight the IS-2s from the front – unbeknownst to me, I couldn’t even cause a “bail out” result from the front with the little Hetzers. Still they fought bravely, and two of them managed to get a flank shot, while bogged in a stream, and killed one of the behemoths, right before the rest of the IS-2s lit them up like a pile of old wood on Guy Faulks night! It was not a pretty sight – to me!

On one side of the table, his mortars, scouts, and infantry platoon did battle with one platoon of Fallschirmjagers with the company commander and light mortars attached. On the other flank, a Fallschirmjager platoon and the Marders slugged it out with his infantry squad and anti-aircraft MG platoon. The Marders earned their points at several junctures, by killing off a pair of his AA/HMG trucks, pinning his infantry platoon, and finally killing another IS-2.

The FJs managed to come into contact with one of the leviathans and put a few panzerfausts into it’s top armor, popping it like a cheap bottle of wine, before withdrawing to cover of the village around the objective.

End of the game came after a very nice mortar attack killed most of my FJ platoon on the right flank, to include the company commander. I then had to roll morale for the entire army, and 2 units failed and left the table. The game ended a tie, and once again, both forces retired to lick their wounds, and prepare for the next onslaught.

Saturday is our “do over” game. We will change nothing, except our deployment. I won’t waste my Hetzers in a head-to-head battle with IS-2s again!


Camera: Louis has a digital. I'm going to email him and remind him to bring it to record our slugfest. I'll also bring my camera - which appears to be working now - though time will tell.

Pirates!

WizKidsGames has another winner on it's hands; Pirates of the Crimson Coast.

For $3.99 you get at least two ships, and maybe a reef, maybe an island, or maybe a fort. Also included are two of the smallest d6 you'll ever see, as well as the rules, and some gold game coins. (Not real gold, not legal tender, except in the game!)

You punch out the ship pieces and put the ships together. Each has a value depending on its stats – like the number of masts it has – which will equal the number of canons the ship has – the amount of cargo it can carry, and it’s speed.

You build a fleet, usually around thirty-five points (ships run from 5 points to nearly 20 points per vessel) and then you roll to see who places terrain – like islands!

After all the Islands are placed, each player puts gold out, face down on each island.

The object of the game is to move your ships from your ‘home island’ to the islands with gold, explore them and collect as much gold as possible.

The player with the most gold at the end of the game wins.

The game is over when the last ship with gold lands at it’s home island – or when one team can no longer move it’s ships. If you’re ships are sunk or derelict, you’re out of the game! At that point, count the gold on the home islands, and the player with the most wins.

A snarky way to play this game is that whoever wins keeps all the gold they collected!

My daughter loves this game, my wife even plays it - she says the little one cheats!

It's pretty easy to play, and games don't take too long, so you can get a few games in during an afternoon.

For a card game, it's really a hoot! Almost, but not quite, "cardboard crack."

An Odd “What-if” Battle

On Saturday afternoon we played Flames of War. We based the game in Russia, with some odd turns to it; we had Brits (8th Army, Desert Rats) as allies to the Soviets, fighting against German Fallschirmjagers and Deutsche Afrika Korps(DAK).

In order to reign in total flights of fancy, the DAK directly faced off against their traditional opponents, while my Fallschirmjagers faced the Red Horde. We only blurred the lines now and again…

Highlights of the battle on my end of the table were my three Marder II tank hunters taking down two SU-152s. While that may not seem significant, think of it like this: three small, light, but heavily armed open-topped tanks tore up two heavily armed and armored self-propelled guns (SPGs). One hit from either of those beasties should have taken out the Marders, and most everything else they aimed at!

‘Sneaky’ Doug, the shop owner, has made good use of the German “Stormtrooper move” rule in the past. You park your vehicle just on the ridge of the hill so you can see over, but you are down enough to be considered “hull down” – and then you fire into the enemy. At the end of your turn, you roll for your “Stormtrooper move” and then move your vehicles back down the backside of the hill into full cover.

I fired six shots the first turn and killed one of the SU-152s, then successfully stormtroopered back down the hill out of sight. The remaining leviathan moved on his turn, but had no target; on my turn, I moved my Marders back up the hill, and then fired at the reduced Rate of Fire (RoF) of 1 each. All three shots hit, killing the last major threat on that side of the table.

With the freshly killed SU-152s still smoking, I chose to move my Marders down the hill in an attempt to flank the lend-lease Sherman tank platoon. Unfortunately the Brits decided that my Marders were a threat to them and they dropped fire on the three open-topped SPGs, killing all three in one go. Ouch. Still, they more than earned their points!

Another highlight between the Sovs and FJs was the game-long gun duel between the 88s and the Sherman platoon.

I couldn’t roll to save my life (literally!) and only managed to kill 3 Shermans and bail-out a few with the 88s.

The battle raged back and forth like this; Louis would fire his Shermans at my 88s. I would save. On my turn, I would fire at his Shermans, and “wiff” miserably! (needed 4s on d6 to hit, I was rolling 1, 2, 3s!)

That went on nearly the duration of the game.

Other “highpoints”, though not from the view of the FJs, was the destruction of two FJ platoons by MG fire (tanks), and infantry assault on one flank, and death by Anti-Aircraft MG on the other flank, followed by infantry assault. Louis sort of forgot about the 2cm flak guns my FJ crews were dragging across the table into range, and after he had killed my company commander and another stand of FJs, my turn came. The three 2cm flak guns opened up with RoF 4 each, decimating his infantry. As if that didn’t hurt enough, my “team mate” had roared to my rescue with some Panzer IIIs and he opened up on the remaining Popov infantry, finishing off the last of them.

We called the game at this point, each side retiring to lick their wounds and prepare for the next onslaught.

Allied Assault

Friday nights game of Trench Wars started out with myself, a good friend just back from Iraq, via a year in Korea (long story!) and a couple of young men who showed up ready to watch. I explained that Trench Wars is one of the easiest games I’ve ever played as far as getting a grip on the rules quickly. The rulebook is not very big and only the first 19 pages are rules, and some of those pages are charts.

So the two lads jumped in ready to play, handy-dandy “Cheat Sheet” in hand, pushing Frenchies across the board, while my friend Stephen was pushing his “hairy men in skirts” – AKA Highlanders – around the table.

With three newbies playing, I chose to limit what the defenders had available. I gave them one heavy machine gun (HMG) and about 20 infantry spread the length of the table – approximately eight feet.

We had barely got going when four more folks showed up! Another friend from the Trench Wars Egroup, ‘British’ Dave, and a local gent who runs the Eagle and Empire Egroup for us, with several sons and their friends.

By the time they arrived, things were already starting to look rough for the defenders; the German HMG lost a crewman on the first allied turn, reducing its rate of fire to 12d6, instead of 18d6. With that weapon being the lynchpin of my entire tactical plan, the loss of crew put the defenders at a disadvantage.

The game went downhill from there. The young lads defending had some bad rolls, the attackers were now backed by a very knowledgeable and canny player (‘British’ Dave is a fine gamer, with excellent tactical instincts.) and my friend, who has a very firm grasp on real WWI tactics, and further, is an outstanding analyst, put game knowledge together with real-world tactics and overcame any disadvantage he might have otherwise suffered due to lack of experience.

The two lads on the allied right flank were having a ball, moving and shooting with a large force of French, totally distracting the defenders from the sly movements up to the trench on the left flank.

Unfortunately we had to call the game early, but it is probably better that we did. Stephen had flanked the trench and it was a matter of time before ultimate defeat for the defenders.

All in all a pretty good game, though it would have been better if we’d had more time.

I stacked the odds initially, fully believing that my superior game-mechanics knowledge combined with some luck and tactical skill could overcome the numbers advantage, however, when I handed off to the inexperienced players, I failed to compensate them with some reinforcements. Sorry lads! I’ll know better next time!

Unabashed Request for Assistance

This really is a two-part request:

1. If you surfed in here from BlogExplosion or BlogXchange, welcome! Please have a look around, drop a comment or suggestion in the comments or in an email.

2. Click on one of the advertising links and help me support my addiction to various lead and pewter products!

3. Ok, this is a three-part request!

If you are a gamer and have a club you'd like to promote or a game you'd like to review, drop me a line. If I've played it, I'll write a review. If I haven't and you have, and are willing, please feel free to email me your review. Credit will be given to the writer per instructions. (Which means, you have to provide the instructions to me so I can properly give credit!

Now go! Clicky clicky!



Important note! A kind reader popped in for a quick read and informed me that it is against Googles' TOS to draw attention to their adds. In light of that, please ignore the above post, and whatever you do, don't look down to the right at the advertisements! Thank you.

Death in the Motherland

The combat jump into the Russian Steppe went far better than I had hoped.

The Fallschirmjagers took only 10% casualties on landing – far less than the anticipated 25% losses.

That included about 6 stands of various types that landed on or in a river or in other rough terrain.

Mike and I were running the Germans, Louis and Bob ran the Russians.

If not for Mike’s incredible die rolls, I think we would have lost more like 40% on the jump! He rolled like a man possessed, only losing 6 stands total out of approximately 60 stands! Absolutely amazing! And to top it off, he only lost 2 stands from the rough terrain!

Not only did Mike make incredible rolls, it just happened that all but two platoons landed nearly on top of their weapons containers. We started the first turn with all platoons, except two, in command, and with their weapons!

The Sovs weren’t happy about the FJs successful jump. With the Gliders landing and stopping just inches from one of the objectives, and the troops spread out nicely in a pair of lines pointing to both of the objectives, we just had to figure out which one to head to!

Since the Light Arty (GeB76G 7.5cm Mountain guns) landed so close to the one, we chose that one. Mike took that half of the board and made it happen. He quickly moved 1st platoon towards the objective, using the downed gliders as cover. He made it to the cover of a walled farmyard on the second turn. The AOs (Artillery Observers) were also in cover there, looking for targets – and it was certainly a target rich environment!

Across from the farmyard was a Soviet heavy machine gun platoon. Horror of horrors; with around 12 stands of HMGs, the turn they opened up would be murder on anyone in range.

Beside the HMG platoon was a platoon of infantry – with at least two HMGs attached. Again, this was a large formation, and would cause a lot of pain on our side if left alone.

While Mike began moving his troops towards the objective, I began moving troops carefully towards the remaining two containers. This would be 3rd platoon and the 2nd HMG platoon.

1st HMG platoon covered our movement, hammering the Red Infantry platoon, and the Popovs took heavy casualties. Unfortunately, since they had gone first, some of our platoons had already taken casualties as well!

I put an air strike on the Infantry platoon, pinning them. The Light arty dropped rounds on the HMG platoon – to no effect.

On the third turn the Sov HMG platoon hammered 1st platoon, wiping out three or four stands. The Sov infantry platoon fired (RoF 1) into the massed troops nearest them, taking out one stand of HMG from 2nd HMG platoon – who still had not reached their canister, and thus were armed only with pistolas! 2nd HMG platoon went pinned due to the number of hits. We lost one A/T gun and crew as well, pinning that platoon.

Bottom of the third, we started with 2 platoons pinned – the 2nd HMG platoon and the PaK 36 A/T (Anti-tank) platoon. I needed to unpin them, as there were tanks appearing on our far right flank – I needed those doorknockers in place or our flank would fold!

I rolled a 1 and a 2; all I needed was 3s! DOH!

I rolled for air – got it, got two planes and attacked the Popovs HMG platoon, hammering it nearly to death. They went pinned, lost some stands, which greatly reduced their threat. I moved the small anti-tank rifle (2.8cm) towards the oncoming tanks. It would be a paratrooper last stand if I didn’t get the doorknockers in place, as this little gun would only just have a prayer of slowing the tanks. Left by himself to defend the flank, the little critter would get 2 shots and that would probably be all she wrote – and that’s if he survived the first turn of enemy tank fire!

1st HMG platoon fired, as they had since the first turn, on the Popovs infantry platoon, taking it out of play. The last few stands were removed, and if we were lucky, this platoon would not be back!

2nd platoon moved into place, supporting 1st platoon, who were taking a beating from that nasty Popov HMG platoon.

Fourth turn - The Popov HMG platoon fired at a greatly reduced rate of fire but still gave casualties to 2nd platoon. They had also taken out one of the mountain guns in an earlier turn, cutting our fire power from the guns down to 1/4th - and that’s just ugly!

The Popov Rifle platoon failed it’s morale check, so the Kommisar attempted to "motivate" the troops, but was in turn shot. The platoon then scarpered.

The Russian tank company (two platoons of T-26s) were “screaming in from the right flank was still too far away to be a threat, and they kept blowing their fragile engines!

One thing that was helping, in a small way, was the Stump Mortars attached to the Company Headquarters. They were only getting a couple of shots per turn, as most had their view of the enemy blocked by a stand of trees. I spent much of the game figuring out how to un-snooker them, while not blocking line of sight from the 1st HMG platoons stands.

After the destruction of the Russian infantry platoon, I moved 1st HMG platoon up on line to fire into the Russian HMG platoon, which was still a thorn in our sides!

I called for air support and got it. I dropped both attacks onto the tank companies approaching on the right flank, nearly wiping one out. He made his morale check, surprisingly, and they continued to trudge towards our flank.

I was able to unpin the AT and 2nd HMG platoons – 2nd HMG platoon began to look as if they might reach their container prior to the end of the game! Unfortunately the doorknocker AT platoon was down to one gun at this point and would have to roll for morale to accomplish anything for the rest of the game.

Louis rolled for the “human wave” effect for his infantry platoon – and made his roll – the Infantry platoon would re-appear in the same place it had been before it was destroyed at the beginning of the next turn..

Turn 5 – The Russian platoon we had decimated reappeared. Nasty. This could be bad – except there was nothing they could do to us at this point.

See, by now, we were dug in on the objective and there is no way anyone is going to pry us off. The Sovs had no air support and their reserves were arriving too far away and moving too slowly. They weren’t going to be able to make it in time. The best they could hope for would be to cause extensive casualties.

The HMG platoon opened up, with yet further reduced abilities on 1st and 2nd platoons – and did little damage. The reconstituted infantry platoon opened up on 2nd HMG platoon, causing a morale check – which they passed! The little anti-tank gun that could finally moved into position to take on the two platoons of tanks single-handedly.

I rolled for air, got two planes – and lost control of them! Oh no! So this is how it would end? Being bombed off the objective by our own aircraft!?!

Mike said, “We wave them off!”

I had been unaware of this tactic/rule. Very nice. That means that 2nd platoon, sitting hard on the objective would not fire or dig in – but would spend their “shooting” turn waving off our own planes. The second flight also dives in on the objective and the battered remnants of 1st platoon wave them off as well.

End of game. FJs take and hold the objective through to turn 6 – and at this point the Sovs call the game, realizing that though they may cause more casualties, there is no way they can shift us from the objective!

I look forward to fielding my FJs as a ground force in mid/late-war scenarios. They are some tough guys who can even survive most of my lousy die rolls!

The stormtroopers prepare to charge up the rubble onto the second floor - the grenadier pulls the pin on a grenade and drops it - Viva la France! They all die.  

A Chauchat gunner hides beside the doorway, while a forward observer calls in arty. 

Hidden in the shadows, death awaits - an HMG in the doorway - riflemen in the windows. 

More from the Verdun Campaign - a grenadier in this room sacrificed himself and took out 5 stormtroopers! 

Verdun Campaign, the city 

Evil Dice

Ok, this is a bit down the bunny trail, but it is a topic that will vex many a gamer!

How often do you have a bad day with the dice?

I mean, a really, really bad day?

Like when your opponent opens fire, hits your guys with nearly every die he throws, and then you roll your handful of saves - and needing anything above a 2, you roll mostly 1s and 2s?

Or when your turn to fire on your opponent comes, you roll 50 d6 and you need 4+ to hit - and you roll maybe 5 hits? And to add insult to injury, your opponent immediately rolls 5 saves, needing 5+ and makes them all!

I mean, what's up with that!??

I have recently found that I like large dice. The little ones seem to roll worse for me than the larger. I use Chessex almost exclusively, since that's what my local shop (Eagle and Empire) sells.

Let's use that Haloscan Comment thing - remember it will parse your comments if they run too long - to discuss your feelings on dice...

Done!

I now have a fully capable and very flexible Fallschirmjager Mid-war Airborne force. I've finally finished the "doorknocker" platoon. I'll get some photos up, I promise!!

I'm now working on the mid-war ground force. I have a pair of Marder IIs painted and two more on the table, as well as three Hetzers painted, with a fourth on the table.

I've just started work on a Battlefront Minis Fallschirmjager platoon, since all of my Fallschrimjager infantry and HMG platoons are from Command Decision, and based incorrectly for FoW tourney play. So, repainting, rebasing, etc. I want to play this army in Tourney to see how they do...

Now, up against Brians Soviet Infantry Company, I don't think I'll have enough RoF to kill the stands I'll need to knock out for a win, or even a tie! If you've never seen the huge number of figs in a Soviet Infantry unit, you would be absolutely stunned. It's huge.

Still, it would be an interesting battle - for a while!

Jumping into Battle in Russia

Friday night, Bob and I (and one other player, perhaps!) will play another Death from Above Scenario, this time on the Russian Steppe.

This will be an Early War Death from Above scenario, with a slightly altered list on my part, and a whole pile of T-26s and Soviet Trained Conscripts. This ought to be a hoot.

Each unit that is “destroyed” can reconstitute or regenerate on a roll of 3+. Regenerated or reconstituted units will come back onto the board at the original point of entry for that unit, prior to destruction. Any company not making it’s regeneration roll is permanently destroyed.

I’ll be fielding my “doorknockers” for the first time in this game.

The German soldiers assigned to this 37mm anti-tank gun (PaK-36) knick-named it the “doorknocker” since apparently all it did to many tanks was alert the tank crew to the gun crews presence. This usually proved fatal to the gun crew.

Later in the war, the Germans added Stielegranate ammunition – a sort of giant rifle-grenade designed for short range, which fired off the front of the PaK 36. This special rocket-type ammo had a shaped charge in it and was very effective, if limited by its short range.

This is, as I mentioned, an Early War battle, so no Stielegranate is available. One good thing is that the PaK-36 has a Rate of Fire (RoF) of 3 per gun. With an initial anti-tank platoon strength of 4 guns, that makes for 12 shots per turn!

Now if I can just get them all into battle.

While not strictly “historically accurate” in that there was no German airborne offensive in the Soviet Union, the forces themselves are historically accurate, and this will serve as an interesting “what if” scenario!

Battle report will follow.

Kreta

Saturday (I know I’m a little late with this – been ill and very busy!) Bob, Louis, and I ran a little Invasion of Crete action.

Rules were Flames of War utilizing the special rules from the Diving Eagles manual, Death from Above scenario.

Initially, my opponent (Louis) set up his 3 platoons or so in an ’L’ shape on one corner of the board.

Then we made our first mistake; I rolled for wind direction – placed my landing points on the table – then Bob realized we had done that in reverse! See, you can choose where you want to drop your troops, you can even have some advance knowledge of the disposition of enemy troops – but you can’t know the wind direction until you are on the D.Z.

So, I re-rolled for wind direction – and the direction came up the same!

I placed my two platoons of glider assault troops – a glider assault platoon and my GebG76 mountain guns – on the table. I rolled for them to land and they did wonderfully. No crashes and all stayed on the table!

Next, I lay out the drop zones for my paras. The Fallschirmjagers kicked their equipment canisters out the door of the Junkers, followed by the troops leaping to death or glory.

Initially my Mortar platoon landed partially off the table – so I removed the entire team and brought them back on as reserves.

Total casualties for the drop were three stands of infantry. Not bad at all!

Next, the pre-first turn action begins!

The gliders slide to a stop, the squad machine gunners open up on the unsuspecting troops nearby, and the glider assault platoon leaps out and into battle, just inches from the enemy.

Unfortunately, with only 2 teams per glider, the command team and two assault sections (1 squad) made it into contact with the enemy – the rest of the platoon was too far away.

With just the command team and two assault sections entering into assault against basically two platoons (1 infantry, 1 HMG), things didn’t look good – but the choices were, stay in place and receive full fire on the enemy’s’ turn or assault and try.

Try they did, but they were nearly wiped out and fell back.

Then turn one began.
The battle appeared to go downhill for my part, from the start. Though pinned and with limited fire, Louis Brits were able to focus their fire effectively and nearly wipe out the 450 point Glider Assault Platoon in just one turn. That’s nearly 1/4th of my entire force! OUCH!

Lady Luck intervened, as Louis had abominable to hit die, failed to roll for his reserves, and I made all my saves.

On my portion of turn 1, I rolled for reserves – and failed. I rolled for Air support, needing only a 3+ on a six-sided die – and failed. My HMG crew made it to their equipment canister

My Mountain guns unlimbered and set up, the rest of my troops began the sprint to their equipment canisters, and the Glider Assault platoon “unpinned” and passed their morale. Nice!

Turn two – Louis rolled for reserves – and failed. He fired at the remnants of the Glider assault platoon and finished them off. He fired on the Light Artillery platoon (Mountain guns) and hit them a few times – I made my saving throws.

On my half of turn two, the HMG crew, now with weapons began to sprint for an objective on the far side of the table from all of Louis’ forces. The infantry platoon on that side of the table went into the woods near the table’s edge, opposite the side near the objective, to provide cover for the Mortar Platoon – which I successfully rolled onto the table using the ‘reserves’ rule. I rolled for air before any of this occurred and failed. Again.

Louis kicked off turn three by bringing on the first of his reserves. Using the “scattered reserves” rule, he rolled to see where they would come on – unfortunately for him, his limbered 105 battery came onto the table directly in front of my set up and prepared HMGs. He lost the entire battery. For revenge, he began firing and advancing on Second Platoon, who was moving to take the objective on his side of the board. Casualties were light, but even light casualties hurt at this stage. He fired and advanced on the light arty again – and I made all my saves, again.

I rolled for Air – and failed – again. My light gun crew (7.6cm recoilless rifle platoon) made it to their canister and began to set up. The mortar team began the long trek to their equipment canister, while first platoon covered them.

Louis kicked off turn four by rolling more reserves on. He brought on the Bren gun carriers, fired them into the light gun platoon and wiped it out. His heavily hurting infantry platoon again fired on the light arty and managed to kill the observers and one gun. The other gun and command saved. His other platoons, including the HMG platoon fired on my second platoon and chewed them up pretty bad. They were now below 50% and I had to roll for morale – they were happy and stayed in place.

I rolled for Air and… got it! I aimed my single aircraft at Louis’ Bren guns. I killed one. My anti-tank gun (a 2.8cm anti-tank rifle!) fired on the Brens and killed another. The light gun fired on his advancing infantry – and missed. My mortars continued to move towards elevation nearer to the combat, first platoon began to sprint towards the contested objective.

Louis started turn 5 by rolling on the last of his reserves – a Matilda platoon. He opened fire on my light arty, killed it off. His Bren carrier made it’s morale roll and headed towards my HMG platoon, firing on it and killing 2 stands – that’s 50% - they made their morale roll! Second platoon finally took enough losses that it had to retreat off the contested objective (I failed my morale roll!) and Louis moved troops closer to the objective.

I rolled for air – and got it again! I dropped one attack on his Matildas – killing one, and the other attack went against his last Bren – and killed it. My mortars set up on a hill, just in range of his infantry; 1st platoon continued to sprint towards the sound of the guns, and 2nd platoon recovered enough to stand fast still contesting the objective. My HMG platoon was still sitting pretty, with no enemy in range on the far objective. Thus ends the game.

The game ended at the beginning of turn six: victory conditions were met by the attacker (me) having control of one of the objectives.

Just for giggles and grins, Bob had me roll for air one last time – remember, I only needed a 3 or better to get air support – and I failed again. Two successful rolls out of 6 is not good odds!

Louis and I both made some “silly beginner” mistakes and I hope we both learned a lot. I am grateful for Bobs’ patience and assistance in making this game happen.

Crete revisited

Bob, Hailey, and I are working on a game of Flames of War. This will finally test my Fallschirmjagers using their "Death From Above" special rules. We are going to attempt to land two glider platoons, and the rest of the company will parachute in.

I am going to try to get a digital camera and record the event turn by turn and give you an accurate AAR of the battle.

Yes John, I'll get more work done on your tanks too! ;-)

The Continuing Quest for 25mm WWII Rules

Comments needed!

Lon from Brigade Games sends this in response to my moaning about a dearth of WWII rule sets for 25mm...

"Disposable Heroes (great rules!)
Platoon Commander
A Corner of Hell"

Has anyone seen these played, played them yourself, or have any idea about them?

I hope to have a review of TAC: Skirmish. It's a good ruleset that we just haven't been able to get folks together to try out. That sounds like a project!

More Progress - and a Rant about Mud

I skipped something last night I probably shouldn't have, but got a good deal more done on Johns' tanks. This afternoon I'll get a bit more RLM-62 light tan on the last two that I built, and then I'll do the camo. Then lettering, markings, then finally inking, highlighting, and then the very best part...

mud!

What's not to like about mud?

One of the things I distinctly recall from my few times in the field, is that after a few hours in the boonies, everyone’s uniform looks pretty much alike, unless they're a slacker! Muddy! Dirty! Salt stains where your straps and belt rest.

Those parade soldiers are just a bunch of pretty boys! Real soldiers, meat-eaters, mud-crunchers - they get dirty and grimy, and they don't have a chance to clean up very often.

So you're thinking, “But those great little figs have so very much beautiful detail! I don't want to cover it up!”

What detail are you talking about?

The boots? Yeah, nice detail; usually the weakest bit on a figure.

The pants? Hey, a little mud won't cover the detail on the pants - and it might actually bring out the detail a bit!

Ok, before any of you Nappy (Napoleonic’s!) gamers start looking for measurement lumber to adjust my attitude, please keep in mind I'm talking modern warfare here - Hooo eeee! Modern warfare includes, for Keith’s purposes, anything from 1914 to current day.

Now... I'm also painting up my Johnny Rebs - or that is to say they are sitting on my table. I painted one command set, officer, drummer boy, and banna wava. I muddied them slightly and it looks good.

Just a touch on the boots, elbows and knees won't destroy any of that lovely detail on their chests (ribbons, medals, etc) or the braid on their epaulets.

Go on... dab a bit on... you know you want to!

Vallejo Paints

What's not to like about these critters?

You have an eye-dropper bottle of paint that comes in all the colors a gamer might want, with names that are useful, like, "German Uniform."

The eye-dropper bottle is pretty small, but it's thick paint - so you drop a tiny bit on your palette, add a heap of water, and voila! You have enough paint to do what you have to do!

It dries pretty quickly, so they even sell a “slower” that, strangely enough, slows the drying process. Note – if you are painting something on Saturday morning that you need for a noon-ish game, don’t add the “slower!” Your figs won’t be dry till much later!

There are many distributors in the states – and now that they are creating special packages for Flames of War, a box of paints for each army-type, you’ll be able to find them nearly anywhere!

Now, if you're not a historical gamer, that's all right too! They have "Game Colors," which are the fantasy colors. The names are close enough to Citadel paint colors that you will be able to figure out color switches with ease.

Just my Two-cents worth!

Update: For new readers, or those who don't go that extra step to delve into the Comments, Brian left a very good and important comment relating to Vallejo Game Colors, their fantasy colors - He says the red (I'm assuming "Bloody Red?") runs like ink. That's not good! I'll stick to what I know - their historical colors are fantastic - so far! I'm trying to replace all my Citadel and Polly 'S' paints with Vallejo!

But Hey! That's just me!

Brigade Games - New Stuff

For the 25mm gamer, head over to Brigade Games and see what Lon Weiss has to offer.

Both the Renegade line, as well as BGs own line of WWI are fantastic.

They run 28mm for BG, a little larger for Renegade.

So, what does that mean to the average gamer?

If you have built your army using mass-produced, buck or less per figure bags from Old Glory or Battle Honours, you may want some new poses and some extra nice command figures that will stand out - or even a platoon or company that is your "elite" force! The BG figs will fit nicely with Old Glory. Renegade tend to be a bit larger, but if you are tired of "dirty mold" figures and are willing to lay down the bucks for a fine army, Renegade is the way to go.

After all, it's not Games Workshop! You're still getting a bargain!

So what's new?

Lon has just released the new FT-17 Tank in resin/pewter. The picute on his website is actually the pre-mold metal version.

It's an amazing model with some of the finest detail on an affordable wargames model I've ever seen. It's size is right, the weapons are right - you get a choice between the little canon and the MG. Sweet! Since this tank was fielded in WWI by both French and American forces, it's very useful to the WWI wargamer!

I had a little trouble on one model with the tracks, however, other than some minor bubble issues, which all resin models have to a greater or lesser degree, I found these to be sweet models. On a scale of 1-10, 10 being sacharine, 1 being salt - they are an 8. Very sweet models and well worth the price.

Also have a look at his Panzer II Luchs. It's a sweet model as well, very clean lines, and it paints up nice!

The Ink Technique

I wont' dally on this one, just a quick post on the Ink technique. This is a real time saver if you are painting up whole pile of lead.

Clean and prime your figures - a good job cleaning is imperative - Mold lines will stand out like Pikes Peak once you ink.

Paint all basic colors on the figs, starting from the inside out. That means, paint the lowest lying portions or deepest detail portions first - like the face on a figure with a helmet - the face, neck, hair - that sort of thing.

Now, selecting an appropriate color of ink or wash (if using Citadel inks or washes, I find that a 50% water/ink or wash solution will do nicely!), paint the figure and let it dry. It takes a lot longer for inks and washes to dry than your standard acrylic paint.

What happens? The ink runs into all low-lying areas and then drys there. The ink only lightly shades the raised detail - however it does alter the color slightly!

Go back and look at each figure after it dries and highlight or drybrush up as needed. Look especially for any flat spots where the ink may have pooled. take the original color, water it down a bit and cover the dried ink pool.

Voila! Your figure now looks highly detailed! Aren't you a clever Tabletop General!?


On Ink colors: for modern war figures (WWI through current warfare) I use Citadel Brown Ink at a 50/50 water/ink solution.

Another technique I've read about, but not tried is the "miracle dip" method.

Feeling brave? I mean, it's only several hundred dollars of pewter and or lead, with many, many hours of painting involved. Go ahead! Be brave! If it doesn't work - you can always melt it down and go black powder hunting! ;-)

Flames of War

FoW is a points-based World War II wargame using 15mm miniatures. The company that produces the game is Battlefront Miniatures of New Zealand.

This is particularly fun for a gamer, as you can select and build an army, then just find an opponent to play, decided on the number of points you want to play, and start rolling the bones.

Check your local games shop for minis, rules (or “Intelligence Briefings”) and opponents!

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

Why the Geeky Gamer Blog?

Like I don't already have enough to do with my limited time, I split my Blog into two - one to cover my geeky gamer stuff, the other for punditry and general rants. What fun!

For the folks who surf into Baby Wings from Blog Explosion, or my 6.25 loyal readers, this will take the gamer-stuff to a land of its own, and leave my rantings and vaguely amusing punditry undiluted with geeky-gamer-stuff.

So, a welcome to all fellow geeky gamers - we'll leave politics and punditry aside, and concentrate on the more serious things like: "Does size really matter? 15mm V.S. 25mm!"

Or "Secrets of the Dip technique."

Time will tell. Stick with me and see what happens.