Bunker and M8 Armored Car

Inspired by the Angry Lurker's post today, I put together an Italeri bunker that's been sitting on my "to-do" pile for a few weeks.

Also recently completed, an American M8 Light Armored Car (a.k.a. Greyhound). This one's been done for a while, though I only just took the photo.

Otherwise I'm still looking at possible rules to use in conjunction with Platoon Forward.  I've tested a couple of very simple free sets -- Paper Tigers, FUBAR, Red Poppy/White Feather -- all of which are good options. I've also been buying and reading through a few commercial sets -- Fields of Honor, Battlefield Evolution World at War, Rapid Fire -- which have potential as well, and I'm waiting for a copy of Crossfire to arrive in the mail.  The latter intrigues me because I like the use of "initiatives" rather than fixed turns or bounds.  I've fiddled with this type of system a bit with Red Poppy/White Feather.  The possible advantage with Crossfire over RP/WF, in terms of my own preferences, is that the infantry units are squads (rather than RP/WF's individual soldiers), which makes vehicles a more reasonable asset to have on the table as well. Crossfire needs tons of terrain, since all weapons (I'm told) have unlimited range in the game, but I have a fairly decent stock of trees and buildings at this point, and I have some Italeri stone walls on the workbench which I just primed today as well.

Action at Darville: PAPER TIGERS Battle Report

Here's another game with Paper Tigers, this time using my now enlarged 3' x 6' tabletop and including my first vehicle (the Puma). There are also a few new terrain pieces (an Italeri bridge and some "Battlefield in a Box" river sections) as well as a new temporary basing for my squads (magnetic tape on the bottoms of the minis, so they'll hold to 2" x 2" metal bases). The basing is temporary because I don't know yet if I want to go with a set of rules with squad basing, like Paper Tigers, or a set with individual basing, like FUBAR.

Setting the Scene: June 1944

As the allies try to press inland, a platoon of G.I.s are ordered to cross the small Boissière river into the town of Darville to screen the flank of an eastward American advance south of the stream. They are to hold the village and its bridge over the Boissière against any German spoiling attack aimed at the northern flank of the main U.S. advance.

The Germans, expecting an American attack but unsure where and when, are sending out reconnaissance units to probe the U.S. positions, and snatch up any key towns or bridges undefended or only lightly held by the enemy. One such probing attack, executed by a German platoon supported by a Puma armored car, is launched from the village of Menton toward Darville, in the hopes of snatching the bridge over the Boissière.

The Firefight:

Turns 1-3: The Germans have trouble keeping organized and they advance slowly into the woods northeast of Darville. As the Puma rolls into view of the Americans, the G.I.s reposition themselves further into the town, in the hopes of drawing the enemy AFV to close quarters and negating its firepower advantage. The Puma opens fire as they do, initially to little effect.

Turns 4-6: The German and American infantry on the east side of Darville engage in a violent firefight, taking maximum advantage of cover and courage [Game note: both sides made an improbably large number of cover saves and recovery rolls for damaged units], before the G.I.s finally manage to wipe out one of the German squads. Meanwhile, the Puma succeeds in catching one of the withdrawing American squads in the center of town and keeps them pinned down continuously by pouring in unrelenting fire.

Turn 7: Finally the Puma destroys the U.S. squad in the center of Darville, clearing the way into the rear lines of defense nearer the bridge. However, on the east side of town, another German squad is pinned by accurate fire, and the decision is made to withdraw, since the infantry has stalled and the Puma commander has no intention of fighting the American infantry deep in the town at close quarters all by himself [Game note: the turn deck ran out, bringing about the "mechanical" end of the game; the stalled attack is the "narrative" justification for the end of the fight reflecting the situation on the board at game end].

Aftermath:

Time worked against the Germans in this game. They needed to kill US squads quickly, make a hole, and push through to the bridge in a hurry. Unfortunately they got really bad card draws, severely limiting their actions early on, while the Americans got tons of cards, which allowed them to burn through the deck rapidly (the game ends when the deck is empty). At the same time, firing was quite ineffective all around (compared to previous games of Paper Tigers I've played) as both sides made a surprising number of cover saves negating otherwise effective attacks and, when units did get damaged, they repeatedly made successful recovery rolls before they could be hit again and eliminated. Again, because the Germans needed to quickly blast open a path to the bridge, this worked more against the Germans than the Americans. On the other hand, it was quite fun to watch such a heroic stand by the G.I.s who survived far more punishment than they should have been able to, effectively blunting the German attack before it could even pass the outskirts of Darville. The U.S. platoon commander and his men ought to be up for commendations.

Paper Tigers Battle Report

In my quest to find a set of WWII skirmish rules, I decided to take one more look around the Free Wargames Rules site, and came upon Paper Tigers, by Paper Tiger Armaments. The rules are not new, and I had seen them before, but had never tried them. So I decided to give them a spin. Since I was just testing out the rules with this game, I didn't create any scenario or back-story, but just set up some terrain, plunked down three squads for the Germans and three for the Americans (PT uses groups of 3-5 minis to represent squads), and let them have at it. The game uses a playing card mechanic for activation order, firing and movement. You assign a limited number of playing cards (unseen) to your units, which determine both the order and number of actions, and the probability of success in moving or shooting. Units can take two hits, becoming "damaged" after the first one (a generic term used in the rules for any unit pinned, suppressed, stunned, etc.) and destroyed after the second. I added one house rule (in mid-game, since it seemed to make sense), and that is if a unit can move into contact with a "damaged" enemy, the "damaged" unit is immediately eliminated.

Turns 1-2: The opposing platoons moved into positions under cover, with squads on both sides occupying patches of woods.

Turn 3: The US third squad on the American right flank lays down fire on the German first squad facing them, suppressing ("damaging") their target. The German third squad does the same to the American first squad on the opposite flank. The Germans then charge the suppressed ("damaged") American unit. Meanwhile, the US third squad maintains a withering fire that causes the German first squad to melt away (destroyed). The suppressed American first squad is unable to recover as the Germans come on.

Turn 4: The German third squad rushes the woods where the American first squad put their hands in the air and give up (destroyed). The German second squad shifts from the center in an attempt to flank the Americans on what is now the US left. The American third squad turns and moves toward the center to counter this maneuver. The US second squad takes a gamble and rushes out to gain a better position on the German unit trying to flank them – with luck they'll be able to fire on the Germans in the open (the US second squad still has a card remaining this turn, while the Germans do not). The German third squad, having secured their prisoners, swing back to the center in an effort to help their comrades by putting additional pressure on the US second squad's flank. The US second squad opens fire, but fails to hit the Germans in the open. Exposed on open ground themselves, this poor marksmanship will come back to haunt the Americans.

Turn 5: Tragically, the US second squad is caught in a deadly crossfire from the two German units, and is ripped to shreds (destroyed). Helpless to stop the slaughter, the US third squad pulls back to the village rather than take on two enemy squads all alone.

Turn 6: The US squad reaches the safety of the houses. Meanwhile one German squad takes up a position in the woods to fire on the GI's while the other sweeps out to try and enter the village from the rear.

The German fire momentarily pins (damages) the US unit, but they quickly recover, and the fight ends with the Americans withdrawing from the town to safety, and with the victorious Germans holding the field.

The overall flow of the battle looked like this:

Having played this game (and a couple others) here are my impressions of Paper Tigers:

First, from a mundane, pragmatic angle, the basic unit is a single vehicle, a single gun, or an infantry squad, the latter represented with only 3-5 models. This is excellent for me right now considering the very small size of my collection. In effect, each of my two current squads suddenly becomes a platoon under these rules, and with the addition of a few guns and vehicles, I could play the full array of Platoon Forward scenarios with little more than the original number of models I had planned to use just for the smaller "patrol" scenarios.

Second, while the rules are quite simple (which I like), there is some meaningful decision-making going on, which is also important. I found the ratio of "weight of decisions" to "lightness of rules" very favorable.

Third, while designed for player vs. player games, they are very solitaire-friendly – in fact there is a section at the end of the rules that details how to go about playing the game solo, and it works quite well.

Finally, in my play through, I found that there was enough of a luck element to keep things upredictable (especially in solo play), while at the same time not making the game a total coin toss.

All in all, I really enjoyed these rules, and to top it all off – they're free.

German Squad

Finished a second batch of five German infantry, so my first German squad is complete – now I can start toying around with rule sets to use in conjunction with the Platoon Forward campaign system.

Among the rules sets I'm considering are: 

• Skirmish! (by Skirmisher Publishing)
• Men of Frost (by Paul Scrivens-Smith, available for free online)
• FUBAR (by Craig Cartmell, available for free online)
• Battlefield Evolution World at War (by Mongoose Publishing)

Both Skirmish! and Men of Frost will work really well for up for small squad-size engagements (which is what the size of my figure collection limits me to at the moment). FUBAR and Battlefield Evolution World at War appear better-suited to platoon-size engagements (where I'd like to be eventually). Some other rules sets that have caught my interest in other people's blog posts appear to be out of print now (Face of Battle, Crossfire) so I'll have to see if I can track them down used somewhere.

All the houses are by Miniature Building Authority

On an unrelated note, Lock 'n Load publishing's Tank on Tank is a fun little game.  It really does play quickly and, clocking in at about 30 minutes a game, it's just the ticket for something light to kill time waiting for a coat of paint to dry on some minis or to play during a lull between chore and errand sessions on the weekend.

ORIGINS: WWII Loot

I went to Origins today on a day pass to look around the exhibits and buy a few things, but with a strict spending limit, considering how many Miniature Building Authority houses I've bought recently (in addition to the ones I posted about earlier, I picked up three more online which arrived last week).

Also, given the number of games sitting still unplayed on my shelf, largely because I'm always too tired to dive into any substantial new sets of rules, I decided to limit myself to wargames that specifically called themselves "introductory."

So, apart from some solo T&T modules to scratch my fantasy itch, I picked up three small WWII games. Two of them were old metagaming minigames being sold for $8 each: Rommel's Panzers and Stalin's Tanks.

I also picked up one new game, from Lock 'n Load publishing called Tank on Tank. According to the blurb on the back of the box: "A smaller game that can be learned in less than five minutes and played during a lunch break, Tank on Tank depicts tactical ground combat in Europe in the latter years of World War II."

I think between these three I'll be good to go for a while. The first scenario of tank on tank is already set up on my desk.