I can't imagine the craziness of trying to get a successful boardgame Kickstarter up and running, but the fellows at Shakos still took the time to answer my questions about their project.
I wish them every success and this is is well worth checking out.
http://grogheads.com/?p=13736#more-13736
Saturday, January 28, 2017
Thursday, January 26, 2017
Much Deserved Warm Review for "Fields of Fire"
I've run Fields of Fire games at Origins for the nice folks at Proving Ground games for two years now. We've done both modern micro-armor and WWII 15mm. Participants have always found the game easy to learn and a lot of fun. Underneath, there's also a very thoughtful rule set to which, I'm proud to say, the boys and girls of Grogheads Central Command have contributed a thought or two.
Now Bill Gray has given the rules a go and this review is, frankly, glowing. Credit to him for giving it a spin and to the Wargamer website for giving a great company some much-deserved attention.
http://www.wargamer.com/news/crunchies-a-review-of-fields-of-fire-the-fow-killer/
I would note that, God willing and the creek don't rise, MB, HL, and I will be back at Origins this year both teaching and playing Fields of Fire. Rumor has it they're also bringing something special to add to the experience.
Looking forward to it.
And, because everything is better with miniature soldiers, a couple shots from Origins '15:
Now Bill Gray has given the rules a go and this review is, frankly, glowing. Credit to him for giving it a spin and to the Wargamer website for giving a great company some much-deserved attention.
http://www.wargamer.com/news/crunchies-a-review-of-fields-of-fire-the-fow-killer/
I would note that, God willing and the creek don't rise, MB, HL, and I will be back at Origins this year both teaching and playing Fields of Fire. Rumor has it they're also bringing something special to add to the experience.
Looking forward to it.
And, because everything is better with miniature soldiers, a couple shots from Origins '15:
Saturday, January 14, 2017
Eagles: That Old, Drunken Friend
Greetings to the few and sundry that stop by here from time to time. I know it's been a bit, but the grim hand of real life has prevented far more enjoyable activities like, for example, reminiscing about old friendships.
To that point, did you ever have that one friend who was forever showing up at 2 a.m. with a desperate need to tell you that now, for real this time, he was setting his life right? The one who wanted to borrow a cigarette even when you only had three Basics left? The one who was forever falling madly in love with a girl, telling you to mind your own business that this time Tristan had found his Isolde, only to wind up drunk on your couch regaling you with her sudden but inevitable betrayal?
And yet you -- for reasons that you can't quite discern -- loved him anyway?
This is how I feel about Columbia Games' Eagles: Waterloo.
Offspring of both Dixie, which took up the American Civil War, and, by indirection, the seminal block game Napoleon's tactical system, it's honestly hard to believe that this game has been in my head space for 21 years. Originally a collectable card game (more on that in a minute), the game is intended to be a colorful, quick-playing way to hammer through the battles of the Hundred Days. I love this game. Honestly, I do. But, damnation it can stink up the couch.
Let me count the ways:
1. It was collectible (told you I'd come back to this). The original point-of-purchase product was a deck of 60 cards that had a weighted, though random, selection from not one but three collections of playable cards. Each one of these collections, labelled bronze, silver, and gold, had a total of 300 cards. A Waterloo game from Columbia was and remains utterly unresistable (despite my somewhat precarious personal situation in the mid-1990s) so I invested in several decks, but I got nowhere close to a set until the market for CCGs crashed and, suddenly, individual decks were available for well less than $5 each. Candidly, I find the idea of a wargame CCG, at best, tedious.
2. It was obnoxiously collectible. I mentioned above that there are three types of cards. A scant 10% of the cards in the weighted distribution are gold. The grim secret, revealed right in the rules pamphlet, is that there is no difference between any of the three sets. I cannot for the life of me imagine why you would bother to release what amount to three identical sets of the same cards. Surely some of that money could have gone towards hiring a better artist. Turning to which...
3. The art is not to standard. I am being kind. Behold:
Mind you, some of the unit art is quite nice and I like the landscapes very much, but, overall, it's a sub-par effort.
4. The rules aren't done. The game is intended to be simple and quick and, by and large, succeeds. There are, however, holes, some of which were addressed over time, but some of which, in my mind, remain. These become more grievous as one attempts to play the campaign game which imagines playing with the whole of the 300-card deck. A few examples:
4.a. Fundamental to the game is the "Left-Center-Right" deployment areas for both sides facing off over a "Middle Ground". The problem is that for everything except artillery to attack, units must advance over this "Middle Ground". It's said not to be a space itself, but, given simple ergonomics, should have been granted a clearer place in the rules and its illustrations. I understand that the rule writers didn't want it to be a "space" of its own, but it takes several playthroughs to figure out just how important it is and begin making allowances for it during play. And there really should have been some mechanism developed to demark a unit as having advanced to engagement and therefore being ineligible to fire or shock attack.
4.b.In the Campaign Game, do engaged troops undergoing their second rout check receive the benefit of commanders and terrain?
4.c. In the Campaign Game, may I reinsert those Special Cards that have multiple battles listed on them into a later battle's deck, even if I used that card in a battle I lost?
4.d. In a Campaign Game, which units does the loser of a previous game get to advance to the next battle. Obviously not those destroyed, but how about those on the field, in his hand, or in his reinforcement deck?
And I love playing this game.
I love the feel of pouring troops from my hand into the maw of a sector that I seem certain to lose. I loved it just this evening when HL played the "Friendly Fire" card on the Old Guard and he argued that, as they are old, they likely lack good eyesight anyway. And I particularly love the decision of when and where to commit your leaders. They provide no benefit in combat, but, in the all-important morale phase that begins each player's turn, they make it more likely that units damaged in the previous player's turn will not turn tail and run. Leave then about too long, however, and they, like the Emperor himself in my last game, will meet a grim end.
And, of course, I'm extremely fond of using the Eagles system to play out the tactical battles in Napoleon, 4th ed. (You could do it with previous editions, but why would you when 4th ed. is available?) That right there is a long weekend of great fun trying to undo the wrongs of June 1815.
Now and always, Vive L'Empereur! If I could only get him to pick his socks off the floor.
To that point, did you ever have that one friend who was forever showing up at 2 a.m. with a desperate need to tell you that now, for real this time, he was setting his life right? The one who wanted to borrow a cigarette even when you only had three Basics left? The one who was forever falling madly in love with a girl, telling you to mind your own business that this time Tristan had found his Isolde, only to wind up drunk on your couch regaling you with her sudden but inevitable betrayal?
And yet you -- for reasons that you can't quite discern -- loved him anyway?
This is how I feel about Columbia Games' Eagles: Waterloo.
Offspring of both Dixie, which took up the American Civil War, and, by indirection, the seminal block game Napoleon's tactical system, it's honestly hard to believe that this game has been in my head space for 21 years. Originally a collectable card game (more on that in a minute), the game is intended to be a colorful, quick-playing way to hammer through the battles of the Hundred Days. I love this game. Honestly, I do. But, damnation it can stink up the couch.
Let me count the ways:
1. It was collectible (told you I'd come back to this). The original point-of-purchase product was a deck of 60 cards that had a weighted, though random, selection from not one but three collections of playable cards. Each one of these collections, labelled bronze, silver, and gold, had a total of 300 cards. A Waterloo game from Columbia was and remains utterly unresistable (despite my somewhat precarious personal situation in the mid-1990s) so I invested in several decks, but I got nowhere close to a set until the market for CCGs crashed and, suddenly, individual decks were available for well less than $5 each. Candidly, I find the idea of a wargame CCG, at best, tedious.
2. It was obnoxiously collectible. I mentioned above that there are three types of cards. A scant 10% of the cards in the weighted distribution are gold. The grim secret, revealed right in the rules pamphlet, is that there is no difference between any of the three sets. I cannot for the life of me imagine why you would bother to release what amount to three identical sets of the same cards. Surely some of that money could have gone towards hiring a better artist. Turning to which...
3. The art is not to standard. I am being kind. Behold:
 | ||
| Nosey, a dough golem, and, Lemmy. |
4. The rules aren't done. The game is intended to be simple and quick and, by and large, succeeds. There are, however, holes, some of which were addressed over time, but some of which, in my mind, remain. These become more grievous as one attempts to play the campaign game which imagines playing with the whole of the 300-card deck. A few examples:
4.a. Fundamental to the game is the "Left-Center-Right" deployment areas for both sides facing off over a "Middle Ground". The problem is that for everything except artillery to attack, units must advance over this "Middle Ground". It's said not to be a space itself, but, given simple ergonomics, should have been granted a clearer place in the rules and its illustrations. I understand that the rule writers didn't want it to be a "space" of its own, but it takes several playthroughs to figure out just how important it is and begin making allowances for it during play. And there really should have been some mechanism developed to demark a unit as having advanced to engagement and therefore being ineligible to fire or shock attack.
 | |
| Middle Ground Matters |
4.b.In the Campaign Game, do engaged troops undergoing their second rout check receive the benefit of commanders and terrain?
4.c. In the Campaign Game, may I reinsert those Special Cards that have multiple battles listed on them into a later battle's deck, even if I used that card in a battle I lost?
4.d. In a Campaign Game, which units does the loser of a previous game get to advance to the next battle. Obviously not those destroyed, but how about those on the field, in his hand, or in his reinforcement deck?
And I love playing this game.
I love the feel of pouring troops from my hand into the maw of a sector that I seem certain to lose. I loved it just this evening when HL played the "Friendly Fire" card on the Old Guard and he argued that, as they are old, they likely lack good eyesight anyway. And I particularly love the decision of when and where to commit your leaders. They provide no benefit in combat, but, in the all-important morale phase that begins each player's turn, they make it more likely that units damaged in the previous player's turn will not turn tail and run. Leave then about too long, however, and they, like the Emperor himself in my last game, will meet a grim end.
 |
| As we are given to say, "Boney took the pipe". |
Now and always, Vive L'Empereur! If I could only get him to pick his socks off the floor.
Wednesday, December 7, 2016
It's KS, How Can One Not Love It?
Asid and his Dogs of War ran a HQ-in-the-Saddle game of Scourge of War: Waterloo over the weekend. I couldn't participate due to other responsibilities, but my friend Doug (panzerde) took one of the commands. What didn't quite click with me -- although I think Asid tried to tell me on-line -- was that some lunatic has created the classic KS Meckel map for Scourge of War: Waterloo. I wonder what Baron von Reisswitz would have made of that.
The write-up is nicely done and well worth a visit:
http://dogsofwarvu.com/forum/index.php/topic,3784.msg16193/topicseen.html#new
The write-up is nicely done and well worth a visit:
http://dogsofwarvu.com/forum/index.php/topic,3784.msg16193/topicseen.html#new
Saturday, November 26, 2016
"War at Sea" -- A Love Letter, Albeit a Faded One
As I write this, I am sick in love with both my kriegsspiel dice (see below), and Battlefield 1. The latter, a glorious ode to organized violence and the Great War, has encamped in my head space like no other shooter since Doom. Among its many enchantments, Allied medics are depicted as Indian troops. Given my affection for "Gunga Din", this is quite a heady thing.
Earlier this week, though, HL and I spent quality time with a very old friend that I did not realize was so dearly missed -- Avalon Hill's War at Sea.
I don't think I've ever owned the game before; not in all these years. I've played the devil out of it, though. It may, indeed, be the very first war game I ever played. The first war game I ever bought, which I've documented several times elsewhere, was Starship Troopers, purchased from a Milwaukee Gimbel's (were there non-Milwaukee Gimbel's?) I was ten at the time, though, and could never quite get my head around the rules. Only a few years later, my best friend and I had at War at Sea and something about war gaming clicked. I can't honestly say who owned that copy of the game. I should probably ask. All that to the side, I was wandering around Half-Price Books with a 50%-off coupon in my hand and this above-photographed copy of the game was on offer. I checked it for contents -- as one absolutely must when purchasing from that often incautious purveyor of used games -- and brought it home.
The first thing that struck me was how small the board is. I don't know this to be so, but it reads like someone at AH challenged the designer to build a game on half a game board; or at least a single Squad Leader/Panzer Blitz-sized board.
The second is how cluttered the game can become as a result of the board's size. The side-charts and org tables that we're so used to seeing in games these days aren't there and there's not even the off-map "battle board" for carrying out combats that would today be obligatory. One thing that I cannot decide if it be genius or madness is the placement of the POC (victory) track smack in the middle of Europe and at a 45-degree angle.
The third is that the game remains, as advertised in its rules, simple. There's really only three pages of rules -- though done up in a tiny print that is also, damnably, BLUE. The combat sequence is, of course, where the game got its nom de voyage, Dice at Sea, and the game can come down to a series of horrific rolls, but the sequence of ASW, U-boat, airstrikes, and surface combat remains refreshingly simple and easy to memorize.
This isn't a review, though. It's a mash note, one I'm glad to write. The stories the designers were trying to tell in this game are clearer to me now as I better understand the battle for the North Atlantic. I get, for example, why the Allies want to smuggle those convoys across the North Sea and to the Soviet Union. I now understand why the British -- and the Germans -- have to choose between defending the North Atlantic and the Med and why the Germans have to keep a tight grip on the Med or risk losing the Spaghetti Fleet. I enjoy the mechanic under which both the U.S.S.R. and the U.S.A. aren't necessarily willing to sail in defense of the Allied cause and, in the case of the former, can force the British to defend the Baltic lest the Germans sail a single ship that way. And, knowing what I do about the big girl, I loved the look on HL's face when he first saw the Bismark take steam on turn two and make a beeline for his shipping. I figured it would distract him, but I didn't expect him to deploy the better part of half his fleet to bring her down. In the event, he was irate to do 9 points of damage (10 required) only to have me ship her back to Germany for repairs. Imagine his joy, then, when, during the airstrike phase, he rolled two 6s on three dice and sent her to the bottom with 10 points of damage.
Of course it's not Seekrieg. It's not close to the verisimilitude of 1805. It was, however, an evening of great fun, die rolling, and exploration; one that made me want to play again very, very soon.
Oh, and, to make the record clear, HL cleaned my clock. I did quite well in the early going, pantsing him rather badly in the Med. He rallied, though, and, by turn six, just about ever ship I had worth a tinker's cuss was populating the bottom of the sea.
Earlier this week, though, HL and I spent quality time with a very old friend that I did not realize was so dearly missed -- Avalon Hill's War at Sea.
The first thing that struck me was how small the board is. I don't know this to be so, but it reads like someone at AH challenged the designer to build a game on half a game board; or at least a single Squad Leader/Panzer Blitz-sized board.
The third is that the game remains, as advertised in its rules, simple. There's really only three pages of rules -- though done up in a tiny print that is also, damnably, BLUE. The combat sequence is, of course, where the game got its nom de voyage, Dice at Sea, and the game can come down to a series of horrific rolls, but the sequence of ASW, U-boat, airstrikes, and surface combat remains refreshingly simple and easy to memorize.
Of course it's not Seekrieg. It's not close to the verisimilitude of 1805. It was, however, an evening of great fun, die rolling, and exploration; one that made me want to play again very, very soon.
 |
| This round went reasonably well. Later on, not so much. |
Friday, November 25, 2016
Kriegsspiel Dice
Just look at them. Just look.
There's a moment in the wildly underappreciated Might and Magic X: Legacy in which the brogue-speaking dwarf (female) calls on the party to "behold the great halls of Sudgurd". After the appropriate pause she says, with a fair amount of pique, "I don't think you're beholding enough".
I feel that way when I show these dice to people. They're not huge. In my case they're stickered badly. But, to me, they are grand.
Created by the folks at Command Post Games (their wonderful Pub Battles: Brandywine is the background to this picture) their blog makes it sound like they set these up almost as a lark. Given the title of my blog, though, it shouldn't surprise anyone that I take these very seriously indeed.
While Too Fat Lardies did the world service when it brought the Reisswitz kriegsspiel with several of its maps back into print, and Photon Cutter Studios made nice unit blocks available for a reasonable price, this is the third and final step. Now the combat tables that the Lardies created are no longer necessary and we can play the game the way the Baron did in 1824.
For those unfamiliar, each of the dice represents increasing strong combat odds, i.e. 1:1, 3:2, 2:1, &c. The left numbers are for musketry at various ranges, the right for skirmishers at these same ranges, the top and bottom for melee results. All these numbers are expressed in terms of points, each point representing a different number of men depending on the formation in question.
I could say so much about them, but I'll observe this: Baron von Reisswitz saw musketry as far more bloody than many contemporary Napoleonic rule sets and he -- and those that played his game and praised it -- knew well of what they spoke. I have a corps of red and blue troops courtesy of Photon Cutter and will now be compelled to press the lads into service. If only that I may roll these dice.
Command Post Games is here: http://www.commandpostgames.com/command-post-blog/
Too Fat Lardies is here: http://toofatlardies.co.uk/product-category/kriegsspiel/
Photon Cutter is here: http://www.photoncutterstudios.com/kriegsspiel.html
Proud to say I played a wee part in helping Photon Cutter get started in the kriegsspiel several years ago. Buy early, often, and in quantities no smaller than a corps per side!
There's a moment in the wildly underappreciated Might and Magic X: Legacy in which the brogue-speaking dwarf (female) calls on the party to "behold the great halls of Sudgurd". After the appropriate pause she says, with a fair amount of pique, "I don't think you're beholding enough".
I feel that way when I show these dice to people. They're not huge. In my case they're stickered badly. But, to me, they are grand.
Created by the folks at Command Post Games (their wonderful Pub Battles: Brandywine is the background to this picture) their blog makes it sound like they set these up almost as a lark. Given the title of my blog, though, it shouldn't surprise anyone that I take these very seriously indeed.
While Too Fat Lardies did the world service when it brought the Reisswitz kriegsspiel with several of its maps back into print, and Photon Cutter Studios made nice unit blocks available for a reasonable price, this is the third and final step. Now the combat tables that the Lardies created are no longer necessary and we can play the game the way the Baron did in 1824.
For those unfamiliar, each of the dice represents increasing strong combat odds, i.e. 1:1, 3:2, 2:1, &c. The left numbers are for musketry at various ranges, the right for skirmishers at these same ranges, the top and bottom for melee results. All these numbers are expressed in terms of points, each point representing a different number of men depending on the formation in question.
I could say so much about them, but I'll observe this: Baron von Reisswitz saw musketry as far more bloody than many contemporary Napoleonic rule sets and he -- and those that played his game and praised it -- knew well of what they spoke. I have a corps of red and blue troops courtesy of Photon Cutter and will now be compelled to press the lads into service. If only that I may roll these dice.
Command Post Games is here: http://www.commandpostgames.com/command-post-blog/
Too Fat Lardies is here: http://toofatlardies.co.uk/product-category/kriegsspiel/
Photon Cutter is here: http://www.photoncutterstudios.com/kriegsspiel.html
Proud to say I played a wee part in helping Photon Cutter get started in the kriegsspiel several years ago. Buy early, often, and in quantities no smaller than a corps per side!
CM:FB -- Baraque de Fraiture -- Fin
I did a brief write-up on this battle between Doug and myself a little while ago and, finally, it's come to an end. The battles in Combat Mission: Final Blitzkrieg tend to be on the long side and this one is no exception. That isn't necessarily a bad thing, but combatants can find themselves in situations where both are spent and have nothing to throw at each other. With a full half hour to go, Doug told me he'd proffered a cease fire and I was in no position to disagree.
As is often enough the case in a double-blind battle, it's what you didn't know that is the most pleasant surprise. In this case, it turns out Doug's boys had hot-wired one of Hobo's funnies and brought it a long to deal with the mine-clearing duties. Problem was, he lost in the first five minutes of the battle. Thus here, wide to my right, is this very expensive parking lot of immobilized monsters. Interestingly enough, my boys saw the KT as a Panther; rather the inverse of what I would have expected.
This is my personal hero, the now blazing tank that took out so very much before being undone by a 'faust.
A view of the carnage from up above. Comparison to an earlier photograph taken from roughly this perspective is instructive. My hero tank is at right. On fire.
And looking the other way. This is the main route of Doug's approach. The little scrap yard at the outskirts of town, just off the bottom of this shot, was another surprise. One of the sadder stories of this one involved the artillery spotter who hid himself for much of the battle right near the center of town to call in danger-close fire on the TRPs you see in this picture. I pulled him back as the ranging shots began to fall only to have him shot up by a half-track I hadn't expected. Ever so.
So how did we do? Well, considering that this was Waffen SS against, essentially, the guys in Kelly's Heroes that didn't go on the heist caper, I'm all but pleased with a minor defeat. As Doug himself said, though, if his tanks would have made it past the mines, this would have been a very, very bad day.
I observe before passing that Combat Mission's scenario writers really seem to be wrapping their heads around the tools presented to them by CMx2. These are some great situations that go far beyond the challenge of "A Meeting at the Crossroads". Makes me wonder what they'll have in store for the East Front as they slowly walk that part of the series back in time as well as West Front scenario packs.
As is often enough the case in a double-blind battle, it's what you didn't know that is the most pleasant surprise. In this case, it turns out Doug's boys had hot-wired one of Hobo's funnies and brought it a long to deal with the mine-clearing duties. Problem was, he lost in the first five minutes of the battle. Thus here, wide to my right, is this very expensive parking lot of immobilized monsters. Interestingly enough, my boys saw the KT as a Panther; rather the inverse of what I would have expected.
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