The Six Turn War - Fate Of A Nation AAR

This picture captures the Israeli side of the game perfectly...

Gaming returned to full form for the Fawcett Avenue Conscripts this past week with Dallas hosting.  We played "Fate Of A Nation", the Battlefront "Flames of War" rules supplement for the Six Day War.   The house was packed as many Conscripts stopped in for gaming and visiting after the summer, and some new Conscripts took in the atmosphere as well - I think there were about twelve people out - quite a crowd!

IDF forces before the game 

Part 1 of the Egyptian Forces

Part 2 of the Egyptian Forces

The scenario was taken from the Flames of War rules, one of the defensive battles from the rule book.  We imagined an Egyptian battalion commander on the second day of the war in the Sinai, seeing the army collapse around him, rallying some troops outside of the Mitla Pass to try and hold back the IDF spearheads and buy some time for his comrades to reach the (relative) safety of the crossings over the Suez Canal.

Conscripts receive their briefings before the game starts

The very small but hard-hitting IDF force would have six turns to capture the objective in the middle of the Egyptian half of the table.  Half of the (very large) Egyptian force would be in reserve.

M51s at their start points on the table 

The Egyptians lie in wait...

The IDF force was comprised of a total of 8 M51 Ishermans - one company commander, one platoon of three tanks and one platoon of four tanks, backed up with a mechanized infantry platoon in M3s and priority air support from the Israeli Air Force.

I wonder which Conscripts set up this particular deployment? :)

Egyptian AAA and Mech Infantry Command wait in the centre - the old house is the IDF objective

The Egyptians had a company of nine T-55s, a company of six IS-3s, a platoon of three SU-100 tank destroyers, a mechanized infantry company in BTR-152s and two ZSU-57-2s.  It was a LOT of stuff. With so many folks out to play, we subdivided the T-55s into two smaller companies - one of five tanks and one of four.  We also split up the mechanized infantry company into platoons, something not strictly within the rules, but whatever.

Air support arrives…but not much happens

Dallas, Indo, Kevin, Brian and Mike all took command of the Egyptians, while Dave, Graeme (hope I spelled that correctly) and Bill took command of the IDF.

M51s roll out - confident of victory...

This ZSU-57-2 was taken out by an M51 on the first turn…would end up as one of the few losses for the Egyptians in the game...

I have only played Flames of War a few times.  The last time we played "Fate Of A Nation", four Centurions took on like 20 T-55s and shot them to pieces in the space of three turns at the cost of only two tanks.  I expected the Sherman tanks would have similar results.  But we were in for a surprise!

"Hey - was that a hit from an SU-100?"

The M51s press ahead without their comrade - after all, their superior gunnery will surely prevail, right?

IDF radio net - "Hey! WTF???"

The Egyptians started with the SU-100s, the IS-3s, the ZSU-57-2s and the command element of the mechanized infantry deployed on the table, with the rest of the force in reserve.  The IDF's whole force started on the table.  The IDF players made plans to destroy the Egyptians one platoon at a time, counting on their terrible gunnery and weak morale to sink their superior numbers.

Egyptian armour tangles with the advancing IDF; one T-55 is lost, another bailed out, but they keep advancing

And yet…in the first turn, the D'Assault Ouragan made its first run, and only managed to bail out a couple of SU-100s.  What at first seemed flukey was in retrospect an ominous sign for the IDF and portent of favour for the Egyptians.  The bailed out SU-100s re-mounted, and promptly knocked out an M51.

Dallas takes out one of Kevin's M51s...

Kevin loses a second M51…ruh roh...

As the turns continued, the IDF players suffered a string of terrible luck with their tank gunnery.  In "Flames of War" you roll a Firepower Check to see if you blow up the target.  In many cases, with 105mm high-velocity shells from the magnificent gun on the M51, this is literally a 2+ roll.  But the IDF players rolled "1" after "1" after "1"…the tanks would bail out, and because they were not destroyed this would have serious implications for the IDF attack.

The tide of Egyptian steel threatens to overwhelm the IDF...

Meanwhile, the Egyptian players, beset by clouds of negative modifiers and struggling to hit the veteran IDF tankers, would roll very well and start to make a hit here and there - after all, they were rolling buckets of dice with so many tanks on the table - with more and more arriving every turn with the reserve rolls.  Dallas's T-55 company of five tanks weathered several turns of direct hits from IDF guns - either rolling Vegas with his front armour or cheering as Kevin and Dave would roll a "1" on the Firepower Check - to knock out several M51s.

Bill's mechanized infantry dismount to prepare for a desperate assault...

The poor M51s did not hold out well against direct hits from 100mm and 122mm guns - in fact, their armour could not stop the shells.  Even the roll of a "6" would not prevent the Egyptian guns from penetrating the old armour. 

And the Egyptian players were spot on with their Firepower Checks, knocking out one or two M51s every turn.  Considering the IDF only had 8 tanks, it was a loss rate the IDF force could not endure.

Dallas, Brian and Indo deal with the last of the M51s - that's 8 M51s lost in action!!

The air support had a rough night too…again and again, the bombs and napalm would have no effect, and when it did, the crew would bail out, as opposed to having the vehicle destroyed.

It ends in tears for the IDF…their mechanized troops are gunned down by the armour

The final scene - a devastating victory for the Egyptians of the United Arab Republic

The IDF fought to the bitter end, with Bill leading a last-ditch charge of his mechanized troops toward the objective.  But it was not to be - done in by a tidal wave of Egyptian armour, the IDF force was knocked out.  The IDF may have won decisively won the Six Day War, but last week they decisively lost the Six Turn Battle.

Cairo would have looked like as reports of the great victory were shared over the radio! Praise the gunnery of Dallas, Indo, Mike and Brian, heroes of the revolution!!

So that was our first real game of "Fate Of A Nation".  You will notice I didn't impose my usual mandatory minimum distances on the tanks or anything like that.  It certainly was a crowded table, but it was still a fun and very light-hearted game with lots of humour and sportsmanship on both sides.

Of course in the real Six Day War, the Egyptian army, leaderless, poorly deployed, shocked by the IDF attack and without any air cover, were utterly routed. But they did manage to put up tough stands here and there, so to me this game represented one of those instances - a sharp shock to an advancing IDF column, which would have been dealt with by a sudden hit from the flank by another IDF force.

I don't have a lot of experience with Flames of War, and chances are I missed/screwed up some rules that may have made things inadvertently tougher on the IDF players, but to me the game showed how the small elite IDF forces could really dish it out but, particularly in the old Sherman tanks, had a glass jaw.  There was very little room for error and bad luck, and the IDF players had terrible, terrible luck with their dice.  Those missed firepower checks on the first and second turns were decisive - if the Egyptian tanks had been destroyed, their companies would have started to melt away and it would have been a very different game.

Flames of War still has a few "gamey" aspects that I dislike, but overall it was a lot of fun.  It's a good excuse to move a bunch of toy soldiers around and blow them up!  I hope we can play this again sometime soon.  Thanks to Dallas for hosting, and to everyone who came out to play, watch and visit!

Egyptian T-55 Company in 15mm

Egyptian T-55 company in 15mm - models from Battlefront

Before I got too much further back into Horus Heresy stuff, I wanted to finish off a project I had started back in the spring - completing Egyptian and Israeli forces for Battlefront's "Fate of a Nation" supplement.  I had painted quite a bit of stuff through the spring and summer for both sides, but true to my short-circuiting attention span, I eventually got distracted by other projects even with the finish line in sight!  This T-55 company was the last component I needed for the Egyptian force. I finished three T-55s in July, started on the rest of the company, but suddenly trailed off on to other things.

The T-55 - an inconic piece of Cold War era kit. A decent and modern MBT for the era of the Six Day War, they didn't get a chance to do too well in 1967 for the Egyptians, and the IDF destroyed a great number of them, and captured so many they refit them for IDF service!

I have the attention span of a gnat.  Anyway, while I did this other stuff, six T-55s were sitting on the painting table with a base coat of paint. After weeks of passing over them I finally snapped and finished them off this week.  So here is a completed T-55 company, nine tanks strong.

The tank with the open hatch will be used to represent the company commander

These painted relatively fast, but as I said in my previous post on these vehicles, the quality of the cast metal accessories is very, very disappointing. The cupola MGs, fenders, hatches, fuel tanks and crew were all very poor quality castings.  A great disappointment considering how much you pay for them.

Tactical numbers are from Battlefront; I don't know that the Egyptian army of 1967 was too rigorous when it came to turret numbers, but I think it adds a nice flourish to the vehicles

The main colour is GW's "Zandri Dust", pin-washed with GW's "Agrax Earthshade" wash and weathered liberally with some dark brown chipping and a bit of soot and dust coloured weather powder. The numerals are all decals from Battlefront.  And while their accessories seem to be taking a dive quality-wise, the decals are top-notch!

In Flames of War, the Egyptian companies essentially move as platoons...so this will be a horde of tanks...

This completes my initial Egyptian force for "Fate Of A Nation". In addition to these bad boys, I have a company of IS-3s, a company of mechanized infantry, and a pair of ZSU-57-2s.  It works out to something like just over 1000 points of stuff for the table.

We'll see how long they last on the table tonight!

Byron's Mad Plan for Curt's 4th Annual Painting Challenge

So with a few of the Fawcett crew in on Curt’s 4th Annual Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge I thought I would post a bit of my plan for the challenge and see what the rest of you have in place for long term plans, or see if you are just winging it.

First up, my main goal is to complete 4 infantry sections for each of the 10^th and 16^th Battalion of the CEF from WW1.  I have already submitted one section from each Battalion and have another in the works for the 16^th.  To go along with these as opposition I am aiming to finish at least 3 infantry sections and 2 HMG sections for the Germans.  This should give me a good solid base to host WW1 games with.

The first of hopefully 4 sections of the 16th Battalion.

My second goal is to get a unit of 28mm French Napoleonics done.  This was something I had promised Curt a while back, that I would at least give them a go.  Well, now is the time.  What I didn’t realize is…. WOW that’s a lot of damn Frenchies….  32 models in a unit!! Ouch!

My third goal is to clean up some of the many Gamer ADD induced purchases and projects.  Just a few of which include a TONNE of FoW stuff, some Dystopian wars ships to round out my French fleet, a Malifaux warband, an infinity squad, some more Sedition Wars figures, and more.

Part of my cleanup.  I put these together and based them over 6 years ago,
then never did anything with them...  they were not even primed!

Those were my goals going in, then Curt sprung a surprise on us at the last minute.  There were going to be bonus rounds. Hmmm… now I have a fourth goal.  There will be 7 different bonus rounds and my goal is to submit entries for at least 5 of the 7.

Here are the themes, dates, and my plan of attack.

·       December 22: Non Combatant(s) – Old Woman (done)

·       January 5: Villain(s)  - Nurgle Demon Prince

·       January 19: Vehicle – Dystopian Wars French Skybase

·       February 2: Hero or Heroic Group - ???

·       February 16: Casualty / Casualties  - WW1 Casualties

·       March 2: Favourite Character  - ??? Something Cthulhu based

·       March 16: Last Stand - ??? Maybe Necron Centipede

My Demon Prince has already been converted and is just waiting
to be primed up and painted.    Now that I am done the non-
combatant figure he will start to be painted this week.

So, that’s my mad plan of attack, and at my current pace, maybe even do-able.  However, despite my recent pace I will not say it’s a sure thing.  That damn Gamer ADD is sure to kick in at sometime.  At least any new projects that I have planned are all Kickstarter based, and therefore according to Greg, never likely to happen.

I know that Dave is not directly involved in the Challenge, but is trying to paint up his Sedition Wars force during the same time.  Which, if accomplished will be quite a feat for him, since it will likely quadruple his painting output of the last 2 years! Sorry Dave, we all love you, but painting speed just ain't your thing. 

Bagration Sensation - Flames of War Battle Report (Yes, Really)

Germans pre-game

Dallas hosted our regular game again this week, and we loaded up for some Eastern Front late WW2 action, with a scenario set during Operating Bagration, the Soviet annihilation of the German Army Group Centre in summer 1944. For a bit of a surprise, we played Flames of War...I have held a very dim view of the Flames of War rules, but I have to admit that the game was a lot of fun.

The scenario pitted a Russian tank spearhead against a (largely vain) counter-attack by elements of a German Panzer division. It was tanks galore - my kind of game! The Soviets had a group of T-70 light tanks, some heavy duty IS-2 tanks, and a company (!) of T-34/85s.  An SMG platoon accompanied them.  They were rated "confident trained".

The Germans had a platoon of Mark IV-Hs, a platoon of Panthers, and a platoon of German Panzer Grenadiers.  They were rated "confident veteran.

Soviets pre-game

For this game there were a few modifications - I ignored a lot of the army list restrictions, I used my own scenario rules instead of one from the rule book, I ignored nearly all of the special rules, and I stipulated that the tanks could be no closer than 4" to another tank that wasn't burning.  I also ignored the chain of command restrictions for the tank units, so they could spread out.

Dallas, Jim and Dave V took the Russian side, while Bill, Frederick and Kevin took the German side.

Panthers from Plastic Soldier Company

I promised the guys that things would be burning in short order, and it didn't take long.  The Soviet T-70s and SMG infantry started the game on the table, and were promptly tangling with the Panzer IVs. I assumed the T-70s would be ventilated immediately, but they actually held out well.  Frederick had some bad luck rolling firepower checks for the Germans, and the T-70s surprisingly managed to move up and knock out some of the Mark IVs! Good performance from the Soviet recon element.

Flaming trucks representing an earlier German column which had been hit by the Red Air Force

In the second turn the Russians welcomed five IS-2 heavy tanks.  The heavily-armed and armoured the Russian breakthrough tanks started blasting away, duelling with Panthers and Mark IVs alike, all while keeping up a steady advance.

Germans enter from the bottom - Russians from the top

We used Litko "WTF?" markers to represent pins and "bailed out"

I have to credit the Russian players - they really played to doctrine, rolling ahead very rapidly, heedless of their losses.

A Panther tries to shore up the German flank...only a T-70 to worry about here....

Russian T-70 crew sees where things are headed...

The T-70s had a good outing against the Mark IVs, but were no match for the Panthers.  Their brave sacrifice had, however, bought time and space for the follow-on Russian elements, something the Germans would pay for as the game went on.

"Run for it Yuri!"

Another factor affecting the outcome was some bad luck for the German dice - the Panthers were lethal tanks, but the German players rolled a lot of "1"s and "2"s at key points, missing opportunities to knock out Soviet tanks with their potent 75mm guns.

Line of Panthers advance...very ominous

Things end poorly for  a T-70 crew

By the fourth turn the table was swarming with Russian armour, and the Russian players were not holding back.  They rushed headlong at the enemy, hoping to overwhelm them.  It was very cool!

Soviet tanks pour on to the table

The Panthers took a small toll - knocking out an IS-2 here, a T-34/85 there, but the Soviets hit hard as well.  The 122mm gun on the Soviet heavy tanks is a tough customer, and the small German panzer force was feeling the pain.

IS-2s pave the way for the Soviet spearheads

Soviet tanks race ahead

One bright spot of resistance was the German Panzer Grenadiers.  This game was not an infantry fight, but Kevin's Grenadiers made a bold stand, knocking out an IS-2 and stunning two T-34/85s with their panzerfausts...a rude shock for the Russian players.

The table starts to fill with wrecks as both sides exchange fire

Ultimately the weight of Russian armour prevailed.  Down to three Panthers, the Germans ultimately pulled back, leaving the field to the Russian spearhead.

The Germans are overrun - but they extract a toll from the advancing Russians

Check out all the burning tanks...

The table was FULL of burning tanks - lots and lots of fun! The guys were really into the spirit of the game, and it played at a good clip.  We got five turns done, and a game resolution, in less than two hours.  Not too bad at all.

German Pamzer Grenadiers dismount and grab their panzerfausts...

You know, I've really disliked the Flames of War rules for some time.  I hate on-table heavy artillery.  I don't like the thick plaque of special rules that encrust the rules.  But I have to admit their basic mechanics, while simple, were a lot of fun.  We conveniently ignored the rules we felt like ignoring, and the basic game played well. I really enjoyed this game - there were 27 tanks on the table, and it was all settled quickly and enjoyably (well, maybe not for the German players, but they still seemed to enjoy the overall game).

So I guess I have to get over myself - Flames of War was a hoot!

Heavy fighting on the German left...

Thanks to Dallas for hosting, and thanks to everyone who came out to play.  I look forward to another Eastern Front armour battle in the future.  And we might even play more "Flames of War" again some time - stay tuned! Greg B.