Lord of the Rings / Hobbit gaming at the Kapiti Wargames Club

Tonight Andrew and I co-hosted a demo try out session of Lord of the Rings / Hobbit SBG gaming at the Kapiti Wargames Club.

Andrew had proposed the idea of us bringing down some forces and terrain and letting those interested give it a go, a couple of weeks ago...  We managed to get 5 of the club interested to have a go and the club saw a new prospective member come all the way from Upper Hutt to join in and have a game with us too.

Andrew and I set up 4 adjacent tables with playing areas of about 42'' x 48", taped off and set up the terrain and each of us had brought two paired adversaries.

We kept the points and format small, 450 points armies and minimal spellcasters and monsters, concentrating on infantry and cavalry - to allow the new players to get the hang of the core rules and tactics...

Andrew brought Easterlings vs Dol Amroth, and Goblins vs Dwarves

I brought Goblins vs Galadhrim Elves, and Mordor orcs vs Gondor...  though in the end Pete came over from Upper Hutt and brought his Wood Elves with him so I played my Orcs against him, and put Gondor back in the box...

Then all up and ready, and after a quick briefing were all into it. From L to R... Pete ( from Upper Hutt), Rex, Arnold, Ethan, Andrew, Jayden and David...

We kept the scenario simple too, a straight up, 'To the Death'... just kill each other!

Pete's Wood Elves against my Mordor Orcs above.

Rex commands the Galadhrim against the Goblins led by David, below...

Arnold commands the forces of Dol Amroth against the Easterlings commanded by Jayden, below...

I think Andrew commanded the dwarves against the Goblins commanded by Ethan, I believe, but others might have joined in replacing Andrew? - I am not sure, it was all fast and furious stuff, and we had several interested onlookers too!

The games played well and everyone enjoyed them... with comments afterwards of " I'm going to get Uruks" , and "I'm going to get Easterlings" etc etc...

What topped the evening off was a kind donation timed wonderfully by the local GW manager, Nathan Smith of Wellington GW, who donated to the club today some Gondorian soldiers.  The Gondorians grabbed a lot of peoples interest, including those who were enjoying playing in the demo and onlookers too... Those interested got some models, with the deal being - paint those up and bring them back to show us, and you can have some more!

So with that we already have a bunch of people grabbing Gondorians eager to get some paint on them, and get some games in with them... this may of course lead to a huge Gondorian civil war breaking out at the club! Great thing is this gets folks interested in the game and giving it a go, and once you collect one army you're bound to want to expand on it... so that all bodes well...

So a big shout out to the Kapiti Wargame Club for hosting us and allowing us to demo the game again to them, and to Nathan Smith for his very generous donation, and to Pete for making the journey over from the Hutt, and Andrew for making the journey up from Wellington and helping run the show, and of course to the players who were keen to give it a go on the night!

As Andrew put it afterwards, I dont think we've had that many people playing LOTR together at once in the Wello region for many years! I think that speaks for itself!

Hopefully we'll have more games in the future to report on, with a growing pool of local LOTR enthusiasts!

Update:
Some great pics on Jayden's blog here at The Imperial Patrol

Hit the Beach! - FoW Demo Game at Kapiti Wargames Club's 'Big Day Out'

Well the Day of Days finally arrived! After much preparation, I was in a position to put on a Flames of War demo game, using all the Normandy beach invasion material I have been working with over the last few months.

This demo game took place at the Kapiti Wargames Clubs - "Big day Out". It was a Sunday club game day, to help draw interest to the club, from the general public, and wargamers from the region in general. For the first time there were several 'historical' games on display, as well as the Warhammer and 40k games.

Paul and I had decided it would be a good chance to showcase the Normandy Beach stuff, and the scenario in play would be widely recognisable to the general public. The dilemma we had in planning, was the army lists to use and their size and composition.

The Hit the Beach Mission, was originally staged in the V2 rules, from the D-Day supplement, and Das Book supplement. In this mission 1750 pts of attackers go up against 1000 pts of defenders, who then get a set amount of 'fortification points' to spend on fortifications - dependant upon board width being defended.

However, the recent switch to the V3 rules, and new lists for the beach defenders from Earth and Steel, has the fortifications pointed in as part of the main force. The Hit the Beach mission, no longer features in the list of missions in the V3 book, nor is it featured in either the Earth and Steel book or Turning Tide, which I found a little odd...

So after much discussion, it was agreed to allow the defender to also select a force of 1750 points, from which his fortifications must also be purchased as per Earth and Steel.

Having reached this decision, forces were chosen to theme: Sword Beach, so a Commando force facing a '2nd line' Grenadier force.

The defender must deploy half their troops on the board including all fortifications, which counted as one 'platoon choice', and the attackers force comes ashore in landing craft, in waves over the turns of the game.

Interesting points of the mission being:
Neither side will break from lost company morale. The games is played to a fixed number of turns (12), and then the winner determined. Destroyed allied platoons recycle back into the waves of reserves (excluding armoured platoons and warriors)

So here follows a pictorial battle report of the events of the game.

Initial deployment:
German defenders have a 88mm pillbox to the right, a 75mm pillbox to left and a defilade 5cm KwK nest centrally. These are backed up by 1 HMG pillbox, 3 HMG nests, 1 Tank turret, and 4 static StukaZuFuss launchers. 4 sections of trench lines and matching barbed wire defend the beach front held by one Grenadier Platoon and the CiC and 2iC.

Further back are the Czech Howitzers (proxied by leFh18's).

The beach is protected by a lengthy sea wall, meaning there is only one way off the beach for vehicles, and this is covered by a minefield...

The Allies are bobbing about in the 'Sea Zone', waiting to Hit the Beach!

Neither of us had played this mission before so it was going to be a learning curve... One thing I found straight away was my trench lines couldn't quite span the board. This wouldn't have been a problem, a central gap at the road was ineveitable, but... my "confident trained" Germans command range was 4" and I couldn't get this to 'work' spanning the trench gap with the road and central bunker. So I had to move it one way closer, meaning a gap developed at the end, nearest the 88mm Pillbox... Paul immediately saw a gap to exploit...

Please excuse the odd streaks through the board... I had to transport the main board to the venue in my trailer and it was raining, and despite plastic sheeting, some rain got through...

A view of the German trench line...

And the central minefield Paul's British engineers were going to have to clear...

The Allies get an Initial bombardment so all deployed teams take an attack roll, with a standard allowed save. This cost me one Howitzer, and 2 grenadier teams.

The first wave comes ashore, but Paul battles with delayed landing craft... only one arrives, plus the DD Shermans...

The HMG pillbox takes a lot of smoke fire as this is the only HMG in effective range of the beach...

My fortification deployment was not ideal, I had not come up with an amazing plan, I had been in such a rush getting all the stuff made in time and then went on vacation... so my prep work was a bit poor for the game play, some of my bunkers were not well placed to cover the beach but as it turned out did well covering the Hinterland where the objectives were placed...

More waves of troops arrive...

The typhoons roar in to destroy the Howitzers ( I only just got the typhoon finished before packing everything up to get to the game! This one is a gift to Paul, as he'd previously given me a Hurricane as part of the post V3 rules planes swap that occurred here between players...)

As it turned out whilst the typhoon hit the target,  my gun team saved but was pinned, then stayed that way for the next 4 turns as I rolled successive 1's to unpin... This then inadvertantly helped me as Paul used up his pool of air dice over the subsequent turns trying to get the guns, and as I hadn't unpinned them, and thus been unable to fire, they were getting infantry saves (3+) under the v3 rules, and not the normal (5+) gun save!

The commandos move to exploit the gap in the defences and the engineers move to see to the Minefield. However they suffer to HMG fire... The AVRE's also arrive... and the commando mortars...

The commandos get ready to assault the 88mm Pillbox...

They are thrown back by defensive fire in the first turn, but get in in the subsequent turn and blow it to bits! Up to this point the tanks haven't dared to venture away from the side of the beach, where it couldn't hit them!...

By turn six, I had got all my reserves on the table, despite needing 6's to bring them on and they rapidly starting 'At the Doubling' into the battle. The StuGs race up the road, but are still wary of the Typhoons, and park up next to some buildings...

The mortars also come on from reserve, ahead of the StuGs by one turn, and race to get into suitable firing position and range...

The Mortars are backed up by the 2nd Grenadier platoon...

The commandos now try digging in, in a position contesting the first (Allied placed) objective. Peter Young, can be seen identified by his plain brown base. Also by this point, the German grenadiers have been flushed from this end of the trench lines...

The M10's arrive...

The engineers have done their job, the minefield is gone and the AVRE's make a break inland, they are fairly impervious to the remaining bunkers...

Pushing further in, they destroy the HMG pillbox but miss the 5cm KwK nest...

The StuGs have taken up position adjacent the German placed objective, as the 2nd grenadiers rush to reinforce this position...

The StuGs are in position to fire on the approaching Allied armour...

Paul is struggling now to get his tanks to move off the beach, it's slow going and a bogging check is required to move across the sandy surface... but a Sherman and an M10 make it to the road...

At this point we called a brief loo break and I snapped a few pics of the other games in action:

A 40K game...

A 28mm SYW game using I believe Die Kriegskunst rules ( A "G-de-B" derivative). I spotted Reg Newell from the Hutt Club, in action here though didn't know the other fellows...

A 28mm New Zealand Wars Skirmish game, using I believe a derivative of Sharp Practice rules, put on by fellow Fusilier, Roly Hermans and assisted by Notorious Greg, and others?

A huge 40K Apocalypse game spanning two tables joined by two large bridges... I think someone mentioned there was 16000 points here...

There were other smaller  games running in the side room, in which may young son was having fun playing 40k with his club mates...

Back to the Normandy action...

My 75mm pillbox claims its first victim, an M10...

Just to show Paul's difficulty getting off the beach... 2 bogged Shermans in the soft sand...

More waves of commandos arrive...

Good tactical use of smoke by Paul to try and limit my StuGs effectiveness, forcing me to move to get any shots...

...but I get lucky and bag the bailed out AVRE in the flank...

The typhoons have given up tying to kill the guns and come roaring in to try and wreck the StuGs, but only managed to bail one...

The StuGs still sitting  pretty over looking the beach access... and have destroyed the last AVRE at close quarters...

After a ton of HMG , Mortar and Howitzer fire the commandos are dislodged from their hold on the frontal objective, and even Peter Young falls, as evidenced by his now empty foxhole...

Trying to pressure the 2nd objective, Paul gets a Sherman up to get a flank shot on the Stugs but fails to get a kill and is in turn taken out by a rear shot from the 5cm KwK...

At this point the game comes to an end at the end of turn 12, and the Germans have held on for a win having dislodged the commandos on the beach front objective and held on to the Hinterland objective...

The StuGs still intact and covering the beach access...

... 2nd Grenadiers and Mortars and Howitzers still  active...

Three tanks still on the beach, and more commandos trying to recapture the front objective, as play comes to an end...

We then had the typical post game discussion about how we thought things went.

Despite feeling under pressure initially, I would say my HMGs kept me in the game, and I got lucky getting all my reserves on by turn 6. It still felt like a rush to get them into position, but they did none the less and held on for the win. My Artillery was shocking to start with but oddly may have saved them, and I positioned my Static Rocket launchers far too far back (thinking they had longer range! Oops!)

Paul battled manfully, but was up against it, not so much from me but from the scenario, the mechanism of landing craft deployment and recycling on and off the beach, meant his forces arrived in dribs and drabs and there was never the "overwhelming force" in evidence. That and the difficulty of getting his tanks off the soft sand, just about made it a none starter for him, despite playing to 12 turns, he never really threatened the Hinterland objective, so would just about find it impossible to get a win.

We didn't have time to restart the scenario, so decided to play on to see what would happen, in case the Allies simply needed more time... but over the next extra couple of turns, the commandos continued to pressure the front objective, but HMG nests kept them at bay and the last three tanks were destroyed by the bunkers and StuGs, as they got off the beach... With no armour left for the Allies there was no real hope and Paul called it.

So what did we learn?

I think the forces were balanced but the landing craft deployment mechanism we feel needs tweaking...

However we do plan to have another go under the V2 version of the game and army list composition and see what difference that makes... I know I will get a lot less bunkers for one thing !

But the main aim of the game was to draw interest to the Flames of War game, and to the to Kapiti Wargaming Club, and I think we both admirably achieved that.

Thanks to the club for hosting and allowing us to demo the game , and to the wives and helpers to ran the lunch canteen.

Well the game drew a lot of onlooker interest both old and young, as expected, and that is what we really hoped for.

We wuz robbed!

Well a quick report to say the KWC's interest in FoW continues.

When I turned up last night at the club to do the participation game, one of the guys; David, had been and bought two starter sets, and another; Jaydn had bought the rules. They were both keen to join Paul and I for our participation game.

The setting was southern Italy, with a 1500 point Midwar tank match up.

I took a German PanzerKompanie (Panzer III L-Ms proxied by Panzer III H’s), back up by 2 x 8Rad armoured cars, 2 x Pak 40s, and a battery of  four 10.5cm artillery.

Paul took a Canadian Sherman Armoured Company of Sherman III’s support by 3 armoured cars, and a battery of four 25pdr artillery.

We played the Free for All mission.

I won the roll off for attacker, picked our table edge and started deploying, alternating platoon for platoon with Paul. I then also won the roll off for first turn.

I apologise that there are no pictures – I forgot to grab my camera in rush to get everything packed (troops and terrain) and down to club in time for the start…

To start with it was a bit of a shock, fielding a German Panzer force, to find I actually had an inferior tank than my opponent, poorer range, and penetration and firepower! At least we had the same front armour… The thing was I was Veteran against his Trained so he as easier to hit… but he had more tanks then me… Plus the Canadians have a special rule that allows them to reroll motivation to remount bailed tanks, much like Panzers ‘Protected ammo’… It was going to be an interesting game…

The opening moves saw the armoured cars engage each other across a field on our left flank. The bulk of our panzers headed up the centre and up our left flank to get towards the easier looking objective. Paul spread his Shermans from the centre to his left.

Early exchanges of fire went in favour of the Shermans and we lost two Panzers up the middle. However within a turn or two, our Panzer force had got past the armoured cars, and onto the objective. This forced Paul to turn his recce armoured cars back round to contest the objective, and to swing his army around to bring all to bear as quickly as possible on the captured objective. A small stream slightly hampered his movements.

The following turns saw a growing number of wrecked and burning tanks and armoured cars at, and approaching, the objective. Luck swung both ways, with a series of great saves by the Panzers and some well aimed artillery.

It actually looked as though the Panzers were going to hold on and win the game. At this point I kind of slipped in to my “we’ve won it” mindset and then failed to concentrate on the little details…

Paul, ever a shrewd and canny opponent, spotted the last chance he had to win the game, and dropped an artillery barrage on the Pak40s that had been slowly advancing to keep weight of fire covering the objective. One gun had previously been lost, and at the last moment I forgot to try and stormtrooper them forward from under the prior ranged in artillery. A couple of dice rolls later, the last gun was destroyed, forcing a platoon morale check which the platoon commander promptly failed… this with the prior loss of one panzer platoon, and the 8rads forced a company morale check… and both the CiC and 2iC had just been bailed out of their tanks and couldn’t roll for the check… ergo, the company withdraws, and a win to the Canadians, despite us holding the objective with one remaining tank, uncontested!

Waaarrghhh, it’s just not fair! So close and yet so far…lesson learned again… concentrate to the end, especially if you’re playing Paul ;-)

I think I must put the blame squarely on a lack of proper paintjob for my poor performing Panzers… the quartermaster general will get a severe reprimand! ;-)

A great game and my first real ‘tanks only’ battle.

The guys at the club thoroughly enjoyed it too , both David and Jaydn , and other frequent spectators from the club.

Looking forward to more…

Now having watched "A Bridge Too Far" again, I’m all fired up to get my Shermans done and I cracked open the first box of two PSC Shermans last night and got the first one assembled before bedtime… 9 more to make over the weekend and I can do some tank on tank home battles.

More FoW goodies are due to fall through my letterbox over the next few days from Maelstrom, plus I’m hopefully off to Wargames Supply’s last day closing down sale tomorrow, in Wellington, to see if I can grab any last minute bargains… I’ll keep you posted with paintwork as I get it done, as usual.

Happy gaming!

ANZAC Day, WIP and Games Club

Well ANZAC day has been and gone again. A day of to enjoy with family, and yet a time also to reflect on times past, the gallantry and valor of our service personnel in conflicts around the globe. I am not a Kiwi, being a British migrant, but I have a great respect for what these colonial troops did in their times for King and Country, frequently traveling to the other side of the world to risk, and often lose, their lives.

The day off gave me a chance to frantically assemble a whole bunch of Plastic Soldier Company Panzer III's (Ausf H). Why you might ask?

Well, a couple of weeks back I had an invitation to check out a local war-games club (Kapiti Wargames Club) that has been getting off the ground recently. The club is set up as a safe friendly environment for youngsters and mature gamers to get together and enjoy the hobby of war-gaming.

Being aimed in great part at the younger gamer, GW gaming features predominantly with both 40K and WFB being mainstays in gamers of all ages. However they have an interest in widening their gaming audience and games played.

With this in mind I offered to put on a demonstration game of Flames of War, with pal Paul, which we did last Thursday evening. The game was a simple yet colorful affair, pitching 1000 points each of British Para's dug in around a small hamlet, whilst elements of 12. SS Hitlerjugend Panzergrenadiers, tried to dislodge them.

The Para's clung on tenaciously as they always do, and a final 'do or die' charge, reminiscent of Viktor Gräbner's charge across Arnhem bridge, by the Germans, was stymied in the end.

The game generated a lot of interest from the spectators who asked heaps of questions about the game. I'd put on a mini display of the new rules books too including, the V3 set,  Earth & Steel , and Turning Tide books plus some flyers I'd put together myself, and these all met with great appreciation, in terms of appearance and quality of product.

So, we are off to do it again, and Paul, being the more experience player than I suggested that we put on a tank battle, that people can learn the rules with. Paul suggested a MidWar 1500 point game. OK thought I, I've had some boxes of PSC Panzers kicking about unopened for a while now, so I set to putting them together from Tuesday evening, and on through ANZAC day of Wednesday.

With The Longest Day, and A Bridge Too Far, playing on my portable DVD player beside me, I happily snipped trimmed and glued away, to the sound of machine-gun fire and exploding shells in my headphones.

A few breaks were taken to continue a FoW game Chris and I have been playing over the last few days, trying out the fortification rules.

Each tank took about an hour to put together, so its was a pretty full modelling day!

But now they are ready to game with, albeit without paint, but I don't think that will be too much of a problem at the club, as the typical child like standard of most of the kids models being unpainted or beginning paint-jobs for the most part. Kids typically wanting to get their figures on the table to game with, and painting them coming secondary...But thats fine as it gets them interested in the game, and gets them off their computers, Nintendos Xboxs PS3s and what have you!

So, game on for tonight, my Panzer III's against Pauls Shermans in an Italian setting. Looking forward to it.

No doubt the Panzer III's will get a lick of paint shortly too.

I'll report back with progress, and how the game goes...

From the local paper:

  As good mate Roly has commented on his blog too, good to see a 'bricks and mortar' club here on the Coast.

I'll be formally joining club tonight. Unfortunately I am not a 'facebooker' so though I can view the clubs facebook page, I can't comment or add pics or anything. I'll have to see if they set up an interactive club website or whatever. In the meantime I'll keep posts coming here as "AAR" s or "Bat reps" - choose your abbreviation!