More period books and a tournament!

A couple more supplement books arrived in the mail yesterday:

I got into ECW a few years back, through GW Historicals (now defunct) WECW book. I hooked up with a chap up north, and we started building armies for it and had a couple of trial goes which went OK-ish. But then I moved down south and that knackered that. 

I then hooked up with a couple of guys down here, and tried WRG and WECW again, but it didn't really go anywhere, and my troops as usual got abandoned, and left as pretty figures in my display cases.

Black Powder, and later Hail Caesar came along, and I really enjoyed the rule mechanic from these games, after enjoying a long time playing Warmaster, from which they are based.

But there was no ECW period covered by the rules... a period gap between the two supplements/versions, but there were rumours that ECW would follow. And sure enough it has! I will be intrigued to try these out, though it is unlikely to be soon, as other things have me very wargamingly busy at the moment...

Next up, and this book was more readily looked through as soon as the box was opened...

The Eastern Front, for Flames of War, their MidWar supplement covering all forces that fought here, both Axis and Soviet.

I wasn't really a huge fan of Eastern front stuff and the Russkies... I always found the Normandy and European stuff of the later war period more interesting...

However, there is no getting away from the sheer scale of events on the Eastern front, and the length of involvement in time that both sides fought here; indeed the majority of the whole war period.

There is one battle that always intrigues me; Kursk. Reputed to be the largest tank battle in history... How cool would it be have a chance to replay the events of that epic battle?

And so, as local players have Russian forces there seems no getting away from it... I can see a pile of PSC 251/c hanomags arriving at Bowman Towers in the not too distant future...

But that will have to wait because, after the last six months worth of frantically painting Late War German Wehrmacht forces, I have found something to do with them...

The Wellington Warlords are hosting their annual Call to Arms tournament, which will feature a Late War Flames of War tournament, pitched at 1750pts, and with 5 battles played over a weekend.

More details here:

http://www.warlords.org.nz/index.php?option=com_content&view=section&layout=blog&id=2&Itemid=5

So I am now considering my optimum, 'take on all comers' German force. I'll be taking my Mechanised troops in their Hanomags, and will have to decide the best mix of support elements to get the job done.

I hope to get a load of practice games in, in the meantime, to sharpen my knowledge of the rules, and tactics of my chosen force, so I can try and play at a reasonably competitive level at the tournament. I don't want the experienced hands groaning at having to play the newbie... 

I am not expecting to win anything, far from it, unless its the wooden spoon, but I expect to learn a lot from the better players out there, and hopefully have some fun while doing so!

Wish me luck!