Grognard Wargamer Thread!

Games
4064

At the end of the second mission I noticed that Cmdr. Wray’s 91st BG had enough XP to get promoted from Recruit to Green. Every little bit helps.

Week three saw a return to the pens at Lorient, France. The Luftwaffe was again unable to muster anything other than a Poor response. Goering should feel the noose tightening around his neck already. The random event card was a huge boost, called Combined Bomber Operations that caused 4 hits to the target. Kudos to the RAF for joining in! With the Light damage already recorded that put us at 8 hits for medium damage. The newly promoted 91st had the lead again over the target and got through the flak with only 3 aircraft damaged. They managed to get 2 hits on the target which raised the damage into the heavy range. Next up was the 97th BG and they suffered 6 aircraft hits from flak, and got one more hit on the target. The 92nd BG suffered 3 flak losses but got two more hits. That put us one hit away from destroying the target. Last up was Cmdr. Raper and his 301st BG. They slipped through the flak without damage and put 2 more hits on the pens, destroying them!

The event card for the return leg was, appropriately enough, “The Germans want Revenge”. That required a re-roll of the response level with a +3 modifier. Since the campaign card calls for a -2 modifier I only gave them a +1 modifier. Turns out Goering was entertaining his mistress with strict orders not to be disturbed i.e. I rolled a 2+1 = 3 which only raised the response to Average and still required Luftwaffe squadrons to be in the flight path to respond. Without the -2 modifier the response would have been High and 3 squadrons would have scrambled.

The good news is that destruction of the pens gave us 6 VP’s. The bad news is that still leaves us with a Dismal rating for the campaign with only one week left. I’m going to consider going after a softer target for the last week given that it’s unlikely we can destroy another pen with only one raid. Destruction of any target will raise our performance to at least Poor. Stay tuned…

As an aside, I incorrectly used SO points to replace losses after week one. That only happens at the end of the month, not each week. I misunderstood the rule but saw a thread at BGG that clarified it.

Edit - The 92nd BG got promoted from Green to Average as a result of the XP from week 3.

4065

Week four is upon us and it’s my last chance to save my career as Deputy Director of Operations for the Eight Air Force! We need to take out a 4 VP target this turn or I’ll be on latrine duty for the rest of the war.

This fact narrowed my choice of targets to three. The aircraft factory in Gotha that we had damaged before, but which was fully repaired by now, or one of two airfields at Bergen or Amsterdam in the Netherlands. Gotha was deemed too far this time as it meant the fighters could not escort for the whole mission. More on that later. We picked Bergen as it required one less bomb hit to destroy, although the flak was slightly better there.
We armed our bombers and added Commander Wilson to the 97th BG because he had the skill to negate any frontal attacks against his BG, a known favorite tactic of Goering’s.

Speaking of Goering, after his meeting with Hitler the Luftwaffe was ordered to All Out alert status for the rest of the month. Not a good start. To make matters even worse, the event card indicated our Spitfires were unable to rendezvous with our bombers and so the mission was going forward unescorted. Ugh.

As soon as we crossed into the channel we were jumped by two Luftwaffe squadrons, one Fw-190 and one Bf-109. Both had the frontal attack tactic! From bad to worse! Both bandits went after the 92nd BG and they hit 9 aircraft causing the formation to disperse. That has a negative effect on their air to ground capability. In retaliation the 92nd destroyed both bandits for a small measure of revenge.

We arrived over the target where we expected to find 3 more Luftwaffe squadrons. Two chits pulled were No Bandits and the third was an Bf-110. It made three runs at the 91st BG and Comdr. Wray used his evasion skill to avoid all the attacks without a loss. The 91st then began it’s bomb running suffering three losses from flak but scoring 5 direct hits on the airfield! Next in line was the 97th BG. They took damage to 3 bombers but scored another 4 hits on the airfield. It was now heavily damaged and only 3 more hits were needed to destroy it. The 92nd BG was already shaken due to previous losses and they got hammered by the flak with 9 aircraft damaged or shot down. At that point they became unfit which meant they failed to complete their bomb run. That left it all up to the 301st BG and Cmdr. Raper with my career in the balance. :) The flak was light and scored no hits. The BG came over the target unmolested and scored 4 hits destroying the field!

We earned 4 VP’s for the mission and 10 for the campaign which was just enough for an Adequate result. No doubt a promotion is in the works for me…

This is a fun introductory campaign and certainly makes me eager to play a more detailed one that incorporates more of the features and optional rules of the game. I hope a few of you got some entertainment out of reading this rambling AAR.

4066

Absolutely!

4067

I hope that whenever you read “Verviers,” your mind is silently saying, “Ver-vee-AY!”

4068

Nice. Now the next one needs pictures :)

4069

I am indeed working on the next one already. :) It will be the 5 month The Air War Begins campaign. Will see what I can do about pics, but no promises.

4070

Well, I’m halfwayt through the main battle of Ligny 1815: Last Eagles, which is the first game I play on my wall mounted setup :D

It’s a cool system. Pretty simple and with some idiosincracies regarding combat resolution. Differences in troop quality really trump differences in mass, so that an elite French unit is at equal odds agains as many as four times it’s number of mediocre Prussian troops (and once the dice is rolled, it’s less likely to retreat).

I’m not sure how I feel about that. So far it seems really bloody, but it might be because I’m ahorrible player and I haven’t grasped the nuances of the system (judging by Prussian performance, it’s clear I have no idea how to defend).

I like the initiative and order system. That one, along with variable turn length, is really simple but at the same time really effective at conveying limitations in command.

Most importantly it’s fast and fun to play.

I’m getting a soft spot for European wargames (I also got La Guerra di Gradisca and Helsinki 1918), since they are dirt cheap compared to American ones (because of shipping and import fees, mostly).

4071

The Germans have crossed the Meuse in my game and i’ll remember that!

Anyway, i’ve been cheating in the Germans’ favor by not discarding the bonus tactics when they’re used up in attacks, extending their turns considerably. However, I will play this out because it’s fun to be pressed this hard. I might play the game like that anyway because this is a lot of fun.

Also, the objectives have been shiftig northward which has focused the offensive more- Bastogne is not under much threat but as I said before the Germans have crossed the Meuse ad it’s 2 days into the operation.

4072

This is going to be my second AAR for the game B-17 Flying Fortress Leader. Hopefully I’ll get most of the rules right and some of you will find it entertaining.

The Air War Begins (August '42 to December '42)

This campaign covers the opening months of the 8th Air Force operations in Europe. I’ll be adding a number of additional rules that were not used in my U-Boat Campaign AAR including secondary targets, and the Mediterranean and Eastern Front effects. Because this campaign covers 5 months as opposed to the one month of my first AAR my plan is to give a more operational level AAR rather than focusing in on the details of every bombing run. But don’t worry, if something happens that warrants special attention I’ll include it in my report.

Setting the Stage

The campaign calls for destroying at least 10 airfield VP’s or it will be considered a dismal failure regardless of the total VP’s scored. There should be more than enough time to achieve this objective in 5 months. To me it is equally important to destroy aircraft factories each month as that directly affects additional Luftwaffe squadron placement on the map, and so it has a significant effect on what our groups will face on each mission.

The game starts with 8 Luftwaffe squadrons on the map. It was a pretty even distribution with two in the Netherlands, one in Belgium, and the rest in France and Germany.

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We start with 50 SO points to spend on our groups. I was much more careful about choosing groups compared to my first game. The 31st FG was chosen because it has a bonus to replacements after every mission once the group reaches a Skilled rating. Our starting bomber groups will be the 305th (Cmdr LeMay), the 91st (Cmdr Wray) both B-17 groups, and the 93rd which is a B-24 group that gets added replacements once it reaches Average rating. I had two points left over to spend later.

Decks were shuffled and targets drawn, 3 factories and 3 airfields. Two airfield targets were in France and Amsterdam was the third. Two factories were in Belgium with the third in France. No German targets are used in this campaign. Our secondary target card calls for either shipping 12 SO points or one air group to support Operation Torch. I will wait and do this at the end of September (secondary missions apply for 2 months) to give me time to accumulate extra points, or maybe to send a badly shot up group instead. :)

Cmdr Weise is the Luftwaffe commander for August, and possibly beyond. He has an 80% chance of only activating squadrons at the Average or Poor level, but unless there is some other modifier the -2 response DRM for the entire campaign will guarantee we will never face a High or All Out response from him! Very good for us. His favorite tactics are rockets and bombs so hopefully not too many of his squadrons have that tactic.

First Week, August '42

The aircraft factory at Antwerp was the only target for this week. Luftwaffe response was Average so only squadrons in the flight path could engage. Our RAF comrades joined the attack (Combined Bomber Operations event card) and scored 4 hits before we arrived over the target, causing light damage. No bandits scrambled to meet us so they must have gone after the RAF instead. We suffered 9 aircraft losses from flak while inflicting an additional 13 hits on the factory as well as setting it on fire. It was completely destroyed. The event card for the return trip did indeed require a re-roll of the Luftwaffe response with a +3 modifier and the result was All Out, but luckily for us we were only one hex from England so no bandits had a chance to respond as we slipped back across the channel. Score 2 VP’s for our side.

4073

The Air War Begins AAR continued:

Second Week, August '42

We chose the aircraft factory at Bordeaux, France (hex 7 on the map above) as our target for the week. Luftwaffe response was Average again. There is a bandit marker in the target hex due to the factory card requirements. The inbound event was a Fleet Resupply that gave us +3 SO points. Always useful. Our force was intercepted neat the factory but there were no losses to either side. Flak hit 6 aircraft over the target. We scored 7 hits with no incendiary hits, so medium damage. Disappointing, and it got worse. The return trip was uneventful, however upon landing it was discovered that Cmdr LeMay was mortally wounded by the flak at Bordeaux. I guess George Wallace will have to find a different Vice Presidential running mate in 1968. :P The 91st BG rating was raised to Average due to Cmdr Wray’s superior training skill.

4074

The Air War Begins AAR continued:

Third Week, August '42

We returned to Bordeaux this week to hopefully finish the job. Luftwaffe response was Poor so only the squadron in the target hex will try to intercept us. We assigned Cmdr Raper to the 93rd BG and his +2 air to ground modifier should help with some extra hits. Our lead navigator must have messed up his heading to the target since we flew over some unexpected anti-aircraft fire and 9 aircraft were damaged. Unfortunately he was somehow ejected from his aircraft, without a parachute, right after that. Poor guy! No bandits came out to play this week. We suffered 9 flak losses which caused the 93rd BG to become Shaken. Nevertheless we scored 10 hits on the aircraft factory, destroying it. Two more VP’s and all our bomber groups raised their skill rating another level.

4075

The Air War Begins AAR continued:

Fourth Week, August '42

We picked the airfield at Beauvais, France as our target this week. It has a +1 modifier to the Med Theater die roll that might help us divert some Luftwaffe squadrons there at the end of the month. The airfield is in hex 9 on the map so our fighters will be able to escort for the whole mission. Luftwaffe response is Poor. Again there were no bandits to oppose us coming or going. No losses to flak around the target. We scored 12 hits to destroy the airfield. That gave us 3 VP’s plus the Med DRM and the homeward bound event gave us another 3 SO points as well. A great way to end the month. The 31st FG rating went up to Skilled. I will probably do the end of the month cleanup and start September missions tomorrow. There are only 3 weeks for missions in September as the weather is deteriorating

4076

The Air War Begins AAR continued:

August '42 Monthly Cleanup

There were no changes to the Med Theater or Eastern Front situations. Five new Luftwaffe squadrons were deployed at the end of the month. Cmdr Weise has a bias toward squadrons going into reserve for future use and two were sent there. The other three were deployed to the map to zones 4, 6, and 9. Hitler decided to keep Weise as his Air Commander for another month. We’re OK with that. :) None of our groups were eligible for reassignment to the other fronts. We received enough replacement aircraft and crews to bring all groups back to full strength. The Germans brought two new aircraft factories on line to replace the ones we destroyed. They are in Amsterdam (hex12) and Paris/Caudron (hex 9).

Thoughts after the First Month

We earned 7 VP’s in August which is OK but not great. At that rate after 5 months we’d have 35 for the campaign, but that is only a Poor evaluation. We need at least 40 for Adequate and 55 for Good. That comes to at least 33 more points in the last 4 months to get an Adequate result, or between 8 and 9 points each month, which is three 3 VP point targets each month. To get those kinds of numbers we need to run missions with enough aircraft to destroy at least one target each week. So my thought is to use some of the SO points I have built up to add more bomber groups and maybe another fighter group to our forces during September. I also need to keep in mind that 12 points are needed at the end of September to complete the Secondary Mission. The weather will be working against us from here on out with only 3 weeks for missions in September, October, and November. December only has 2 weeks for missions. That is another reason to have more groups so as to run 2 missions in most weeks to get the job done.

First Week, September '42

We added the 44th BG (B-24’s) to our forces for 16 SO points. We used all remaining 14 SO points for our bomb loadouts. The target for this week was the aircraft factory at Paris/Caudron. It is one of the six targets that can have four BG’s on the mission, with the other being the aircraft factory at Brussels. All other targets have a limit of three BG’s so we may rest a group each week as needed or hit Brussels if all groups are in good shape.

I tried several times to get a zoomed out shot of the playing area but none of them were focused. The shot below is the best of the bunch. At the 12 o’clock high position you see the available targets. Going clockwise are the various cards that are drawn for targets, German commanders, and events. Below them are the theater tracks. At the bottom are my BG’s with their loadouts on the cards. The FG is off camera to the right. Going up the left side is the Operation card, Luftwaffe reserve box, secondary and primary target cards, the mission formation chits and the calendar. In the middle is the map of course with our route to the weekly target marked out.

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German response was predictably Poor this week so only two bandits are expected over the target. I was just thinking how good it would be to have the fighter escort when, you guessed it, we pulled the dreaded Fighter Miscommunications event card and the fighters never met up with the bombers. Grrr… And of course neither chit pulled was a No Bandit in this case when we needed it. Bf-110 and Fw-190 squadrons ripped into our bomber groups shooting down 18(!) of them. We shot down the Bf-110 group in return. The flak was devastating, shooting down another 24(!) aircraft. We scored 9 hits for heavy damage while starting multiple fires with the incendiaries that ended up destroying the factory for 3 VP’s. A Pyrrhic victory for sure. The 91st BG was Shaken by their losses so they will rest and refit next week.

4077

The Air War Begins AAR continued:

Second Week, September '42

With the 91st Shaken and out of action this week we’re going for an easier target that hopefully we can take out with our three remaining BG’s, and (ahem) our Spitfires if they don’t get lost. We are also going to have reduced bomb loadouts as we need to conserve 6 SO’s this week and next to have the 12 points we need for the secondary mission. That made it a struggle to decide on a target until I realized that airfields are considered dispersed targets. Never noticed that before. Duh! The M30 bombs get a +2 die roll against dispersed targets, and they cost 0 SO points to use. So that made the choice of an airfield for me. I was able to give my three BG’s a full loadout with M30’s, some M44’s and one M43 for a cost of 9 SO points. Perfect as it saves 6 points for the end of the month.

So the target for the week was the airfield at Wevelghem, France in hex 11. It only takes 10 hits to destroy with more flak than others, but only one possible bandit (or so I thought!). Luftwaffe response was Average (or so I thought!). It really feels like almost nothing is going right in this campaign. The event card for the trip to the target was the Follower card. Our force was being tailed and that meant the response level for the Luftwaffe was raised one level to High. Bandits in adjacent hexes would now intercept so that meant instead of one possible bandit there were up to five! And five it was as none of the chits were No Bandits. Not only that but two of them had rockets and one had bombs, both tactics allowed by Weise. And the hits just keep on coming…

Next my fighter group failed it’s check to see if it could decide which groups to intercept. Nope! I’m going into more detail than usual on this encounter just because so much was happening. The Me-410 group that scrambled from the target hex and a Bf-110 with rockets attacked the fighters. Flak and a Bf-109 with rockets attacked the lead bomber group (305th) and a Bf-109 with bombs attacked the tail group (44th). The 305th lost 3 aircraft to the rocket attack but held their formation. The Bf-109 with the bomb tactic hit 3 aircraft in the 44th and that dispersed the formation. The tactic involves flying above the formation and dropping a bomb into it. The chance of success was only 30%. :( That was it for the German tactics combat. The flak missed the 305th but the Bf-109 shot down 6 of their aircraft and then peeled off and went back to base unharmed. The 44th suffered no further losses from the Bf-109 that had bombed them and did shoot them down in retaliation. Our Spitfires had 15 aircraft shot down but managed to kill both bandit groups they faced. Better than losing 15 bombers instead I guess. At least our boys got some added XP for the kills.

At this point our groups arrived over the target where the flak shot down another dozen aircraft. The 305th was leading the formations and scored 2 hits on the airfield for light damage. Next in line was the 93rd with Cmdr. Raper. They had not suffered any losses to this point and it paid off for them as they scored 8 hits and destroyed the airfield. The 44th was bringing up the rear and got another 5 hits for good measure in spite of being Shaken. The homeward bound leg of the mission was uneventful. Score 3 VP’s for our side. The accumulated damage to airfields and bandits shot down resulted in removing 2 squadron counters from the map. Couldn’t find anything in the rules about how to decide which counters to remove. So I removed the squadron counter in the target hex 11 since I know that squadron scrambled, and I removed one squadron from adjacent hex 12, on a die roll. All three of our mission BG’s gained a skill level.

Feel free to comment on my AAR, good, bad, or indifferent if you feel so inclined. At least that way I know someone is reading it. :)

4078

Sengoku Jidai currently on sale at Matrix for $14.99.

4079

I’m reading it and enjoying it. :) Do you recommend the game? One reviewer at BGG found it too easy (but might have been playing wrong, or using an exploit). Another reviewer says it’s too long, which doesn’t really bother me.

@Panzeh, I assume you’re playing EA: Ardennes on Vassal? I own the cardboard game, but I’ve never finished reading the solitaire rules. I generally like complex rules; I used to play ASL, I’ve played virtually all of Butterfield’s other games, etc. For whatever reason, I haven’t made it through the EA rules. I assume you think it’s worth the effort?

4080

I think so. It’s probably the most ambitious solitaire game i’ve played. The hardest part about Allied solo is probably executing the German movement methods. It initially took me a lot longer to get through them than I do now, and I was doing it wrong. There’s a few things that could probably be expounded upon in the player aid that would help a lot. I could probably make a youtube video all about it.

Also, the reason the Hitlerbot is doing so well in my games is because I got a rule wrong about cards it randomly draws for attacks- I was wondering why it didn’t do so in ‘overwhelming’ attacks but it makes way more sense now- these cards get discarded unless there’s something on their combat tactic indicating otherwise, which will shorten the Axis turns. The game itself is CDG-esque for the player and I found the player side of it to be fairly simple.

Knowing how the Allied solo side of the game works, I can do some things to ramp up the difficulty if need be. The Eisenhower bot seems at a first reading easier to execute- its movement doesn’t require going through 13 methods but it does have some other things to handle(reserve placement for Axis is easier).

4081

OK, glad you are enjoying it. It’s a lot of work to stop play and write the AAR as I go along so I don’t forget what happened. A little early to offer a recommendation though. I’ve only played the intro U-boat campaign and now two months of the current campaign. I will say it has been fun so far and not particularly easy to just roll over the AI. I saw the BGG forum post about it being too easy but have not found that to be the case for me yet. Maybe after I’ve played more campaigns it will get too easy but I hope not. Additional optional rules like weather, target intel, technology and a couple others might even make it harder, and certainly more detailed. Those rules could make the game a bit longer too. It’s not too long for me even with the time I spend on the AAR, but then I’m retired. :)

There is also a single bomber variant that I have not looked at yet, as well as a mini game. You can also merge this game with Dan’s Down in Flames game, if you own it, to resolve the air to air combat using that system instead of just a die roll here. So the game does have a lot to offer depending on how much time you want to put into it.

I play wargames as much to get a feeling of the history as just to play a game for fun. So far B-17 FFL does let me feel like I’m recreating the history of the 8th Air Force and making the kinds of decisions it’s Deputy Director might have made while not getting totally bogged down in details.

4082

The Air War Beings AAR continued:

Third Week, September '42

Found the section of the rules about removing Luftwaffe squadron counters and I did it essentially correctly above. A new airfield card was drawn; Bemay, France in hex 10. We need to conserve 6 SO points again this week so that is a perfect target for us to hit. I’m going to use even more of the M30’s in the bomb loadouts this week so we will have 5 SO points to carry over to October. We are resting the Shaken 44th and returning the 91st to active duty since it recovered enough to regain Okay status. Luftwaffe response is Poor for the week. Let’s hope it stays that way! The trip to the target was uneventful. Flak was light with only 3 aircraft hit. We scored 13 hits and destroyed the airfield for 3 VP’s. That is as close to a “milk run” as we will probably get. The good news is the 91st got enough XP to raise it’s skill level to Veteran. The bad news is we now have to make a roll to see if they get reassigned to another theater. The end of the month report will be posted later today.

4083

The Air War Begins AAR continued:

September '42 Monthly Cleanup

Our secondary mission was a success after we transferred 12 SO points to the Med Theater. That advanced the front from the start of Operation Torch to Algeria. That will increase the chance of the Luftwaffe sending new squadrons there by 10%. Not much but it helps. The new secondary mission is the destruction of U-boat pens. We need 6 VP’s from the three drawn targets in the next two months to succeed. Since two of the cards are worth three points each (Lorient and Brest in hex 8) and one is only worth two points ( La Pallice in hex 6) it’s pretty obvious which targets we will choose. Success or failure of this mission could have consequences for the Eastern Front, and will impact either my replacement points or SO points, so failure is not an option. So far we have scored 9 of the 10 aircraft factory VP’s needed to avert a Dismal performance rating for the campaign and I’m quite confident we will avoid that embarrassment by the end of December.

Five new Luftwaffe squadrons were deployed at the end of the month. One went to the Med Theater, probably in response to our pushing the front forward. Three (!) went to the Eastern Front and with that front sitting at Stalingrad it’s not surprising. Well it was a little surprising since each squadron only had a 20% chance of going there. The remaining squadron was deployed to box 11 on the map.

The 91st “passed” it’s reassignment check roll and stays in this theater. I say “passed” because I don’t want them reassigned. Between replacement points and spending a couple of the spare SO points we were able to get all groups back to full strength except for the 31st FG which needs three more Spitfires and pilots (1 strength point) to top it off. It gets a replacement point each week so it could be back to full strength in early October.

The Germans brought the aircraft factory in Meaulte, France (hex 11) online to replace the one we destroyed. Hitler has decided to keep Weise in command for another month. Hip, hip, hooray! :)

Thoughts after the Second Month

We achieved our self imposed short term goal of 9 VP’s for September, giving us 16 for the campaign. We were able to recover virtually all losses suffered last month so we start a new month at almost full strength. That’s good because the U-boat pens are going to be a major pain in the butt. They have good flak, no air to ground bonuses, are hardened, and require a lot of hits to kill. If we don’t kill them with one mission then it will reduce our ability to hit other targets each of the next two weeks. Alternatively the three airfield targets are worth a total of 11 VP’s so that is good news. And of course we can’t completely ignore the aircraft factories (each only worth 2 VP’s this month) or we’ll be flooded with new squadrons in November. Given all of that it is tempting to consider adding another BG to our forces and running multiple weekly missions since we’re expecting Poor to Average Luftwaffe response again in October. Stay tuned…