WWI Games

I have played a lot of games. And while not all of them have dealt with The Great War many (if not most) have.

This is my start on a top 10ish list of best games of The Great War. While everyone's list will be different I would love to hear about your favorites. Please comment here or on the appropriate Social Media channel.

The list includes both board games and miniature rules.

Naval
Great War at Sea - Mediterranean  by Avalanche Press
Great War at Sea: Cruiser Warfare by Avalanche Press
Jutland - Avalon Hill
The Far Seas S&T

Tactical
If the Lord Spares Us by TOOFATLadries
Through the Mud and the Blood by TOOFATLadries
Trenchfoot - GDW  and Frank Chadwicw

Aviation
Ace of Aces: Handy Rotary Series
Algernon Pulls It Off by TOOFATLadries
Dawn Patrol - TSR
Wings - Yaquinto

Strategic
The Guns of August - Avalon Hill
Pursuit of Glory - GMT
Lawrence of Arabia - 3W

Games Day July 12th

I attended the Gamers Day for Delaware County Gamers and it was very well attended. I do not know if it had anything to do with Historicon being the following weekend, or possibly coming off of the energy from the last meet up on the USS Olympia.

These photographs are from a Blitzkrieg Commander game I played in. My German assault guns did not have a very good day as they were trying to protect the flanks of two Kampfgruppes that kept moving away from each other. I will give the rules another try but will play in my preferred 3mm or 6mm for micro armor. Playing in 15mm made it play too much like Flames of War.

And lastly the remains of the day. My two battalions was reduced to a company more or less. Each stand is a platoon.

GDW 20+ Years Latter

When you are trying to buy back your youth, it is amazing what you find in the boxes that show ups. And that does not include what you were trying to buy.

I have been involved with miniature gaming and wargaming since the mid 70s so a lot of the games I remember fondly are only available on eBay and the like. Moves and mom had taken their toll on the collection. Recently thanks to Tony and Chal over at Army Group York I have gotten back into modern, or at least Cold War period, naval gaming. This is a fun period that is action packed and if you do it right it can be over quickly. Often I got it wrong and it was also done quickly too. I had the miniatures but needed the rules. I still had a copy of Shipwreck but I was not happy with the submarine rules so I went with my old standby, Harpoon.


For me Harpoon is the rule set by GDW. The more current addition by Clash of Arms was to complicated for me without a computer assist. So I went looking for Harpoon 3 and found a cheap clean copy on eBay. I was pleased with this find. I also took a walk down memory lane when I found this 1992ish GDW catalogue. I remember owning a lot of these games. I think many of the old GDW line would still sell well 20+ years latter. They were well thought out games, for the most part. This was also the period of Dangerous Journeys and Twilight: 2000. Perfect for zombie gamers today. Than again that just might be me.

M.Y. Miniatures for The Great War

Thanks to Chal and my friends over at the Army Group York wargame group I was introduced to M.Y. Miniatures. Mick has a large number of miniature lines covering both naval and land gaming. My initial interest was for 1/3000 naval figures to help fill out my Interwar and late WWII collection. And the Naval figures are a good investment for the table top.

While shopping around I also took a look at his 15mm figures for WWI. There are a lot of possibilities here. Mick has most of the powers that fought in The Great War. While his lines are not very deep, I was thinking this was a way to add to my WWI figures from Peter Pig. As Peter Pig are closer to true 15mm and I have a lot invested in this scale I thought I would ask for a sample.

With my next order both the German Jaegers and British Naval Infantry showed up and I was pleased with the figures. In the photograph are my recent additions from M.Y. Miniatures next to Peter Pigs Range 16 Naval Command.

While the figures from M.Y. Miniatures are bulkier than Peter Pig these look good next to each other. These troops, and other from M.Y. Miniatures, will make a great addition to the rest of my 15mm Great War figures. I also am now looking at his 15mm Dark Ages figures for TOOFATLardies Dux Dux Britanniarum. Just a thought.

Nordkapp - Soviets

The Soviets in this campaign have a tough time. The NATO naval forces have the job of bringing these merchant ships into a Norwegian port safely. They have the assets to protect the convoy against any single attack, they can only be defeated if the Soviets can roll back the defenders layered defenses.

To do this the Soviet Navy has only limited resources. For operation they can commit Naval Aviation assets including:

Strike Assets

• Tu-22M Backfire B
• Tu-16 Badger A/C/G
• Tu-22 Blinder A

Reconnaissance and EW

• Tu-95 Bear

They will also use their submarine assets operating in the North Sea and in and around Nordkapp. These include:

• November Class SSN
• Victor I/II/III SSN
• Charlie I/II SSGN

There is also a wild card force that I will be holding back for now.

All in all the Soviets have the forces needed to make life difficult for both the Royal Navy and the US Navy.

Nordkapp

Before going off to war, it is important to make the appropriate war plans. And with a plan you need reference materials. For me, I just needed to go back to some of my old favorites. In this case it is two books by Sir John Hackett.

The Third World War published in 1978 was one of the first of many books written about the Cold War going hot in the 1980s. Considering when he wrote it, the book is very believable in a scary way. As a sailor serving at the time he sets his story I find this not only believable but a good reference for such a non-war. While The Hunt for Red October and Red Storm Rising are good books they were not what I was looking for. So I went with Sir John.

There are plenty of land and tank engagement books written about the Central Front yet little is written about the possible war at sea.  If the balloon did go up the US Navy and the NATO allies were going to be very busy. There will be carrier strikes, convoy battles, ASW operations and sweeping the Soviet shipping from the sea. And that is just in the first week or so. Naval Ops will be based on getting convoys from the US and Canada to the Central Front. These will be needed within four weeks of the start of the war to round out the NATO forces. (While the round out brigades as a process were found wanting in the First Gulf War, this was not known in the late 1970s.) Without these resources the Central front will have trouble holding the line without resorting to nuclear weapons.

As the Central Front will be trying to hold, there will be added pressure placed on both the south (Balkans and Turkey) and north (around Norway) fronts.  My campaign is based on the supply runs being made to support the Northern Front. These were trained for. You can see how these operations were planned for in HMS Fearless. While I have read of the NATO plans, I am assuming they do not go according to plan.

The campaign is designed around Harpoon (GDW Edition) but can be played with using Shipwreck! or similar modern/Cold War period rules.

New Commissions

Latest additions to the fleet:

3 1/6000 scale Missile Corvettes - A69 type Avisos for the Falkland War
2 1/3000 scale British Battleships for post WWII era - HMS Anson and HMS Vanguard
1 1/3000 scale R-80 British Airship
1 15mm scale Gunboat for the Colonial Era to WWII

 

Crews for the gunboat are on the painting bench right now.

The 1/6000 scale are Figurehead, 1/3000 are from M.Y. Miniatures and the 15mm gunboat is Peter Pig's WWI line.