Wargaming is a waste of time!! .... not

 

Recently I have been thinking whether wargaming is an entertainment productive/beneficial enough for me to spend any more time on it. These thoughts were connected with a new addition to the family which quickly encouraged me to re-assess my daily schedule. Due to my hyperactive nature, there was not so much idling involved in what I normally did throughout the day but new challenges related to the little guy meant that any leftover idle time had to go. I started with a reduction of time spent on reading the internet and/or playing computer games nearly to zero. But was there still some room for improvement? Immediately, I considered wargaming.

This hobby is a time sink, honestly. When you consider all the time you have to spend to figure out what you want to buy, find a good offer, take care of the shipment and then assemble, paint and play you end up with a pretty hefty time investment. What is the return on it then?

Well, here is my list of top 4 returns on investment associated with wargaming (I could go on and on but the article would be too long :P) :



IMPROVEMENT OF ENTERPRENEURIAL SKILLS

The hobby costs a lot. Period. With my geeky hoarder nature I will have a hard time parting with my minis to raise enough funds to get my next fix. This means that I have to be really careful with my spendings and only invest when a good offer pops up. Because of this, I have learned how to use e-bay apps, negotiate bulk purchases, use promotions to buy cheap stuff and sell it with a profit. All in all, the hobby made me a pretty hard bargainer :)

 

 

BOOST IN ANALYTICAL THINKING

Ever sat there in front of Easy Army or Forces of War for hours to get your best company composition? I suppose most people would think I am crazy. But reflecting on it I can see it as a mental exercise that is close to solving puzzles. You get your brain working hard to analyze all the possible options your guys can be up against in a game of Flames of War and find the right method of getting the upper hand.

An even bigger thing is the game itself. It teaches you to make the right decisions based on facts (terrain setup, enemy unit's positioning/stats) and assumptions (understanding of your opponent's strategy). It is like trying to get a very complicated process to produce a defined output: a sound win for your troops. It might sound silly, but I find wargaming a very good preparation for my work in an IT department (I am an IT Service Management specialist dealing mostly with process governance) because considering all the possible options and looking at issues from different angles is the core of conducting a battle of miniature soldiers as well as my job.



ENHANCEMENT OF WILLPOWER

Playing wargames for the last ~20 years has taught me one basic rule. Never give up. NEVER. It is a game of endless possibilities and dice. My job as a general is not to sit there and complain about how my dice were bad (although since I am a bit of a control freak I sometimes get a bit frustrated). In games that are not going according to plan my job is to find the winning option in a palette of options that is reduced each time a dice roll goes bad. At the end of the day, each loss teaches you more than a victory does. Focusing on what happened in the past obscures your vision of what is possible in the future. Forget about your mistakes. Concentrate on getting your next move right.

 



INCREASE IN SOCIAL SKILLS

Managing expectations around the game is a skill that I gained throughout the years and also extended it to some areas of my private life. What I understood is that the game is related to an unspoken, unwritten social contract. Every player that I sit down to play with approaches the table with some assumptions and expectations of how the game will be played. These expectations are based on years of experience with all kinds of games, starting with tic-tac-toe and ending with behemoths like Twilight Struggle. An example of such expectation might be: if I play in a tournament I will normally not advise my opponent how to move his troops so that he can counter my moves. Through wargaming I learned to adjust my style of play to meet at least some of these expectations and make the game better for everybody. In practice, this means that I avoid a win at all costs attitude since it never does anybody any good. Same goes for private life. A good lesson coming from wargaming.



These are only several aspects of wargaming that can be beneficial for one's private life or work. I think the big issue is that unlike for sports, there is no one responsible to spread this kind of knowledge around and make people aware that playing social games (including wargames) is in fact a very good mental and social exercise.

All in all, looking back at all these years I spent wargaming, I do not regret a minute I spent on it. I already know that I will try to involve my newborn son in all the good stuff that wargaming brings with it! :)

Achtung! Tentacles of War 2016 - tourney report

With the passing of this weekend, the Tentacles of War have come to pass - another tournament in the city of Łódź (actually taking place in a small city close to it called Zgierz) organized by the Octopus Club of Łódź.


Now a tradition the tourney was a Late War Double:
- Teams playing 2 companies of 1000 pts each - with 50 points that can be passed on to the fellow player.
- Companies can't be repeated, and any combination between Allies-Allies, Axis-Axis can be used.
- There is a catch however - the opponents can choose which company type you count (infantry, mechanized tank) as and if your special rules are not uniform if they work for the team.

For example - if you take a Canadian Rifle and Motor Coy, then you will always be an Infantry coy with the option to go with Night Attack. If you take Grey Wolf Pioneers and BaR SchwerePanzer - then the opponents can choose to count you as either infantry or tanks, both either as regular or always defend.
So it's usually best to pair the companies as 2*Always Attack, 2*Always Defend/Fortified - along the strategy that you take - not to be thrown off by the opponents choice.

I went with P. (another Polish-Rep player), and we took some time to consider our lists. Since a few years back we were reluctant to take attacking lists for the reason that with 3 hours for 2000pts, is not always enough time to resolve the game in your favor- when you're the attacker. And because back then, we had a number of games that finished just before we could win them, we were biased towards playing infantry.
BUT playing defensive is just not our thing :)

And so we were cracking different lists:
KG Westfallen with Marinegrenadiers with 88 Railway cars or Heavy Cat companies,
2* British with Breaching Group and Sexton spam,
US and British Recon or Armoured Car Companies
Tanks?? Russians - maybe, but we didn't have enough to go round - so back to the drawing board...

Then maybe mechanized again?
Something with a lot of firepower - so had o have minimum spending on unnecessary stuff - and then it came: we would play mechanized forces from Brittany - Task Force A and the 644th Tank Destroyer Battalion. The drawback, was that one company would be an Always Attack one and the other a regular one, but we prepared to both attack and defend, and play fairly well in 50% forces case.

These are the lists we came up with:

First Battle Encounter against Reksio and Loucyphr

Tankovy and Gvardyjski Tankovy (?)
HQ Matilda
10 Matildas
10 Valentines
10 Lees
Spetsnaz

HQ T34/85
10 T34/85
10 T34/76

We deployed our TD's more or less evenly on the Table, our opponents placed the T34/85's hidden in the center, Matildas on the right and Valentines on the left.
Turn 1: Matildas move torward, we pop 1 TD ambush but only manage to burn 1 Matidla, and move the security sections to better positions.
Turn 2: T-34/85's redeploy for long range shots at the deployed Hellcat's, and are joined by more moving Matildas. Soviets burn 2 Hellcat's and bail one more, we pass the moral. Next turn we have a discussion with P. as I want to break the smaller Soviet Battalion, whereas P. wants to play more cautious.
Eventually we go with my plan - we pop 3 TD ambushes, and burn or bail all T/34's in LoS and kill the Battalion commander. But Lucyphr passes his 4+ moral check on the T34's - so there is a next turn (the turn after that we will destroy the bailed tanks in LoS - forcing another check he will pass - and with that the opportunity to quickly resolve the game is over).
In return fire we loose the rest of the first Hellcat platoon.
Throughout the game we will exchange mostly long range shots, with both sides taking casualties.
Eventually 2 withered TD platoons that deployed center, and engineers arriving from reserve (doubling on arrival to get into assault range next turn) and another TD platoon arriving from reserve will first break Matildas (on the 2nd check I think), and then in a 2 turn battle of maneuver fight through the Lee's (forcing a moral check and breaking them). Then the Specnaz that was located on the right flank (now completely alone - and facing 6 stands of Engineers and 4 Wolverines) tries to assault the Engineers, that were exposed in the open from last turn as they discharged their bazookas to kill as many Lee's as possible. The assault comes in, but the resolute Engineers fight back, and Spetsnaz moves back and is subsequently destroyed. One of the Soviet companies is broken (killed HQ Matilda, Matildas, Lees and Spets) - and the battle is over. At that moment our left flank was held by 1 105mm gun, a Hellcat and 2 armoured cars.




Second Battle Pincer versus "Młode Pelikany" Team

KG Westfallen
4 Panzerfaust Trap Teams
2 Platoons of Ersatz Grenadiers
3 RT 88's
Mortars
HMG's

2HQ King Tigers RT
King Tiger RT
King Tiger RT
3 Pak40s CV

The table had a moderate amount of terrain with a series of 4 forests in the center some wheat fields on the right and a number of small hills to the right and back (defender's deployment zone).

Objectives were placed back-center and front left. 2 platoons of SS grenadiers were deployed to guard the approaches to each. 88s were placed behind the infantry with LoS thru the center mostly blocked by the forrests, but fairly good to the flanks. PaK's in ambush. Warrior Tigers back to left and center right.

We deployed center mostly with a single TD platoon on the left flank. Then we spearheaded the Engineers in trucks towards the forests, together with the rest of TFA.
On the first turn we moved a single TFA TD platoon down the right flank to threaten one KT with possible deployment+rush and flank shots. Center we moved most of the recon M20s and Engineers disembarked into the forests. Some vehicles stayed on the left flank to spray the grenadiers with .5" cal fire.
In the center the artillery smoked grenadiers basically covering the whole advance from effective 88 fire.
With that done everything unloaded with .5" cal's on the 88's. None went down that turn.
Germans didn't deploy their ambushes and moved the KT on the right flank as expected. 88's remained silent to keep their gtg, instead of engaging the security sections on 5's.

Next turn we moved in yet more light vehicles into 16" of the 88's and lifted their gtg on the 3rd 4+ attempt. Then the combined fire from 3 security sections killed 2 88's.

German turn was mostly uneventful, with the ambush still being kept (it was the only platoon the Schwerepanzerkompanie had on the table). Tiger fire did burn yet another M20 - but no real losses were sustained.

Next turn we pushed further with a TFA TD platoon down the non-protected right flank, securing a small hamlet from ambush with 2 teams from the Recce platoon.
The combined .5" cal fire destroyed a number of grenadier teams, and the ARV closed in and destroyed the last of the 88's, leaving just the command team which passed the moral check.

Engineers assaulted the Grenadiers followed by 1 security section - the exchange resulted in some of the Germans in the center dyeing for 2 Engineers and 2 M20's. This left just 1 stand of Grenadiers, which meant that they didn't Enjoy the War next turn that much and went home. At that moment most of the center was mostly open held by just 1 KT, observer, 88 command team and an observer.
The German Reserves arrived: a KT and mortar platoon (on the previously designated left flank).88's command team passed it's sole survivor roll.
Tigers maneuvered and engaged some of the security sections at long range, but destroyed maybe 1 utility car.

We retaliated by popping 1 TD Ambush in the forests to mop-up the CiC and 2iC in the the center (and succeeded), and moved the rest of security sections for better ambush positions next turn. At this moment we were pretty much on top of the back-center objective.

At this moment the Germans popped the Pak40 ambush on the very far right, but shooting from an disadvantageous just bailed an M20. However 2 Panzerfaust Trap teams which deployed close to the popped TD's managed to score 2 hits, and destroy 2 Wolverines (ups!).

At this moment the time was running low (our original expectations - were well grounded), and we knew that we only had turn 5 to play - and to win we had to destroy the full grenadier platoon which would force a company morale check on the KG Westfallen that they would auto-fail.
That meant we deployed 4 remaining TD platoons and went to destroy the grenadiers.
We also went with 2 Hellcats to shoot at a flank of 1 KT, that we forced 2 HQ KT's to join in. If the KT would be destroyed then we could rout 3 KT's in 1 shot potentially - in the end I failed the FP roll, and it was just bailed...
Meanwhile the full fury of the Tank Destroyers and 2 subsequent assaults only managed to bring the Grens down to 3 stands. They promptly all passed their Enjoy the War rolls.

Because we have a special rule in place for tournaments that says that doesn't allow the defenders to win if less then 6 turns are played and the attacker contests either objective - the defenders could not hope to win - but could still cause us casualties. And that's what they went for. In the end it didn't make much difference, and we finished the game with turn 5 as a draw.




Third Battle Cauldron versus "MiLord" and "Majster"

US 3rd Aroured Tank Coy RV
HQ Jumbo,
Sherman Platoon
Super Pershing
Recon Platoon
2 Sherman Crocodiles

1st Polish Armored Division Tank Coy FT
HQ 2 Shermans
2 Shermans + Firefly
2 Shermans + Firefly
2 Shermans + Firefly
2 AA crusaders

It was over really quick. We deployed 2 TFA TD platoons and 2 regular TD platoons (1 of them in intimidate ambush), spreading out across our deployment zone, as much as possible to limit enemy deployment. MiLord deployed his Recon dismounted and the Super Pershing in a possition which would limit our ability to flank it. However "Majster" didn't have much luck in his deployment rolls and deployed AA and 1 Platoon of Shermans in our close right corner - basically in a shooting gallery. His command tanks he hid in a forest on another flank.
We spearheaded towards the forest where the Polish HQ was and popped TFA TD's close by. On the other flank we popped 2 TD platoons - one on close and one on long range. In the end we saw the Polish Sherman HQ, Sherman Platoon, and AA crusaders burning (actually 1 AA was left bailed out, but it fled. With no models on the table out of the Polish Tank Coy, there was not even an attackers first turn...

In the end 2 victories and a draw, gave us the second place - after Kuba "Kubbek" Charmo and Oskar "Hajmon" Kida, who had the same battle results, but more small victory points.


I went home satisfied with how we fared. Doubles is an interesting aspect of Flames of War, all the more since there is only just 1 such tournament a year :)

Playing doubles tournament in FoW

Hello everyone. Time has come for an event that I organize every year and is quite popular with the Polish players: Achtung, Macki Wojny doubles tournament (Macki Wojny translates into "Tentacles of War" - since the club is called "Octopus" and the tournament formula is also a legacy of WHFB tournaments under the same name). The reason for this popularity is that it is unique in its format and the rules for playing in pairs are in my opinion quite robust (have been developed for several years). With this in mind, I would like to share the ruleset/format so that anyone who finds it useful can adapt it to their doubles tournament.

Format & Rules
First of all, the format that we have been using for the last 5 or 6 years remained the same throughout the tournament's history. It is 2x1000 pts Late War. I have to say that I have tried a few times to change it (period mostly) but there was so much resistance from the players that I gave up. The reason that they usually provided is that the ruleset is a non-standard one so we should go with the most popular period. At the end of the day - makes perfect sense and my advice to TOs is: use my experience and go LW.

Also, 2x1000 points is the max. Games are scheduled to last for 3 hours but every now and again still, there are tables where the game would be at turn 4-5 when the time is about to elapse. Somehow 2x computing power of a human brain does not mean 0.5x time to process but instead, 1.5x. Do not try to go over 2x1000, trust me :)

Listbuilding rules
1. You can only combine allied+allied and axis+axis.
2. You cannot use the same briefing twice.
3. You are allowed to switch up to 5% of the points between the lists, provided the total does not exceed 2k. This means that you can transfer up to 50 points to your partner's list in case you have some left over and he needs a boost.
4. (optional) No more than 1 named hero and/or higher command per alliance.
5. (optional) No more than 1 air support per alliance.

Game specific rules
1. Special rules of one company do not affect the other - under any circumstances (e.g. 2 US rosters cannot combine their bombardments using "Hit them with everything you've got").
2. Allies rules (p. 70 of the rulebook) are used to determine how to handle the separate companies: warriors, independents cannot join platoons of your partner.
3. Company morale is played according to the rules of fielding multiple companies, described on p. 176 of the rulebook. In simple terms - if one of the companies fails its morale roll, both flee and the game is over. While it might seem punishing at first, tests have proved that this can easily be avoided if one plays smart (e.g. does not place all platoons of one company occupying one of the 2 objectives to make it easy for the opponent to force a morale check).
4. For purposes of scenarios, the alliance is treated as a single company - so only 1 ambush is available normally, when you alternate placing platoons on the table in Fair Fights, you only place one per alliance, etc.
5. You cannot use fortifications of an allied company, with the exception of trenchlines.
6. When you roll for reserves, one platoon per PLAYER arrives from reserves. This prevents games where some platoons never have the chance to take active part in the battle.
7. For situations not covered above, that create a conflict in the rules, THE OPPONENTS decide the outcome. This is often used when determining who is the attacker where the pair has mixed company types. In these cases, the opponents of such an alliance define which company do they compare themselves to.

A thing that needs to be mentioned here is that in Poland we use a customized scoring format. We utilize a system which is similar to scoring in old editions of WH40k, where Victory Points of destroyed friendly/enemy units are mapped against a score between 0-20 (with objectives beeing assigned a fixed value) to determine the outcome of the game. This way, we do not have to worry about the basic nature of the BF system. Still, with some modifications, I am sure that the rules above can be also used for BF scoring.

Overall, I really like what we designed as the tournaments run without major interruptions and the players can enjoy their games in peace :)

Hope you like it and can use it in your tournaments!

Peasant army vol 5 - Reworking the Romanian Cavalry for the ETC



Ok, now that I already have several games under my belt playing Romanian Cavalry (from the Cavalerie PDF) I think it is high time to bring in some improvements.

Looking back at the games I played so far I now have a good idea of what are the weakpoints and strengths of the list. Overall, Romanian Cavalry seems to me to be a very good infantry list counter. It has the numbers and the firepower needed to remove stubborn defenders from their positions. If your skill/morale rolls are slightly above awful, you should get at least one veteran infantry platoon of death (13 bases + a Vanator de Care). Also, with so many guns, anything that cannot be assaulted, can be shot to pieces by the 20+ barrels/tubes.

However, there are two major weakpoints of the Cavalerie:

1. Lack of strong ranged anti-tank. The only valuable anti-tank unit in the list is the Pak40 platoon. It can easily deal with any kind of medium tanks but will struggle against heavies, like the KVs. Zero access to heavy artillery does not help too much either. This means that each time I have to fight the heavy Soviet tanks (especially while defending), my list will have a hard time, unless I decide to add a desperate option like the Stuka or the German 105s instead of the 75mm cavalry guns.

2. Vulnerability to templates. The footprint of the company is massive. Each time I get bombarded, the enemy is almost guaranteed to score at least a few hits on my guys. During the games I played, this issue was also aggravated by the fact, that I used dismounted platoons of Romanians. It meant that I usually stayed under fire long enough for the losses to stop being sustainable.

I think in the end, I can either try to mitigate these vulnerabilities during list design or accept them and avoid pairings with my obvious counters. Since I will most probably not be able to switch to a different army altogether, I need to do a bit of both :)

But before going into another round of list building, I also did a review of what worked and what did not work in the old version of my company. I worked under the assumption that I knew how to use my platoons and that they all had a chance to do something valuable during the games I played. Considering the above, I have built my list of best and worst performing platoons:

Best
V        Maxed out 75mms
V        Medium-sized infantry platoons
V        Maxed out 81mm mortars
V        Maxed out Pak40s
V        Maxed out 45mms
V        Maxed out Pz35s
V        Maxed out mounted scouts
Worst

It turned out that the worst idea that I had was to max out the mounted scouts and use them as an assault unit. It never worked. The unit was too small to make a difference and had too many tasks to perform on the battlefield to be effective. On the other hand, the 75mm guns are an amazingly flexible unit. Even if they cannot do any real damage to heavy tanks, they can at least shoot direct smoke after the Pak40s did their job. Awesome unit in my opinion.

Based on these facts, I have come up with a new version of my list to be tested:

HQ: 2x Cavalry Rifle/MG + 2x Vanator de Care
Platoon 1: 13x Cavalry Rifle/MG + VdC
Platoon 2: 13x Cavalry Rifle/MG + VdC
Platoon 3: 4x 81mm mortar
Platoon 4: 6x 45mm gun + transports
Platoon 5: 4x German Pak40
Platoon 6: 7x Pioneer Rifles (3x option to change to flamer)
Platoon 7: 4x Cavalry Rifle/MG scouts
Platoon 8: 12x 75mm guns + transports

These changes somewhat address the vulnerability of the infantry to templates (they do have bigger bases but also move a lot faster and can re-roll unpins while mounted) as well as give me some more anti-tank on the defense with the addition of the pioneers. I think these modifications are more a bandaid than a complete solution of the issue, but hey - what can you do - there are only so many options you can choose from! :)
Now I am off to search for some more cavalry models for my Romanians (although I already have around 8 bases painted and 12 waiting for their turn).

What are your experiences of polishing your lists?

Beyond the completely obvious part 3 - Mid War infantry lists analysis (ETC-wise)

Hello everyone, today I am coming back a bit to good old FoW :) I just checked my posts so far and it turns out that I am still missing a post in the 'Beyond the completely obvious' series that would cover Mid War infantry lists. So here it goes.

As with the previous posts from the series, I have selected 3 lists meeting the Mid War infantry criteria that I found interesting and that I would not refuse to play during the ETC. As a general remark, I have to say that both Mid War books have some interesting stuff in them in terms of infantry. I think that as far as tanks go, the choice is severly limited, Mech also has some constraints but with infantry lists you can really go crazy :)
My first selection is a British Rifle company from North Africa book. The pretty obvious reason for this is that the Brits can make a choice of whether to defend or attack in some of the missions (using their 'Night Attack' national special rule). This possibility gives all infantry lists of that nation huge flexibility. Mid War is the pinnacle period of Night Attacks as if I remember correctly, there is only one list that can counter it - Soviet Cossacks. Since they are an AA Mech list, they would be able to attack the British player's infantry company. Anyway, this is my proposal of a list:

British Rifle (Africa) - North Africa book
Confident/Veteran

HQ: 2x Rifle + bagpipes + sticky bombs
Platoon 1: 6x Rifle/MG + light mortar + sticky bombs
Platoon 2: 6x Rifle/MG + light mortar + sticky bombs
Platoon 3: 6x Rifle/MG + light mortar + sticky bombs
Platoon 4: 3x Universal Carrier
Platoon 5: 4x 3" mortar + sticky bombs + transport
Platoon 6: 4x 6 pdr
Platoon 7: 4x 6 pdr
Platoon 8: 2x Valentine II + 1x Valentine VII (C/T)
Platoon 9: 4x Deacon
Platoon 10: 2x ML 4,2" mortar + sticky bombs

This list, in my opinion can go against pretty much any other force. It has tons of direct anti-tank shots, 3 platoons of C/V infantry for assaults, medium mortars for smoke or getting rid of enemy guns with direct fire and also a small unit of heavy mortars to make the enemy think twice before bunching up his tanks. Also, Universal Carriers provide the necessary recon capability.
Since the company's tank support is either Slow or Slow Wheeled, the Night Attack rules that limit the movement of mechanized teams do not affect them so much anyway.
The big weakpoint of the list is that most of the anti-tank guns are No HE. This means, that against a dug in opponent with a lot of guns, the modus operandi will be to use the light and medium mortars in direct fire and assault when a breach is made.
You might also be wondering what is the idea behind putting sticky bombs on mortars :) Well, if you do this, and you are defending against a tank list like the Mixed Tankovy, you can put them close to your infantry on the objective, to be able to pump out a few extra AT3 hits per assault phase! For 5 points per platoon, it can really add to your defensive capability.

GERMAN PIONEERS

Another interesting list that I found in the North Africa book is the German Pioneer company (15. Panzer Division). What i like about North Africa German infantry overall is the possibility to field decent anti-tank guns integrated into your compulsory foot platoons. This makes them very good on the defense, as it increases the number of guns on the table even if you are limited to only 6 platoons in your list. In any case, this is the sample list that I have built:

German Pioneer (Africa) (15. Panzer) - North Africa book
Confident/Veteran

HQ: 2x SMG
Platoon 1: 7x Rifle/MG + 2x Pak38 + 1x 2.8 cm a-t rifle
Platoon 2: 7x Rifle/MG + 2x Pak38 + 1x 2.8 cm a-t rifle
Platoon 3: 4x Marder III (7.62 cm)
Platoon 4: 4x Pak40
Platoon 5: 2x 8-Rad
Platoon 6: 2x 8-Rad
Platoon 7: 3x 15cm NW41
Platoon 8: 3x Sd Kfz 10/5 (2cm)

The idea for this list is pretty simple: to be acting mostly in a defensive role but in case it has to attack, it will still be pretty good. Again, direct a-t is fairly decent with eight AT11&12 guns plus four Pak38s on the infantry platoons. Also, this list is built to have 4 platoons on the table while defending - 2 infantry, tank destroyers + pak40s which will give it a big edge compared to a 6 platoon list.
If you want even more defensive power, you can drop the anti-air unit and the Nebelwerfers down to 2 guns/tanks and upgrade the pioneers with supply trucks to put down up to 2 minefields or 6 barbed wire sections while deploying.
On the offensive, you still have all the assets you will ever need: pioneers to lead the charge, anti-tank for support, smoke for cover and Sd Kfz 10/5s to provide anti-air screen.

ITALIAN ALPINI

For the last one, I will copy a list by one of the Polish players - hope he does not mind. I already said a few words about it before our Mid War tournament in Poznań, so this is a bit of a copy-paste exercise. But at that time, I did not know that this company is actually Always Defend. I think in general, the only Always Defend lists are the Italian ones. In this case, these lists are a bit of a no-brainer for the ETC as in this competition being able to control whether your player is attacking or defending is crucial for the pairings. But without much more discussion, let me introduce the list:
Clarification: only Fusilieri and Bersaglieri have the Always Defend capability. Still, this does not make Alpini a bad list :)

Italian Alpini
Elite (66% to be vet)/ Artillery (83% to be vet)

HQ 2x Rifle
Platoon 1: 10x Rifle with improvised AT3 + anti-tank rifle
Platoon 2: 10x Rifle with improvised AT3
Platoon 3: 10x Rifle with improvised AT3
Platoon 4: 4x 65/17 gun (16", AT8, Rof2, no gun shield, crap bombardment)
Platoon 5: 4x 65/17 gun (16", AT8, Rof2, no gun shield, crap bombardment)
Platoon 6: 4x 75/27 gun (24", AT9, Rof2, crap bombardment)
Platoon 7: 4x Semovente 47/32 (3/1/0, AT7)
Platoon 8: 6x 75/39 gun (24", AT10, Rof2)
Platoon 9: 7x Pioneer Rifle + 2x Brixia mortar
Platoon 10: 2x 75/27 gun (24", AT9, Rof2, crap bombardment)

This is a list similar to what I have in my Romanian Cavalry (Mech) with slightly different accents. This one has shorter ranges on the guns but has a better ambush platoon in the form of the captured soviet equipment (6x 75/39). It also has a decent mobile semovente unit to go around the enemy flanks or harass light armor. Overall, I like the way this company is built. It has good chances to be veteran (up to fearless vet) and has a lot of hard-hitting units. Its main weakness is: little response capability vs the omnipresent Mixed Tankovy. In fact, it can turn out that the improvised weapons will cause more casaulties to the Italians than the assaulting KVs themselves :)
Also, on the offensive, the footprint of the company is huge, making it vulnerable to templates.

So, here are my proposals. Is there anything valuable that I maybe missed? :)

Team Yankee Rules Analysis - Part 5 - Morale/Special Rules



Morale

Morale in Team Yankee, on a high level of understanding, works in a manner similar to what we have in FoW. Once your Units start taking enough casaulties they are forced to roll their morale checks. When they fail the roll, they are gone. In the end, if at a certain point of the Turn Sequence (the Starting Step), your Formation has no Units that are in still active (remember that Supporting Units do not count), it has to roll a morale check (using Commander's morale rating - so if he is gone: autofail). If the roll is failed, the Formation is gone. If all Formations are gone, you are out and all objectives are automatically captured by the opponent.

Back to the basic (Unit) level, no morale check is needed (it is called "Unit is in Good Spirits") as long as:
- no Teams in the Unit are either destroyed or bailed (the latter is only true for Units containing Tank Teams)
- at least one active (neither destroyed nor bailed) Team is within 6" of the Unit Leader. Two active Teams in case of infantry Units.
- Unit Leader is active

There are two major influences of this rule on the game:

1. Units consisting of 2 Teams will have to immediately test whenever one of the teams is gone, or in the case of tanks - bailed. It just hits ITVs so hard that even at 3 points per platoon they do not seem a valid option. Like I described before, you can mitigate this effect by Joining HQ Units or Independent Teams to these guys, but in all honesty: what is the point of protecting 2 ITVs with 2 M1 Abrams tanks or a FIST?
Same goes for fielding understrength Units of Aircraft in US Forces. Each time you take a casaulty, the other guy has to roll his morale check and possibly flee without event taking a hit. The only 2 Team Unit that does not suffer so much because of this rule is the Soviet Recce platoon of BMPs - it will do its job of extending the deployment zone anyway. After this, it is obsolete (or can be used for some harrasment). Poor rules design at this point, really.

2. Going out of command with a part of a Unit is really pushing your luck. Same goes for moving Line Abreast (not so clearly defined in the rules). If the opponent is able to kill the section containing the Unit Leader, the rest of the platoon has to test (even if you only killed 2 out of 10 tanks for instance).
Overall, Morale mechanic of Team Yankee is very similar to FoW but it is really hard to kill a Unit by forcing a morale check, unless the opponent splits it and you are able to kill the Leader.


Update & a fun fact at the same time (confirmed by Phil): if you do not put any of the Formation's Units on the table at the beginning of the game (meaning - if you only start with Support) you do not have any of the Formation's Units "In Good Spirits" as per the rules and thus you automatically loose the game :)
　
Special Rules


There are about 20-30 special rules in Team Yankee covering high-tech equipment characteristics & tactical doctrines used by the opposing forces. Most of them, add a +1 here or there or make a unit gone to ground when it moves or shoots. There is however, one rule that is really outstanding: Spearhead.

By using Spearhead, a Unit can make a pre-game move when it deploys. Once the move is complete, other Units that have not deployed so far treat anything within 8" of the Spearheading Unit as an extension of their deployment zone!
This extension of deployment zone is limited by enemy teams, deployment area or by any objective. Still, in some of the TY scenarios (like the Counterattack) you can really fast-forward your entire army to be just several inches away from an objective and get a 1st turn charge in or even capture it uncontested. This is huge and I expect it to be used very frequently, especially that in the Soviet Forces you can have more than one Spearheading Unit (each Formation can use one + your support also has the option for one).

Phew, seems I have gone through all the rules of Team Yankee - next mission is: list building :P

And now for something completely different - a Twilight Struggle review

Hello everybody, time has come for the first topic that is only loosely related to Flames of War (or rather Team Yankee). Today, I will be sharing some thoughts around a boardgame that myself and my wife purchased a few months ago: Twilight Struggle. The reason I selected this topic is that I think this game is perfect for any Team Yankee fans who still do not have the models or an opponent to play against but want to have a taste of this Cold War era fun. It functions on a different detail level than BF's miniature game for sure, but is still a great opportunity to get a better understanding of the events happening between 1945 and 1989. In this short article I will say a few words about the two main aspects of the game: theme & mechanics and try to convince some of the readers to maybe give Twilight Struggle a try.

Theme

The good news is that in this game you are on of the two most important persons in the world. The bad news is that your opponent is the other :) In Twilight Struggle one of the players assumes leadership of USA while the other of USSR - the two major powers in the Cold War era. This means you will be fighting on a really high, strategic level. This is also why the board is actually a huge map of the world, divided into several regions. Influencing these regions is the key objective of the players and drives a big part of the scoring system in Twilight Struggle. The game thus feels like a gigantic tug of war in which balance shifts from one side to the other, based on what is going on in the world.
Another part of the theme is built by event cards that contain a game effect that is also related to a historical fact which are distributed to the heads of each faction . These cards really help to build this massive immersion feeling that is prevalent throughout the game by giving good explanations of what kind of influence a given event would have in terms of the game mechanics.
Finally, there is the space race track, which represents achievements of each superpowers in rocket science and relates the historical clash between NASA and its Soviet counterpart.
All of these build a great feeling of a clash of titans and really add to the replayability of the game.

Mechanics

The game could be described as a card-driven area influence war game. Like I mentioned before, the main objective of the game is to gain points by influencing certain regions. These points however, are not a standard allotment per each turn. Instead, each player is dealt a hand of cards which comprise of two main sections: a star of a US (white) or Soviet (red) color, containing the number of influence points it grants and an event (helpful to the corresponding superpower). If you are dealt your faction's card, then you can play it for either influence points or the event. However, when you get your opponent's superpower card, you can only play it for points but also the text is triggered automatically. The combination of these two factors makes for a surprisingly good mechanic that forces the player to balance and mitigate risks by playing cards in the right sequence at the right time. Another type of cards are Culmination events which target a given region and force a calculation of influence each player has in it. Based on defined criteria, victory points are added on the victory track for the superpower that is either present in the region or is dominating/controlling it.
This main mechanic of the game is also combined with a lot of other rules that define how the game is played. There are, however a few main ones that affect it:
- coups which by spending all points on a card let you roll a die and if the roll went well decrease the other superpower's influence in the targeted country and/or increase our own
- alignment change which allows for a roll to decrease the opponent's influence per each point spent from the card. Downside is that you cannot build your own influence if you succeed
- space race track which represents each superpower's advances in rocket science but in game terms serves more as a way to get rid of really punishing cards (as you use cards to get a chance to advance in the race) and sometimes as a way to get one or two extra victory points
With so many subtleties, Twilight Struggle makes for a very interesting and challenging game. Really, there are so many options you can choose from that players become vulnerable to analysis paralysis :)

Final thoughts

Now that you have gone through this lengthy article I have to say that my approach towards the game is a bit of love and hate at the same time. The theme is great, it relates to the Team Yankee setting, lets you play god (or one of the two gods :) ) and teaches you history. Also, the mechanic is intricate and has a lot of twists. However, there is one thing that really pisses me off about this game: for a big time investment (2-3 hours per game), it has a lot of randomness to it. A lot of the game depends on the cards you are dealt and how successful are you with your rolls. Of course you will be able to manage most of the risks but in some of the games you will have the bitter feeling that you did everything right but still lost the game. But for a veteran wargamer this is nothing new, correct?
My final verdict though is: you should give the game a try. 99% chance that you are going to like it, despite its possible shortcomings. Sexy Sixes approved! :)