2023 Retrospective

2023 has been another relatively quiet year for me hobby-wise. I started the year with five goals

Have a good clear out of the random junk in the hobby cupboard.

This I achieved. I had a really good tidy-up in October, bought some new storage solutions, and offloaded some old bits and pieces.

The remaining objectives weren't met: I didn't play any non-FOW games, and didn't make any progress on my ALDG projects.

I played in three FOW tournaments during the year.

ValleyCon was 111pts Late War held in April. I painted a new army for it: a Soviet Rifle Regiment from Berlin: Soviet.

Rifle Regiment - Berlin: Soviet

Regiment HQ

Rifle Company (mid strength with panzerfaust and 1 x Maxim)

Storm Group (full strength with panzerfaust, Maxim and flamethrower)

82mm Mortar Company (6 x 82mm mortar)

120mm Mortar Company (3 x 120mm mortar)

Heavy Tank Killer Company (4 x 76mm gun)

Armoured Car Platoon (3 x BA-64, with 2 x PTRD)

M4 Sherman (76mm) Tank Company (5 x M4 Sherman (76mm)) 

IS-2 (Late) Guards Heavy Tank Company (4 x IS-2)

Unditiching Logs command card (IS-2)

Total Cost: 111 pts

The list was great. It was my first time playing Soviets in FOW since 1st Edition, and while you can argue that Careful troops aren't exactly the classic Soviet experience in FOW, it was still a nice change from Western lists. I won three games, drew two games, and finished tied for 4th place.

The second tournament was Panzerschreck, held in July. This year it was 140pt Late War doubles. I partnered with Bede again, running lists from Berlin: German. My half of the list was four 10.5cm FlaK39 railway cars, and a formation of Fallschirmjager from Fortress Europe. We tied for third out of 18, but lost the dice-off so finished in fourth place again.

The final event was Remember December. This was 60pts Mid War, book points, no Top Armour 2, and only one Support unit. I ran a British Rifle Company:

Rifle Company - North Africa

Company HQ

Rifle Platoon (full strenth)

Rifle Platoon (minimum strenth) 

Rifle Platoon (minimum strenth)

Mortar Platoon (4 x 3-inch mortars)

Anti-tank Platoon (3 x 6-pounders)

Universal Carrier Patrol (3 x Universal Carriers)

Universal Carrier Patrol (3 x Universal Carriers)

Valentine III Death or Glory Troop (3 x Valentine III)

Captured Tank command card (Rifle Company)

Cavalry Commander command card (Valentines)

Total Cost: 60 pts

I started pretty well with two wins, but fell apart in the final game. The Rifle Company played well- I definitely needed all of the infantry, but the Valentines weren't quite as tough as I'd hoped they'd be. The Captured Tank card was a bit of fun: I managed to capture an AB41 in Game 1 and a Stuart in Game 3.

I've continued writing for No Dice No Glory, but my output slowed during the year due to work pressures:

• An overview of Berlin: Soviet
• An article on my Canadian Rifles list from ValleyCon 2022
• A review of the Battlefront Sexton/Ram kit
• A piece on assembling the Battlefront 10.5cm railway car

For 2024, I'm going to keep over a couple of the goals from 2023.

1. I want to paint my ECW Royalists for ADLG-R.
2. I want to play two rulesets that aren't FOW.

FOW has a couple of new things coming out this year, with "Late War Leviathans" adding prototype and 1946 tanks to the game, followed by "Clash of Steel" as an alt-history spinoff. The models look cool, but I'm not sure how much interest there will be locally. 

Tournament-wise, ValleyCon is likely to be Mid War FOW this year, so I'll be looking to put together a new army for that. I can't play at Panzerschreck this year, but hopefully I can make an appearance at Call To Arms in August instead.

2022 Retrospective

I was flicking back through the photos I'd taken during 2022 to try and remember what I've done throughout the year. It turns out that a lot of what I thought had occurred in 2022 was actually from 2021. In effect, the last two years seem to have blurred into one. Matters haven't been helped by not having written a retrospective at the end of 2021, so I don't have a convenient marker to separate the two.

Looking back to the end of 2020, my goals for 2021 had been to run a T-80 company in Team Yankee, play through the Smugglers' Run campaign for Black Seas, paint 1500pts for 40K, and organise a FOW ladder tournament for the club. Of these I only achieved the first: a single game with T-80s against Pelarel's Challengers in December 2021. The 40K setting simply hasn't captured my interest as much as it would need to for me to devote that much time and money to building an army and learning the rules, and it turns out FOW isn't played often enough locally to support a ladder.

Moving on to 2022, I didn't play a huge number of games during the year. Most of my games were focused around the two Flames of War tournaments that I played in.

Priest Kangaroos

ValleyCon was 100pts Late War held in June. I ran a Canadian Rifle Company from D-Day: British, themed on Operation Totalize, with the gimmick being trying to run it as an artillery-centric "Always Attack" force.

Rifle Company - D-Day: British

Company HQ

Rifle Platoon (full strength)

Rifle Platoon (full strength)

6pdr Anti-tank Platoon (4 x 6pdr)

Wasp Carrier Patrol

Universal Carrier Patrol

2 x 25pdr Field Troop (4 x 25pdr each)

M10 SP Anti-tank Platoon (4 x M10 (3-inch))

Sherman OP

Relentless command card (two Rifle Platoons)

Kangaroo Transport command card (two Rifle Platoons)

Carrier Transport command card (6pdrs) 

AGRA command card (eight guns) 

Total Cost: 100 pts

I never wrote a review of the event, but the list was an interesting challenge. I won two games, drew two, and lost one, placing 9th out of 14. Funnily enough for a list that I had intended to attack with, my two wins were when I chose to defend due to facing large numbers of light vehicles. It definitely could attack, but really needed a third Rifle Platoon and the 17pdr version of the M10s. I'm tempted to try again at a later date, using a similar list built using Bulge: British that incorporates those lessons.

6pdrs

A 25pdr Battery

The second tournament was Panzerschreck, held in July. This year it was 140pt Mid War doubles. I partnered with Bede again, and we chose to run German Panzers, built around Borgwards and Hornisse. We had decided not to take the event too seriously, hence a force deliberately built around the inefficient long-barrelled Panzer III while avoiding the underpriced Marder, however we placed 4th out of 12.

My Panzer IIIs in action at Panzerschreck 2022

I didn't do anything for Team Yankee during the year. The Russian invasion of Ukraine removed all enthusiasm for doing any further work on my Soviets. I also have concerns about the balance of the game, which heavily favours ATGMs and 1960s equipment at the expense of the 1980s/90s technology that was the main attraction of the game in the first place. The release of Nordic Forces and Free Nations 2 in 2023 might restore some interest, but until the Dynamic Points philosophy is extended to TY, there's not much that can be done to fix the balance.

I've continued writing for No Dice No Glory, and have averaged a post per month over the course of the year. A number of my pieces were related to release of the North Africa compilation for FOW:

• Comparing the British lists to their V3 versions.
• Exploring the changes to the German support tree compared to V4's Afrika Korps.
• Looking at a more competitive build of the Crusader Squadron boxed set.

Another couple of posts related to the release of Bulge: British, digging into the details of the infantry lists and the reconnaissance Command Cards.

While I expect to keep using NDNG as my main writing platform, I intend to keep this blog open as it gives me a place to post things that don't fit well with NDNG.

2022 marked my first foray into board wargaming. Malta Besieged arrived just in time for me to play it while recovering from Covid,  and I also picked up a copy of The African Campaign. I can see myself playing more hex-and-counter games in future, subject to being able to find games with a strong solitaire mode. It has a significant nostalgia element, as it reminds me of the hours I spent playing Allied General as a teenager.

Malta Besieged

The African Campaign

I will start 2023 by running FOW for Remember December 2022. This event was delayed by a month due to many players being unavailable for the usual date of the first club meeting in December. This is going to be 85pts Late War, with forces to be built using the Bulge books.

There are a number of other events occurring during 2023, with Charicon in February (100pts Mid War), ValleyCon in April (111pts Late War), Panzerschreck in July (Late War doubles), an ADLG event planned for October, and of course RD coming around again in December. I won't be able to play in all of them, so I have a decision to make about which ones to prioritise.

The most important thing, though, is that I need to have a serious think about what I actually want to play, and try to find some focus. I've got lots of random stuff lying around, and a number of rulesets that I've never played,  There are games that I'd like to play more (Fate of a Nation, ADLG, Seven Days to the River Rhine), and games that I'd like to try (for example, Lion Rampant, Blood and Steel, Iron Cross could be a good option for 28mm WW2, O Group in 15mm might provide a different experience to FOW).

With this in mind, my plan for 2023 is:

1. Have a good clear out of the random junk in the hobby cupboard.

2. Play games of two rulesets that I own but haven't played before.

3. Rebase my 28mm Impetus Italians to give me 200pts for ADLG.

4. Paint 220pts of 15mm ECW Royalists for ADLG-R.

5. Consolidate my FOW/TY collections: tidying up and offloading any forces that I'm not passionate about, and finishing off the ones that I want to keep.

That is a relatively short list that should be achievable. Let's see how we get on.

2020 Retrospective

It's hard to do a hobby retrospective for 2020 without mentioning the pandemic. In New Zealand we were blessed that our remoteness gave the government time to put together a heavy-handed but effective response, combined with a whole lot of luck, which eliminated community transmission of the virus and allowed us to have a normal Christmas.

I managed to keep up with monthly posts until June, after which I totally overwhelmed with work and lacked the motivation and energy to do anything. In that time I did however manage a total of 13 posts, which was a significantly better effort than the year before.

The year was bookended by 100pt TY at ValleyCon and 60pt FOW-MW at Remember December. I ran T-64s at ValleyCon, placing fourth, and Afrika Korps panzers at Remember December, also placing fourth.

I didn't write about Remember December, nor take any photos, but as usual it was a great day. I ran a Panzer III company:

Panzer III Tank Company - Afrika Korps

Company HQ - 2 x Panzer III (short 5cm)

Panzer III Tank Platoon - 3 x Panzer III (short 5cm), 1 x Panzer III (long 5cm)

Panzer IV Tank Platoon - 2 x Panzer IV (short 7.5cm), 1 x Panzer IV (long 7.5cm)

Panzer II Light Tank Platoon - 3 x Panzer II

Total Cost: 60 pts

I thought the list would be terrible, but it was felt pretty good. I lost my first game against a US Rifle Company -  I made the error of choosing Attack rather than Manoeuvre, which forced me into a No Retreat, losing because I didn't know that the newest version of the mission requires you to remain within 8" of an objective to keep the game going beyond Turn 6. I won the next two, against US Lees/Stuarts in Free For All (by the skin of my teeth and some very lucky Unit Last Stand tests), and a Panzer IV company in Encounter (confirming that the short 7.5cm is terribly over-costed).

I had a good spurt of painting FOW in the middle of the year, finishing most of the remaining models I had left for my Mediterranean British - two more platoons of armoured cars and platoons of Mk VIBs, Carriers, Vickers MGs, and 4.2" mortars. I didn't touch my TY Syrians.

I had three goals for 2020 relating to 28mm - painting and playing. I painted two squads of Perry Fallschirmjager, but did not play any games with them, nor did I do any work on the 28mm Landsknechts.

My most successful goal was to paint a Black Seas fleet box, which I changed during the year to be painting the Royal Navy ships required to play the Smugglers' Run campaign. I fell slightly short, needing just two more cutters to complete this fleet. With Warlord Games not having released a cutter model at the time (one is now available), I ordered some from Hagen Miniatures in June. Covid got in the way, with Deutsche Post spending much of the year not shipping to New Zealand, and I only received them in December.

I have decided to set fewer goals for 2021.

1. Field a T-80 company for Team Yankee. I have picked up the Soviet halves of a couple of the new TY starter sets, which are great value for the number of sprues that they contain, so need to paint them up and get them on the table.

2. Play a 1500pt game of 40K. I painted up about 400pts of Adeptus Mechanicus this year, so there's a bit of work needing to be done first.

3. Play through the Smugglers' Run campaign for Black Seas.

4. Administer a FOW ladder tournament for the club.

So happy new year, and thanks for reading the blog. Stay safe, and best wishes for 2021.

2019 Retrospective

It's been a pretty poor effort blogging-wise this year, achieving only four posts.

As usual the year started with preparation for ValleyCon. The format was 85pt mid war. I completed my Italy-theatre British Rifle Company, and placed 4th.

My second goal for the year was to do something to mark the 75th anniversary of D-Day. We ran a multiplayer game of FOW at the Hutt Club on 8 June.

The remaining goals saw no progress. I didn't touch my 28mm FJ or Warmachine models. I did play a couple of games of Cruel Seas and bought the starter set, but it was quickly overtaken by Black Seas. I did actually buy some 28mm Landsknechts for Impetus (Artizan Designs, purchased through Kapiti Hobbies, the best hobby shop in New Zealand), but haven't started painting them.

For 2020, I'm going to steal an idea from Pooch of The Regiment blog, and keep to a schedule of monthly posts, tracking my goals through to completion. The theme for the year is going to be focused on uncompleted projects.

1. Paint my 28mm FJ. I've completed one squad, with two more to go, plus an HMG and a medium mortar. On a related note:

2. Find a set of WW2 rules that I enjoy playing in 28mm.

3. Paint the Landsknechts!

4. Complete a Black Seas fleet box. I'm working my way through the Master and Commander set at the moment, and will look to add to it once it's done.

5. Try out Battlegroup: NORTHAG, and write a review. These rules are meant to be out early in 2020, and appear to be compatible with TY basing.

6. Complete some of the random FOW platoons that I have lying around. There are quite a few of these, so I'll come up with a full list over summer.

7. Syrians for Team Yankee. It would be fair to say that Soviet T-72s are suboptimal in TY, so I started turning them into a Syrian T-72M company, intending to run them at ValleyCon in January. I ran out of time for that, but will continue with the project and finish the army.

8. Put together an event or campaign of some kind. I'm not yet sure what this could be.

Thanks for reading, and happy new year. I will definitely be endeavouring to write more in 2020 than I did in the year just gone.

2018 Retrospective

I entered 2018 with five main goals, and this is my review of how I went.

My first goal was to finish my FOW army for ValleyCon 18. This was a mid war competition, coming after the release of the first four North African theatre books. I ran a Panzer III company from 21st Panzer Division themed on the Gazala Line battles of May/June 1942, placing a glorious last without a single win. I didn't write a post about how it went, so the details are a bit hazy, but there were a few lessons. I had made some deliberately sub-optimal list choices for the sake of theme, one being the use of 88s instead of Marders. I also should have taken a platoon of armoured cars for 2pts rather than the Forward Scouts card on the Panzer IIs. I still think Panzers should be effective if you take the time to develop experience with them, but the list is so small that the margin for error is tiny.

The second goal was to buy some Italian light cavalry and a Landsknecht square for Impetus. I'm happy to say that I now have the cavalry, although they have yet to see any paint. The Landsknechts will roll over once again.

The big effort for the year was Team Yankee. My actual goal for the year was a NATO list to play in both 30pt (noting that since then we have established 45pts as a local standard) and 100pt games. Instead of going down that path, my Warsaw Pact collection grew significantly, adding more Hinds, the various BRDM-based support weapons, and my first T-64s, plus a bit of terrain. It was a good year for TY in the club, with many more people starting armies and playing at Remember December, and 2019 promises to be even better as those armies expand, with people looking at playing TY at the Nationals at Easter, and Panzerschreck in July.

My next objective for the year was to look into Fate of a Nation. I purchased a copy when it was released, and like the look of it, but haven't played a game yet. I'm still keen to have a few games with proxies in before committing to purchase anything for it.

The last item on my list was to try a couple of other WW2 rulesets. We had a couple of playtest games of a ruleset written by a member of the club, which was fun and got me painting some 28mm FJ, but I haven't yet had either Chain of Command or Battlegroup on the table.

In other events during the year, I ran the club's V3 Impetus competition in August. That was a good day, and I'm looking forward to seeing the 2nd Edition of Impetus when it's released next year.

Triple T vs McZermof

McBeth vs Reg

Scott's Elephant

Having had a think about goals for 2019, I have the following list:

1. As always, the first priority is preparation for FOW at Valleycon. I have some mid war British infantry, gun crews, and carriers still to paint up for that. 
2. D-Day 75. 6 June marks the 75th anniversary of D-Day, and it seems like a multiplayer game of FOW would be in order. There's a bit of planning, painting, and terrain building required for that. It will become a focal point for the first few months of the year, and will clear out a fair amount of my unpainted FOW stash. The event will also serve as a last hurrah for the old Overlord/Atlantik Wall V3 books before late war lists start being rereleased under the V4 format.
3. Extend the 28mm FJ, and use them in a few games. Ideally I'd get to the point of being able to having enough in case 1000pts is required for Bolt Action, but the primary interest would be in seeing how Chain of Command goes. Putting together some 28mm terrain wouldn't go amiss, either.
4. Cruel Seas. I'm quite excited by this, as it is something completely different to my other games. I plan to build a Royal Navy fleet for it.
5. Warmachine. After a couple of years away from this, I've decided that I will try and play a few games of it next year. I have a couple of models still to paint up, and might even buy a new warjack or two.
6. Yes, the Landsknecht pike block. This first appeared on my To Do list in 2015, and I'm still no closer to completing it. It's part of a larger project to repaint and rebase my existing Impetus army, and 2nd Edition should provide the required nudge.

Looking back through the list, Team Yankee is notable by its absence. There are a couple of units that I would add, particularly DANA and BM-21s (to make the most of the new artillery rules that will be coming with 2nd Edition), Geckos (because they're ridiculous), and another infantry company (because the BF plastics are great, and so I can run a larger Afgantsy battalion), but those are all relatively minor things. I have toyed around with the idea of doing West German Leopard 1s, or the French to see if they're really as bad as they look on paper, but at the moment I'm thinking it would be better to spend my TY time getting more experience with the Soviets, to try and be more competitive with them.

Who knows what else will take my fancy during the year. Will I jump into FOAN? Will I do some Soviets for FOW? How about an Ancients army? Will I finally succumb to the allure of GW products? One thing's for sure, I've enjoyed getting back into blogging over the last few months, and and will endeavour to continue doing it regularly.

So, happy new year, thanks for reading my blog, and I wish you well for the year ahead.

2017 Retrospective

With 2017 done and dusted, it's time for a look back at what I've worked on over the last 12 months, whether I achieved any of the goals I had set for myself, and look ahead to what 2018 might hold.

As always, the year began with the Early War FOW competition at ValleyCon. I ran a British Motor Company themed on 1st Armoured Brigade in Greece. I won four games out of seven, placing mid table, and winning Best Army.

Item three on my list was Team Yankee, and this was one of my main painting efforts for the year, putting together 100+ points of Soviets. There are only two of us at the club that play in 15mm, but we had some enjoyable games in March and November.

In May there was also a big multiplayer TY game in 6mm.

The major change during the year was FOW V4. I finished painting my Comets, although have not yet added the Cromwell CS tanks, and played a couple of enjoyable 1750pt 8x6 games with them in April. The plan had been to rebase my desert Brits and finish off a few odds and ends, but this didn't happen, partly because after the initial glow of some excellent tank battles using the new system, I became concerned about how it handles infantry combat. More on this in a later post, probably.

The last item on my list for the year was related to Impetus. I didn't add any light cavalry to my Florentines, so that task will roll over yet again. I was encouraged to play in V3 in June, despite hardly knowing the rules and only having a renaissance army to take to a competition that was classically themed, and had a great time.

My goals for 2018 are:

1. Finalise my FOW list for ValleyCon 18 - I will be running an Afrika Korps list, but the details are not yet confirmed. The fact that I'm still at this stage of the process when the competition is only four weeks away is a pretty clear reflection of my feelings towards the game, given that in previous years I'd sorted my lists out in August, and spent the last three months of the year painting for it. I have the feeling that my interest in FOW will either live or die by how V4 performs at ValleyCon. 
2. Actually buy and paint some Italian light cavalry and Landsknechts for Impetus after two years of just talking about it.
3. More Team Yankee. I want to add a NATO force for both the 30pt and 100pt formats, and hopefully lure a few more locals into at least trying the game in 15mm.
4. I will be taking a close look at 'Fate of a Nation' when it is rereleased. The original version missed the mark in terms of game balance, but hopefully the extension of the game to 1973 fixes this.
5. Not entirely unrelated to Item 1, a couple of us are going to be trying out Battlegroup and Chain of Command. I have picked up the core rules for Battlegroup, plus the Normandy and Market Garden supplements, but haven't put it on the table yet.

So happy new year, thanks for reading, and I wish you well for the year ahead.

2016 Retrospective

I started 2016 with a long list of gaming goals. In the event, the realities of life meant that most of the items on the list ended up either annotated "2017?", or simply crossed off as unlikely to ever happen. That makes this post a rather short review of my achievements for the year.

As we're out of town for the holidays, the photos in this post have to be repeats of ones from earlier in the year, rather than anything new.

The Flames of War competition at ValleyCon was the first event of the year, and as always it was an enjoyable two days. The location was excellent, the comp had a great format, and I played seven games with people I hadn't met before. The majority of the army hasn't seen the light of day since, but the infantry that I painted for it did form the basis for a mid-war event in December and my army for VC17 next month.

The Brandywine refight in March was another fun day spent with a bunch of great people. I had painted up two battalions of 28mm Perry Continentals for it, which was a nice change both in colour and scale from my usual painting, but to be honest I was glad when I finished them. Afterwards I acquired another painted battalion, and enough leftover sprues to make a fourth, so if any other AWI games come along in future I will be able to contribute a full brigade.

A highlight for the year was supposed to be Warmachine Mk III. I preordered the rules and spent quite a bit of time touching up my collection in preparation for it, but I have still not played a game of it. Part of the reason for this is a feeling, of course without being backed up by the experience of trying it and seeing first hand, that my unit-heavy collection needs a major revamp to make workable lists under the new edition, and the infantry that I had so lovingly repainted no longer have a meaningful role. It's still there in the background and there are a few other kits I wouldn't mind getting simply because they're amazing models, but to be honest I can't see myself playing it in competitions again, and at this stage there is no WM on my 2017 list.

One goal of 2016 was to pick up another system, and to that end I bought a second hand army of Italian Wars Florentines for Impetus, played a couple of games with them and quite enjoyed it. I had planned to add some light cavalry, start repainting the figures, and then play in V3 in May, but all of that was pushed back into next year at the earliest.

One thing that I have actually started, however, is picking up Team Yankee, and in 15mm rather than 6mm as I had originally intended. I don't plan on going overboard with it (I'm still not totally convinced about the scale) but the Battlefront kits are beautiful, and the idea is to build a couple of 60pt armies, starting with the Soviet starter box that I have bought to paint over summer.

The major news regarding 2017 is the upcoming release of the 4th Edition of FOW. I have mixed emotions about this. Version 3 is a good game, and it sounds like Version 4 makes major changes to it that are in line with the "TY is a closet open beta for V4" school of thought. Some of these changes sound refreshing, but others have left me wondering. Very little is certain at this early stage, but I do fear that 4th Edition will do to FOW, a game that has been a passion of mine for the last 15 years, what Mk3 did to my interest in Warmachine.

So, to summarise, what are my aims for 2017? In approximate order of priority:

1. Finish my ValleyCon army. I still have the portees, carriers, transport and objectives to paint. It seems like a lot when listed like that, but it's not difficult painting so should be achievable with four weeks to go. I also have to paint a platoon of Panzer IIs for the list my son will be taking. I had hoped to put together a new table of terrain for it, but that doesn't look likely to happen.
2. Flames of War 4th Edition. I have a decent quantity of 8th Army and Afrika Korps for a 1942 setting, and hopefully there'll be a fair amount of interest in giving it a go. I want to rebase the British teams I have to match my early war infantry, with the goal being to be able to play any Mediterranean setting from 1940 to 1944 just by using different vehicles and gun teams.
3. Team Yankee  - extension to 60 points of Soviets through the addition of Shilkas and an infantry company in BMPs, and getting a game or two, as there are a couple of people locally looking at trying it in 15mm as well.
4. Finishing off a number of other odds and ends for Flames of War - a squadron of Comets, various Shermans, M10s and Matildas, and the last few units for my LW Gebirgsjager. There might end up being a new army in there, depending on what competitions I am able to make it to during the year, but nothing planned at this stage.
5. Getting around to adding that Italian light cavalry for Impetus.

Hopefully I'll have more success keeping to these (slightly more limited) goals than I did in the year just gone. So, happy new year, and thanks for reading this blog. All the best to you for the year ahead.