Old School Tactical II – First Look!
From north of the border comes an advance look at what’s in the box ~
Vance Strickland, 18 October 2017
Here is everything that arrived today in my KickStarter Old School Tactical Vol. II package!
10/18/17
Tag: Board Games
10/14/17
GrogHeads Reviews War in the Wind: The Battle for Attu Island, May 1943
The obscure WWII PTO shootout gets the GrogHeads once-over ~
Michael Eckenfels, 14 October 2017
In June of 1942, as part of the Midway attack plan, Japanese troops landed on the Alaskan islands of Attu and Kiska. These two inhospitable, mountainous islands were home to little but cold weather and leg-breaking slopes. The Japanese thought it prudent to occupy for…well, the reasons depend on what source you read. Some think they thought occupying part of a U.S. State would cause a tremendous morale drop among Americans; others thought it was meant to help ‘shield’ their northern flank, because both islands were closer to Japan than Alaska. Regardless of the reasons, the Japanese arrived, found little resistance, and after bombing Dutch Harbor to the east a few times, settled in for a long occupation.
American troops didn’t arrive until May 11, 1943, and were woefully unprepared for it.
That occupation lasted nearly a year. American troops didn’t arrive until May 11, 1943, and were woefully unprepared for it. The troops earmarked for the invasion were training in southern California for operations in the south Pacific – not for operations in near-Arctic mountainous conditions. The powers-that-be thought the attack would be brief, only lasting a few days, whereas when all was said and done, it took nearly three weeks. It might have taken longer had the Japanese not executed one of the biggest banzai charges of the war, costing them half their casualties. The number of troops they lost came close to 2400, with only 28 prisoners taken. The Americans suffered about 550 killed, 1200 wounded, and another 1800 or so wounded due to exposure, frostbite, trenchfoot, gangrene, and a number of other nasty, debilitating conditions. It was by no means a cake walk, though the result was inevitable.
10/11/17
Tracer Rounds: What Do You Buy, Read, or Play?
Rapid fire thoughts about your game acquisitions ~
Brant Guillory, 11 October 2017
Plenty of us have a stack of wargames that we haven’t played yet. And quite frankly, there’s a not-insignificant portion of that stack that is, in all honesty, unlikely to ever get played. Occasionally, we’re just holding onto something in unpunched condition (ie, “investing”). Sometimes we got it, read thru it a bit, and decided we weren’t going to play it after all. But how many of us bought something with the express purpose of studying the game more than playing it?
What do you buy? What do you read or study? And what do you actually play?
That brings up a very interesting three-part question: What do you buy? What do you read or study? And what do you actually play?
In my case, I buy a lot of games from designers and companies I like to support (that said, I’m a bad comparison for “what do you buy?” because as the editor at GrogHeads and a regular reviewer of games, I don’t spend nearly as much on games as it might appear). But the games that I study and the games that I play do tend to diverge quite a bit. Continue reading
10/2/17
Alien vs Predator – First Look!
Michael digs into the sci-fi shootout game ~
Michael Eckenfels, 2 October 2017
Digging into a battle game with a pair of iconic sci-fi franchises facing off… again.
More coming on this one in the future…
Chat about it below, or in our forums, or hit our FaceBook page >>
09/25/17
GrogHeads Reviews Table Battles
Hollandspiele’s new ‘abstract’ wargame hits the table ~
Doug Miller, 25 September 2017
I’m a hardcore grog. I like my games with hexes and chits. Fifty-page rule books don’t scare me, in fact they often appeal to me. I’m a lot more interested in the simulation value of most games than I am their playability. I’m interested in narrative and historical accuracy. I like maps. A lot.
All of which are reasons that I’m something of an odd choice as reviewer for Hollandspiel’s latest, Tom Russell’s Table Battles.
Table Battles bills itself as “a thinky filler, a light dice game that nevertheless will have you scratching your chin and agonizing over your decisions.” Tom himself posted in a Facebook discussion something to the effect that it might not be a wargame. There is no map. There isn’t any movement of pieces.
