Tag: European Theater

10/10/15

Bonus AAR! Rommel Attacks, ’43 (part 2)

What does a 4-player throwdown look like in Gary Grigsby’s War in the West: Operation Torch?  The gang at Matrix Games shows us ~

Matrix Games, 10 October 2015

Turn 3

Axis Air Commander

On Turns 2 and 3 I provided Stuka Ground Attacks on enemy concentrations until Fatigue and Low Morale forced me to ground the Stukas to recover.  At this point my goal switched to keeping the enemy aircraft away from our Ground Forces by flying Air Superiority Missions over the most dangerous part of our Front, which was in the Center.  I believe this was also quite successful although I was not able to see the Air Battles raging during the Ground Phase.

Axis Ground Commander

The battle continues to rage to the north of Sdid Bouzid but the Allies are unable to exploit forward.

Torch-017-screenshot

I take this turn quietly and ensure that I take easy chances to push back units that have over extended. I bide my time as I don’t want to exhaust my combat power and open myself to being caught by a counter attack.

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10/9/15

Bonus AAR! Rommel Attacks, ’43 (part 1)

What does a 4-player throwdown look like in Gary Grigsby’s War in the West: Operation Torch?  The gang at Matrix Games shows us ~

Matrix Games, 9 October 2015

This is an AAR of a 4 player game of the Rommel Attacks 43 scenario from Gary Grigsby’s War in the West: Operation Torch. Rommel Attacks is a short 5 turn scenario that covers the Axis counter-attack that led to the Battle of the Kasserine Pass. In the actual battle, after initial success, the Axis attack was halted and the German command withdraw some of the forces to focus on the British 8th Army arriving from Libya. In this scenario, the German forces are retained by the Axis player for the duration of the scenario, so the Axis side is expected to seize critical objectives and hold them.

Operation Torch allows each side to be split in two for true multiplayer play, with one player commanding the air forces and the other the ground forces. The players in this game, all from the Torch development team, were:

  • Axis Air Commander – Randy Seger (scenario designer)
  • Axis Ground Commander – John Young (scenario designer)
  • Allied Air Commander – Erik Rutins (producer)
  • Allied Ground Commander – Joel Billings (game developer)

This AAR will mix in comments from the different players. This was John’s first play through the scenario, while Joel had the advantage of having played an earlier version of the scenario as the German ground commander in a 4 player test game.

Torch-001-screenshot

There are 7 territorial objectives in this scenario, with various victory points awarded, each turn and at the end of the game, for control of these objectives. In addition, victory points are awarded for causing casualties, but the bulk of the victory points in the scenario stem from control of the objectives.

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08/19/15

Tank on Tank – First Look!

LNLP reboots the Tank on Tank franchise with 2 new boxed games

Brant Guillory, 19 August 2015

Click images to enlarge

Lock’n’Load Publishing has brought back the Tank on Tank franchise, with the long-awaited East Front stand-alone game to accompany the previous version, now labeled as West Front.  What’s in the boxes?  Lessee…

The boxes are the standard LNLP "thin" boxes, which stack nicely on the game shelf alongside all their others.
The boxes are the standard LNLP “thin” boxes, which stack nicely on the game shelf alongside all their others.

edit: to clarify, when referring to the standard LNLP “thin” box, we’re referring to the height of the box, and not the thickness of the actual box material.  These things are pretty substantial, but are only about 1″ high.  They are not the paper-thin tuck boxes of LNLP days gone by.

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02/27/15

GrogHeads Advanced Research on Projects Advisory #65

GARPA IN SPAAAAACE!  OK, not just in space, but there’s a pair of space games for you this week, along with some OCS action and the non-explosive type of RPG.

Falling Stars: War of Empires (LNLP)
$2600 of $10k, ends 26 March 2015

With its new ownership, LNLP is branching out into digital products, too, and they’ve’ got a 4x space game out there for you to check out.  A strategic game that includes a heavy dose of negotiations with its ‘bartering’ mechanics, Falling Stars gives you more than just a ‘chat with people before you kill them’ vibe for its diplomatic channels.  Check out the Kickstarter page, or find them on Steam Greenlight, and stay tuned to GrogHeads for a preview soon.

g65-falling

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