I’ve thrown together an idea for a
short late war Flames of War campaign using input from a few different
people. The catalyst for this is Phil, who originally envisaged a FOW
tournament, with victory points and league tables. I felt this would work
better, and be more interesting to play in if it was styled more as a campaign,
but keeping the victory points and overall victor of a tournament. As
well as Phil, other people who have contributed ideas so far include Dennis,
Peter, Dave H, Aidan, and James. So here goes:
Background:
Following the partial success of Operation Market Garden, and other
allied actions, the Axis forces are now in full retreat towards their next best
line of defence; the River Rhine. If they are able to reach it they have
a chance of stemming the tide, although only if someone remembers to blow up
the bridge at Remagen obviously….
In this campaign you command your company as it fights its way either to
safety on the banks of the Rhine, or to prevent the enemy escaping retribution
and a good kicking and shorten the war. Just as in the actual event your
forces will be limited, and casualties could be heavy so you will need to
preserve your troops lives – plus nobody wants to die this late on surely?
The Mechanics: Technical Time
This is a short campaign, covering a scant 4 rounds of play where each
player and their army is only required to play one battle a round – with a
month counting as a round. This is similar to the Bloodbowl tournament
where each player only has to play one game a month so that FOW doesn’t
dominate existence, and players are not pressured to get games in.
- Games are to be played up to a total of 1750pts,
although it is not compulsory to take this many, and if one side wishes to
conserve their men by taking fewer points that’s fine, as long as they don’t
exceed the 1750pt maximum.
- Matchups will be drawn randomly for the first round, and then based on
players standing from the second onwards.
For example the Axis player with the highest points total (total of the
league if you will) will face the Allied player with the highest total, then 2nd
against 2nd and so on. You
may only play each opponent once, so you will get to play 4 different armies.
- Games will be played using the scenarios from the book, players should
roll to pick a random one from the below table of the more balanced ones:
1]. Free For All (pg276)
2]. Encounter (pg277)
3]. Fighting Withdrawal (pg283)
4]. Dust Up (pg278)
5]. No Retreat (pg279)
6]. Break Through (pg286)
- Players will gain victory points for each game they play following the
rules for this in the FOW rulebook (e.g. 5-2 in the victors favour, if the
victor only lost 1 platoon). At the end of the campaign the player with
the most victory points is the winner, while the side (Axis/Allies) with the
most combined victory points is the winning side (divided by the number of
players) – should your personal campaign be going terribly rest assured you can
still cut the hamstrings of the opposition and win your side the overall
victory! A draw will of course mean I will have to come up with some sort
of nasty bridge-related scenario to decide a winner….Don’t draw, I haven’t a
bridge.
- After each battle both players should send me their
result, let me know which option box (if any) they have lost or purchased back,
update their own copy of their army list with any lost/purchased boxes, and
finally send me the % of their army that they lost during the battle. So if they started with 1750pts, and lost
units totalling 950pts then they have lost 54% (round up) of their army.
- On the eventuality that two players end up on the
same number of points then the deciding factor will be the overall loss % of
each player (see above) – heavy losses will weight you down, lighter losses
will help, the player with a lower loss % will finish higher. The exception to this will be the top spot. If two players are tied for 1st
place then they have to play one last Playoff game, with the winner getting 1
victory point which will take them top.
Schedule:
Better have one
of these – below are each round, and the date by which games in that round
should have been played. If a player is
unable to complete a game for whatever reason, or concedes part the way in then
they automatically lose 6-1.
Round 1 – to be
played by the 6th November.
Round 2 – to be
played by the 4th December.
Round 3 – to be
played by the 1st January.
Round 4 – to the
played by the 5th February.
Choosing your army:
Each player must choose a legal late war company at the start of the
campaign (e.g. a Panzer Kompanie, or an American Rifle Company) and they will
use that specific company for every game. This should be from a late war Western Front list if at all possible,
more closer to the right period the better, but if (like me) you’ve only got
Grey Wolf then don’t worry, your force will still fit in. No Russians etc please!
- Each player should make 2 photo-copies of their force organisation chart,
one for themselves and one for the tournament organiser (Rick); if a platoon
they are using is wiped out during a game then that option box on the chart is no longer available to them for the rest of
the campaign – if your 88’s are destroyed in game one you’ve lost them and
clearly the high command haven’t the reserves, or the faith in your ability, to
send you any more or anything similar!
- The photo-copy is necessary so your opponent can witness you sadly
crossing that option out at the end of the battle. Core options (the
compulsory choice ones – HQ etc) are always renewable, and can be changed in
their consistency each game (e.g. you can choose to have your HQ armed with
panzerfausts one week, and just rifles the next).
- This rule means players have to think carefully about what they are
taking, and whether they want to risk their troops in the next game, hence the
choice of playing with up to 1750pts.
Players can purchase options which have been lost back by using victory points
– 2 victory points which they have previously earned can be sacrificed to
regain an option.
- No special warrior characters are allowed – Patton is too scary.
- Clarification – platoons that split into multiple
patrols (e.g. German heavy panzerspah) are only wiped out if all teams from all
patrols are destroyed.
- Players should be very clear on what is a support
option and what is a combat option if the same option can appear in both – for
example being able to field Panzer IV platoons in both.
The two sides, multiple games &
dropping out:
This system requires at least 4 players to be on each side, and also
allows for there to be an uneven balance in the numbers of players, for example
if there are 5 Germans and only 4 Allied players then the allies will have got
their months game in before one of the Germans can. In this case an Allied player can play a
second game using their army option available at the start of that month, but
they do not gain any additional victory points, only the Germans gain points or
suffer casualties for the game.
If a player has to drop out for whatever reason, or is unable to fulfil
the 4 games, then they are unable to win the campaign regardless of how many
VP’s they have already accrued. Their
side keeps the points towards overall allied/axis victory however.
Starting the Campaign & Scoring:
The campaign will start in October, and each players choice of company
should be in by the first Thursday (3rd October).
I will keep score and players should report their results to me, along
with which platoons they have lost, at the end of their game. I’ll post monthly results and points totals
as they come in.
Edited & Updated 23/9/13
