Flames of War 2017 Masters Preview

When the days get shorter and the leaves with their reddish hues fall from the sky, we all know it’s time for the annual FoW Masters Tournament. Each year the top 18 players in North America get an invite to play against those who have excelled during the 2017 tournament season which went from September 2016 to October 2017. The 2017 Masters will take place once again at Games and Stuff in Glenn Burnie Maryland and will feature six tough rounds over two days, the 17-18th of November. When the dust settles after round six, the 2017 champion will be crowned and the 2018 tournament season will begin in earnest.


I have been to a few of the previous master’s events, however I felt this year’s tournament would be even more interesting with the advent of V4 of the game. When the tournament season started everyone was playing V3 and the first big V4 Event wasn’t until the Mid-War Masters at Historicon in July. So, the players at this year’s event had to deal with the change of the rules more than halfway through the season.

Despite the change of rules, the invitees to this year’s event features a lot of the same faces as years past:

Joe Lewis
Chris Fretts
David Vigor
Chris Jackson
Ron Wismer
Chris Novak
James Best Jr.
Tony Davis
Brian Sullivan
Will Yankausky
Keith Gilmour
Andrew Hopson
James Best
James Copland
Ed Sales
Tim McClelland
Rob Duchesne
Bryan Koches

This year, all 6 of the games will take place in the Early War period with each list being set at 1625 points. I will assume that the lack of lists in the Mid-War period made it very hard to use for the event. Plus, who doesn’t love early war?

As he has done in previous years, Battlefront’s event coordinator - David Griffin - and has some curveballs for the players who attend . The 2017 event will be a “reversal tournament” where players will play with their opponent’s army for half of the 6 games. Having played in events like this before, I can attest that this format really challenges your skills as a player.

Dave also plans to keep everyone up to date via Battlefront’s Facebook page and full rules of the tournament can be found here.

The event is open to the public so please stop by to watch or root your favorite FoW player on! I am planning to attend the event and maybe interview some of the participants, so I hope to see you there!

WWPDMitch@gmail.com
Twitter: @MitchWWPD

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Team Yankee North American Nationals 2017: Mission Selection

Over the last few weeks I have been planning the upcoming first ever Team Yankee Nationals that will be held at Historicon on 14 July 2017.  One of the issues that seems to have gotten a lot of comments on various forums are the missions we plan to select for each of the 3 tournament games. I held off on this decision for a while because I wanted to get the advice of others and I wanted to see what lists players planned to run at the event. I know that any decision I could make would draw the ire of the denizens of the forums.
My thoughts on making this decision were based on two major factors, 1) keeping the selection fair for all players and 2) not wanting the insane to run the asylum.

What I have notice so far in playing this game since it came out is that you do not have a very wide selection of lists from each nation to choose from and that there is a vast difference in the composition of the available forces. At 100 points an East German player can have 63 T-55AM2’s while a West German Player tops out at 9 Leopard 2’s, each list costing 99 points.  However list selection is left up to the players and that is something I didn’t want to get involved with. However based on the rules of the mission, a player can end up with a mission that their force is not built to accomplish. My thoughts on this is for players to build a better list that can handle any type of mission. However that thinking could be more based on Flames of War and may not be applicable for Team Yankee based on the lack of list diversity.

This lack of diversity is not Battlefront’s fault, modern armies are standardized and have a cross section of combat capabilities within them. The main difference in an armor force as opposed to a mechanized unit is one armor battalion is swapped for a mech unit. Combat support for both units will also be relatively the same.

So based on this I took a look at the “Expanded Missions” pdf that was put out to augment the number of missions that are available for players. Also in this expansion is mechanic called “Battle Plans” where players can bid to attack or defend and bases on that selection a type of mission is given o them and they roll off.  At first I did not care for this method, I felt that TOs should dictate what missions are played in order to make sure it is fair for all and that using battle plans rewards players who have on trick pony lists.

Another things I factored into the decision is that a lot of folks feel battles will time out. I feel that 2.5 hours per game is enough time and players who want to be competitive know they have to act aggressively and try to win the game instead of having a tie. Some players feel that certain missions lead to a tie more often than not, however I feel that good players know how to win and put forth tactics to achieve their goals in the time allotted. 

So after doing my research I feel that using the Battle Plans for the tournament is the right call and is a really neat mechanic. Deep down I still think it may favor certain types of lists which I will not go into here, however it is way we will go for the 2017 Nationals.

So let me set up the ground rules
- Players will have a copy of the Team Yankee Expanded Missions on them at the event. A link can be found here.
- Players will have 5 mins from the time table assignments are given to review the table and their opponents list, pick a “Battle Plan” and roll for a mission.
- Players will accept the mission that is rolled and will not re-roll even in both players mutually agree that they do not wish to play the rolled mission or have played that mission previously during the event.

So with this put to rest I want to once again plug the event.  The prize support and the fact that it is the first of its kinds means that you can have fun and be a part of history. Now if we can get more players who are not in love with the Leopard book we will be set.

You still have time to register; please send your list/force selection to WWPD2017wwiii@gmail.com


Twitter: @MitchWWPD
Mail: WWPDMitch@gmail.com

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Cold War Singles 2017 - Last Call for V3

I was foolish enough to sign up for 6 games of FOW in 2 days.  I had a blast, and even squeezed in a team Yankee game in between, but man, was that a lot of standing and measuring and rolling dice.  cheers to the folks with the stamina to do that at nationals, I haven't yet had the pleasure.

When choosing a list for my last major tournament in V3, I wanted ride out on the horse I rode in on.  The 2nd Household Cavalry.  With the new V4 rules, recce isn't quite as fun anymore.  no more disengaging.  no more exposing ambushes.  the recon move itself has less utility than it did.  the special rule these guys have, to disengage after having shot, would be gone.  So i gathered all my dingos for one more crusade.

Kurt Reese was nice enough to lend me his display board, he carries a spare.

9 platoons (when you include the Staghound HQ platoon)

Priority air would also do a lot of work this tournament.  The v4 rules at first had me excited, but after looking that they had nerfed the Typhoons rockets to be AT 3 in a bombardment, I don't really ever see a reason to be taking them in the future.  I would have used them to kill heavy tanks, but now that's not going to happen.  Cannons are AT 8, and on a side armor for a tiger of.....8. what's the point? Live it up while you can I suppose.

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1945 LW FOW Tournament - Feb 18th "The Final Hour" - Kirwan's Game Store

The end of V3 is fast approaching, as many regular readers of this blog are aware.  And with it comes a possible end to many lists and models we held dear.  In an effort to say our final goodbyes to a version of the rules many of us loved dearly over the past 1/2 a decade, Chris Johnson (my arch enemy) helped put together a tournament up at Kirwan's Game Store. 1945pts LW, 3 rounds, beginning at 11am.

Below - Chris Johnson and a raffled off German Panzer Army for EW.  Everyone started with one ticket, but each loss earned you another ticket. (very good idea)

My List: I debated a lot about what to bring.  I decided on something I could never get to work.  I had only played them once, at 1425 pts and they were the worst list I ever brought to a tournament.  I should have known better at the time, but there it is.  What is over pointed like crazy? What is a fast tank? What has the stink of the oddly non-synergistic British rules about them.....you guessed it.  Comets.

My List - Nachtjager
British Motor Company (which for some reason is an Infantry company)
HQ - 2 white scout cars with cmd and 2ic
1 - Motor Platoon (cmd MG team + 3 MG teams w/ piat and lt mortar) (6 stands)
2 - Motor Platoon (full)
3 - required scout platoon (3 UC's)
4 - Wasp platoon
5 - AT guns 6pdrs
6 - mortar platoon
7 - 4 comets
8 - 4 comets

for a grand total of 1945 pts.

First Round - Joey Laderoute from Blackmoon Games in Lebanon NH

I missed the chance to play him last tournament so I was glad I got a shot this time around.  He brought American Tanks, Jumbos and Easy 8s, and an assortment of other trained armor. He reasoned that in V4, Easy 8s were dead, and Jumbos wouldn't be nearly as good. He attacked, since I was an infantry company.

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Fulda in Fredericksburg: 2017 Team Yankee Nationals

Now with Cold Wars 2017 behind us it is time to turn our attentions to Historicon 2017 and the first ever Team Yankee North American Nationals also known as “Fulda Gap in Fredericksburg”.

Here are the details

GMs: Mitch Reed (WWPDMitch@gmail.com) and Brian Sullivan

Cost: Free!!!

Date/Time: 14 July 10am – 8pm Arrive at 9:30am to register.  Players who do not check in by 9:45 may have their spots taken by a player on the stand by list.
Three 2.5 hour rounds.  100 Points. All official lists from Team Yankee (including Afghansty), Leopard (including Panzertruppen), Iron Maiden, and Volks-Armee will be allowed.  All forces will be fully painted.  We have spots for 120 players and we will make a stand-by list if the tournament fills up. Each participant will get the Wolfgang’s Bratty Wagon objective for free for playing in the tournament.

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North American Yeam Yankee Nationals; 14 July 2017

With Brian Sullivan

First of all, let me fill you in on some big news; WWPD and Battlefront will be hosting the first ever Team Yankee North American Nationals on 14 July 2017! The event will take place during Historicon 2017 in Fredericksburg Virginia. So, this post serves as “save the date” for all of you that have been looking forward for a huge Team Yankee event and we will be posting a series of “Tournament Organizer” articles to keep you informed over the next few months.

We will be working with Brian Sullivan, who will be the POC from the Battlefront side of the house and I will be the POC from WWPD.

Right now, we have so many details to work out;

Points totals? Will 100 be too much? Is 80 the sweet spot?

Scoring? Do we use an alternative scoring system to have a definitive winner in 3 rounds?

Prize support? Well with Luke doing this I am sure it will be something great!

So, since we have more questions than answers right now please hold off any you have until we have firmed things up. Until we can get the event into the PEL for Historicon we will not be taking any sign-ups, so stay tuned to WWPD.net and we will drop more info as it becomes available.

We want to make this the biggest and best Team Yankee event ever! So come join us for "Fulda in Fredericksburg 2017!"

@MitchWWPD         

MitchWWPD@gmail.com

"Why We Fight" and "On the Road" Podcasts http://wwpd.libsyn.com/podcast 

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The Portal's World at War Tournament - December 10th 2016

So I begin by apologizing to Chris Kadish and My friend Karl, as well as the folks over at CT Valley Gamers for not getting this typed up sooner.  My laptop died a horrible death right after this tournament and then I waited for its replacement to arrive well into the new year.  After that, I had to chaperone 20 kids into NYC for a 4 day field trip....bottom line, this AAR dropped down on my list of priorities.  Moving forward however, I expect I will be a lot faster with these reports.  Since my new computer doesn't randomly shut down and erase all I was working on.

Without Further ado....

The Portal in Manchester CT, has played host to a few FOW tournaments over the course of the past year.  and I've been lucky enough to attend two of them.  Chris Kadish, TO organizer and man about town, helped put this one together.  A doubles tournament with 2000 pts per team, and some restrictions on combinations. (no fortified companies for example) drew in quite a few teams.  Due to some friction over criteria for lists, a few teams from up North had to drop (when their ride decided against going.)  But we still wound up with 6 teams, and 12 players, which was more than enough to have fun moving our toys around the table.

Below, Chris, wondering why I am taking this picture.

Below: Some photos of the tournament area and some of the folks setting up.

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Mid War at Fallin - Kurt Reese's Midwar Extravaganza - Nov 5th 2016

I finally made it down to Fall In! in Lancaster PA for the first time in my mini-gaming career.  I've made it to Historicon before, but never Fall in.  It was a well run really laid back convention, and I got a chance to meet a lot of people the WWPD crew has spoken so much about in podcast or article form.

I decided not to play in the Doubles on Friday, which in retrospect was a mistake, since I had my winter germans with me , and it looked like a blast. But I did jump into the Mid War tournament the following day.  I took a lot of pictures (with my good camera) and can honestly say that after a lot of travel and a lot of tournaments, I lucked out with the best 3 man panel of opponents I've ever had.  All were funny, gracious, and solid players.  I had a really hard time voting for favorite opponent.

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On The Road; Episode 2

Episode 2; with Sean Sarah and Mitch Reed, hosted by Tyler Held

Direct Download

In this episode Mitch and Sean go to Fall In 2016 which is hosted by HMGS. The guys talk too many of the folks at the event and discuss a wide variety of games as well as listen to the concerns some have about Flames of War Version 4.

From our LA studio, Tyler interviews his girlfriend Ashley about her video and board gaming addiction.



For comments, concerns, or if you want us to come out and cover an event, please contact me at WWPDMitch@gmail.com or on Twitter at @MitchWWPD.
Ron Wismer’s Fireman podcast is called Mythic Giraffe and you can find him on twitter @mythicgiraffe or on facebook.
Matt MacKenzie aka Matt Varnish can be found here on Dice Devils, and of course on WWPD.net
Ashley Nekomata’s Youtube page can be found here.

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FOW: Bastogne In Brea - Tourney Recap in SoCal

Note: Photo Dump at the end of this article

If you are new to the Flames of War hobby tournaments may be a bit intimidating if you’ve never been to one. Or, you may not have any in your area to attend. I can understand. Here in my neck of the woods of Sunny Southern California (USA), tournament are about as prevalent as rain or snowstorms in that same area. In other words, almost non-existent. I recently relocated to SoCal from the USA’s midwest, where FOW tournaments blossom like dandelions in a country lawn.

So, when I find one in my own back yard, a mere 40 minute drive away, I try to make sure I can get to it. Originally, I was scheduled to make a four-plus hour drive to Las Vegas, and attend a two day tournament there - but family commitments interfered with that plan. I was afraid this local tourney was going to face the same fate. Fortunately, I was able to finagle the family schedule and sneak in a day of gaming around the other activities.

This tourney was held at The Realms Comics and Games in Brea California. A nice little shop in Orange County (East of Los Angeles proper). After a few last minute cancelations, the tourney stabilized with eight players. Our lists were pulled from the new hardcover Bulge books. We didn’t have to deal with winter weather on the tables, but all forested areas were treated as sparse, with a 12 inch vision range, instead of six inches.

1685 points of Desert Rats fun!

I elected to run a Desert Rats 7th Armoured Division Mechanized Infantry Company. Two solid platoons of infantry, backed up with two platoons of three Cromwells plus one Challenger, along with heavy mortars, carriers, and Daimlers (with a Dingo). I wanted to find room for more 17-pounders due to the plethora of Jumbos, Panthers and King Tigers that I expected would be swarming the fields,

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On the Road: Iron Maiden Roll-Out Tournament

With pictures from Kato Lee

After all the hype over Iron Maiden, I was looking forward to the release of the models and new book that will certainly be a hit for all of us who love Team-Yankee. The folks from Battlefront always like to make a big splash when it comes to a release, and the one on 8 October lived up to the excitement I had for the weeks prior. Battlefront used a series of world wide tournaments to introduce the public to the new line, and I was lucky to have an event near me, at my not so local gaming store Games and Stuff in Glenn Burnie Maryland.

Besides the release I had other reasons to be excited, as Battlefront was holding an 80-point TY tournament with the winner getting an 80 point British army and this event was going to be the test bed for our first "On the Road" podcast that Sean Sarah and I will be putting together for the WWPD community. So Sean and I headed up to Games and Stuff with Ben Gobel and Scott MacLemore in tow, both competing with loaner armies we were able to scrap together for them. Ben used my Soviet army, since I wanted to play with my West German force.  Scott and Sean followed suit and both also fielded 80-point German lists. The 3 West German forces we traveled with with were all based on having 5 Leopard-2 tanks and 4 Gepards.  I had Marders, Luchs, and Jaguars backing up this force while Sean had Leopard-1s from the new Panzertruppen list while Scott used a combo of Jaguar, Luchs and attack helicopters supporting his MBTs. Ben took and interesting force of 2 T-72 platoons of 4 and 5 tanks each, a medium sized BMP company, Shilkas, Carnations, and of-course Hinds to make up his force. Perhaps the best units he picked were the two scout platoons which cause me so much grief.

Around 14 players showed up for the tournament and it was a good mix of all three of the nations represented in the game so far. The event run by Battlefront's John-Paul Brisigotti and Brian Sayman started off with a "build a Chieftain" contest. The goal was to build a Chieftain from a sprue and the winner was to get an Iron Maiden book.  What made it difficult was the fact that we had no instructions, so I felt I had an edge from doing so many articles on the Chieftain last month.  I finished my tank in less than 5 minutes and was bested by Sean who was accidentally declared the winner on a tank that did not have any machine guns. I plan to give Throck a hard time about this as much as I can.

Right after this, the first games began and because of the large turn out, Scott and I had to play on a table set up with terrain from another game. It was cool to play on a real city table.

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Terrain for Tournaments

A few years ago, I played in a tournament where the table was a tan bed sheet with some pillows underneath it to simulate large, gently sloping sand dunes. Not only was it difficult to decide what units were out of line-of-sight, but almost impossible to determine which ones were concealed by being hull down.  Players spent much of the game, bent over like two angry Quasimodos arguing about which units were visible and which had "sanctuary". To make matters worse, the heavier Battlefront metal and resin models actually sank down into the terrain, allowing their hull-down position to follow them around the board, while lighter plastic models sat fully exposed. (Brand loyalty does have its rewards.) As the futility of playing on this table continued, we started debating if the heavier models needed a bog check to move, as they were constantly moving out of deep holes.  After a few hours of players' complaints, the table was removed from play.

I spend far too much time carefully painting and basing my figs so they will look nice (hence the huge painting queue), so I want to have a table that looks as good as the armies that fight over it. This means making the terrain looking both good and realistic is important to me. Unfortunately, natural terrain does not always fall into the game categories defined in Flames of War, so it becomes necessary to diverge from realism when it begins to interfere with playability.

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Able Kompanie's Crossing the Rhine Tournament Report

Able Kompanie held a LW 1625pt. "Crossing the Rhine" Tournament at Sinclair Games in Carmel, Indiana on Saturday June 25, 2016.  Generally we like to run themed Tournaments and felt that limiting the event to Market Garden, Bridge by Bridge, Nachtjager and Bridge at Remagen might bring out some interesting lists we had not seen in a tournament setting.  We ended up with 6 Allied and 6 Axis Players.  No one brought a list from Nachtjager but we did have a good variety of lists from the other books.  The Germans tended to favor lists from Bridge by Bridge while the Americans chose Remagen and the British chose Market Garden.  Sinclair Games has two different gaming areas in addition to a well stocked store so our tables were split between the two spaces.  Several players brought terrain to augment the store's stock.

 The Upstairs Room

The Back Room

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Clash of Cultures: Tournament Play

by "Dirty" Jon Baber

Serious

I really like to participate in Flames of War tournaments.  Making lists, predicting - often incorrectly - what the current meta-game lists are, thinking up mission strategies - all of these things are really fun for me.  In talking with other tournament participants over the years, I have heard a ton of thoughts on tournaments.  In my mind, I have broadly divided the admittedly nuanced thoughts and approaches into Serious and Casual tournament participants.

So, what do I mean by these VERY broad categories?  When I talk about Serious tournament players, I mean the people who are trying to win it.  In addition, I mean people who will find their ranking in the tournament important - perhaps they are trying to finish in the top 10 or top third or improve their standing from the last tournament.  These people have usually spent some significant time thinking through their lists and tailoring them for the particular tournament.  Perhaps they have painted up some new units or tweaked an existing list or gone through some specific changes and plans for the missions to be played.  In any case, the Serious tournament player has invested significant time into tournament prep and is keenly interested in the outcome.

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Summer Tournament Diet

By Matt MacKenzie

With warmer weather, a growing list of things around the house that need your attention, do you have time for tournament war gaming?

Read on and find out how you can still get the most out of your competitive spirit during the summer!

There comes a point where sometimes you have to look at the busy life you lead and wonder if you have the time to fit it all in. Once the winter blahs are gone and the sun of Spring turns into Summer sweat, playing games indoors may not be on your radar. Playing tournaments present problems all on their own. Long weekends, vacation time, and spending time with family, it all plays a part in your ability to get away with your army and crush your opponent on the virtual felt.

Simple things in the winter, like painting and preparing your army might be a little harder to do once the warmer weather rolls around. Maybe you have a deck to stain or a tree fort to build instead!! Put down the brushes!

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Event Recap: Come As You Are

Last weekend, I ran an event at Huzzah Hobbies where the players just showed up with dice and a tape measure, and played pre-set armies on pre-set tables with pre-set scenarios. The goal of the event was fun - get people playing with armies and toys that they don't get to play with very often, and hopefully do something new.

To facilitate expanding up to 16 players (after last year's 12), I enlisted the help of three invaluable "Bringers", who provided a pair of armies. My sincere thanks goes out to Jon Baber (with the help of Wally Johns), Tim Grimmett, and Bob Evans who stepped up to that role.

First up we have Dirty Jon's 29th Infantry attacking a German security force in a town in Hold the Line. Jon was not able to attend the event, but Wally Johns was nice enough to bring Jon's armies up from Richmond. In this scenario, the Germans won all three games. It was later determined that the village the Germans defended, in addition to taking three strands of wire, made for a very tough attack for the trained Americans, although two of the American players were overheard saying "If I had only done XXX...."

The 29th had the support of a pair of 105 Shermans as well.

Most players opted for three barbed wire from the PSV, but one took the minefield option.

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