Historicals: Only ordered 5 reference books for my lead barbies, any recommendations?

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > Historicals: Only ordered 5 reference books for my lead barbies, any recommendations?

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StashAugustine: Mar 24, 2013; Do not trust in hope- it will betray you! Only faith and hatred sustain.

Anyone have advice on making banners? Got a bunch of bannermen for Saga and some of them have transfers, some of them don't. Might see about ordering some more online if I can find some good ones I guess?

# ? Apr 11, 2023 15:30

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# ? May 26, 2024 03:16

alg: Mar 14, 2007; A wolf was no less a wolf because a whim of chance caused him to run with the watch-dogs.

I only do Little Big Men Studios for Saga. All their stuff is so good.

# ? Apr 11, 2023 15:31

moths: Aug 25, 2004; I would also still appreciate some danger.

JcDent posted:

My crackpot theory that this is partially caused by trying to explain WoT's lopsided casualty counts without going "it's artillery/airpower"

This is more or less the conclusion we came to as well.

They're taking a lot of long-term factors like misreported civilian deaths, one-sided access to medical care, DU exposure, repeated conflicts (the indigenous forces don't get to "rotate out") etc etc and stuffing those into a single tabletop experience. The end result gets Delta Force like DooM Marines ripping and tearing through the locals.

I was looking at using FoF for a con Warsaw Uprising scenario but, by the book, the Poles would have been given lovely irregular stats.

Everything would have played out REALLY loving uncomfortably as I struggle to explain why Hitler's men get bigger dice and are nearly impossible for your grandpas to kill.

It might work for Battle of Berlin, where the defenders are a mix of irregulars and regulars and the attackers are regulars and veterans though.

# ? Apr 11, 2023 15:36

Arquinsiel: Jun 1, 2006; "There is no such thing as society. There are individual men and women, and there are families. And no government can do anything except through people, and people must look to themselves first."

God Bless Margaret Thatcher
God Bless England
RIP My Iron Lady

moths posted:

We had an extremely uninspiring experience with FoF, it felt very much like gaming out propaganda.

It was pretty much designed to recreate the Black Hawk Down movie so... yeah. It's exactly that.

# ? Apr 11, 2023 16:15

Cessna: Feb 20, 2013; KHABAHBLOOOM

moths posted:

We had an extremely uninspiring experience with FoF, it felt very much like gaming out propaganda.

I really wanted to like the game. I think there's definitely a place for a skirmish level wargame about modern firefights.

There is absolutely a difference in, for lack of a better term, "troop quality" between different types (i.e., regular, insurgent, etc) combatants in modern battles. A highly trained Special Forces operator is going to do better in a fight than an unmotivated conscripted militia fighter - that's a fact. But FoF's way of way of quantifying the differences ("they just roll bigger dice") is simplistic at best. There are other wargames that do a far better job of modeling things like training, teamwork, motivation, etc.

# ? Apr 11, 2023 16:22

Tias: May 25, 2008; Pictured: the patron saint of internet political arguments (probably)

This avatar made possible by a gift from the Religionthread Posters Relief Fund

Any line in on good bronze/iron age soldiers, preferably gaul, roman, assyrian/babylonian? I'll take STLs as well

# ? Apr 11, 2023 16:57

moths: Aug 25, 2004; I would also still appreciate some danger.

What scale are you looking for?

# ? Apr 11, 2023 17:07

Tias: May 25, 2008; Pictured: the patron saint of internet political arguments (probably)

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moths posted:

What scale are you looking for?

Preferably 28mm

# ? Apr 11, 2023 17:13

moths: Aug 25, 2004; I would also still appreciate some danger.

You can currently get a stupid amount of Gauls and Romans (and the first edition of what would eventually become an OK wargame) for $60 at miniature market.

# ? Apr 11, 2023 17:32

long-ass nips Diane: Dec 13, 2010; Breathe.

Tias posted:

Preferably 28mm

Victrix.

https://www.victrixlimited.com/en-us/collections/punic-wars

# ? Apr 11, 2023 17:36

Cthulu Carl: Apr 16, 2006

Tias posted:

Any line in on good bronze/iron age soldiers, preferably gaul, roman, assyrian/babylonian? I'll take STLs as well

Wargames Atlantic has Legionaires and Goths, Persians, and Dark Age Irish

They're MyMiniFactory storefront also has things like Hoplites, Gladiators, and Jewish Revolt dudes

# ? Apr 11, 2023 18:07

Springfield Fatts: May 24, 2010; Pillbug

3dBreed has Romans, Celts, 'Germanic Tribes' and Greek / Persians but their stuff can look wonky at 28mm.

# ? Apr 11, 2023 18:46

moths: Aug 25, 2004; I would also still appreciate some danger.

You can fix their weird proportions by printing the X and Y axis at ~85%, but it's annoying that you need to.

I've done some Roman auxilia archers that way and they look good next to Warlord's. I'll take a photo when I get a chance later.

# ? Apr 11, 2023 19:04

Tias: May 25, 2008; Pictured: the patron saint of internet political arguments (probably)

This avatar made possible by a gift from the Religionthread Posters Relief Fund

Thanks all!

# ? Apr 11, 2023 19:18

Class Warcraft: Apr 27, 2006

Arquinsiel posted:

Sorry for this taking so long, busy weekend and I had to root out a PDF of the book since my physical copy is in storage.

1: "Actions" are not a formal thing in the game. It's just accounting for situations when you might want to do something like neutralise a hotspot and also fire. Basically "do a thing during a turn" because you can do lots of things. Such as:

2: the US player is supposed to use the dispersal rules to represent evacuating the civilians. This is an "action" that takes an entire turn. Basically that scenario is a race between the players to swing the civilian points in either direction and then get down to murdering each other.

Thanks for the response, but I'm still a little confused about what exactly units can and can't do when they're activated. The rulebook says "when an initiative unit is activated, it must announce what Actions it will take and in what order" and then says "some actions may be taken in conjunction with each other in a turn, such as Move and Fire/Fire and Move". Are they saying that a unit can move and fire, and also fire and move in the same turn (firing twice and moving twice)? Or just that some actions are move/fire combo actions that allow you to do each once in an activation?

I feel like the table of possible Actions on page 66 of my PDF rulebook is adding to my confusion rather than helping. The rulebook declares that you have to announce which order you will take your actions in, but the table lists includes Move, Fire, Move & Fire, and Fire & Move as different options. If those are all separate actions and you can only take one of them would it not be more accurate to say you just declare which action you're taking? (Also it apparently doesn't actually cover all the actions you can do since dispersing mobs isn't on there)

# ? Apr 12, 2023 07:27

Cassa: Jan 29, 2009

Looking at my PDF, there is one list of actions you can pick from basically you get to do the single Action with each unit, but certain Actions contain multiple things, like the Move and Fire one. But you only do one of the options from that list.

That's my understanding at least.

JcDent posted:

My crackpot theory that this is partially caused by trying to explain WoT's lopsided casualty counts without going "it's artillery/airpower"

The mission text is deffo propagandist (lol at the Vietnam mission, Cassa could probably say more)

And then you get into Tomorrows War (FoF In Space) and it's 100% propaganda.

Honestly my overwhelming memory of the Osprey edition is; incredibly tacky america wank throughout, and painfully tonedeaf scenarios.

The Vietnam mission basically paints it all as American failures and not a tactical/strategic successes on the part of the North Vietnamese but dumb luck in stumbling upon the most vulnerable base.

Which is basically the book, I maintain the core is useful if you want to do irregulars vs regulars but you have to equivocate the two sides, otherwise the D10/D8 side will run roughshot.

moths posted:

This is more or less the conclusion we came to as well.

They're taking a lot of long-term factors like misreported civilian deaths, one-sided access to medical care, DU exposure, repeated conflicts (the indigenous forces don't get to "rotate out") etc etc and stuffing those into a single tabletop experience. The end result gets Delta Force like DooM Marines ripping and tearing through the locals.

I was looking at using FoF for a con Warsaw Uprising scenario but, by the book, the Poles would have been given lovely irregular stats.

Everything would have played out REALLY loving uncomfortably as I struggle to explain why Hitler's men get bigger dice and are nearly impossible for your grandpas to kill.

It might work for Battle of Berlin, where the defenders are a mix of irregulars and regulars and the attackers are regulars and veterans though.

Like I think a Warsaw Uprising scenario would work really well, you don't have to stat up the Germans the same was as the game might encourage.

But yeah ultimately while mechanically interesting there's a lot of baggage.

# ? Apr 12, 2023 08:28

Southern Heel: Jul 2, 2004

Tomorrow night I�m going to have a few hours spare to play a napoleonic war-game with all my new 2mm figures. I may videotape it, shall I do Absolute Emperor, Lasalle, or One Hour Wargames?

# ? Apr 12, 2023 09:14

Genghis Cohen: Jun 29, 2013

spectralent posted:

There's some decent AA in TY but, yeah, in Flames since there's no drive-off mechanic and planes are insanely hard to kill, AA is heavy machineguns for mauling infantry dug in on objectives with (or sometimes heavy AT for pulping tanks).

See I get that but I have to say that any firepower except flamethrowers seems poor at removing dug in infantry in FoW. Against guns or MG platoons maybe it's better because the teams are worth more individually. But against massed relatively cheap infantry, either you have plenty of dice but need to pass a 5+ or 6 FP check after failed saves, or you get good FP and throw way too few dice to hope for much. Like even with brutal weapons with great FP, they tend to be RoF 1 and sometimes slow firing as well. Maybe I'm too used to the 40k mindset where 'soft' targets get evaporated if you get the right shooters into range, but dug in infantry seem the hardest thing to shift in FoW. Even the points-efficient AA gun platforms don't seem great at it. My best solutions so far would be flamethrowers by a mile, or maybe try to assault with heavy tanks.

spectralent posted:

That and guns that have 40" AA range, ROF 6 and 4+ firepower, which also do way more work against planes than the ones in FoW which are RoF 3, AA range 20 if you're lucky, FP 5+

This does sound better. I know I was talking a second ago about how air support isn't very effective, or at least is too random, but equally I think AA should be better against it (although a historical purist would point out that the effectiveness of ground AA was very dubious in this period). Maybe if the aircraft fails it's save, it should be driven off the table for the turn, so it can't fire, and if you also pass the FP check, it's destroyed.

Flipswitch posted:

Played in my first TY event last weekend with two games under my belt and managed to take second place and best sporting! Which I'm very happy with even if I pulled one of the wins out of my rear end. It was 50pts and I took VDV Afgansty.

Really quite enjoying the game though I'm avoiding BFs mixed resin and metal kits like the plague after building some Gvodzikas. Sold them off immediately and replaced them with zvezda plastics.

Oh well done mate! Where was this held then? Seems like finding an active community for TY or FoW would be a bit tricky, as it is for most non Warhammer games.

Guest2553 posted:

The house rule was something I read on a forum somewhere to make CAS not suck. The zero-cost was from a game store that did that in the tournaments which, now that I think about it, was probably a ploy to sell useless models.

100% that AAA sucks and it best employed in a DF role.

# ? Apr 12, 2023 10:05

Arquinsiel: Jun 1, 2006; "There is no such thing as society. There are individual men and women, and there are families. And no government can do anything except through people, and people must look to themselves first."

God Bless Margaret Thatcher
God Bless England
RIP My Iron Lady

Class Warcraft posted:

Thanks for the response, but I'm still a little confused about what exactly units can and can't do when they're activated. The rulebook says "when an initiative unit is activated, it must announce what Actions it will take and in what order" and then says "some actions may be taken in conjunction with each other in a turn, such as Move and Fire/Fire and Move". Are they saying that a unit can move and fire, and also fire and move in the same turn (firing twice and moving twice)? Or just that some actions are move/fire combo actions that allow you to do each once in an activation?

I feel like the table of possible Actions on page 66 of my PDF rulebook is adding to my confusion rather than helping. The rulebook declares that you have to announce which order you will take your actions in, but the table lists includes Move, Fire, Move & Fire, and Fire & Move as different options. If those are all separate actions and you can only take one of them would it not be more accurate to say you just declare which action you're taking? (Also it apparently doesn't actually cover all the actions you can do since dispersing mobs isn't on there)

Yeah the actions table makes things a lot worse. The Move & Fire/Fire & Move distinctions make sense when you look at the rules for moving. It's a little arbitrary and very silly, and they could probably do with D&Ding it up and formalising what an action is and how many of them you get in a turn. Were I writing second edition I'd just change it so that any action can include a tactical move before or after attempting it, but they seem to want to do poo poo weirdly.

Cassa posted:

Honestly my overwhelming memory of the Osprey edition is; incredibly tacky america wank throughout, and painfully tonedeaf scenarios.

The Vietnam mission basically paints it all as American failures and not a tactical/strategic successes on the part of the North Vietnamese but dumb luck in stumbling upon the most vulnerable base.

Which is basically the book, I maintain the core is useful if you want to do irregulars vs regulars but you have to equivocate the two sides, otherwise the D10/D8 side will run roughshot.

When I first looked at the Afghanistan book I was surprised that the Taliban units were D8 Irregulars, often with better morale than the NATO units. It totally bucked the trend of it being the game of cakewalks for white people.

Also with the Warsaw Uprising scenario, I'd stat that as both sides being D8s, with the Polish having higher morale but being Irregular, and the German garrison being low-morale regulars. Sprinkle a few Regular leaders into the Polish force and make that player choose where to deploy them for maximum effect. The real problem I foresee will be making the Fog of War deck to avoid having the nazis show up with drones.

Genghis Cohen posted:

See I get that but I have to say that any firepower except flamethrowers seems poor at removing dug in infantry in FoW.

Ah, see there's your problem. Not sure what the current rules are and don't have a book handy to check, but in my 2nd/3rd edition days the way you get rid of dug in infantry is you run a scout car over and remove the dug in status from them, and then you're just shooting at regular infantry again with whatever terrain they happen to have. If you've placed your objectives cleverly they won't be near terrain so you're just removing them from the open ground.

Arquinsiel fucked around with this message at 13:41 on Apr 12, 2023

# ? Apr 12, 2023 13:35

Genghis Cohen: Jun 29, 2013

Arquinsiel posted:

Ah, see there's your problem. Not sure what the current rules are and don't have a book handy to check, but in my 2nd/3rd edition days the way you get rid of dug in infantry is you run a scout car over and remove the dug in status from them, and then you're just shooting at regular infantry again with whatever terrain they happen to have. If you've placed your objectives cleverly they won't be near terrain so you're just removing them from the open ground.

Oh, as far as I'm aware of the current, v4 rules there's no way to remove the foxhole markers from a unit except if they voluntarily move, or I suppose if you assault them and they break off. I completely get what you say about placing objectives so enemy infantry can't approach in bulletproof cover. Honestly with my main friend/opponent, I just seem to always end up playing more offensively, so most of my experience is trying to take an objective defended by his static infantry, rather than defeating his attacks.

# ? Apr 12, 2023 14:12

Arquinsiel: Jun 1, 2006; "There is no such thing as society. There are individual men and women, and there are families. And no government can do anything except through people, and people must look to themselves first."

God Bless Margaret Thatcher
God Bless England
RIP My Iron Lady

I'm misremembering anyway, it was Gone to Ground that Recon removed. Units still got the benefit of being Dug In as long as they didn't move. Putting objectives in the open just gave you a turn of leeway before they got Bulletproof Cover, so your AA guns would have a fun time unloading on them. After that the 5+ Firepower of the quad 20mms I used wasn't great, but without G2G enough hits would be rolled to pin them and make a subsequent assault much easier.

# ? Apr 12, 2023 15:17

Cessna: Feb 20, 2013; KHABAHBLOOOM

If you're looking at doing Warsaw Uprising, have you checked out InfamousJT's figures? They're quite good.

# ? Apr 12, 2023 15:23

best bale: Jul 4, 2007; Lipstick Apathy

Southern Heel posted:

Tomorrow night I�m going to have a few hours spare to play a napoleonic war-game with all my new 2mm figures. I may videotape it, shall I do Absolute Emperor, Lasalle, or One Hour Wargames?

You should play Lasalle 2 bc I just bought the book and need to figure out how to play it. That or one hour

# ? Apr 12, 2023 15:33

Ataxerxes: Dec 2, 2011; What is a soldier but a miserable pile of eaten cats and strange language?

Could you folks recommend a Napoleonic wargame for 10mm or 15mm miniatures? The last one I have played was General de Brigade and that was ages ago. It should have rules for Swedes.

Edit: and not be a skirmish game.

# ? Apr 12, 2023 16:02

best bale: Jul 4, 2007; Lipstick Apathy

Ataxerxes posted:

Could you folks recommend a Napoleonic wargame for 10mm or 15mm miniatures? The last one I have played was General de Brigade and that was ages ago. It should have rules for Swedes.

Edit: and not be a skirmish game.

Blucher is recommended a lot, haven�t played a game though

# ? Apr 12, 2023 16:04

moths: Aug 25, 2004; I would also still appreciate some danger.

Cessna posted:

If you're looking at doing Warsaw Uprising, have you checked out InfamousJT's figures? They're quite good.

I saw that Kickstarter! They're phenomenal , but I was aiming more for 15mm or 1/72 to keep things affordable at the scope I wanted to do.

# ? Apr 12, 2023 16:20

Southern Heel: Jul 2, 2004

best bale posted:

Blucher is recommended a lot, haven�t played a game though

Isn�t blucher basically designed for epic scale and smaller? 10/15mm recommendations appear to be broadly similar to any other scale - the real question is what kind of game do you want? Do you want to control individuals? Battalions? Regiments? Corps? As your atomic units

# ? Apr 12, 2023 16:57

best bale: Jul 4, 2007; Lipstick Apathy

Southern Heel posted:

Isn�t blucher basically designed for epic scale and smaller?

Everything is based (ha) on base size so you can play with whatever feels right to you. I�ve seen people playing with 6mm as well as 28mm

# ? Apr 12, 2023 17:13

Southern Heel: Jul 2, 2004

Yes, but isn�t it thematically manoeuvering armies around? I.e., the game scale is pretty Grand

# ? Apr 12, 2023 17:17

SpaceViking: Sep 2, 2011; Who put the stars in the sky? Coyote will say he did it himself, and it is not a lie.

Ataxerxes posted:

Could you folks recommend a Napoleonic wargame for 10mm or 15mm miniatures? The last one I have played was General de Brigade and that was ages ago. It should have rules for Swedes.

Edit: and not be a skirmish game.

I did a test game of Soldiers of Napoleon and had fun with it, though I think it's gonna take me a few more runs to wrap my head around the range system and movement.

# ? Apr 12, 2023 17:19

best bale: Jul 4, 2007; Lipstick Apathy

Southern Heel posted:

Yes, but isn�t it thematically manoeuvering armies around? I.e., the game scale is pretty Grand

Ah gotcha, sorry took your comment too literally. Yes, it�s a grand scale game where you control battalions

# ? Apr 12, 2023 17:49

JcDent: May 13, 2013; Give me a rifle, one round, and point me at Berlin!

what games are you looking forward to coming out this year?

# ? Apr 12, 2023 18:00

StashAugustine: Mar 24, 2013; Do not trust in hope- it will betray you! Only faith and hatred sustain.

Personally I'm really excited for Saga's 2022 rules updates

(Also for their hundred years war book supposedly out this year)

# ? Apr 12, 2023 18:24

alg: Mar 14, 2007; A wolf was no less a wolf because a whim of chance caused him to run with the watch-dogs.

What a Cowboy!!!

# ? Apr 12, 2023 18:36

Ataxerxes: Dec 2, 2011; What is a soldier but a miserable pile of eaten cats and strange language?

Southern Heel posted:

Isn’t blucher basically designed for epic scale and smaller? 10/15mm recommendations appear to be broadly similar to any other scale - the real question is what kind of game do you want? Do you want to control individuals? Battalions? Regiments? Corps? As your atomic units

I'm not particular on which units should be controlled, but I would like there to be mechanical differences. So that an unit of French line infantry isn't the same as a Prussian one. Not quite Flames of War "12 pounders with Tiger Ace rules" but something that makes armies different from one another.

# ? Apr 12, 2023 18:36

Southern Heel: Jul 2, 2004

Ataxerxes posted:

I'm not particular on which units should be controlled, but I would like there to be mechanical differences. So that an unit of French line infantry isn't the same as a Prussian one. Not quite Flames of War "12 pounders with Tiger Ace rules" but something that makes armies different from one another.

Could do worse than Lasalle 2nd Ed. Really! I�m going to fill my battle report tomorrow night and I�ll post a link to it here. It�s a really wonderful game as I�m sure everyone else in the thread will attest to.

If you wanted to go fictional, then shop practice is a common alternative � which is a very thematic skirmish level game.

For pretty much anything else you are at the whim of the groggiest of grog gamers giving their views on 20+ year old games. Not that there�s anything wrong with that, but clearly these are people with very strongly held opinions and any advice on game systems like general de brigade should be taken with the understanding that these are all systems with a huge buy-in by lots of gamers who are conservative by nature.

# ? Apr 12, 2023 19:12

Endman: May 18, 2010; That is not dead which can eternal lie, And with strange aeons even anime may die

Genghis Cohen posted:

Oh, as far as I'm aware of the current, v4 rules there's no way to remove the foxhole markers from a unit except if they voluntarily move, or I suppose if you assault them and they break off. I completely get what you say about placing objectives so enemy infantry can't approach in bulletproof cover. Honestly with my main friend/opponent, I just seem to always end up playing more offensively, so most of my experience is trying to take an objective defended by his static infantry, rather than defeating his attacks.

Honestly, dug-in infantry should be really difficult to shift. Holding ground is 90% of an infantryman�s job.

I recommend more artillery.

# ? Apr 12, 2023 23:01

Comstar: Apr 20, 2007; Are you happy now?

Ataxerxes posted:

Could you folks recommend a Napoleonic wargame for 10mm or 15mm miniatures? The last one I have played was General de Brigade and that was ages ago. It should have rules for Swedes.

Field of glory Napoleonic. Corps level game (units are brigades). Although it�s 3rd edition is still bring written and I�m guessing won�t be out till later this year. Has rules for Swedes.

Note its the only game at 15mm that anyone else seems to play in AU/NZ which is why I started it.

The trick to any system is finding someone else to play with

# ? Apr 13, 2023 04:26

Ataxerxes: Dec 2, 2011; What is a soldier but a miserable pile of eaten cats and strange language?

Thanks for the recommendations, everyone. Also, what are the Black Powder rules like? I see they gavey sets of miniatures + rules for sale in convenient bundles, are they any good?

# ? Apr 13, 2023 07:53

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# ? May 26, 2024 03:16

Genghis Cohen: Jun 29, 2013

Endman posted:

Honestly, dug-in infantry should be really difficult to shift. Holding ground is 90% of an infantryman�s job.

I recommend more artillery.

Absolutely true. While it's not perfect, I think FoW is a pretty good wargame in how play mimics the basic tactics of real life. If you want to remove infantry holding ground, as you say, you can't just blast then with something instantly. A long softening up with artillery and removing or smoke-screening out other defensive fires, until you can assault the weakened and pinned survivors, is the way forward.

For anyone interested, this is what I'll be trying at our next 100pt game on Sunday. Mission is likely to be Counter-attack, we decide attacker/defender at the table:

Fmn 1: motor coy (25)
Hq - 2
1x large pl, 4 bases + piat & mortar - 6
1x large pl, 4 bases + piat & mortar - 6
Vickers carriers - 4
Universal carrier patrol, 1 piat (or use 50cal card)- 3
Wasp patrol - 4

Fmn 2: armoured sqn (42)
Hq - 1 Churchill 75 - 6
2x3 Churchill 75s - 36

Support (33)
3x crocodiles - 21
4x 17 pdrs - 12

I think I could use a 3rd infantry platoon, since they're only small, but I haven't assembled the models yet.

# ? Apr 13, 2023 08:00

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > Historicals: Only ordered 5 reference books for my lead barbies, any recommendations?

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