Normandy '44 - Bolt Action - September 2nd

[Primarch]

but there will be some changes to the National Rules especially Tiger Fear

You could limit it to actual big cats - no Panzer IVs. Or dump it entirely I guess!

It's still an issue. Park your Tiger on top of a hill at the back of the board. The entire allied force then grinds to a halt. It's a dumb rule IMHO.

I was thinking about making it: If hit by the main gun and not destroyed, take an immediate order test to avoid going Down. As vehicles make a reverse move when they go Down, this can represent them frantically trying to get out of sight before the Tiger reloads. I figure limiting it to big cats only should be enough.

[Primarch]

Were there Airborne at Cherbourg or Caen? Could we work in defending Carentan or Graignes?

I could just borrow some regular yanks, but I'd prefer to give the airborne another run if possible,

Both the 82nd and the 101st were taken out of the line before Operation Cobra.

Rather than aiming to recreate any specific part of the battles in Normandy, I was thinking that the game/games would be more representational of the fighting in June and July '44, so you can still use your Airborne if you want to. No combat jumps though.

To clarify the mission, the Cherbourg, Caen thing is just to add flavour to the scenarios and to give people an idea of what to expect. It isn't a hard and fast limitation. The liberation of Caen took far too long to realistically do in one day of gaming.

[YellowStreak]

but there will be some changes to the National Rules especially Tiger Fear

You could limit it to actual big cats - no Panzer IVs. Or dump it entirely I guess!

It's still an issue. Park your Tiger on top of a hill at the back of the board. The entire allied force then grinds to a halt. It's a dumb rule IMHO.

I was thinking about making it: If hit by the main gun and not destroyed, take an immediate order test to avoid going Down. As vehicles make a reverse move when they go Down, this can represent them frantically trying to get out of sight before the Tiger reloads. I figure limiting it to big cats only should be enough.

I like that idea.

[Auxryn]

I should be free on Sept. 2nd and I would be happy to fill in with a tape measure and dice!

[Primarch]

I should be free on Sept. 2nd and I would be happy to fill in with a tape measure and dice!

Good to hear.

[Primarch]

I'd like to thank everyone who came along today for making it a fun (though tiring) day of gaming. I'll try and post some pictures up sometime soon, but the two tables looked like real warzones by the end of the day. I'm happy that both groups could get through 6 full turns of the game this year, I think the revised order system worked well.
How did people feel about the experience? What worked well, what didn't, what would you change if we did it again?

And we will be doing it again next year in fact. The Italian Campaign is next on the NagoyaHammer List by popular demand.

[YellowStreak]

Thanks for all your organizational efforts Prim, and thanks to Koji for helping get all of Prim's stuff to the venue!

Great day, thanks to all the participants! I agree the order system worked much more smoothly this time and it was good to get a full 6 turns in!

I've stuck up some photos on facebook and will post some here once i have uploaded them.

Thanks again all!

[job]

It was good fun. Thank to Primarch for organizing, and to everyone who played on both sides. Sorry to bail early as one doesn't have control over when mom visits.

It seemed both games were excellent fun. Lots of armor being light up and infantry making dashes at buildings. I felt the game on the table I was on was great fun as there was a lot tank duels and fiesty street fighting. I heard it finished as a very close draw.

The dice mechanic worked really well in my opinion. There were a lot of tanks and armor, but actually it worked out really well. It was nice to be able to put my Panther down on the table alongside my Lorraine Schlepper. Distances were good too as even the reserves arriving turn 2, 3 and 4 were able to get involved in the fighting.

Well done.

[Mike the Pike]

I agree with all of the above!
This was one of the best big, multiplayer games we've done. I liked the Divisional asset idea and individual secret missions (some seemed harder than others though). Having loads of tanks everywhere was great too especially on our table where AT weapons were plentiful on both sides.

No real grumbles, but just a a reflection. My LHS model, while a cool piece of terrain is actually huge and completely dominates a standard gaming table. It created quite a bottle neck for the Americans in the middle.
If we do use it we should make it an objective itself. Make armies fight for each room etc. In our game, the great barn basically formed a giant bunker while the rest of the building just got in the way of Auxryn's deployment. It did the same in our Napoleonic game too. Oh well, it still looks fantastic IMHO

Next time Italy! Democracy rules!

[kojibear]

Thank you to Prim for proving yet again he could be an excellent candidate for a German officer school with such enviabe organisational skills and for defending and holding on tenaciously to the terrain piece named after himself.

A great day and great to see our Japanese friends enjoying with us.

The British airborne held their objective but left their run across the bridge too late - it was a bridge that proved to be too far. Not really, I just left my bren carriers in reserve too long. A well placed german light howitzer caused the paras a bit of trouble and they needed a bit more `Monty' in them during the later turns to push across the bridge. Oh, and tetrachs are the cutest tanks. Just how my flame thrower team `missed' those krauts in the building from just a few feet away, I don't know. War is a fickle dance partner.

Cant wait for the next event. Thanks everyone!