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Sunday, October 20, 2019

New Project putting 6 x 6 challenge on hiatus... 3mm Eastern Front

Now on to my new project…

I am officially putting my 6 x 6 challenge on hold after only two measly games.  Why?  Not because I am losing my enthusiasm for the hobby, but because it has been reinvigorated!  Participating in the double-blind game at Southern Front has inspired me to develop my own game to take to conventions next year.  While Mike’s game was tactical, I plan to do this at a little different level.

In summary:

  • Eastern Front, 1942-44
  • 1 Base will = 1 maneuver company or artillery battalion
    • On a big 80mm x 40mm base because I like the look
  • 1 small base = 1 recon platoon
  • The rules will be very fast and inspired by 5Core Brigade Commander and Tank on Tank:East Front
  • They will play on a hex grid, to facilitate laying out identical terrain and speed up play
  • 1 hex = roughly 500 meters, with max 2 units in same he
Command friction will be the focus and will be provided by:
  • Multiple players per side (this by itself adds a lot)
  • Players will not know where the enemy is until spotted, recon is critical!
  • Players will not necessarily know when they have been spotted, so they will not know what the other guy knows about them!
  • Players will not know the exact results of their firing on the enemy
  • Must play fast, fast, fast
  • Some Logistics will be included as in an abstract manner

I have drafted rules and will post them after I have had a chance to do some playtests.

As a double-blind game involves painting twice the number of units you would normally, and I want a grand, sweeping look, I am using:

  • 3mm Picoarmor
  • Based on 80mm ovals (ovals look more like situation maps!)
  • On a 4-inch hex grid



Here are some shots of my first completed units.  I am aiming to give each player 6 - 8 elements to command, so this would be one command.  It is a Tank Brigade, a little understrength, with 2 x T-34 battalions, a motor rifle battalion, an armored car platoon, and a couple of logistics markers plus a duplicate version to use on the German table.

 Close up of 1 Tank Brigade.  3mm is not that photogenic, but at gaming distances, they look like an areal photo.  And the vehicle look more tactically spaced than hub to hub games.
 Motor Rifle Battalion.  SMG's, for rifle companies, I will add Maxim machine guns to distinguish them.
A battalion of T-34's, slightly out of focus so as not to give intelligence to the Fascist invader.


As you can see when I am done, I will have big forces for face to face games as well.  I have gotten a good start, considering I am balancing family, work, and grad school.  Stay tuned and I will do weekly updates and I hope to get the rules exercised next month.

I am tracking my progress via a Kanban Board HERE

Good gaming!

Saturday, October 12, 2019

Vacation recap and USS Yorktown

Picking up from our last entry, after enjoying Southern Front on Saturday the 21st, we decamped early on Sunday morning to board a cruise ship bound for Bermuda.  Alas, the hurricane forced a change in itinerary and we wound up in the Bahamas, but any time spent on the ocean with Mrs. Tin Man is vacation enough.

If you can, keep the folks affected by the recent storms in your thoughts and help if you are able.  Most of us are tourists passing through the region, but the locals in both the Bahamas and Bermuda make their lives there.

We had a great time, did some snorkeling, played a lot of our new favorite card game (Dutch Blitz), and took a long-needed break.  I did pick up a copy of Travel Battles at the convention and brought it along, but of course, I did not have any glue with me so it stayed on the shelf the whole trip.

After returning to Charleston, we visited Patriot's Point and the USS Yorktown.  I have probably been there a dozen times in my life, and my wife and I had been together 4 times.  Except for every time we went, it was chaperoning 50 of our closest 8th-grade friends when she took her class every year.  She is taking the year off from teaching, so we thought it would be great to go and actually get to see what we wanted to see without worrying about kids falling off of the flight deck.

We spent our time going through the Vietnam exhibit (that I had never seen) and the Yorktown, as we usually wind up on the Laffy and Clagamore.  Here are a few snaps...

The new engine room exhibit is really nice on the Yorktown, and it is probably my favorite part of the ship.  We clocked it and we walked 3+ miles just onboard the ship.

Next time, I will unveil the new project I am working on, why I am already abandoning the 6 x 6 challenge after 2 games, and how I plan to execute on this plan to bring a new game to the regional convention circuit.

Until then, good gaming!


Mrs. Tin Man and I at the Vietnam exhibit.  It is around 2 acres and is laid out like a riverine base.  The exhibits are great and they have several helicopters and armored vehicles, including a helicopter you can walk in to.  There is a great simulation of a night attack during Tet, and a good number of artifacts on display,
 This is on the Yorktown's hanger deck.  I have ALWAYS wanted to sit in this thing since I first came here when I was 12, but there is always a line.  It is a TF-9F Cougar Trainer.  The Cougar is literally a Navy F-9 Panther from the Korean War, but with swept wings instead of straight.  I managed to wedge myself in, I am, errr, considerably bulkier than a 22-year-old fighter pilot in the 1950's.  the original seat has been replaced, but it is eye-opening to see how cramped the cockpit is and to see the level of complexity operating one of these jets.  I have Korean War aircraft in my lead pile but will resist the temptation to start on them, for now.

Saturday, October 5, 2019

Southern Front Report 2019

We are back from vacation and I finally have time to report on my visit to the Southern Front Wargaming Convention in Raliegh, North Carolina.


First off, I cannot praise the organizers enough.  It is a small but very well run event.  I vastly prefer attending small conventions as compared to my last visit to Historicon a few years ago.  I suspect I am getting cranky in my old age, but crowds and noise are not my favorites anymore!

There were only 8 games running at once, in a single room, but they were all high quality and the ratios of games to players were good.  There were plenty of vendors (I will show off my loot in another post)

Saturday morning, I played in a game that was one of the peak wargaming experiences of my career (tm) and Saturday evening I ran a game of Astounding Tales 2!  Here is a summary:

Random Shots

Here are a few random pics of other games going on, it is NOT representative.  There were some really great looking games.  I missed Saturday afternoon (the missus and I went to lunch), but here are some from the other 2 Saturday slots.


Chain of Command.  There were many games run in various theaters, I wish I had been able to work it in.  Looked great! 

Wings of War, with honking great German Bombers
Little Round Top
A really nice Napoleonics game in 28mm.  I love the ground cloth and I think they were using the Blucher computer moderated rules. 

WW2 Double-Blind Crossfire

I may exaggerate occasionally, but this was one of the peak gaming experiences of my tabletop career!  It was a double-blind game of Crossfire run by Mike Tyson (Thank you Mike, if you read this!) 

He had two identical tables set up next to each other divided by a clever curtain on a PVC pipe frame.
This is all I saw of the opposition...

The scenario was early war Eastern Front, and I draw the Russian straw.  As I was the only player who had and Crossfire experience, I was nominated to be the COmpany commander.  Or else, per the Commisar.

Each side had a company plus some armor support in a meeting engagement.  I cannot give a blow by blow as I was completely engaged in the game, but a few observations:
  • The rules worked well.  Mike also had an assistant umpire on each table, which helped greatly.  Crossfire was a great choice of rules as it flowed well, he kept the tables roughly in synch.  The rules are simple enough that they were almost transparent to the experience of "where the heck is he? Should I try to cross that open ground? Where the hell did those guys come from ?!?!?!"  He made some mods to allow continuous fire until you failed, and I have to say they worked well.  We came to a decision in 2 hours and even the guys who had their platoons wiped out enjoyed it.
  • We lost, but barely.  each player took a platoon, and I also had the company commander and a T-26's and SU-76. But my master plan of ordering one of the platoon leaders to retreat across an open field to "draw in" the Panzer 38T to the muzzle of my SU-76 ended in lots of dead Russians shot in the back in the above-mentioned field.
  • I spent 4 turns firing into what turned out to be an empty wood because I thought Germans might be in there and ammo is cheaper than bodies, even for Russians.  When does that happen in a normal game? 
It really is the best way to wargame, suddenly recon becomes vital as it is in real life and fire and movement really becomes viable and overwatch comes into its own at the tactical level.  The fog of war was heavy too, with a lot of command friction and uncertainty. 

I am so inspired, I am working on my own double-blind game, but on a different scale. Stay tuned for details.

I will leave you with this quote of the game:"Umpire: You just got shot at by a machine gun.  Player: Crap, what machine gun ?!?!?!"


Here are some snaps.
My fellow Soviet players


Movement to contact, Two Russian platoons advance in line at the top, my guys are at the bottom

My Comrade's platoon in the center, getting ready to peek through the hedge...

The endgame, where my SU-76 waited in ambush for a target that never showed up.  I did not know that he had spotted me and knew I was there.  That is an important thing about double-blind, you not only don't know where the other guys are all the time, but you don't know what he knows about you!

Kudos to John Acar, the German player opposite me, who also played it slow and used lots of recon and bounding overwatch.  As a result, he easily avoided my ambush It was good to roll dice with you again.

Astounding Tales 2!

Saturday Evening, I ran my Death Temple of Sarnath game, with a full crew of 8 players! Here is the background information and the last couple of times I ran the game:

I was busy running around GM-ing the game but, fun was had by all!  It ended with the Nazis winning and making off with the Eye of Azathoth, the Gangsters recapturing Shirley Uoff after she had been rescued by the RCMP just before she could get on the plane, and the Zanzibar Slavers deciding the kidnapping Miss Lemon would do and hauling her off for shipment to the slave markets of Istanbul.

Here are a few snaps from the game.

Everyone fully engaged!
Hercule Poirot ponders his next move

Doc Savage prepares to punch out a few robots.  Supreme Subjicator Zenobia of the Radon Zombies of the Ionosphere had also crash-landed in the jungle.


That is all for now, next time I will recap our vacation, which does almost have some wargaming content!