Welcome back to Firefight Fridays. Last week, in the twelfth article, I talked about the sixth scenario, “Bloody Gulch”. This involved a rules dump on vehicles. Now that we have covered all of that, virtually all the game’s core rules have been covered. We can instead start jumping straight into the scenarios. This week we are talking about “To the Last Man, to the Last Cartridge”, our Cherbourg scenario.
This overview provides perspectives on why the National Socialists is a playable faction in The Weimar Republic, as well as some insight as to how the faction actually functions in gameplay terms. Future posts will highlight the other playable factions and the game’s general mechanics in a more detailed manner.
First off, I’d like to mention the solo system, designed by Joe Schmidt. This simple yet dynamic system can substitute any faction for a card-driven set of automated impulses that are easy to use and require no complex flowcharts. With Joe’s system there is precious little downtime as well, as the “bots” do not contemplate strategies or actively try to win the way a human player would. Rather, they provide an increased level of difficulty for the human player(s) to achieve their victory conditions.
Obviously this addition to the game is a great asset, both for players who wish to play but lack the full number of human opponents required, and for those who simply want to avoid playing any given faction. With the solo rules you can still experience the harsh, dog-eat-dog atmosphere of The Weimar Republic, shaping Germany’s destiny in the process.
Several months back, when preparing for the Spring semester course on wargaming, I wrote a blog post about the plans to use Stephen Rangazas’ The British Way in the classroom. The game has now made its debut at the university, and it is interesting to look back and see what worked and how.
Whenever introducing a new game in class, some issues must be considered to ensure that it can work in that specific environment. What gaming concepts will the students be already familiar with? How much time will the game take and how many games could be run and facilitated in parallel? Have they covered the topic of the game in their other classes? As The British Way was released in 2023, it was the first time to be used, and all these questions had to be answered.
by Mark G. McLaughlin (with Fred Schachter)
Does the gaming community need another Hannibal game? The answer is “why not?” or, more simply an empathic “yes!”: just as it is to the question of a new Gettysburg, Pacific Theater WWII or another Waterloo game (such as Mark Herman’s latest forays into those topics) or of a new upcoming movie on the subject. (Note that Denzel Washington’s Hannibal will be on Netflix later this year.)
Just as Denzel Washington is taking on a role made famous by screen legend Victor Mature and (more recently) by Star Trek’s Alexander Siddiq, among others, so did we also make the decision to cross the Alps into Ancient Italy to confront the power of Rome.
We are big fans of previous Hannibal games, including that designed by our mutual friend and GMT colleague Mark Simonitch. This is a game recently updated as Hannibal and Hamilcar. By the way, Simonitch’s game is the basis for a miniatures’ campaign Mark McLaughlin is involved with. Battles among the group are resolved using several different sets of miniatures rules – most recently “To the Strongest.” Incidentally, Mark is not Hannibal in this game but has the role of his younger brother, Hasdrubal, and he lost – if barely –in his first outing on the field).
But we digress…
Welcome back to Firefight Fridays. Last week, in the eleventh article, I talked about the fifth scenario, “Purple Heart Lane”. This got us into artillery and multi-deck scenarios. All this pales in comparison to this week though, where we only have one thing to cover before our scenario: Armor. Almost every scenario from here on out will feature vehicles in some capacity so they will be important to understand.
Only the German Infantry still in the trucks is unspotted.
All French not Hidden Units except PzIIIF #3 are spotted. None of the Hidden units are spotted.
German Commands – The forward-Most Tanks are firing. The rear most tanks are moving. At least one unloaded infantry is firing while the other ones will move and possibly close assault. The H-39s will fire while the Loaded infantry will move.
Ah, good day to you once more, young Inventor.
I am happy to see you once again.
And you have brought your copy of the Inventor’s Vade Mecum with you.
May I see it, please?
Hmmm, I notice it is now a very worn and much-thumbed work.
I am proud of your diligence.
What benefit is a book of knowledge if you don’t use it from time to time, eh?
However, there have been several updates since this copy was printed.
The section on Power has received significant editing.
Oh, good.
I see that there are still unused endpapers in your Vade Mecum that you can use for note-taking.
Let’s make an update to your edition on the subject of Power, shall we?
Welcome back to Firefight Fridays. Last week, in the tenth article, I talked about the fourth scenario, “About Last Night”. We looked at exciting new mechanics introduced by that scenario, like mortars and snipers. This week we will be moving on to one of my favorite scenarios, “Purple Heart Lane.” Purple Heart Lane is our Carentan scenario, and it adds a couple more new mechanics: multi-deck scenarios and off board artillery.
Welcome back to Firefight Fridays. Last week in the ninth article I talked about the third scenario, “Shot in the Dark”. I covered a couple of new concepts like reinforcements and night combat, neither of which are too different from what we have seen before. Well, buckle up, because this week we are jumping into “About Last Night”. Scenario 4 adds a few interesting new experiences to the game: multi-front scenario entry, snipers, and mortars. Multi-front scenario entry is pretty simple to understand, but let’s talk about snipers and mortars a little bit first and after we will jump into the details of “About Last Night.”
Over the years, Fields of Fire has proved to be quite tricky to learn for a lot of people. As a solitaire wargame, the usual method of a finding an experienced opponent, or even a club of experienced players, to guide you through learning this new, complex system is a non-starter. This leaves you at the mercy of the Internet and its hidden pearls of wisdom amongst an awful lot of noise.
For Fields of Fire Deluxe, we address this in a few different ways:
