Great War Stosskompanie - List Discussion

Hello all

So when I first got the new Great War book I as happy to see that the original two nations had been bulked out to four with the French and the U.S. and while I wanted to collect a Entente army there was one list that stole my attention, The Stoss Company.

Why a Stoss Company? Simple really, how doesn't like elite troops? Add the imagery of these elite troops using ,at the time, revolutionary tactics to raid and take enemy trenches and break the deadlock of the Western Front.

Berlin Digital - German List Review

Hi all coxer here, I thought having done my in depth review of the Volksgrenadier lists from Berlin digital I would take a glance over the other German lists to help those of you who want something extra for your games.

502 and 503 SS Schwere panzerkompanie

So these two lists have one thing in common - the need to spend close to 1200 points on your minimum compulsory purchases. Now that does not leave you with much for anything else - but there is something completely overpowers by the idea of FV king tigers (unless there is a pesky AoP around).

The problem will be making a list which can attack infantry - you'll need to recon and AA cover, and both lists have these (with 502 having the puma pak40!) but there is not enough left in a typical pointed game to get the things you need to dig out hoards of infantry (or even just some vets)

Who Dares Wins - The SAS in Flames of War

Earlier on this year when the SAS Squadron from the Nachtjaeger digital lists was published on Forces of War I knew I just had to have a go at building such a list.  I mean who doesn’t like the thought of a load of tooled up hooligans racing around the ulu brassing up the Jerries!

One of the first models I ever built was the Italeri 1/35 Commando Car, basically a SAS Jeep as seen in Northwest Europe in 1944-45.  Given the fond memories I had I was sold straightaway.

ETC List Discussion

So I'm currently going through all the ETC lists to try and find some kind of strategy/ edge that will help us plucky Scots on the day. Now I won't divulge our cunning plan but I thought i would look at some of the popular list types at this years event.

For those of you who have no idea about the ETC it involved teams of 6 representing their nation (or other nations depending on mercenaries etc...) against other nations. This year it's held in Prague (Czech Republic) each team has six players, it's EW 1550 and two players must be infantry, 2 mech and 2 tank - oh and you can't have two of the same nation in the same slot, so no two French tank companies, but you could have a French infantry, mech and tank list.

Thoughts On Using A Panzergrenadier Company

Ok sitting back having now played 9 games with my little panzergreadier list (and a few previously with the Lehr aufklarungs panzergreadier) I thought I'd share my reflections on using them.

Firstly I'd suggest in future ask yourself the simple why are you playing this list? That might sound an odd question but it's important. As a mech player you have to set yourself up to defend vs tanks and attack infantry - As a tank player (especially the AA variety) you need to attack vs infantry and tanks, as an infantry player you need to defend, (occasionally attack I will admit) but the percentage is less than for Mech.

Tactical edge - Germans in Berlin

So I thought I'd take a look at what we're going to see from the German forces in Berlin - what builds look viable, what builds look less viable...

I think the first question is going to be which HQ you go for - I'm personally more in favour for the CV HQ - if you're using the Fearless roll then you're probably losing the game anyway! Now if you have mainly Fearless troops I can see a benefit with the reroll, but I think you can save points here!

German Obsessions

I honestly wish I didn't enjoy playing Germans! The problem is that I do, and unlike every other nation it requires relatively little expenditure to move from list to list to list.

Well there's been one style of list I've not been able to do before - and I'm rectifying this mistake now - I'm coming for you Gepanzerte Panzergrenadiers!

Expanding Grimball's Beasts (USAB05)

Hello all, Fez here.

I've been given the task of writing up how to expand the fantastic Grimball's Beasts US starter Tank army from Battelfront, as I had all the models in the box already!
Out of the three starter boxes, this is probably the hardest to write such an article, for one reason - the Pershing!

Bovingdons M26 Pershing

Unlike the German or the Soviet boxes, currently the Pershing only appears in one list - the Tank Company in Bridge at Remagen. This can be either the Confident Vet 9th, or my personal favorite the Reluctant Vet 3rd 'Spearhead' Armoured Division. I find that the points break for reluctant means I can round my platoons out to give me the tools I need for the job, and if I play it right, I won't need to motivate much anyway. Add the fact the 1ic is rolling up with the normal shermans anyway, a 5+ with a re-roll is still pretty good.

British Airborne Forces from Nachtjager (Digital) aka Varsity

Hi all, Coxer here returning to me oldest FoW love - British Airbourne forces. With the new lists out on Forces of war, I thought now was a good time to look at the new lists covering Operation Varisty, if you want to know my views on British para's here are thoughts about Market Garden, and Overlord.

So Where to begin? Well there are three lists, Parachute Company (British and Canadian), Airlanding, and Airborne Armoured Recce (AAR). Interestingly all of them including the AAR are Infantry (now it's been changed to mech)- even though the AAR has no infantry in it's core platoons. So what are the big changes if any? Well firstly there is the new rule 'All on the same page'  which shows the closer co-operation by ground forces so that there are no 'allies' in the list, just all one big force.

Expanding Vasily's Hammer (SUAB06) - Part Two

Hello all

In part one of this two part post I looked at how to make the new Vasily's Hammer (SUAB06) into a full 1750pts army. As I said at the time I thought that the Hero Tankovy aren't as good as the normal Tankovy, well today I'm going to look at how to expand your box set into a full Tankovy army.

I'm going to be using Desperate Measures again for this list so there is no need to buy another book just yet (you may want to later on when you look at more options and I would highly recommend you do pick up Red Bear (FW117) at some point as it has a lot of Soviet lists in it). This is going to be a very different beast, where you need to think and get used to Hen and Chicks, but at the same time you will have twice as many tanks. So lets look at the list.

Expanding Vasily's Hammer (SUAB06) - Part One

Hello All

Continuing on from Adam's post last Monday I'm going to look at how to expand the new Vasily's Hammer Boxset (SUAB06) set into a full 1750pts army.

What you get in the box

I'm going to split this into two parts. One will be how to expand the core box to make 1750pts ASAP which will be a Hero Tankovy list. The second part will be turning it into a regular Tankovy list.

The Night belongs to Panzers.... List deconstruction

So after ten games with my 'Von Ben' night attacking panzer list I thought I'd break down what's worked well, worked badly, would do differently next time and lessons learnt.

What worked well is pretty easy - night attacking! The ability for a spearhead move + always being hit on a 5+ on the first few turns is a huge benefit. With one exception where a king tiger rolled three sixes, I'm fairly certain this kept my force going most times. It really helps as well being a panther, as the FA10 is still huge, and all bar king tigers are pretty easy to ignore, add onto that IR equipment and Uhu half tracks and you're in a good place to lead the charge. Alongside the night attack getting to spearhead is effective especially when married with panzersturm or recce!

Expanding Rämsch's Charge (GEAB12)

So we set ourselves all a little challenge of expanding the new army boxes into 'proper' 1750 points Flames of War forces - and at the same time doing it on a budget!

So this is basically what you get in the box. As the groups main german player I got Rämsch's Charge (GEAB12) to expand. In the box you get 5 Panzer 4's, 3 StuG's and a platoon of Panzergrenadiers. Not a bad starting point, but also (if I may whisper) a little unfocused with the mixture of StuG and Panzer 4.
Lastly I'm going to go for a choice based more on coolness of model, both for look and effect on the field -

So firstly let's find a 'competative' list I can use as a base for a new player. The answer is obvious I think personally - the free 'Devils Charge Digital exclusive (which is free on Forces of War, and known to many as Panzers to the Meuse) even less cost for those of you joining the hobby. For this list I've gone for Lehr.

Road to Nowhere - List Destruction

So I'm back from Art of War, and my French have had their first outing, 3 wins, a mutually lost fair fight, and a loss - no 6-1 loss so happy on that!

It was a learning experience, with only one previous game vs armour, I found defending - especially in a mobile battle tough. The Czech 38t is my nemesis! (On a side note I've ordered two boxes from PSC!) The difficulty with this list against the 38t is that I have units which can hurt them - panhards/lafflys and units which can take a hit from them - hotchkiss, not one which can do both. Combating them was also problematic for the hotchkiss, with the 38t having a longer range - and my one man turret getting to shoot at them effectively was tough.

The other problem was against infantry - with lots of no HE I needed to assault to clear people off objectives, and with lots of HMG's the recce Hotchkiss were not relied upon. 

Thankfully I only faced barbed wire in one mission, but in my practice games it was noticeable how tough that made things for me.

Five Shades of Panzer

Hi all Coxer here again with more ramblings for you, this time about LW panzer lists.

The ongoing problem I have is this, 'getting what I want, for the points that I play, and covering all the bases, is tough!' I'll start by going though my 'methodology' on a list, and then look at how that plays into the construction of a list.

Some of my new panzers, and other stuff I've been working on/updating

I look at LW panzers as a real rapier list, you do not have the luxury of hitting lots of places - you lack the numbers, your main aim is to hit hard and fast in one area and punch a hole though - whether that's to the objective or the soft underbelly of the artillery park. 

The Road to Corrivalry, Ben's 2nd ID (Yes them again!)

Hello All,

If you tuned in for the last Podcast you will know the biggest (and one of the best) FoW tournament in the UK takes place next weekend, Corrivalry. This event marks the beginning of the tournament scene for 2015 (they come fast and furious after this, including Breakthrough Assault III in a months time).

So after last years less than glorious performance with my Matilda horde I decided to go back to an old favourite of mine- US Infantry. I had already done a fair amount of the infantry for my US Armoured rifles but I needed to bulk my collection to turn the Armoured Rifle platoons into Rifle Platoons,

Project Finland Epilogue - Panssari Kompanie

Hi all, 

One of the common questions which I got asked whilst painting my Finns was 'what do you think of the Panssari'. Honestly never thought about it, but then there was the EW sale, and I needed 2 blisters, so I ended up getting some T-28's...

So what is it about the Finnish panassari that is so appealing - obsolete fearless veteran tanks. I'll be honest I'm normally against fearless tanks on principle, and I prefer a few quality tanks over lots of chaff - but somehow with the Finns it works... Ok it kinda works in LW, but in MW...

So let's look at the two versions quickly

Project Finland : Mid War Fun & Madness

Hi all welcome to the third part of my Finnish list discussions - this time Midwar! (Early and Late war are here.)

I'm going to be honest this post has been rewritten perhaps three times - because trying to come up with a Finnish list for Mid War is tough! I'm once again sticking with Jääkärikomppania, and once again I'm FV. I'm planning this list for the next BA one day event, and Reading Warfare!

So where am I going to start, well once again lets go with the compulsory choices Jääkäri platoons, unlike late war I don't think I have the points for lots of upgrades, except of course Torni for one platoon and a close defense team for the other.

I'm thinking that I'm going to be defensive quite a lot due to the overwhelming number of tankovy lists I've previously played in MW, as such I'm going a little different, I want big platoons on the board with everything. As such I'm going to next go for the Anti Tank Rifle Platoon, but going to make them all Close defense teams and I can combat attach them out.

British Airlanding for the Euro GT

Hi All Adam here and I have a difficult decision to make! 

Up until 24 hours ago I was going to take Westfalen to this, but as Ben, Winner and Army were all trying to persuade me to take these guys, and Alex criticized me for thinking of taking them I thought - with 4 recommendations I might as well go for it!

So let's look at the construction of this list. The hq with the bagpiper is essential - needing an extra hit to be pinned is gold dust - when you assault (always through cover!) instead of statistically needing 15 shots to pin you, it's now 18 - I like those odds! Also let's take the extra PIAT's - only way Brits get two.

List Discussion - 9th Armored, Armored Rifles

Hello All

It's been a while since I have done a list discussion and while I was turning my Mid War Armoured Rifle Company into a Late War version I thought it was a good chance to correct that. Now I will start by saying this is a List Discussion with a bit of a difference, I'm using the New Bridge at Remagen book and the 9th Armoured Rifles list.

So what is the difference from are normal list discussions? Well normally it's about use fine tuning our lists and making the best list we can, well I'm not trying to do that, I'm going to try and make a list that will use some new options I haven't tried before and not use some of the staple units I normally use for the US. I'm doing this as I personally think one of the best ways to improve at any game is to try and play the game without your normal staple as it forces you to think more about what you have to do. Now I will say at this point I don't try to make bad lists, I'm not all about trying to win the game but I like to have a list that has a chance.