Monthly Archives: October 2020

Sam Mustafa’s Rommel: first look

This game has been out for a few years now, and I’ve had my eye on it. It’s by Sam Mustafa, one of the world’s top wargames designers, for whom I have had a huge respect since the days of Grande Armée. Here he goes into a whole new era: WW2, and he has produced a game at operational level, to use the US military terminology (which I would otherwise call grand tactical). Each player has one or more divisions, and the playing area represents 72 square kilometres (or more…). Such games are commonplace as board games, but not on the tabletop, where games tend to have the flavour one-to-one representations, even when (for example Rapid Fire!) each piece actually represents a platoon or more. Now that I want to bring in such elements as artillery and air power to the tabletop, this is the sort of game I’m looking for. So at long last I splashed out on a copy.

I was rather underwhelmed at first. It’s quite a small book, like the Napoleonic Blucher from the same stable. The typesetting and visual appearance is similar to Blucher too, and overworked to my taste. The scantily clad 1940s girls adorning the chapter numbers may be very evocative of servicemen’s pin-ups, but it is just annoying to me, I’m afraid. The photos are a bit underwhelming too, and there aren’t many of them (though I don’t mind that so much). More seriously, as I got into the rules there seemed to be a lot missing: antitank guns, infantry guns (except when they aren’t), heavy mortars, recce units, AA units. Air power is dealt with in a very abstract way. Worse, the game structure seems very “gamey”, with each player having a “Command Post” sheet that reminds me of something similar in Saga, the very gamey Dark Ages game. The worry here is that you spend too much time playing the rules, rather than making decisions that resemble those of the historical counterparts. Sam badly overdid this in my view with his 18th century Maurice game, where players were playing hands of cards as well as troops on the table in a way that bore no resemblance to how actual generals went about their work.

But it quickly got better, though I still can’t reconcile myself to the visuals. Producing a game at this level is a tough gig if you are used to traditional style rules. You have to leave a lot out or else the whole thing gets overwhelming. This is the sort of thing that Sam is so good at. The game went through a lot of testing during which a lot of extraneous stuff was thrown out. I suppose if I want 120mm mortars, Bofors guns or Grille SP guns on the table then I need to go for a system like Rapid Fire. Likewise for model aircraft, though these could be brought in at a pinch as markers or tokens for “Events” or “Tactics”. The Command Post is much simpler than the Saga equivalent, and it is just a more sophisticated Command Point system. That may be too gamey in the end, but it’s not like playing a hand of cards.

So, what about the game? The first thing to say is that it is played on a grid of 1km squares. Practically these can’t be more than 6in (15cm) across, or else the table gets too big. That brings some challenges that I will come to. If you don’t like squares it is easy enough to adapt to hexes. The advantage of squares is twofold. Most important, they are very easy to mark out on the table using very discrete dots for the corners or the centres (the recommended method). Second is cosmetic; modern maps are marked up in a square grid, and maps played a critical part in the conduct of war at this level. Hexes make it look more like a board game. The use of squares to regulate movement, combat and artillery ranges feels like an excellent compromise for this sort of game. But it does mean that a lot geographical features get lost, like those support units: villages, roads, streams and so on.

Beyond that it really is quite hard to explain, especially since I haven’t tried playing it yet. It has an IgoUgo turn system. The player has a very limited budget of “Ops” (Command Points to you and me – I’m afraid I dislike Sam’s game terminology almost as much as his graphic design), which can be spent on movement, “Events” or “Tactics”. Doing well in combat looks expensive in points, while moving around is not so much. The combat resolution system is quite basic, but looks pretty appropriate. The whole thing is so unlike conventional games, though, it will take a little learning. As ever, Sam has thought of that, with basic rules and advanced rules, and a simple introductory scenario.

So what are my concerns? The first concerns my toys. For WW2 they are mainly 20mm, which is undoubtedly on the big side. It should be possible to get three Shermans into a 6in square (three is the stacking limit), but it would be a squeeze. There aren’t many photos of games in progress, but these mainly seem to be 6mm models on a 4in grid, with occasional 15mm or 2mm models. Undoubtedly the smaller models look better, though often I find their bases to be distracting. But 20mm models on a 6in grid will be not unlike 15mm ones on a 4in grid. Of course the missing toys grate, especially the anti-tank guns, which played such an important part in tactics of the time. The advanced rules allow what they call “tank hunters”, lightly armoured SP AT guns like the German Marder or Russian Su-76. That looked a bit of a cop-out to me – a bit of warmgamer’s bias to anything with tracks. These really are just mobile AT guns with almost no attack value. This clearly grated on early gamers too – as the downloadable optional rules contain an extra rule on massed AT guns. This is meant to represent such tactics as German Pakfronts, used by German, Soviet and British armies from mid-war on. There is also a “Tactic” to represent the presence of 88s and British 17pdrs (“Pheasants” – though I think that term only applied to the early improvised weapons on 25pdr carriages, of which I actually have a rather crude model). If you wanted to, it would be quite easy to put on heavy mortars or infantry guns, as after all the rules make occasional provision for 75mm howitzers. The issue is how concentrated these units were in practice – as an artillery unit needs to be quite beefy to get onto the table. Indeed it is quite hard for me to reconcile the presence of German 75mm guns in the early and late periods, and US pack howitzers for paras, but not American Chemical Mortar units, which played quite a significant role at Salerno, for example. Of course this game is doubtless plagued by dozens of issues like this, and you have to draw the line somewhere.

After the toys issue, I thought there was something else missing. There is no recognition of the significance of vantage points and commanding heights. That shows the influence of the Tunisian and Italian campaigns on my thinking, for my Project 1943. Commanding heights were critical objectives, and their possession influenced the direction of battles in these theatres. It was also a big deal on the Western Front in WW1, even around Ypres were on first impression the ground is pretty flat. On reflection I am feeling this is not such a big problem, as I don’t think it was such an issue in the relatively fluid battles fought across relatively flat terrain for much of the war. There are ways it can be dealt with too in the exceptional places, perhaps with the use of the Recce tactic, or other parts of the Command Post; exploiting a vantage point should surely require CPs. But that brings on another issue: the game has a fairly easy to understand open architecture when designing units, but the design of the Command Posts is less transparent. Each country (with the US and Britain treated as integrated allies) has a standard CP for each of the early, mid and late war periods. This looks as if it should work well enough for most of the time, but there will always be a case for tinkering with it, and the design aspects of this are not transparent.

Still, I feel I must give this a try. This means I must give some thought as to table design. I am not inspired by the photos of games In action. Firstly, with my 20mm models I think I need to go for an abstract look, bringing to mind maps rather than real terrain. That would men no physical terrain pieces on the table. There just isn’t room, and they look wrong. A tree is not a forest. A lone building is not a street. The terrain markings need to be flat, so that the models can go on top as glorified counters. Features can be named, including ones that have no game significance (like villages and major roads), but would have been important geographical markers. It might be a bit ambitious to give every square a name (72 squares!), but there should be enough to help navigation. I think that would do a lot to give the game atmosphere . I do have some 6mm models too, though only a US army that is ready for the table top. I was thinking of using these to try out Battlefront rules, based on the late war (perhaps the Lorraine battles in September 1944). Some thought needs to be given about these as well. It is more practical for these to have more representational terrain though the temptation is to have smaller (4in) squares, which make this harder. This is worth thinking about. I have a feeling that a weak visual appearance on the tabletop is one of the reasons these rules haven’t caught on as much as they might have done.

A final issue for me is to think about ways to make the use air power less abstract. I totally understand why Sam never attempted this – it entails a whole new layer of the game. It is purely something I need to get off my chest. Air power did have an important part to play at this level, though it was often away from the main battle front. I would like players to have air assets which they then choose to deploy to influence the battle as best they can, through front line support, air superiority, interdiction or medium level bombing. I think space could be made for this in a game like this. But a while down the track on that one!

But overall Sam Mustafa is to be congratulated in taking on a very challenging project, and coming up with solutions I would never have thought of, and giving insights into the sorts of compromises that have to be made. I am looking forward to trying these rules out. One day.

WW2 aircraft – my next thing

The box top for the Eduard Spitfire Mk VIII, showing a later-war version in Far East colours. The kit is designed to display the model sitting quietly on the ground rather than in action like this…

2020 has been massively frustrating from a hobby point of view. Lockdown stopped gaming, and meanwhile a long drawn out house move meant I couldn’t even catch up on my miniatures or try a bit of solo gaming. And a new house, complete with garden, means lots of jobs need be done. Disappearing off to the wonderful new hobby room (a big win in the long term) would attract some pretty stern looks from the person that cooks over 95% of my meals. On top of that I have had a rather sadder duty – to spend time caring for my father in the last months of his life (he died on Monday, RIP, aged 96). I should point out that I shared this caring with two brothers, both of whom did more than I did, and one a lot more. But another higher priority to hobby time.

But in between jobs I had plenty of time to surf the internet, here and there. Alas this had the result it so often does with people who share my hobby. I’ve started another project. I have been researching WW2 aircraft, and models that are available in 1/72 scale. This, of course, is meant to go alongside my 1943 wargames project, focusing on the Tunisia and Italian campaigns, and the British experience in particular. Unfortunately there has been no compelling need for model aircraft in my 1943 games so far. My games have been at skirmish level, where air involvement was pretty incidental. But as I move up to higher gaming levels then aircraft might start coming into it. Still the main reason I am embarking on this is that I love WW2 warplanes, and I love to make models. It is part nostalgia, and part developing some new techniques for my old hobby. Funnily enough I threw out my last model aircraft saved from my youth in the house move this year (an unfinished Ju-88C night fighter, an FW-190A-8 and a Gloster Meteor). I had earlier thrown out my library of aircraft books, convinced that that chapter in my life had closed – a decision I now regret. The internet is a useful resource, but has its limits.

While the need for the models for wargaming is very limited, I still want to build them so that they can be used on the tabletop – so in flight and with a means of attaching them to a stand. Where appropriate they will be in fighter-bomber mode, with bombs attached. I have started buying. My first two models were a Spitfire Mk VIII, and a Kitty Hawk 1E (I will come to why). I got a bit of a shock when these models arrived (the Spitfire from Eduard, the Kitty Hawk from Special Hobby). These are modellers’ models, not war-game models. I knew that, but simply expected a lot of detail that would be unnecessary. But I found that, unlike the 1970s, models are nowadays displayed as on the ground with crew absent. Retracting the undercarriage could be a bit tricky sometimes, and I will have to source crew. Ouch! It wasn’t like that in the old days of Airfix and Revell. Also a bit puzzling – I think aircraft are made to be observed in flight, with all those sleek lines. But modern modellers get exercised about the seatbelt straps in an empty cockpit!

The first stage in any project, and one of the most fun bits, is compiling the list of things you are going to collect/build. It was logical to start with the British, as my 1943 project is a bit of tribute to my national forebears. The workhorse plane in 1943 was the Spitfire VC. It was outclassed as an air superiority fighter by the FW-190, but it was the best the Allies had until the later Spitfires started to appear. Airfix are about to release a model of this aircraft in its tropical version, and this is the logical model to get (as far as I can see you can build these in flight and a pilot is provided – Airfix is still tied to the old-school values). I also wanted one of the later Spitfires, which started to appear in numbers in 1943, and which were a match, or more, for the more modern Luftwaffe fighters. The most important of these was the Mark IX, which was a re-engined Mark V. But in the Mediterranean theatre there were also significant numbers of Mark VIIIs. This was actually a more advanced design (for example with a retracting tail wheel), and was the base for later marks after the IX, but it could not be produced in the numbers needed to counter the FW-190 quickly enough, hence the Mark IX project. I wanted one of these. Eduard make a well-reviewed model of this, so I thought I had better snap it up while still in stock. I went for the slightly more expensive Profipack version, rather than the cheaper Weekend, because the Weekend model had fewer versions, and not the early Mediterranean version I was looking for. This was a mistake. The extra parts in the Profipack are ones I am unlikely to use (the fiddly bits for proper modellers), and the Weekend version has all the parts needed for all versions, and one or two more on top (for the Mark IX I think). Meanwhile the decals included in the Profipack for the 1943 Med. plane are for a senior officer’s personal plane – not a proper front-line aircraft. I will have to source these separately anyway (though the roundels should be OK to use, and I have quite few bits left over from my old modelling days).

Next up I decided I needed a Kitty Hawk. This plane somehow characterises the Desert Air Force more than any other. It was the best of the US aircraft available at the time, a better fighter than the Hurricane, robust and an excellent fighter-bomber. Various versions were in use right up to the end of the war. The best looking version looked to be the Special Hobby Mark IA (or P-40E), so I plumped for this to save on postage while ordering the Spit. Quite often I have found models were out of stock, so I was tending to buy when I could. I have subsequently learned not to panic, as it isn’t too hard to get models even for some time after production has ceased (eBay being a good source). I then learned that the IA was being phased out in 1943 for versions with more powerful engines (the Mk II and Mk III) – these had a slightly longer body for air stability, so are visually distinct. Special Hobby do a model of that too. So I have been too quick on the draw again. It’s too extreme to buy another model, as in fact they are still pretty similar.

The next plane to think about was the Martin Baltimore. This was a light bomber used extensively by the RAF in this theatre, but not much by anybody else anywhere else. The wargames value of this one is questionable. By 1943 they were being used for targets well behind the lines. Still it seemed right to include it in my collection of distinctive aircraft. (I draw the line at the heavier Wellington bomber, also much used, but mainly at night). Also it is quite hard to source a model, which, of course, only adds to the attraction. There was an old Frog model (the brand was renowned for being a bit dodgy back in the day). There are more modern models from Azur and Special Hobby (possibly the same one for all I know…), both (like the Frog model) hard to get. On eBay I found somebody stocking an Azur Mark V (in Free French colours) and so I ordered that. It has just arrived and it looks fine, with parts for the turret used in earlier marks. I will have to source the decals for a British plane used in 1943.

There is one more plane I am thinking about for my British collection, and that is the Hurricane IID, the tank-buster version with cannon under the wings. Only one squadron was equipped with these, and only for the Tunisia operations. But I have always had a soft spot for the Hurricane, and the IID was used in a tactically interesting way, sweeping through in advance of the ground forces. A kit doesn’t look too hard to get. My plan is to build all the British planes in a single batch to save time (and similarly for the other nationalities).

What of the Germans? The workhorse fighter-bomber was the FW-190, so I need at least one of these. The most widely available model is of the A8/F8, but these were not deployed in numbers until 1944. I have my eye on an Eduard model of the A5, which was current in 1943. This was slightly longer than the early As, to improve its bomb-carrying ability. I think there are models for this very early version about, and it is possible I will get one of these as well. Next comes the Bf-109. By 1943 it is the Gustav that is in service, with the G6 (with its upgraded armament and ammunition blisters on the forward fuselage) coming into service. There is an Airfix model of the G6, which has pretty bad reviews – but the Airfix production values seem to be close to what I want, and the niggles that modern modellers have are unlikely to concern me much. Once again an earlier version is worth considering to have in addition (an early G or perhaps an F).

In Tunisia the Stuka was still in operation; they were around in Italy later, but the Germans did not dare use them in range of allied fighters. At the time the Ju-87D was the main version operation, though there were some Bs still around. The D is much harder to find models for than the B (though the similar G with underwing tank busting guns is more popular, though used only on the Russian front). The main issue is whether to try and find the later D-5 with longer wings and uprated wing armament. I also gave thought to the Ju-88 bomber, one of my favourites, and the main German medium bomber in this theatre. But these were mainly used at sea, and did not seem to have played any role up close on land – as well as being a big model to make. I have not yet committed to any of these purchases of German aircraft, having learned the lesson not to panic.

Finally on the German side I want a Bf-110. I’m not actually sure this type played much of a role in the Tunisian and Italian land battles. But a number were captured on the ground at Montecorvino airfield (along with some FW-190s) in the battle for Salerno, and I’ve always wanted to build a model of one of the 110. It is the fighter-bomber G2 that I am after. This isn’t a very popular model, but Eduard did one, and in the Profipack version they have one of the Montecorvino planes, with a distinctive hornet emblem on its nose. But the model is out of production. I found one on eBay in France, but hesitated to click. When I eventually decided to take the plunge, I couldn’t find it, so I assumed the last one had gone. So I bought a Weekend version from a German stockist, the last Edouard 1/72 kit I could find, but without the Montecorvino decals. I did manage to find a decal set with the hornet emblem on (for a different unit in the same wing that was based in Sicily and transferred to France during 1943), so I bought that, which made the overall cost higher than the Profipack. The French Profipack promptly turned up again in another search. Jumping too quickly again. On reflection I might have been able to convert a kit of the much more widely available G4 night fighter.

On colours, in Italy the German fighters all seem to be in the standard European scheme of three shades of grey, with a white fuselage stripe for the theatre and often splashes of yellow. A lot of these planes were transferred rapidly from other theatres without time for a tropical paint-job – which would have been less relevant in Italy anyway (and a lot of the air action was over the sea). In Tunisia quite a few planes were overpainted with dark yellow and olive in varying degrees. My plan is to use the grey scheme for the Germans, except the Stuka, which I will have in a hybrid scheme. If I go for the early Bf-109 and FW-190, these will have topicalised schemes too. Perhaps I will do them in two batches.

Finally I plan to do some American planes, as these sometimes supported the British forces. Top of the list is the A-36 Apache (or Invader). This is the early Mustang with Allison engine and used as a dive-bomber. It had a very active and successful career in 1943, but then faded away, and is often forgotten about (I have even seen it mis-identified as a P40 in an Images of War book). I don’t know how close these got to the front line, but, like the Baltimore, this is so characteristic of this era that I feel I must have one. There is a kit available from Brengun, though purists quibble that it isn’t quite the right shape. Second is a P-38 Lightning, kitted out as a fighter-bomber. These did not play a big role as fighter-bomber in this theatre (or any other), but a least one German account mentions them at Salerno, and it is an interesting plane. I want an early version, such as the F, which is less available as a model than later ones, but RS Models do one, which still looks obtainable, which apparently can be kitted out with bombs. Finally I want a medium bomber, as these occasionally got close to the front line (occasionally on the wrong side). The workhorse here was the B-25 Mitchell, and there is a nice-looking Airfix model available. But I recovered from my loft an old Airfix B-26 Marauder still in its box from the 1970s. This was a well-regarded model at the time, and I have always liked the B-26. I was going to make up this model in RAF colours, but there was only one squadron of these in operation in 1943, and these mainly operated in the maritime theatre. I will need to locate decals for one of the 1943 Mediterranean-based planes, but that doesn’t look too hard.

And s that’s the plan! It’s a digression, but promises to be a lot of fun.