Team Yankee Escalation League: Round#1
By Howard West
Photos By Rich Baier, and Michael Schwille
Videos By Donald Skovira
In the Greater Pittsburgh and Western PA area we have several groups of players that play Flames of War and Team Yankee at geographically dispersed stores and the players seldom get together other than for tournaments. So after reading about how other groups have run escalation leagues we decided to try a Team Yankee Escalation League here in Western PA.
Background Info for the Team Yankee Escalation League
The Team Yankee Escalation league will consist of three rounds, and each player will select a core formation type that will be the basis of your force for all rounds. Each round will have different points for the players to purchase their core formation and support options for their Armies.
Each round the core formation type will be the same EX: Soviet BMP Motorized Rifle Battalion. The contents of the example core formation can change. But the formation type cannot. Also if the player wanted to they could build a second formation for their army, then both formations will be built out of the core points provided, including Allied formations.
Also, new players can jump in at any time during the three rounds.
Army construction and game rules:
- All Army books that are in Forces.
- Formation limit = 2.
- NO Stance limit.
Round #1 Points = 50 Formation Points + 10 Support Points.
Game Length 2-Hours. You can use up to 50 points for your core formation or formations and 10 additional points for support or black box units. You cannot exceed 50 points in your core formation or formations and cannot use any leftover points for support or black box units. Also, you cannot spend any leftover support points on core formations.
Round #2 Points = 60 Formation Points + 15 Support Points.
Game Length 2-Hours-15-minutes. You can use up to 60 points for your core formation or formations and 15 additional points for support or black box units. You cannot exceed 60 points for your core formation or formations and cannot use any leftover points from the 60 points on support items. Also, you cannot spend any leftover support points on core formations.
Round #3 Points = 70 Formation Points + 20 Support Points.
Game Length 2-Hours-30-minutes. You can use up to 70 points for your core formation or formations and 20 additional points for support or black box units. You cannot exceed 70 points for your core formation or formations and cannot use any leftover points from the 70 points on support items. Also, you cannot spend any leftover support points on core formations.
Authors Note: The idea of splitting the points between core and support came about since we had a few players that wanted to play Armies that have not had their book updated to the V2 format. EX: Soviet BMP Motorized Rifle Battalion player could fill out the three Infantry companies and then buy an additional rifle company via a black box. The V1 Army Books cannot do this. We felt that the Armies out of the new V2 Army Books might have an advantage. So in essence we put a cap on how you spent your points. And since we had fiuve players using the V1 Army Books we felt we needed a solution to the problem.
# of players and # of games played in Round#1
In Round#1 we had 12 players with 13 different lists, We had 1 player play two different Nations. We completed 19 games.
Armies Entered in Round#1
The chart below shows the Nations that had armies played In Round#1 and had at least one game played.
For Round#1 we ended up with a balance of Nato vs Warsaw Pact players, but we are not doing Nato vs Warsaw Pact or Red vs Blue matchups. The players decide on the matchups based on who shows up for gaming or they can arrange a game on their own. So the paring’s are semi-organized. We have a start and end date for each round.
Example Players Lists Round#1
Enclosed are some of the player lists that were used in Round#1. Rounds #2 and Round#3 lists will be based on the core formation that you build in Round#1.
Missions Played in Round#1
Below is a chart showing the Missions used in the 19 games played in Round#1. For the Team Yankee Escalation League, we did not have restrictions on stance usage. So if a player wanted to attack in all of their Round#1 games were permitted.
Video of one of our Round#1 Games
https://youtu.be/WnsZ_-B1e40
Tank Units Used in Round#1
The chart below identifies the different Tank Types that have been used in the 19 played in Round#1. The Chart does not reflect the multiple tank units of the same type in a formation. EX: If a player used a US M-60 tank company it would only count as 1 for the chart below.
Air Units
The Chart Below identifies the number of times an Air Unit was used in a game on one side. With 19 games played you had 38 player sides. The total # of Air Units appearing in Round #1 was 16 of which one player had 2 Air Units in their Army in two of the games played. Also in the 19 games played 3 of the games both players had Air Units in their Armies. Confused yet? What that means is that 8 games did not have any Air Units, 8 games one side had Air Units, and 3 games had both sides having Air Units.
I was surprised at the point levels in Round#1 of Armies that had Air Units in them. Three Armies had Air Units of 4 Aircraft in them the remaining, Three Armies had Air Units of 2 Aircraft.
Video of one of our Round#1 Games
Round #1 Results
The chart below identifies the final scores of our 19 games that have been played in Round#1. Nine of the games finished with either an 8-1 or a 6-3, the other 9 games finished with some combination of 3’s,2’s, or 1’s. Several of the games could have finished with slightly more time. Also, some of the games did go beyond the suggested time limit for each game, but that was up to each of the players in that specific game.
Wrap-Up
We finished Round#1, based on feedback the players are pretty happy that we are trying to help organize gameplay. One of the other outcomes we wanted with the Escalation League was for it to be a testing ground for point levels and game length for Team Yankee in our local area. I’m looking forward to Round#2 and the various matchups. Round#2 will be published on NO Dice No Glory.
Please leave comments below, I normally respond to them in a few days and try to incorporate your suggestions or ideas into future articles or modifications to our Escalation League.