FOW Cards in the Pocket: Hungarian Command Cards for Late War

By Ian Birdwell

Introduction

With new books and lists comes the opportunities to discuss new command cards, and the Hungarian ones are a doozy for all kinds of gamers. Personally, I’m pretty excited about the expansion into the realm of Axis minors, they add a ton of depth of field for the game on the Eastern Front in terms of gameplay while also opening new doors to explore the complex history of the war in the East. And those two perspectives, gameplay vs history, really characterize the command cards for the Hungarians in a big way.

So let’s get down to business in discuss the nuances and intricacies of the command cards that bring back some crowd favorites while opening the door to some brand new opportunities; through first a brief overview of some of the new units and abilities added into the Hungarian faction, then noting the new formations at hand, before finally bringing it all together in building a list from the cards.

New units/Abilities introduced

In terms of new things brought to the table for the Hungarians for abilities and new units its important from the get go to say these are all of the units that don’t have a command card formation bound to them, instead they focus on upgrading existing units or changing up existing formations. For ease of work we’ll break this down into two major areas: things changing existing formations/units and things that bring a little more historic flexibility into existing support units.

Initially, the biggest winner in the realm of Hungarian command cards lay in the already-coming-out-ahead Zrinyi Assault Gun Formation. You know it, you love it, you’ve already got three new plastic boxes of it on pre-order at your local friendly game store, the command cards take that fantastic formation and make it better.

I know, you’d never believe that right? But take a look at this: the ability to snag a veteran infantry unit instead of some Pak 40s to ride gloriously into battle supporting your assault guns. It turns the Swiss army knife of the Hungarians for LW into an even more versatile force for addressing any foes you’ll face on the gaming table.

And if you’re concerned of not having enough punch to take on tanks with the AT 10 105mm gun, upgrade one to a Zrinyi I 44M with an AT 11 long 75mm gun. While you can only snag one, it means you can make sure your HQ is able to adequately able to knock out anything that could reliably destroy your Zrinyi as they’re pushing towards the objectives. Each of these options I’d say are things to help in tailoring a force rather than auto-includes for the Zrinyi formation, and that makes them even better because it gets you thinking about how to shape your tactics well before the game even starts.

Other considerations in relation to existing units in the Hungarian repertoire include things like Motorcycles, Lucky, and Machine Gun Nests.  Pretty self-explanatory from my perspective with how these cards have been looked at in other Battlefront publications.

These cards are still interesting, but not as interesting as alterations within things like Fresh Divisions. The former takes the standard Hungarian Infantry Company and makes it cheaper at the cost of being easier to hit and a worse tactics rating, neither of which are deal breakers in terms of list building. Saving some points on an infantry formation opens the door up to take more Assault guns or tanks to really make an impact in list building.

Still, one of the more interesting avenues to explore for Hungarian players in these command cards not tied to formations lies in the 75mm Skoda Mountain Guns and the 149mm Guns. Both of these choices I’d largely put up as historically inclined choices, but their inclusion does provide some options for the enterprising Hungarian player – I know at some point my 149mm guns and my Mountain Guns will take the field. After all, its good to have choices.

Speaking of choices, the Hungarian Command Cards add six warrior cards to upgrade your formations, with Ervin Tarczay returning (as less a formation upgrade and more a commander upgrade) alongside the likes of Josef Barankay, Sandor Hanak, Barnabas Koszeghy, Erno Billnitzer, and Janos Bozsoki. What’s fascinating is that four of the six are all for the Zrinyi Assault Gun formation, with benefits ranging from better tactics ratings near the commander (Bozsoki) to significantly better remounts, rallies, and last stand checks (Billnitzer). Each commander provides an interesting angle to further refine the honed edge of Hungarian armor, my personal favorite being Billnitzer for the flavor he can add to a force with that improved tactics rating.

New Formations

With that discussion out of the way, let’s turn to the meat and potatoes of the Hungarian command cards: new infantry formations. One of the highlights of playing Hungarians in V3 was the Hungarian infantry division PDF. It added a ton of varied infantry formations to the force and enabled a ton of variation to the army.

All of those formations are back, and this time they brought two friends. As a quick list the following are the formations brought in: Motorized Rifle Company, Pioneer Company, Assault Pioneer Company, Border Guard Company, Huszar Company, Scout Company, Volunteer Rifle Company, and the Parachute Company.

In terms of where we’ll focus our attention, we’re going to look at the benefits of each type of new infantry unit and the Parachute Company before delving into one of the more interesting options from the cards.

Initially, the new units brought in with the Command Cards provide an interesting lens of being able to present a historically oriented force or one tailored for gaming. United like the Pioneer, Assault Pioneer, and Border guards are each able to take flamethrowers instead of a single rifle stand.

So there’s some solid options there. Meanwhile, Huszars, Scouts, and Motorized rifles are faster due to Huszar and Scout rules getting them up the board a bit faster. These forces certainly add a great deal of flavor and some solid competitive leanings within things like the Assault Pioneers, but in my eyes the Parachute rifles add something really unique to the Hungarians.

Parachute rifles are a brand new infantry formation for the Hungarians, completely divorced from anything in V3 and standing apart as a formation of everything being fearless veteran. That makes them a solid formation to really hold their own in nearly any encounter at a significant cost for each platoon upgraded. That gives Hungary an option it hasn’t had in any of the previous editions and a good choice if you’re trying to get the hang of the force.

While all of these forces are interesting, I think the biggest consideration for drawing out a new formation from the card is to bring in some of these individual units into a single formation.

The Pioneers, Assault Pioneers, Border Guards, and Volunteer Rifles are each unconstrained by a single formation based on my read of the cards (the only exception is the Parachute Platoon which has the “title” keyword that may restrict it solely to the Parachute rifle formation).

None of them are limited either, implying you can take a regular rifle company as a formation, slot out the regular rifles for your choice of infantry from the above list, and have a fairly convincing Budapest pocket formation with a ton of flexibility in unique units. My personal favorite list at the moment after playing around with the book and cards is listed below:

Zrinyi Formation

Zrinyi HQ

Zrinyi AG Platoon

Hetzer AG Platoon x 5

Assault Artillery Rifle Platoon (Panzerfaust, Panzerschreck)

Infantry Formation

Infantry HQ

Full Sized Rifle Platoon (Volunteer Rifles, Panzerfaust, Panzerschreck, HMG)

Full Sized Rifle Platoon (Volunteer Rifles, Panzerfaust, Panzerschreck)

81mm Mortar Platoon

AT Rocket Launcher Platoon

Support

8.8 Heavy AA Gun Platoon

3 Csaba Armored Cars

 

This force has a ton of flexibility and evokes a ton of the flavor of the Budapest Pocket, which is now more playable than it was previously because of the release of the Axis Allies book!

Before we depart though, I’d like to pour one out for a few of our fallen favorites from V3 that did not appear in the command cards.

Goodbye established rules for the CV33/35, we will miss you and remember you fondly.  As an aside, the unit can easily be fielded as a Csaba if you’re so inclined. Just avoid firing the main gun and fire the machine gun instead. Additionally, several other command cards common to other decks for upgrading units like commanders are absent in this deck. While not a deal breaker, it would be nice to upgrade my infantry commander to roll an additional die in assaults or for a Zrinyi commander to count as concealed in the open if remaining stationary.