Great War

By Tom Gall

The folks at Hard Knox Games in Elizabethtown Ky are on to something for Flames of War and you probably want to know about it. With Flames of War (FOW) (and TY) I’m sure you’re more than familiar with the current matrix of missions that dot the competitive and casual landscape.

Part of the fun of FOW is showing up with a list, and not knowing what mission you’re going to play. You and your opponent each pick a stance (Attack, Maneuver, or Defend), reveal which gets you to a table to roll a D6, and decide the mission to play. The mission of course determines where you place objectives, where you deploy your forces, if you have reinforcements and other situational rules that’ll give your game extra flavor.

It’s a great system and thankfully Battlefront has been refreshing it approximately yearly. Sometimes tho, you want a little more variety. This is where the Move to Contact format you’ll find is interesting!

The folks at Hard Knox have run this format of missions 5 times now. Locally we’ve been using the missions for casual play, we’re fans.

By Tom Gall

Flames of War Great War has recently been re-released by Battlefront. Let’s take a 2023 look at the product line, what it offers, and what it takes to get started.

Great War takes Flames into the WWI period. Tanks are in their early infancy. Due to trench warfare, the mortar was refined and saw a great amount of use. The machine gun and light machine gun as infantry support weapons came into their own.

You might be thinking WWI was all trenches and mud, and certainly there was a whole bunch of that, but in 1918 especially as the front became more fluid, fighting both in and out of the trenches occurred and this game reflects that  Battlefront in my opinion really nailed the feeling of WWI in this variant of Flames of War, but only for 1918.

Nam, Fate of a Nation, and Great War are in many ways close cousins in that they’ve taken the core Flames of War rules and adapted them to each period to give you more fun gaming options.

Phil and I had a chance to talk with legendary game designer on his upcoming Great War Card game that is on Kickstarter now.

Many of our readers know that I am fascinated by the Great War, it was an event that changed the world unlike any other and when the guns fell silent in 1918 society, maps, and military thought were almost unrecognizable from how they looked in 1914.

This passion has led me to help develop a bunch of games that cover the Great War. Back in January I caught a glimpse of a game called Verdun 1916 Steel Inferno (V1916SI) by the French gamers at the Fellowship of Simulations. I was impressed as most gamers are with the sheer beauty of the game and I made sure I was the first backer when the project hit Kickstarter on 21 February, the 104th anniversary of the start of the battle.

Now that has hit the streets many gamers are starting to learn the mechanics of the game, they are trying to figure out what armies they will play in the game. While gamers have a lot of armies to choose from the basic composition of the forces in the game and the basic capabilities they possess are very balanced. This article will go over how to build a list that fits your personal playing style and maybe win a game or two.

By Mitch Reed

Many of you know that I am a huge fan of Great War gaming, and this month we have some great new games being released or in the works that gamers should take note of.

I find the history of the Great War fascinating and I have always wondered why it is not more popular and prominent in our hobby. I think some of these new games may change some minds over the next few months.

Our coverage of Blood & Valor isn’t done just yet! Over the last few weeks, the previews of ‘who’ will be storming the trenches and gun emplacements of Blood & Valor. This week, I’m here to look at the ‘why’ – or rather, to give you a look at the scenarios for the game. Oh, and also, some armored fighting vehicles. You can ‘tank’ me later.

By Mitch Reed

Gallipoli and the Near East are two campaigns that have become iconic and thanks the many movies, TV shows and books on these campaigns we have some great examples of how the conflict in these theaters went down.

This article will detail the forces in these two theaters and will be the third and final preview on what is in store for you in Blood and Valor from I would recommend that you look over the first article (or second) in this series that explains the construct on the force lists in the game.

By Mitch Reed

In my last article I told you all about the armies you will find fighting on the Western Front in Blood and Valor from Firelock Games. In this article we will go over the forces that fought in East Africa during the Great War. If you did not catch my previous article, I would recommend you do, the first half of the article talk about how formations are built and what units comprise a unit.

Last year when I asked (begged) Rufus and Kai DeVane to help with Blood and Valor it was my intention to include the fighting in East Africa which is omitted from so many games. My love for the theater is due to the many books I have read on the subject, the colorful characters who played a role in the campaign and the fact that it breaks the trench deadlock vision that many gamers have when the Great War is brought up.

The upcoming Great War game Blood and Valor from covers many different theaters of the conflict and when talking about the forces and factions in the game it is best to detail the force lists in relation to where and at what time they are found in the Great War.

Players will see that the forces in are balanced to fight against all other forces in the game, so it may be fun to have East African German Askari fight against US Doughboys just to see what would happen. The first book for Blood and Valor covers the fighting on the Western Front, Gallipoli, the Near East and East Africa. This article will give you an idea of what forces are in play for the Western Front.