Preview

by Mitch Reed

Like many of you, I am willing to try any historical game, whether it be a board game, miniatures, or video game. However, one type of gaming I have never tried is role-playing games.

The new game from Firelock Games called War Stories has gotten me to change my mind and take the plunge.  Lead designer Gabriel Garcia really got my attention for this World War Two-based RPG when we chatted in my interview with him on our podcast. Prior that that discussion, I did not believe that a topic as WWII would translate well in the RPG format.

However, the depth and breadth of War Stories really had me wondering why this has not been done before.

By Mitch Reed

I have been a fan of the COIN (Counter Insurgency) games for some time now and I was excited to be able to meet Steve Rangazas and play one of the games from his upcoming 4-pack, The British Way from GMT and should be shipping sometime later this year.

The game harkens back to the days of the old SPI Quad-Games series where you get four games in a single box. The British Way covers the insurgencies as the sunset of the British Empire and covers the conflicts in Malaya, Cyprus, Kenya, and Palestine.

By Mike Rafferty

The British Bulge book is finally out, which covers the British from post-Normandy Market Garden up to the end of the war. The book adds a lot of new features and army lists for the British and has a special significance for me. Welsh Guards Cromwells were the first army I actually built and painted fully. I still have this force and the Cromwell is my favourite-looking tank of the war, despite the obvious superiority of the Sherman. The new book adds Challengers, so I can finally play my Welsh Guards as intended with Cromwells and Challengers.

By Richard Steer

Bulge: British is the latest release for the Late-War era of Flames of War. This book covers the British, Canadian, and Polish forces in Western Europe from August 1944 through to the end of the war in Europe.

It’s a book that many of us have been looking forward to for a long time. The arrival of the Comet is a large part of that anticipation, but there are several infantry formations in the book that also deserve a close look.

Kangaroo Rifle Company

Bulge: British takes the standard Rifle Company from the previous books and upgrades it. The overall structure of the formation is identical to those earlier iterations, but the Company HQ and Rifle Platoons now have the option of including Ram Kangaroo transports.

By Richard Steer

Flames of War began its Late-War Journey in June 2019 with the publication of Fortress Europe, bringing V4 into the 1944-45 era. Subsequent releases have seen Late-War develop with books covering the Normandy and Bagration campaigns, and most recently the Ardennes.

Throughout the last three years, however, there has been something missing. You can argue about their historical significance. You can make jokes about them breaking down, running out of fuel, and being unable to cross bridges. But one thing is certain: in the Tiger II, Jagdtiger, and Jagdpanther, Bulge: German contains some of the most anticipated additions to V4.

Do they live up to expectations? Let’s take a closer look at how these vehicles have been represented in the game.

By Mitch Reed

I was honored to help the team at Battlefront write the initial Polish list for Team Yankee. The new Polish lists in Warsaw Pact forces make the force (that I love to play) even better. While not blessed with tons of new kit, the update is one that fellow Polish players will really enjoy.

By Richard Steer

The North African campaign has always been the theatre of World War II that I have been most interested in, and specifically the British perspective of the conflict. This interest carried over into , with British forces in the Mediterranean has been my primary focus in the game.

To be honest, I was pretty disappointed with the first releases for FOW V4. Desert Rats and felt very lightweight compared to the previous lists for the African Campaign that we had been playing with, being the original North Africa compilation from 2009. That’s not to say that the V4 lists were bad. On the contrary, with the exception of the 17/25pdr anti-tank gun, Desert Rats was a reasonably historical representation of the most common British armored formations in Egypt and Libya in the middle of 1942. The British lists from Desert Rats were later expanded and re-released as Armoured Fist, which filled in many of the gaps, but the fact remained that the army lists had taken a step backward in detail and completeness under V4.

By Tom Burgess

Bagration Axis-Allies, along with the Finns and Hungarians, brings the Romanians to Late War for Flames of War V4. As a wargamer who always prefers Red vs. Blue match-ups, the fact that the Romains fought for then against the Axis in World War 2 makes them very appealing to me.  The Romans lists are solid  with a lot of decent options. The Romanians seem to combine some of the best aspects of axis and allied armies into a force that can fight on either side.

Bagration Axis-Allies gives us three tank and one infantry formation to choose from. These are expanded by command cards options with an additional Pioneer, Cavalry Squadron, Mountain Rifle Company, and T-38 Tank Company formations. We end up with far more options and variations then we ever had from Version 3 for the Romanians.

By Mitch Reed

Hungarians recently were added to the late-war period with the release of the book for Following the Finnish we now have the Hungarians making an appearance for the mid-war period. The new expansion comes in a 36-page booklet and gives you a lot of options if you want to field a Hungarian MW force.

By Mitch Reed

The Germans are no longer going at it alone for late war with the addition of the Bagration Axis-Allies book that brings the Hungarians, Romanians and the Finns into . Many gamers have been eagerly awaiting these forces to come back into the game and now their wait is over with new book that contains three of the most important allies that Germany had in the Second World War.