Tanks for the Memories – American Armour lists in Bulge American for Flames of War

By Tom Gall

The tide of Late War books for Flames of War continues with the Bulge American book by Battlefront. This pushes American lists further into 1944-1945 offering American players lots of good options. In this article we’re going to focus on Tank oriented lists contained in the book and command cards. By this I mean lists where the core units (ie black box) are armored.

List wise, the book and command cards introduce the following tank formations.

1. Veteran M4 Sherman (Late)
2. Veteran M24 Chaffee
3. M4 Sherman (Late)
4. M24 Chaffee
5. M18 Tank Destroyer
6. M36 Tank Destroyer
7. M24 Chaffee Cavalry – Command card
8. M5 Stuart Cavalry – Command card
9. Cavalry Recon – Command card

Sherman (Late) Tank Companies

The Sherman tank companies come in two flavors, the Veteran and normal. Either way they are designed (Late) and no that doesn’t affect your reinforcement roll. Both formation type is built around the M4 Sherman with it’s base 7 frontal armor and 75mm gun as a base. For a single point per tank you can upgrade the Sherman to a 76mm gun.

Further using the Uparmored M4 Sherman (Late) command card, you can up the front armor to 8 at a cost of 1 point per tank however the cross check then increases to a 4+. At 4-5 points per tank depending on if you take the normal or veteran option, the work horse tank looks to be a reasonable value.  Do you minimize and build up your support or do you maximize that’s a good question. Additional M4 Sherman platoons, veteran or not can be upgraded where all M4 Shermans are replaced with M4 Easy Eights, or one Sherman can be replaced with an M4 Jumbo.

The Veteran Sherman (Late) Companies gives you the most options for adding in different hardware into your Sherman based list. With M26 Pershing options or Stuart/Chaffee options in the core platoons, instead of M4 Shermans, you can craft a list with no Shermans in it save for the HQ platoon.

About those Pershings

The T26 Pershing and Super Pershing are the American version of the dreaded Tiger and better. High frontal armor, great gun, everything to make you pretty proud as you deploy on the table for the first time hoping your opponent is starting to sweet bullets. This is the formation to field in order to access this kind of hardware especially as part of the core formation. The downside is they aren’t cheap!

With Front Armor of 9, a AT14 90mm gun, this is the American Tiger… but did I mention the price?  9-10 points each. This is the kind of unit which can be a game winner and as such, if you play American, you’re going to want to pick up a box of these tanks. They’ll serve you well.

The next tank is the Super Pershing, it’s the one that I think will become important in anticipate of the Tiger II, JadgTiger and so on. It’s 90mm gun has an AT18 with 48″ range. That’ll give lots (but not all) Germans a bad day. At most you’ll only be able to field 1 Super Pershing per platoon. Like the Ferdinand they are a unit which parks and confidential says “none shall pass.”

 

The normal non-veteran M4 Sherman (Late) Company does not have the same range of choices for it’s core platoons excluding the options I’d mentioned before where M4 Shermans can be either upgraded or replaced with M4 Easy Eights or a single Jumbo with the 1-1 swap.

Veteran vs Regular?

Veteran tanks are hit on a 4+ as you’d expect. skill is a 4 however they have a tactics on a 3+. Additionally the Jumbo, Easy Eight and M4 Sherman all remount on a 3, all good stats for a pretty low cost per tank over regulars. Regulars are as you’d expect hit on a 3+, skill of 4+ with no tactics rating, yet they have a remount of 3+ and a last stand of 3+. The choice boils down to better to hit rating and tactics vs a worse to hit rating but better last stand.

For me I think I’d error on the side of the Veteran tankers, the post cost isn’t bad and you get access to a wider range of hardware which in theory should make the Company more tough to break.

Chaffee Companies

The Chaffee Tank Companies come in two flavors, just like the M4 Sherman, either Veteran or Regular. The Chaffee sports a 75mm gun with the same stats as a bog standard M4 75mm Shermans, AT10, Smoke and Stabilizer. The Chaffee offers a 12″ tactical and while the front armor is only a 4, it positions itself very well as a replacement for the Stuart. Veteran Chaffees are like Veteran M4 Shermans with a remount of 3+, a hit on 4+, skill of 4+ but tactics OF 3+, all for the price of 4 pts per tank. The regular Chaffees are hit on 3+, trained 4+ skill, gain last stand at 3+  and remount on a 3+, for 3 pts per tank.

The choice between Veteran Chaffees or Regular is similar to the M4 Sherman choice, and at just a point of different per tank, I can imagine many will struggle which one to go with.

The unit layout for the formation is the same for either Company choice. With the ability to have as much as two Veteran M4 Sherman (Late), you can build up the Company with more armor before turning to support options.

M18 Tank Destroyers

Tank destroyers are meant to be big guns with high AT at the expense of armor. Ambush being a major tactic to employ with this hardware, hit, hit’em hard, and do so from cover. The M18s are a 4+ to hit, springing something from cover when the return fire comes they’ll be looking for at least 5+. Unfortunately for the M18, it’s 76mm gun tops out at AT12. To the rescue is a command card entitle “Tank Destroyer Hyper-Velocity AP” which for the price of 1 point per 2 teams, increases the AT to 13. An auto include especially if you are fielding M18s.

The M18 formation is otherwise made up for M20 Security Sections, which means you’ll have to lean on either other formations or support to balance your force.

M36 Tank Destroyers

The M36 Jacksons are an upgrade from the M10 to M18 to M36 tank destroyer progression. Sporting a 90mm main gun, the anti-tank increases to a 14. The gun like an M18 has a 36″ range. Like the other tank destroyers before it, it’s hit on a 4+, veteran skill. It remounts on a 3+. Tough beast indeed! It is 6-pts per vehicle tho and with a 14 AT, that’ll certainly do the job against Tigers and Panthers. We all know the Tiger II is coming, as well as other exotic German armor, likely for those side shots will be your only hope.

The formation layout is very much akin to the M18 formation, with the exception that you can field “throw back” M10s in the mix as well which can lower the cost to field the formation. Like the M18 formation you’ll need to turn to support or other formations to put together a balanced force.

Between the two Tank Destroyer formations, the choice you’ll need to make as a player is do you need a complete formation to achieve what you need or will just fielding a single platoon get you what you want such that you can spend points elsewhere. For me I think I’ll be more likely to field a platoon of M36s instead of a formation.

Cavalry Formations

Via the Command Cards there are 3 formations you gain access to, these are the M24 Chaffee Cavalry Tank Company, the M5 Stuart Cavalry Tank Company and the Cavalry Recon Troop. The M24 Chaffee and M5 Stuart versions are very similar where there is 1 HQ unit of the named type (Chaffee or Stuart), 2-3 platoons of veterans of the named unit, 0-2 platoons of M8 Greyhounds and last 0-1 platoon of M8 Scott Assault guns. Each formation is a choice of either all M24 Chaffees or M5 Stuarts with Greyhounds and Scotts. It’s a bit of a twist of the earlier Chaffee list but without the mortars or Shermans.

The Cavalry Recon formation is an HQ platoon of M8 Greyhounds, 3-9 M8 Greyhound Recon Patrol platoons, up to 1 platoon of veteran M5 Stuarts or veteran Chaffees with an optional platoon of Scotts to round out the formation. A Greyhound recon Patrol is hit on a 4+, and for 5 points is 2 M8 Greyhounds with 2 jeeps, one with a MG and one with a 60mm mortar.  The other option is 3 points for 1 M8, 1 Jeep with an MG and 1 with a 60mm Mortar. If you fielded 9 of these platoons plus the HQ, that’s only 30 points however before the smile on your face grows too big, the last stand on these units is a 5+ and their assault is a 4+.

Tanks for the Memories

The core formation for Americans have significantly been upgraded with the Bulge American book. In competitive circles Americans were struggling at times with a less than great AT situation. For the noncompetitive player, you gain access to a set of Battle of the Bulge historical units all the way into the end of the war for your Flames of War gaming. The book and command cards are well worth it.