White Death: Mid War Finns in Flames of War

By Richard Steer

It’s been a long wait, but the Finns will soon be returning to  with the release in June of a 26-page booklet that allows them to be played in the Mid War era.

The Finnish Mid War list has three Formations: an Armoured Company, an Infantry Company, and a Light Infantry Company. The troops are all rated as Careful, Fearless Trained. All of the infantry units have the Hunters rule, which allows them to Cross-country Dash through snow, woods, and forests, and units in the Armoured Company and Light Infantry Company have the Crafty rule, giving them Tactics 3+.

Armoured Company

Finland formed its only armored division in 1942, comprised mostly of tanks captured from the Soviets in the Winter War in 1939/40. This is faithfully represented by the Armoured Company, resulting in a Formation that has an interesting mix of vehicles.

The core of the Formation is the T-26, which is quite possibly the worst tank we’ve seen in the Mid War era. You are required to field a Company HQ and a minimum of one platoon of T-26s, and a second platoon of either T-26s or the significantly better T-28, before you can unlock the main attraction of this list: a platoon of either T-34s or KV-1s, and the Landsverk Anti II anti-aircraft tank.

Immediately you will note that the T-34 and KV-1 Armoured Platoons are not “Black Box” units, so are not available to the other Formations as Formation Support. Both of these platoons, as well as the T-28 Armoured Platoon, have the Small Numbers rule, which limits the number of platoons of each that you can have in your Force.

The T-26s have the Armoured Reserve rule, which adds them to the list of units forced into reserve by the Deep Reserves rule, even though they only have Front Armour 1.

The Formation can also include a platoon of two Landsvertk Anti II anti-aircraft tanks. These have a ROF3 40mm gun and their stats are as good as your T-26s, so even if the enemy has no aircraft they will still be a useful source of AT7 shots.

Light Infantry Company

The Light Infantry Company primarily represents the infantry of the armoured division. In addition, each battalion in the infantry regiments had a Light Infantry Platoon, and these platoons were sometimes grouped together to give the regiment a Light Infantry Company.

The Light Infantry Platoons can be quite large, with up to nine Rifle teams, and options for adding an anti-tank rifle, a 50mm mortar, and a HMG team. One of these platoons can be replaced with an SMG Platoon of up to nine SMG teams with Assault 3+. The infantry are backed up by platoons of HMGs, 81mm mortars, and anti-tank rifles, giving them some useful additional firepower.

Infantry Company

The regular Infantry Company has a similar structure to the Light Infantry Company. They don’t have the Crafty rule so remain at Tactics 4+, but the Infantry Platoons are made of Rifle/MG teams with ROF2 instead. One of the infantry platoons can be a Light Infantry or SMG platoon. The other difference is that instead of the Anti-tank Rifle Platoon the company has the option of an Anti-tank Gun Platoon with a pair of either 37mm guns (including the option of a Stielgranate upgrade that grants them AT12 with Range 10″/25cm), or 45mm guns.

Support 

There is a good range of Support Platoons to round out your Force, including light and medium anti-tank guns (but again only available in pairs), anti-aircraft guns, BA-10 armored cars, artillery and heavy mortar batteries, Fokker CX fighter bombers, and a Pioneer Platoon that includes two flame-thrower teams. Of particular use is the option of taking a German Formation and ‘Black Box’ unit as Allied Support.

The booklet finishes with a basing guide and a list of the relevant product codes. There is no painting guide, but there is one in the Late War book, and there are a number of old resources on the Flames of War website that can help: a , a , and a between Vallejo Model Color and the old FOW paint codes used in those articles.

Command Cards

Supporting the booklet is a set of 18 Command Cards. These are mostly generic bonuses, with half of them applying to the Formation Commander. This is consistent with the other Mid War Command Card sets, but it is a bit jarring after becoming used to the recent Late War releases, all of which add a huge amount of depth to their books. Some particular standouts are:

• Close Defence gives the affected unit AT3 and FP1+ against Top Armour in Assaults until the end of the turn.
• Deadly Gunner increases the efficiency of your precious 75mm Anti-tank Platoon by allowing the Unit Leader to reroll one failed Firepower test a turn.
• Forward Scouts gives Light Infantry Platoons Scout.
• Pioneer Company creates a Formation of an HQ and two or three Pioneer Platoons.

Closing Thoughts 

White Death provides us with some unique models that combine to make an interesting set of lists that are solidly grounded in history.

The Armoured Company is not a great Formation, being built around a core of tanks that are totally outclassed in Mid War. The addition of a platoon of highly skilled and motivated T-34s or KV-1s toughens it up significantly, but it will need to be handled with finesse: not an easy task when the bulk of your tanks move at walking pace.

The strength of the Finnish army in World War 2 however was not their armor, but rather the skill and tenacity of their infantry, and this is reflected in the book with some solid infantry platoons. They will be extremely competitive on tables with dense terrain that reflect their historical battlefields. On the whole though they look significantly less scary now than they were under previous editions of the game.

The Finn’s primary weakness is a lack of decent anti-tank weapons, compounded by these weapons only coming in units of two. Due to the way the Support boxes are grouped, if you take the 75mm guns in order to get some AT12 on the table, your next best option is the 37mm with the Stielgranate upgrade. Beyond that, the only other AT8+ weapons available to you are the artillery batteries. The Close Defence card is going to be important, and I can imagine German Allied Support will be popular.

That word “finesse” would sum up my thoughts on the book. Your troops are skillful and determined, but they lack firepower when compared to what other nations can field, and that’s a tricky combination that requires careful handling. If you bring Finns to the table you are guaranteed to be the underdog. That challenge, along with the unique range of units they offer, will make them a rewarding force to play.