Hostile Realms Campaign Map

I used the Wizard Kings Vassal module to design an interesting map for a Hostile Realms fantasy campaign.  I've owned the Columbia Games' block game for some time and I always thought it would make a good fantasy campaign aid.  You can mix and match the map sheets to your heart's desire.

Each block represents a Battle Group.  There are 4 player kingdoms.  From lower left clockwise, they are: Undead, Goblins, Gonfor, and the Middle Kingdom.  I imagine we could play on Skype and. I could move the blocks according to the players' orders while they watched online.  I think the module only handles 2 players, but unlimited observers.

Battle Groups move as follows:

• Light Terrain Move card:
• Enter a clear hex (2 MP)
• Follow a road (1 MP)
• Medium Terrain Move card:
• Enter a desert hex (3 MP)
• Enter a woods hex (4 MP)
• Cross a wood hexside (4 MP)
• Sail any number of hexes from a friendly city to a friendly city (3 MP)
• Heavy Terrain Move card: 
• Enter a mountain (6 MP)
• Cross a mountain hexside (6 MP)
• Enter a swamp hex (5 MP)
• Cross a river without a bridge (5 MP)
• Sail to or from a coastal clear hex as long as the departure or landing hex is a friendly city (5 MP)

Castle blocks will mark controlled cities.  Occupation of cities scores points for the players.  Supply depots can be built in cities.

The players will know what Battle Group strength their blocks are.  For example, the Goblin player secretly knows his Orc block is Size 3, his Goblin block is Size 2, and his Troll block is Size 1.

Fielding a Hostile Realms army

This is part of a series of articles I've been writing on converting Piquet's Theater of War campaign system for use with Hostile Realms, Piquet's fantasy rule set:

• Part 1: Campaign deck conversion
• Part 2: Campaign Roster creation
• Part 3: Campaign Playtest Turn 1

Now that we have the campaign roster established and you know how many units are on campaign with you, it's time to talk about how to determine which units are in a particular battle.

Theater of War uses a Piquet Army Characterization Deck to select the units.  You could also use a poker deck.  Special Effect cards have the following effects:

• Stratagem (4 each) - Remove random enemy Effect card.
• Army Effect (4 each)) - Pick any one slot for your army.
• Infantry Effect (4 each)- Pick any one infantry slot for your army.
• Artillery Effect (4 each) - Pick any one character or engine of war slot for your army.
• Cavalry Effect (4 each) - Pick any one cavalry, beast, or large creature slot for your army.

Force Size cards are worth their normal value (4 each of values 2 through 10).

In this example, we'll assume the army is Battle Group of Size 3 vs. an enemy Battle Group of Size 3.   The Middle Kingdom player has no Advantage Level based on his Battle Card hand.  We'll use the Campaign Roster I created in the last Hostile Realms article for the Middle Kingdoms:

*Champion General
*Hero Sub-commander
1. Household Knights
2. Household Knights
3. Household Knights
4. Feudal Knights
5. Feudal Knights
6. Feudal Knights
7. Feudal Knights
8. Sergeants
9. Sergeants
10. Crossbowmen
11. Crossbowmen
12. Hand-gunners
13. Mountaineers
14. Civic Militia
15. Civic Militia
16. Archers of the Guard
17. Mountaineers
18. Civic Militia
19. Civic Militia
20. Ribaldequin organ gun
21. Minotaurs
22. Shire Archers
23. Rex Champion Upgrade
24. Jhone of Orc Hero Upgrade

25. Priest

The player pulls 3 cards for his campaign roster size.  He draws a 5 (Roster 1-10), Cavalry Effect, 2 (Ignored because his Battle Group is Size 3), 7 (Roster 11-20), Stratagem, and a 9 (reduced to a 5 because the roster only goes from 21 to 25). 

The total number of units is 17 (5+7+5).

Since a Stratagem was drawn, the player can take away one of his opponent's random Effect cards.  I use the Cavalry Effect card to pick the minotaurs since I'm pretty sure there will be plenty of cavalry chosen randomly from the list.

So now it's time to pick 16 random units (the Minotaurs are already selected).  I use poker cards assigned to each unit.  The results:

Mountaineers
Ribaldequin organ gun
Shire Archers
Crossbowmen
Priest
Household Knights
Rex Champion upgrade
Feudal Knights
Civic Militia
Household Knights
Hand-gunners
Civic Militia
Feudal Knights
Jhone of Orc upgrade
Crossbowmen
Household Knights

Interesting Army.

The Rex will lead a mounted command of 3 Household Knight units and 2 Feudal Knight units.

Jhone of Orc leads a foot command of an organ gun, 2 Crossbowmen units,  a Civic Militia pike block (2 units), 1 Hand-gunner unit, 1 Shire Archer unit, and 1 Mountaineer battle order unit.

The Priest leads...wait for it...a Minotaur unit.  I can only imagine what the back-story is behind that command.

And there you have it.  I built this army while drinking a Bushmill's on ice with a few cards and a calculator while the wife watched the Real Housewives of Wherever.

A fun army with a King who is a master of jousting and personal combat, but a commander of unknown quality leading a command of the brashest, best-equipped and wealthiest knights of the Middle Kingdoms.

A young female hero who was raised as a child by Orcs, but now rallies the common infantry of the army with her Blessed Banner.  The center of her command is a solid pike block of townsmen.

And a mad priest who has emerged from the wilderness with a group of minotaur converts.  Hmmm.

Welcome to the wonderful campaign world of Hostile Realms.  It won't match up against the art and printing quality of Games Workshop, but there's magic in this book.

Next Hostile Realms campaign article...Making a campaign map.

Converting Hostile Realms Campaign Rosters

 This continues my efforts to convert Piquet's excellent campaign rules, Theater of War, into a format usable for Piquet's fantasy rules, Hostile Realms, that I began here.

One of the best aspects of Theater of War is that it is designed to prevent the battle size inflation that can often kill a fun campaign game.  Once you have generated your campaign roster, the battles will never include more units than you have on your campaign roster.  TOW uses a calculation of sequence deck card size, troop quality modifiers, and card divisors to figure out how many units each side can have.  This doesn't work as well for Hostile Realms because the sequence decks are all the same size and there isn't a card divisor for army characterization used in the rules.

Here is my solution.  To illustrate it, I'll use the Middle Kingdoms army list.

For this example, I'll start with a list of 20 units and a total roster points of 2000 points.  You first have to fill in all of the minimum numbers required by army composition percentages.  The list you make can be any size, but I do recommend your army point total should be 100 points per unit.

According to the Middle Kingdoms army list, at least 30% of the army has to be mounted knights, Household and Feudal.  However, there has to be more Feudal knights than Household Knights.  So, you need 4 Feudal Knights and 3 Household Knights.

At least 10% of the army has to be Sergeants.  You add 2 Sergeant units.
At least 10% of the army has to be Crossbowmen.  You add 2 Crossbowmen units.
At least 5% of the army has to be Handgunners or Skirmishers.  I chose to add 1 Handgunner unit.
At least 5% of the army has to be Mountaineers.  You add 1 Mountaineer unit.
At least 10% of the army has to be Civic Militia.  You add 2 Civic Militia units.

That does it for your mandatory units, so your campaign roster looks like this:

1. Household Knights
2. Household Knights
3. Household Knights
4. Feudal Knights
5. Feudal Knights
6. Feudal Knights
7. Feudal Knights
8. Sergeants
9. Sergeants
10. Crossbowmen
11. Crossbowmen
12. Handgunners
13. Mountaineers
14. Civic Militia
15. Civic Militia

The total points for this group is 1146 points.  That gives us 854 points left.

Your army will always contain a Commander in Chief Champion and 1 Sub-commander Hero.  We allow the Commander in Chief to lead a command, so this allows you to have at a minimum 2 commands.  They are listed first on the roster and they always appear in a battle unless upgraded to someone else.  They cannot be unique characters unless upgraded.

Middle Kingdom has a Prince Champion for 168 points and a Count for 104 points.  That makes 1418 points.

You can use slots to upgrade these leaders if you desire.  The slot costs you the points difference between the mandatory leader and the upgraded leader.

The Middle Kingdom can field as its general "the Rex" mounted on a flying beast for 220 points and Jhone of Orc, a unique Hero, for 128 points.  The Rex upgrade costs 52 points (220-168) and Jhone costs 24 points (128-104).  That's another 76 points (1494 points).

Here is the current roster:


*Champion General
*Hero Sub-commander
1. Household Knights
2. Household Knights
3. Household Knights
4. Feudal Knights
5. Feudal Knights
6. Feudal Knights
7. Feudal Knights
8. Sergeants
9. Sergeants
10. Crossbowmen
11. Crossbowmen
12. Handgunners
13. Mountaineers
14. Civic Militia
15. Civic Militia
16. Rex Champion Upgrade
17. Jhone of Orc Hero Upgrade

Some of the army lists have additional mandatory requirements when certain units are selected.  These requirements are satisfied by presence in the campaign roster, even if they are not ultimately selected to be at a battle.  The choice of a Rex Champion Upgrade triggers the mandatory requirement that 2 Household Knights units and the Archers of the Guard be present if he is to be included. So, we add the Archers of the Guard for 126 points (1620 points total).  The Household Knights are already on the roster.  Done and done.

So far, that does it for the mandatory units required on the list.  Now we can do a bit of shopping.

The army list has to contain 20 units, so we have to shop appropriately.  Every 2 units of mountaineers and civic militia can be put together to form a pike block.  A single unit can only form battle order.  I like pike blocks, so I'll go shopping for some more infantry:

1 Mountaineers unit (Max 4) 60 points
2 Civic Militia units (Max 4) 66 points
1 Ribaldequin organ gun (Max 1) 36 points
Total points: 1782

*Champion General
*Hero Sub-commander
1. Household Knights
2. Household Knights
3. Household Knights
4. Feudal Knights
5. Feudal Knights
6. Feudal Knights
7. Feudal Knights
8. Sergeants
9. Sergeants
10. Crossbowmen
11. Crossbowmen
12. Handgunners
13. Mountaineers
14. Civic Militia
15. Civic Militia
16. Archers of the Guard
17. Mountaineers
18. Civic Militia
19. Civic Militia
20. Ribaldequin organ gun
21. Rex Champion Upgrade
22. Jhone of Orc Hero Upgrade

I'm at 20 units and I still have 218 points to spend on anything I want as long as I don't go over army maximums for the 20 unit army size.  I could buy up to 5 units of orc warriors for Jhone of Orc to command (an option when she's on the roster).  I could buy up to 2 units of foot knights (77 each) to stiffen the infantry.  Or maybe 4 units of Peasants (14 each) as a cheap way of increasing the morale chips for my army.

Instead, I opted for:

Level II Priest (126 points)  The High Priest is much too expensive (242 points!!).
Minotaur unit (65 points)  This army allows dragons and minotaurs.
Shire Archers (27 points)  The army can have a max of 2 longbow units.  The Archers of the Guard count as one of them.  The Shire Archers aren't as good, but they both get overhead longbow fire which can be pretty effective.

So, here's the final campaign roster:


*Champion General
*Hero Sub-commander
1. Household Knights
2. Household Knights
3. Household Knights
4. Feudal Knights
5. Feudal Knights
6. Feudal Knights
7. Feudal Knights
8. Sergeants
9. Sergeants
10. Crossbowmen
11. Crossbowmen
12. Handgunners
13. Mountaineers
14. Civic Militia
15. Civic Militia
16. Archers of the Guard
17. Mountaineers
18. Civic Militia
19. Civic Militia
20. Ribaldequin organ gun
21. Minotaurs
22. Shire Archers
23. Rex Champion Upgrade
24. Jhone of Orc Hero Upgrade

25. Priest

It's a pretty strong campaign roster in terms of troops, but it is a little weak on command.  I would have loved to purchase another Count, but I blew too much money on my mounted knights and the Rex upgrade.   Also, the characters in this army are expensive.  

In most battles, it looks like the General and the Count will lead two commands, most likely 1 mounted command and 1 foot command.  If I get lucky and draw the Priest, I could always give the Good Bishop a third command to lead.

Next article...selecting the troops for battle.

Hostile Realms Campaign Conversions

Since we've been playing a lot of Hostile Realms lately, I've been thinking about how to use Hostile Realms and Theater of War to run a Hostile Realms campaign.  Theater of War (my review here) allows you to convert Piquet sequence decks into campaign decks that can move your campaign armies and decide the size of the forces in the battle.  The sequence decks in Hostile Realms are similar to Piquet decks, but several Piquet cards aren't present or are represented by rules or other cards in Hostile Realms.

After mulling over the TOW rules and the Hostile realms army lists, here is my conversion from Hostile Realms decks to TOW decks:

•  Army Morale/Courage: Every army gets a Major Morale card and a Supply card.
• Brilliant Leader: Wild card
• Engine of War Reload: Strength card for the first card.  Further cards are Retire cards.
• Favor of the Gods: Strength card per card.
• Fliers and Light Cavalry Move: Scout card and Retire card.
• Heroic Moment: Heroic Effort card per card.
• Leadership Check: Officer Check card per card.
• Lull: Staff Inefficiency card per card.
• Manna Recharge: Attack card each for the first 2 cards.  Further Manna cards are Strength cards.
• Maneuver: Defend card.
• Melee: Engage in Battle/Strength card per card.
• Move:  All armies get 3 Light Terrain, 3 Medium Terrain, and 1 Heavy Terrain move cards.
• Move 1 Command: Flank Attack card for the first card.  Extra Light Terrain Move card for second card.
• Missile Reload: Attack card per card.
• Only the Required Optional cards are placed in the deck:
• Berzerker:  Wild Attack card per card.
• Uncontrolled Charge:  Wild Attack per card.
• Crushing Missilery: Defend card.
• Superstitions and Omens: Wild card 50%/Command Indecision 50%

The Maneuver conversion makes armies like the Dwarves better able to fight battle on the defensive.

Meanwhile the Undead have more Melee cards, but no Move 1 Command cards, so they have more strength in battles, but aren't able to make flank attacks unless they have a Skilled Commander with a Brilliant Leader card.

Let me know what you think.

Next article...What troops show up for the campaign?

Battle of Grave Crossing

This was a Hostile Realms battle we fought at my place on Saturday.  Jed brought his Undead and Greg and I matched him up against a Middle Kingdoms army.  The Middle Kingdoms are a Hundred Years War-based fantasy army.

Like most Piquet -based games, the actions of the armies are driven by card decks which are created from their army lists.  The Middle Kingdom army had 3 Optional cards: Look to the King, Uncontrolled Charge, and an extra Courage! card because they were fighting the fearsome Undead.  The Undead had an Uncontrolled Advance, an Ineffective Missilery, and a Brilliant Leader card because Jed rolled up the Necromancer King as a Skilled Commander-in-Chief during army generation.

We created the battlefield terrain and deployed the commands using Piquet's excellent "Theater of War" campaign rules.  1750 points of Middle Kingdom attacking 1600 points of defending Undead.

The Undead are an interesting army since many of their troops cause Fear, they don't take morale checks, don't pursue, and they never rout.  We did play that they could be disordered, but they never retreated from melee.   We weren't sure if they could be routed from a "double disorder".  In retrospect, they probably can't.  So the skeletons tend to fight grimly in battle to the last bone, stopping the momentum of their attackers with sheer weight of Undead numbers.

The Middle Kingdoms army was led by King Jean himself, mounted on a pegasus.  The King was a very capable warrior, but an average commander (he was also only half-painted).  His army consisted of 2 commands: a large left flank command of mounted, heavily armored knights led by a warrior priest and a center infantry command of pike-armed commoners, royal archers, crossbowmen, handgunners, foot knights and a cannon.  The infantry was commanded by Johne of Orc.  Maybe her enthusiasm could stiffen the resolve of this hodge-podge of social classes.

King Jean led off the battle by challenging the evil Necromancer General to a personal combat between the two front lines.  The Undead overlord was smart enough to turn down Jean's chivalrous challenge, even though his refusal boosted the morale of the Kingdom knights as they began to taunt the Undead forces as cowards.

Frustrated that he wasn't able to end the battle with a single swing of his sword, Jean ordered the infantry to capture the village of Grave Crossing in the center of the battlefield while he rode the skeletons down under the thundering hooves of his heavy knights.

The hills were Class II hills.  The villages were Class II terrain capable of holding up to 3 units each.  Since the Undead were the defenders, they could deploy on the right half of the table.  The Kingdom troops deployed on the left table edge (picture below).  The strip of table in between was the combat area.

Western end of the table at game start.
  Undead left flank faces off against the Kingdom's right flank

Skeleton cavalry and monsters on the Undead left flank.

Pike blocks from the common ranks backed up by missile troops,
guard archers, and dismounted foot knights from the poorer noble families

Kingdom mounted knights wait for the signal to charge.

Undead right flank at game start.

The Kingdom pike blocks attempt to close with the Undead.

The mounted knights of the Kingdom left flank advance across
the battlefield.

Close up of the Undead archers waiting for them.

Chariots back up the Undead center.

Close-up of the Undead center front lines.

Skeletal giant smashes into a unit of foot knights.

The giant routed the knights next to Grave Crossing, but was
shot by handgunners and routed during its pursuit,
because it was double disordered.  We later determined it
probably shouldn't have pursued.  Oh well.

It took the Kingdom knights quite a while to charge across the battlefield and attack the Undead right flank.  In the meantime, Johne of Orc pushed her infantry toward Grave Crossing.  The powerful blocks of pike men marched toward the skeleton cavalry and made contact with them.  Unable to draw a Melee card, the Kingdom pike men hesitated to fight the frightening skeletons.  The tightly packed infantry were ravaged by ludicrously effective Undead bow fire.  After the pikemen were disordered by the missile fire, the flip of a Courage card forced them to take a Courage check because the skeletons caused Fear.  The units failed the check and routed from the battle line.

The Undead rolled well for their sub-commanders and had several Undead lords who must have commanded troops in their previous "living" lives.  The Undead infantry in the center lurched forward and occupied the village of Grave Crossing in the middle of the combat area.  The skeletons would hold this village the entire game, grimly driving off all attackers from its narrow, muddy streets.

Pike blocks rout away from the Undead lines after receiving
missile fire and rolling poorly on a few Courage checks.
 Those Undead skeletons are scary!

After Johne's unsuccessful efforts to rally the pikemen with her Blessed Banner (she rolled a 1!), the mounted knights finally made contact with the undead on the other side of the battlefield.  An Uncontrolled Charge card sent even more impetuous knights charging into combat and two units of foot knights lunged forward to assault the skeletal defenders of Grave Crossing.

Kingdom mounted knights charge into combat led by their
King mounted on a pegasus.

A timely Uncontrolled Charge sends the knights into a headlong
charge against the skeleton infantry.

While the foot knights were repulsed from the village objective, the heavy mounted knights carved a path through the Undead ranks.  King Jean's pegasus soared into the air and carried the King out from underneath a giant pile of shattered bones.  The Necromancer King cackled as he cast a Crush spell to destroy King Jean and his feudal knights.  I explained to Jed that the only way the spell could be a miscast would be if he rolled a "1" on a d4 to cast it and Greg rolled a "6" on a d6 to resist it.....and then that's exactly what happened.  The sun came out from behind the clouds, the sunlight reflected off the golden armor of King Jean and momentarily blinded the necromancer during his preparation of the spell, some arcane verse was spoken incorrectly, and the Necromancer King's head promptly exploded.  A common occurrence in our games.

The loss of the Necromancer King sent a detectable wave of shock through the animated corpses of the undead army.  The army lost 7 morale chips out of its beginning total of 20 and the tide began to turn against the Undead.

The melees on the north end of the table continue as the
skeletal chariots attempt to reinforce and turn back the armored
knights.

The chariots ended up on the losing end of this 2 on 1 melee.

The mounted Kingdom knights have destroyed their opponents.
and are looking for new victims.  Just at the top of the picture
 behind the catapult, you can see the smoke remaining from
where the Necromancer General blew himself up trying to
cast a spell.

On the Kingdom right flank, the skeletons hold on to the
village of Grave Crossing and refuse to give it up.
The skeleton cavalry have started flanking the Kingdom infantry,
but it's probably too late.   They're facing a disordered unit of
Kingdom foot knights, a cannon, and some hand-gunner skirmishers

By the end of the battle, the Undead were completely out of morale chips and their right flank was practically gone.  While the Undead cavalry was making progress near the village of Grave Crossing, the Kingdom still possessed almost 16 morale chips and their mounted knights were poised to attack down the Undead lines and gather even more.

The Undead started off the battle well and good tactics combined with hot dice did early damage to the Kingdom's army.  In the end, the Undead had trouble handling the strong melee power and extra-heavy armor of the mounted knights.  The Undead monsters that could have handled them were deployed too far away on the battlefield.  The Necromancer King won't make that same mistake again. And it didn't help that he exploded.

We all had a great time.  These rules continue to amaze me with how much fun they are to play.  Jed had a great time running his Warhammer Undead army during the game and after the battle, we talked for an hour about different ways the Undead could be played and deployed.  Great, great fun.

Prokhorovka at Gateway 2012 Battle Report

Greg and I ran the Kursk: Drive on Prokhorovka scenario at our local gaming convention this past weekend.  It really is a huge scenario and even with an early ending, it took us at least 9 hours to play it through.  When we play, the game goes much more quickly, but newer players always play a bit more slowly than experienced ones.

The Field of Battle : WW2 (FOBWW2) rules aren't that complicated, but it did take a few of the players a bit of time to get the hang of them.  

The battle started off very badly for the attacking Germans.  An early end to the first two turns meant that on the morning of 11 July 1943, the Germans had not yet seized any of their first turn objectives and even Hill 241.6 was still in Soviet hands. 

German starting positions.  Hill 241.6 is just ahead in front of the 1st SS Panzer Regiment.
Prokhorovka is on the distant horizon.  

Soviet defenders dug in around Hill 241.6 prepared to endure the onslaught.
26th Tank Brigade on the hill.  99th Tank Brigade in the village.
11th Motorized Battalion in the village behind them.

3/285th Rifle Battalion guards the Oktiabrski State Farm.
A brigade from the 9th Guards Airborne Division is dug in
around them.

On the morning of 11 July 1943, the Germans threw their forces into the attack.  Both panzer grenadier regiments moved up the right flank and became embroiled in a vicious fire fight around the town of Storozhevoe.  Meanwhile the panzer regiment advanced up the left flank, encountering heavy minefields as they went.

Heavy fighting on the German right flank around the town.

German panzer regiment approaches the farm complex.

The Soviet players were very happy with their progress so far, so they decided to order one of the airborne brigades to move out of its defensive positions and move into the woods surrounding Storozhevoe on the German left flank.  These airborne troops would make it much more difficult fr the German panzer grenadiers to capture the town.  The 58th Motorized Rifle Brigade was tasked with filling the gap left by the airborne troops.

Unfortunately, the 58th MRB suffered heavy casualties soon after it entered combat.  It wasn't able to dig in and the German armored forces chewed up the lightly-equipped Soviet infantry.  The brigade broke and ran.

The KV-1's of the Soviet 57th Heavy Tank Regiment were destroyed by the Panzer IV's of the 1st SS Pz Regiment and soon the Soviets were left without any armor support on the table.  The Soviets began to wish they had left the airborne regiment back in its defensive positions.

Soviet infantry and heavy tank reinforcements entering from the
left as they attempt to stiffen the defences.

Where are the defenders for this side of the battlefield?!?!
They are in the woods off camera to the left.

After vicious fighting and several unsuccessful attempts to close assault Storozhevoe, the German panzer grenadiers finally managed to blast the Soviets out of the town.  Even the airborne troops in the woods had suffered heavy casualties, and with the flip of a Soviet Morale card, both units defending the area failed their morale tests and surrendered.  The Germans entered the ruined town and then prepared to swing further along the right flank toward Prokhorovka, the final objective.

Luckily, a few cards earlier, we had ordered an infantry battalion to move back into Prokhorovka and help defend it.  Otherwise, the objective would have been completely unprotected.

Iamski.  A critical town to anchor the Soviet left flank.
The German panzergrenadier battalions shot the bejeezus out
of the Soviet defenders,. They died to the last man.

Prokhorovka defended by one lone Soviet infantry battalion.
The white stuff i supposed to be rubble, but I think next time,
I'll make it a little darker.

As the night turn arrived, we took a break and I set up the massive reinforcements the Soviets would receive during the night.  These armored units represented the main strength of the 5th Guards Tank Army.  I just needed to pull a Move card for them to arrive in Prokhorovka and pound the Germans.

The Soviet 18th Tank Corps waits off table to rescue the day.

Soviet 29th Tank Corps waits next to it.  They're ready to do some damage.,

The night ended quickly and we started off the 12 July AM turn with a massive artillery bombardment of the Germans.  This bombardment took 9 strength points off of the German forces and left them with only 6 morale points to finish the battle.  The Soviet players felt pretty confident they could claim those morale points when their large reserves entered the table.  

The Germans won the initiative and moved closer to Prokhorovka, dishing out heavy casualties to the few Soviet infantry units remaining on the table.  The 1st SS Panzer Regiment was stopped in front of the Brick Factory by grim infantrymen and attached AT guns.  The 2nd Panzer Grenadier Regiment began rapidly pushing up the right flank and was nearing the defenders of Prokhorovka.  Would 3 infantry companies be able to hold them off?

......

Apparently not.  When the Soviets took their turn with initiative, they were unable to get a Move card to bring their reserves onto the table.  Even worse, they pulled a Morale card and failed every morale check on the table.  The defenders of Prokhorovka saw the panzer grenadiers coming and headed for the rear.

With 5 more cards to flip, the Soviets flipped through their deck, looking for that precious Move card.  With 2 cards to go, they pulled a Lull card!!!  The Germans seized the initiative and had one chance to play a card.  Greg flipped a card and it was the one card the Germans needed: Move 1 Command.  There was much high-fiving, screaming and cursing.

One of the German panzer grenadier battalions rolled an Even Triple Move roll, raced into Prokhorovka and occupied all 4 town sections.  Game over.  The next Soviet card in the deck?  You guessed it.  The Move card........

So it was an exciting finish.  Greg almost called the game after the disastrous start for the Germans, but the Germans played a great middle game and inflicted some tremendous casualties on the Soviet infantry.  I doubt the Germans would have survived the Soviet counterattack, but the Soviets just couldn't hold on long enough to find out.

Prokhorovka is a giant scenario and as I studied the battle, it turned out to be much larger than I thought it would be.  For my future plans, I intend to design a few smaller scenarios based around the Soviet operations at Kharkov in 1942.  These scenarios should be considerably smaller than Prokhorovka.  I'm also painting up some winter boards so I can run games that recreate Operation Mars and the Korsun Pocket.

I've also decided to just use 1 stand units for FOBWW2.  The 2 stand units look better, but the footprint of the units is smaller when there is only 1 stand and it allows more room for maneuver  Also, players became confused when told the unit has 2 stands, but 3 strength points.  It will also allow me to repaint some of my existing armor units as winter units.

Drive on Prokhorovka at Gateway 2012 Convention!

On September 1, 2012, I will run the complete Kursk: Drive on Prokhorovka operational campaign scenario at our local Los Angeles gaming convention, Gateway 2012.  I'll be using Piquet's Field of Battle :WW2 rules.

I posted the following on the event description:

"Ever wanted to try out an epic miniatures wargame before? This is your chance! Simple rules, complex decisions. Players can feel free to join or leave as their schedule permits. Wipe out your Soviet tank brigade in a desperate assault and then go grab a hot dog to celebrate. This battle featuring hundreds of 10mm miniatures pits 1st SS PG Division against the 5th Gds Tank Army in July 1943."

I thought I'd post some pictures of the elements of the game in an effort to tempt and lure players into joining.  Pictures of SU-152's and Churchill tanks are coming also!

Scenario description is here.

Some additional pictures of the ruined buildings of Prokhorovka are here.

If you want to review some of he Kursk articles, check the Kursk, WW2 tags.

If anyone is interested in participating in this experience, feel free to email me or post a comment to reserve a spot.

The battlefield from west to east.
Prokhorovka is on the distant horizon.

Quiet town of Storozhevoe surrounded by thick woods.

The entire Soviet force for the game.

9th Guards Airborne Division.  The circles are BN command stands.
  The hex stands are heavy weapon support markers.

Artillery spotting round markers.  Hexes are D10 artillery.
Circles are D12 artillery.  The HE template is self-explanatory.

The 1st SS Panzergrenadier Division.  

1st SS PG Regiment's three battalions.

2nd SS PG Regiment's two battalions.  It has a Tiger company.
It's halftrack-mounted battalion is with the tank regiment.

1st SS Panzer Regiment's two battalions.

1st SS AT battalion and recon battalion.
Engineer stands in front.

Casualty markers mark strength point losses.

AT gun bunkers.

More Soviet infantry.

Soviet armor ready for the counterattack on 12 July, 1943.

Soviet tank command stands using flags.
"Green, no Red..just attack dammit!!!"

These SU-76's are on the painting table,
but they'll be ready for the game.

These are being painted, but will serve as more
motorized infantry command stands for the Soviets.

Some more Soviet command stands.
  Leg and airborne infantry battalion command stands are all on foot.
Motorized units have jeeps or trucks on their command stands.

Soviet KV-1 and assault guns ready for action.

Lots of armor ready to flood onto the table!

This marker represents a suppression result.

The railroad embankment and railyard at Prokhorovka Station.

Close-up of Storozhevoe.

Soviet airborne companies defend the Brick Factory.

German engineers deploy to clear the minefield for the tanks.