"What If" Games of Flames of War

Hi folks,

I've been collecting a number of Flames of War forces for about a year and a half now, and haven't played in any games yet. Mainly because my gaming group is more interested in Warhammer 40k, and Warhammer. So I collect, and do a little painting, and so on.

I have the following forces:

• Gepanzerte Panzererte Panzergrenadierkompanie (partially painted) - From Fortress Europe book
• 2nd SS Boxed Set + Panzerpioneer platoon (partially painted - around 2000 points) - From Cobra book
• Stug Batterie (Small force 10 Stugs + Beglieit + Panzerwerfers) - From Stalin's Onslaught book
• Udarny Strelkovy Batalon (fully painted force thats around 2000 points) - From Stalin's Onslaught book

As you can see from the above, I've been all over the place when collecting, and the only forces that can fight one another from my collection (according to the books) are the Stug Batterie and Udarny Batalon. I kind of wish I had narrowed my focus a bit, but at this point, that's neither here nor there.

My question are as follows:
When you guys play, do you play games with forces from different books fighting each other?

I'd like to introduce some of my gaming group to Flames of War, and do it right, but the best forces to fight one another from what I have got (as in most complete, and most nearly matching points) are the 2nd SS and the Udarny.

These units never historically fought (as far as I know), but do you guys play games where you allow this kind of stuff?

Are there any pitfalls to doing so (different points costs in different books) that I should be aware of?

Thanks in advance!

FoW is a miniatures game and you can play any force against any force without problem so long as both are from the same era (early, mid, late). I've run my Americans versus Soviets many times. Though the lack of long ranged very high AT shooting in the US lists makes some of the Soviet armor a tough fight, they're still very winnable games. I know the Soviet players are equally challenged to deal with the massive numbers of models the Allies can field when compared to the Germans.

Since you're in Austin, check out Battleforge games. We play there fairly regularly on Thursdays and Fridays. Just talk to Brandon behind the counter if you want a game and no one else is around. The store also has a monthly FoW tournament.

Another store to check out in Austin is Great Hall Games. They have a "Modern Era" day on one Sunday a month, but you could probably get more regular pick up games if you simply asked some of the patrons.


Lux

Well, you can run any force against any force from Early, Middle or Late era books, but they don't often work out well from a fun gaming stand point. I've played in many tournaments where they allowed any list from Mid-War, which creates huge problems when your 8th Armored Division from North Africa is facing down a German company from the Eastern Front. The books divide up armies based upon battle compatibility and the Eastern Front armies are a bit tougher than those from North Africa.

As for what you have painted/built, I'd try the Panzergrenadiers against the Strelkovy on a small scale - say around 400-500 points and let your friends try out the armies and take them for a test drive. Once they see how the forces work, they will either like the rules, or dislike the rules. I've found that many 40K players migrate to the FoW rules easily because of the similar mechanics. They play well, and they are not so codex specific - because all of the major rules are in the main core book and not parsed out into the various codexes.

When collecting forces, infantry as a general rule are fairly consistent across the board in terms of costs to field them, with the later war formations going up a bit in cost depending on the amount of anti-tank capability they have in the formation.

Best of luck on building your group - and try to go to a tournament and see what people do in those conditions with their armies. It will help you build better formations, and remember, that all armies are not equal - even if they have the same point cost - if the scenario requires them to do something they are not designed to do! Make sure you build armies with multi-role capabilities - combined arms forces work best if you use them correctly!

Ive been WW2 gaming for many, many years now. Ive done everything from 6mm to 28mm, all periods, all nations.

Flames of War are a good set of rules, I like them. What I dont like is people getting too hung up on their army books and points values. That is not what WW2 gaming is about.

Many forces that people come up with are totally unrealistic, but because they appear in those books they seem to think its some kind of historical justification. Take a look at the period you want to do and go find out what was there and what got used. Some of the best games Ive ever played have been between what you would think of as totally unbalanced forces.

You can have a weak defending side with strong attackers, and those attackers will wipe out the defenders eventually, but that is not always the point. Can the defenders maul those attackers enough that they would not be able to exploit that breakthrough? Many WW2 games are about so much more then the actual result on your small bit of the front.

The rules are a great starting point but dont ever be constricted by them.