PBEM / MBX Wargaming

Well worth a look, including after action reports and game plots ... Full article here: Dance of the Vampires

This boxed game is supposed to be an intro to the Second world War at Sea series from Avalanche Press. I ordered it last week and was waiting for me upon my arrival home after being away for a few days. Nice components...eg counters tactical map, and two ajoining operation map segments. Series Rule book appears to be a decently prepared photo copy as well as the game specific rules/scenarios. Scenarios include two of the shorter "Battle" Scenarios - "Night Action" and "Convoy Defense". The Operational Scenarios call for a "Battle of the Coral Sea 1-10 May 1942" scenario of 60 Turns (Each Turn is 4 Hours), and the full blown "Coral Sea Extended Campaign, 1-30 May 1…

Decisive Action Decisive Action is a modern Division and Corps level simulation that depicts combat with maneuver brigades and battalions along with supporting artillery, airstrikes, electronic warfare, engineer, helicopters, and even pysops units. Units are depicted with official NATO symbology, and US Army official map control measures delineate the battlefield. New life may have been blown into the languishing gem with the very recent release of v2.7. The sim is available from HPS Sims. I have had an on again off again love affair with this sim. The civilian version is a deviation from a product used at the US Army Command and Staff College. It suffers fro…

Defenders of the Fatherland This is a solitaire battle report of Arrigo Velicogna's scenario Defenders of the Fatherland from the Battles Within Battles expansion. The scenario takes place in the upper right most corner of the Blood & Bridges map. A West German reserve M-48 tank company, and a light infantry grunts with milan ATGM, company are tasked with buying time for reqard units to prepare to halt the Soviets at the Rhine. The T-80's, BMP-2's and assorted cats and dogs of the Soviet 93rd Reconaissance Battalion is tasked with getting to the Rhine by exiting at least 6 units of the west map edge with six turns and control a cross road at Hex AA7. Both …

This miniatures game is a well supported franchise. I've had and enjoyed FFT2 for some years now. FFT is a fast playing rule set. FFT's one "model" equals 1 platoon. Basing is decided by the user. 1 inch = 100m, or simply 1cm = 100m. Turn is about 12min per turn. A pdf is currently available at the wargamevault and spiral bound and hard cover versions coming to Lulu.

Today's CPX was based upon the April 1999 Marine Corps Gazatte's Tactical Decision Game 99-4 Battle Along the Tziepov, by then Major John F. Schmitt USMCR. The general situation was that Blue Forces "(advancing north with the mission of destroying 'Red Forces' en route to an operational objective some 30km north)" and Red Forces "(advancing south) have clashed head to head along the trace of the Tziepov River." The OOB's were essentially as described in the TDG. "Upon contact, in an effort to sieze the initiative, both forces have started shifting forces west, trying to turn the other's flank and establish a bridgehead on the far side of the river." Map997c Th…

Saludos Caballeros Devido a que estoy disponible para nuevas campañas aeronavales, he decidido crear un nuevo escenario que sera integrado en la campaña en la operacion triton, dicho escenario es un escenario AAW/ASW/ASuW, en dicho caso, se permitira cualquier unidad tipo FFGs, LCSs, FACs o SSKs de cualquier marina de la OTAN, en un numero de 1 unidad en caso de los FFGs, LCSs o SSKs 2x en el caso de las FACs, Hay un maximo de 2 SSKs en este escenario. Todos los buques tendran unos sistemas de armas genericos, exectuando SSMs y torpedos, que seran de un solo tipo, tambien hay que tener en cuenta los helicopteros seran tambien de un solo tipo. Si alguien desea …

There are several huge topics for MBXing, and one of them is certainly the art and science of GMing. I am probably a newcomer to MBXs compared to others, having played in two (Global Thunder, with Rikki Tikki GMing, and War in 2010, with Bill Jennings GMing). What I've come away with, however, is a profound recognition for such a game's demands on a GM. Not only is there combat to model... in fact, that's the easy part. The GM needs to master several things. Perhaps we'll be able to get Rikki and Bill to join HarpGamer to share their wisdom. But in the meantime, here are several of what seem to be the key topics: - website design and maintenance - good picture-…

Anyone interested in trying some of the GCS scenarios from the Falklands War?

Despite small and off the top of my head after a few hours, this one is for Brains. It was a rough dipiction of the first mission flown by the author of Angles of Attack as a part of VA-145 on the first night of Desert Storm. I prepared 2x A-6E TRAM to attack the docks in Umm Qasr. They were both armed with a BAP-100 x6 Cluster Bomb under stations 1,5. An AGM-88 HARM and an AJM-C under stations 2,4. Here the weather was pleasant as opposed to the IR defeating nighttime mist/precipitation thesy faced. For this run through, the port facility was protected by a FCR directed KS-19 battery. There was an EWR-A further back inland. The 2x A-6E came in at T-Level…

Flew Scenario S-1 Border Clash in a USMC F-4S versus a WP MiG23MF. It was guns only and the MiG used the Evasive Movement Table...to no avail. On Turn 6, I was able to dive onto him ending up on his 0 degree line point blank firing a 2 second burst from my external SUU-23 Vulcan 20mm gun pod scoring a cripple result thus 16 points. Always a good feeling getting your first "kill".

From the never ending battles over Thorpe Bridge, the following report is of a short skirmish using the GDW Assault (circa 1983) rules (as I describe as a manual TacOps). For those not familiar, the overall scenario was derived from a USMC Tacical Decision Game "problem found in the Marine Corps Gazette. The actual problem can still be found on the MCA's website. MCA TDG 99-4. Thorpe Bridge can be located on the center right of the TDG map. My hand drawn map of the environs around Thorpe Bridge is here. Hexes are 250m each. The bridge is centermass but partially obscured by flash on scotch tape..., damn scotch. Since Assault was US Army-NATO centric M…

First of all - No disrespect to the belligerents and/or victims of this current war between Georgia and Russia. Just using the situation to frame a viable scenario. Georgian Su-25 responding to ground units observing a Russian armored column advancing on their defensive positions. Russian armored column of 2x tank platoons and a mechanized infantry platoon. At a rearward position, covering a bridge crossing, is a solitary SA-11 launch vehicle. Su-25 enters the south edge of the map at T Level and moves up along the eastern side of the map. Turns 3-4, Su-25 effectively jams the SA-11 TTR with its AJM-A EW Pod. Turn 5 it is not jammed and the SA-11 lock…

This OOB data may or may not be accurate or useful, and is reportedly from a UK diplomatic source ... I post it here in case someone would like to do some wargaming (like Pete ) ...

Excerpt from the Executive Summary: Global Shipping Game report (PDF)

Thought it might be useful to guage folks' interest in MBX style wargames generally ...

I would like to run a PBEM game based on the Gulf Escort Deja Vu scenario from the H4 Quickstart guide. The game will be played out with SimPlot v1.6.0.0. This will give me a chance to evaluate SimPlot for multiplayer use. My own in-house experiments show promise, but now it's time to play for real. Turns will be played by me until either a new detection is made or we reach a decision point (no set time frame per night--it will be "event driven"). I will then communicate to the appropriate player (sending a new turn file and ask for new orders). It will be inevitable that a player may not get an email from me every night. You will definitely get one when somethi…

OK, using the Gulf Strike system I ran a short, small-scale engagement. Background: Iran has declared itself the arbiter of all naval traffic in the Straits of Hormuz. The straits have be sown with sea mines and Iranian fast attack craft have been attacking/harassing western naval assets in the gulf. Two US Carrier Battle Groups, along with an Expeditionary Strike Group are operating in the northern Arabian Sea. USCENTCOM tasks CENTNAV and CENTMC to destroy the silkworm batteries both along the Iranian coast and on Qeshm Island, and clear Qeshm Island of all Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps forces. US forces for avoid attacks into and around the Iranian militar…

A three person off-shoot of my current gaming group has begun an attempt to tackle Gulf Strike Scenario 2 which depicts a mid 1980's invasion of Iran. One player is the Soviets, one the Iranians, and me, the other, is the Americans. After close to 30 years (1983), I have finally had an opportunity to set this up and play through a couple of turns with live opponents. We have completed five turns before pausing last night about midnight. The Soviets are advancing, from both sides of the Caspian Sea, toward Tehran agains slowly deteriorating Iranian resistance. US Special Forces have made some effective raids and strike coordination operations against soviet supp…

This is an introductory scenario for Gulf Strike, a game designed by Mark Herman through Victory Games. Ethiopia is attacking western interests in Somolia and Djibuiti. Each attacking force is provided with air defence by a soviet Anti-Air Regiment. A US's Kitty Hawk CBG has been tasked with conducting air strikes in support of the friendly goverments. ROE prevents the CBG from attacking the Soviet AA units themselves. The US commander is also given two B-52 sorties per turn. Soviet naval and air forces are arrayed along the southern Arabian peninsula and in the Arabian Sea/Indian Ocean. There orders are to attack the US forces in the area, to include the US …