Matt and Martin came over for some more of Dan Mersey's very jolly Armoured Storm. I have no actual tanks for this - I just provide the table (and cups of tea) - Martin has printed all the forces needed. As they're only 6mm his basic 3D printer is more than good enough for the job.
I laid out a battlefield, Martin had tweaked some army lists to be hopefully a little better balanced than our previous game and off we went with Matt assisting me with command of the British and Martin as the Desert Fox.
The British force was a mixture of Matildas and Honeys. The Germans had Panzer 2, 3 and 4s.
There's no deployment guidance in the rules, so we just set up as best we thought. After a turn or two we realised maybe a little closer together would have been better (especially for the very slow 'tildas).
James' painted backdrop is a lovely match for this terrain cloth.
As well as the tanks Martin printed the small settlement of Sidi-Hogg
We parked some Matildas on the rise overlooking the settlement to secure our flank, while planning to sweep around the other side.
We soon had some Panzers aflame.
The card squares represent "bunkers" an abstraction in the game to denote anti-yank/artillery/infantry presence.
We should probably build little camps or gun emplacements.
The lines closed slowly and we began to realise the folly of even thinking about flanking with Matildas.
Soon enough the British began to take fire.
As the Germans advanced on Sidi-Hogg we sent some reinforcements.
While the 'tildas kept watch.
The German left flank was taking some punishment.
But the British weren't having it all their own way.
Martin began a concerted push on his right.
And the force on the hill began to take fire.
More British casualties in the centre.
The German left went "hull down"
The Matildas on the hill were suddenly wiped out - Sidi-Hogg was wide open.
Desperately we poured fire into the German left.
But the Panzers raced toward the town.
More British tanks brewed up
And the British were forced to withdraw and lick their wounds.
A great fun game with good company. The rules are very *light* but work well and the scale looks terrific - taking us all back to days of Airfix tanks.
We did make a house rule for the shooting which is supposed to be done tank-by-tank, but with all shots declared before rolling. This just felt very fiddly and unnecessarily complex, so we came up with a little alternative firing method that speeded things up no end. We also debated afterwards that command tanks don't really seem to have much impact or importance in the game - which seemed counter intuitive so we may look at a few minor tweaks to them.
That said they're a great set of rules and we'll be using them again - next time with some sort of scenario.
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