[Ian]

I hope they take this opportunity to finally make squad LMG’s and MMG’s worth choosing in an army selection. At the moment they are poor points value and don’t reflect their importance on the battlefield.

[Ian]

Hi LT,

I’m not arguing about the definition of an LMG, MMG, GPMG or automatic rifle or what ever they are classed as. The BA rules are clear as to what is an LMG (basically the squad automatic weapon), what is an MMG and what is classed as an Automatic Rifle.    That’s OK, I get that, the rules are fun and not extensive.

The point I’m trying to get across is that, the way the rules are written at the moment experienced players very rarely pick an LMG in their infantry squad or chose an MMG unit in their army due to its cost and vulnerability.

This is wrong.

The rules should reflect the effectiveness of these automatic weapons in WWII and ensure that every player wants to chose them in their army lists, not avoid them!!!

[Ian]

Treat as a building with two floors.

No. Must be on the same floor

[Ian]

The big advantage of a half-track over a wheeled vehicle is that they, just like a tank, ignore obstacles. So its not just mud etc but any terrain classed as an obstacle. This would include  hedgerows, fences, steams and the like. These would stop a fully wheeled vehicle and limit its movement on the table.

However the advantage of  being able to move over an obstacle is at the loss of speed, halftracks move 9″ and wheeled vehicles 12″

[Ian]

Highland regiments only wore the kilt in the very early days of the second world war. After the evacuation of France there is little to distinguish Scottish Highland and Guards from other County Regiments.

The tam o’shanter bonnet was also wore by many other Scottish regiments but this was rarely worn in combat. Each Scottish regiment, highland and lowland wore a distinguishing regimental badge. In the North Africa, Italy and France the Black Watch wore a tam’o shanter with a red hackle on the left of the bonnet with a regimental badge on a small patch of the regimental tartan. The other detail is the shoulder flash on the battle dress tunic.

Generally, these details are so small as to not show on a 28mm figure.

In summary; for BA games the Scottish and Scots Guards are dressed similar to other British troops. You could add a piper (Lord Lovat had Piper Milne with his commando unit when he led the advance on Pegasus Bridge on D-Day). But again not to be used in combat.

[Ian]

I think I will stick with the normal two-man sniper team, costs 5 pts less and is more robust.

[Ian]

Great, Thanks for that information.

Paying the extra +5 points for only one man instead of a 2-man team seemed a bit counterintuitive, but I see the advantages now.

The LMG option is too expensive. 55pts +10pts for an LMG firing at a -1 to hit? Doesn’t make sense

[Ian]

Get some barbed wire. That will slow him down long enough for your infantry to whittle him down.

Which army list is he using that allows 5 Bamboo Spear fighter squads??

[Ian]

Hi Lindsay. Look us up. We are the Guernsey Wargames Club.

It would be great to get together but difficult at the moment as you say.

It looks like you have a fairly big membership?

We are all off out tonight for our Christmas meal. So I will tell everyone we’ve been chatting.

Catch you later

 

Ian

[Ian]

Hi Lindsay,

That sounds like a great idea. Do you run wargames weekend right through the summer or only on specific dates?

We are a small club (Max 10 people) based in Guernsey. We fight mainly historical battles we have just finished a BA game for the German invasion of Guernsey……….but in our version the Brits decided to fight it out instead of running away!!! We are now running a SAGA campaign with each member having a different faction. Our big favourites are Brother vs Brother (ACW), Men who would be Kings and  Black Powder. I’m not an IT fan but I think we have a face book page under Bailiwick Wargames Club? But dont quote me on that one.

 

I’m oroginally from Scotland but never been that far north before.

Kind regards

 

Ian

 

[Ian]

Hi Lindsay,

Looks like a cracking game. It also looks like you have a busy wee club up there.

If you guys ever fancy a weekend in the sun you are more than welcome to join us for a wargames weekend.

From the opposite end of the British Isles

[Ian]

Hi Dr Dave,

I have 3 spare Sherman models that I will probably never get around to building (Birthday extras) tell me what you need and I can send it to you.

 

[Ian]

Hi Steel Jacket.

The figure scale is 1:56. If this is translated and used as the ground scale, a standard 6’x4′ table would measure 110m x 75 m, maximum rifle range would be 38m and a man could run 18m per move!!!

To make movement and firing ranges more realistic it is conventional in most wargames rules to have the ground scale different from the model scale.

BA is slightly abstract in its ground scale and move times which works OK for one off battles. However it becomes an issue when you are running a campaign and trying to relate off table map movement onto the wargames table to fight an actual battle. (You can’t  have two reinforced platoons with artillery and amour fighting over an area of 110m x75 it would be rather crowded!!)

It is conventional to therefore use rifle range as a marker for the ground scale. If you take the average killing range of a rifle as 400m in combat then our 6′ x 4′ table is now around 1200m x 800m, a more realistic ground area for two platoons to be fighting over.

The problem with this system is that a road is now 50m across, a steam becomes a wide river and a single house model becomes a whole village. With a little imagination you can overcome these anomalies.

[Ian]

Thanks all,

Looking at it again, I think in built up areas with lots of streets, buildings etc. will reduce it to around 1200m x 800m. That seems to work with terrain, movement and ranges. Where the land is more open it feels better to open the scale up a bit to around 1500m x 1000m

I will let you know how it works out once we get around that table again!!

Thanks again for all your help and advice

Ian

[Ian]

Hi Duncan

 

First of all welcome to Bolt Action. It’s a really good set of WWII platoon level rules, so I do hope you enjoy playing. Also D-Day/Normandy is a great period with all the different troops types and strange vehicles scurrying about the table.

I hope your table works out well and you get a lot of enjoyment from it . I also like the idea of promoting the hobby using such a vast table.

Happy gaming

Ian

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