[Peter]

Hi Ben,

what’s your problem?

[Peter]

Greetings L.T. Russel

I know how a shaped charge works, because I’ve shot countless of these things in my life. The fact that the copper cone becomes a projectile is just easier to explain.

When you see for the first time what this kind of ammo can do through pure explosion, you think differently about it.

As I said, you won’t use it against individual infantry units. That would be pure waste. You have machine guns or other hand weapons for that, but you’ll definitely use it against positions.

I would have expected a different rule from WLG here. But I also thought that they would finally introduce hand grenades into the game system or dodge rolls for indirect fire.
My expectations for 3rd Edition were simply too high.

IMO BA is a fantasy game or let’s say it’s a fictional game. With the changes from V2 to V3 it has lost any relation to reality. It is definitely not a historical game.

The reason WLG still calls it that is because it sells better.

Have a nice weekend.

[Peter]

Hi L.T. Russel,

actually this is one of the few good changes in V3 as these auto cannons were actually used as AA guns.

As the Pzkpfw 38(t) should have the same rules. Unfortunately this version of WLG is not included anywhere.

It could be because WLG does not consider full tracked reconnaissance vehicles.

[Peter]

Hi L.T. Russel

That’s not quite right. Of course, the main purpose of a Panzerfaust is to fight armoured vehicles or infantry in cover.

Whether modern or not, the copper cone of a shaped charge becomes an armour-piercing projectile because an explosive charge behind it is detonated.

If you shoot such a projectile at so-called soft targets, you fight them with the resulting pressure wave and fragmentation effect like a hand grenade.

However, this has not been taken into account at all in Bolt Action.

The next problem is that you have more cover against such a weapon behind a wooden fence than in a building.

Bolt Action is a fantasy game and has nothing to do with reality.

[Peter]

Hi Greg,

If you shoot at infantry with such a weapon, it counts as a single rifle shot without a blast radius. The difference is the strength of the penetration.

For example, if you shoot at regular troops with a bazooka and you hit, it has a pen value of 5+. The regular troops have a damage value of 5, which results in a zero that cannot be rolled. As a 1 is always a failed roll, you kill the enemy model with a 2+.

Is that realistic? No!
Does that make any sense? No!

Unfortunately, this is just one of many rules in this game that have not been thought through to the end.
A 1” blast radius against infantry would have made sense in my opinion. Especially because these weapons are so expensive.

[Peter]

Hi John, so you’re only allowed to say positive things, you have to say yes to everything and you have to like everything? Otherwise you should keep quiet? That’s a good attitude.

It’s not just about having fun. If you invest a lot of time and money, you also want a good product. As a customer, I can say if I don’t like a product. If WLG had listened to the players and taken V2’s criticism seriously, we would have a good product now.

WLG is unfortunately stuck with their products, rules and rulebooks of the 90s. They didn’t introduce a single innovative rule in V3. Instead, they changed good rules, left out bad rules and even misstated rules in a brand new rulebook that were correctly explained in V2. I’ve never seen anything like this before.

However, if you don’t care about the customers, even lie to them before the release and just want to sell something, you don’t have to be surprised about the criticism afterwards.

The point can’t be to buy a rulebook and then, as a player, compensate for all the mistakes with your own rules and try to make the game meaningful just because the person actually responsible was too lazy or too incompetent to do so in advance.

[Peter]

Hi Nat,

I see it a little differently to you. Yes Warlord Games is outdated and in my opinion has the wrong authors and no experts for these topics…BUT…then they should ask someone who has the necessary knowledge.

Furthermore, they already had rules that were at least comprehensible for the game itself. The incomprehensible thing is that although they worked, they were changed.

I don’t mind WLG doing what they want with their products, but if you change the rules so that they no longer have anything to do with reality, you should no longer call the game a historical game, but a fantasy game.

WLG itself does not call BA a comic game. Every explanation refers to historical events and occurrences. See the MG rule for vehicles. The fact that some of these explanations can only be justified by the fact that someone was drunk or under the influence of drugs is another story.

They have lied in so many articles in advance, have published two rulebooks so far that are of incredibly poor quality and with the third rulebook, you can see where it’s going. The Americans now have wonder weapons, two air strikes and cheaper tanks. The British will top that.

If the goal was to make these two armies so strong again and not have a balanced game, they’ve succeeded.

There will be enough people who continue to spend their money on WLG and therefore nothing will change.

[Peter]

Which page was that in the second edition of the German army book?

[Peter]

I disagree with that. It’s no longer a B&P game. The second edition can be described as such. BA third edition plays like a different timeline or a kind of multiverse. It has absolutely nothing to do with reality. For that kind of game, WLG actually has Conflict 47.

If you even equate weapons that could hardly be more different, then you don’t need to use the original names. Where is the difference in the different nations then?

The LMG and MMG rule worked in the second edition. In the third edition, for whatever reason, the vehicle – MG rules were changed and so the weapon profiles had to be changed. But in the end, nothing fits anymore.

You could also say there are nations 1, 2 and 3 and weapons A, B and C. Some are green, some are brown, others are grey and everyone does the same. This is BA third edition.

What they have done with the minor nations is the absolute highlight. Copying and pasting and then publishing two pages of PDF. WLG might as well have said FU. That’s all it is.

The big mistake was that they didn’t change the rules because they didn’t work or because they wanted to make things easier. It was all about selling something and the result is that people lose interest in the game. I don’t know anyone who says that the third edition is better than the second.
Nobody in our tabletop club plays BA anymore and when you see the declining numbers at tournaments, that says it all.

I still play BA for fun but based on the second edition and with adapted rules. These are much more realistic and you know what? It works.

But I’ve also switched to CoC and already waiting for the second edition. The official BA as it currently stands is dead for me and WLG doesn’t see a penny from me anymore. I can also find books with so many mistakes at the flea market and at a lower price. I simply can’t take this company seriously any more. Sure, WLG used to be a name, but they haven’t developed at all. Why does Rubicon, for example, manage to release a really good Pak 40 in plastic and at WLG you get a bent piece of metal? The 90s are over WLG!

After six months, the quick reference sheet is still incorrect and WLG is unable to correct it. I currently know of no other company in the tabletop sector that is as incompetent as WLG.

BA second edition has brought me back to tabletop. However, this bad joke called third edition brought me to other game systems and manufacturers. At least that’s a positive thing about the third edition for me.

And none of this has anything to do with it being a B&P game. These are absolutely bad business decisions.

It’s just a shame that WLG didn’t listen to the players.

[Peter]

The topic with V3 starts with the rulebook itself. It is not possible for 80% to fully understand the rules if WL itself explains the rules incorrectly.

Example:
Page 96, diagram14

This diagram is shown incorrectly and the funniest and stupidest thing is that it was shown correctly in V2.
So they deliberately changed a picture, which is now wrong. I have never seen anything like this in any other game system.

The same with the index and the countless cross-references.

Example:
Infoltrator (Index shows page 120)
Page 120 is correct but then… Cross-reference to page 161.
Once on page 161 you find a picture and then you can search. On page 174 you will find the rest of the Infiltrator rule. Why Warlord Games? Why?

Solution:
1. a rule on a topic is on one page and not spread over half the book.
2. if you use cross-references, you write the correct page
3. all pages that have something to do with this topic are also written in the index

Is that really too difficult for this company?

Halftracks have been completely forgotten in the index. Why should you think of a vehicle that was almost only used in ww2? No words.

And that runs through the entire book. Don’t forget, this is the third edition! Years of experience and feedback and you publish such quality.

[Peter]

I use Vallejo and AK 3rd Gen with a brush and Vallejo Air and Tamiya with my airbrush.

[Peter]

It’s not about balance. This is lazy gameplay writing.
I invest money and time in a model and then it gets destroyed because of a random dice result because it just drives away?

You give the player the opportunity to use more vehicles. Then you weaken them with FUBAR, failed order tests and this ridiculous MG rule.

At the same time, you make all anti-tank weapons more expensive. A one-shot Panzerfaust has increased in points by 300%.

Making one thing worse to make the other thing also worse is no design mentality. Maybe WLG should stop writing rules and just produce plastic miniatures.

[Peter]

I understand what you mean, but then you can’t charge money for it. I would accept that for a free PDF and a first edition, but the rulebook itself is full of errors. Diagrams are wrong, cross-references are wrong and some rule explanations that were still there in the second edition are missing.

The promise was that nothing would be changed that worked. That was a lie. After 8 years of the second edition and endless feedback from players, this cannot and must not be the result.

Why is there the new FUBAR rule, for example? Veterans surrounded by officers run off the table and are destroyed. Even drunk, I wouldn’t think of something like that.

Of course you can introduce your own house rules here and there, but a set of rules should work in such a way that two players can meet and play without having to spend several hours discussing which rule could mean what.

The spotter obserever rule shows that WLG has not thought about this at all.
WLG logic 1: He can lead all mortars, howitzers and an air strike at the same time.
WLG logic 2 Erreta: He can only lead a single gun.

Sensible logic: A platoon with indirect fire gets a spotter that directs the fire of this platoon. Then the officer with snap to action would also make sense.

And the same with the rule for motorbikes. A rider on a horse can ride across a field and shoot, but a motorbike with a sidecar and a mounted machine gun  can only stand and shoot.
With fewer shots, of course, because a machine gun on a vehicle is a completely different weapon.

In terms of quality (basic rulebook / armies of germany rulebook) and game logic, everything that can be done wrong has been done wrong.

If only a little thought had been put into it, the third edition could have been an incredibly good game.
The result is Simple Jack of tabletop games.

• This reply was modified 8 months, 3 weeks ago by Peter.

[Peter]

I realise that the game is not historically accurate. But it should at least follow a certain logic in the game itself. Then a motorbike with an MG costs 10 points more and the issue is settled.

It seems to me as if all these rule changes were decided completely at random without even thinking about whether they make sense.

[Peter]

I still don’t understand that there was really someone at Warlord Games who thought that these rules made sense and were useful for the game.

[Author]

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