Downsizing, and revisiting an old idea!

As previously mentioned there have been ongoing domestic manoeuvres that have had a knock on effect upon my hobby time and space. It's just temporary until the New Year, but I have been looking back through my blog at early efforts in smaller scales and on smaller tables in order to get back to some kind of wargaming again.

Looking back, I used to enjoy playing Memoir '44 scenarios using 15mm model tanks and figures rather than those supplied with the game. A few years ago I invested in the base game, the terrain pack and the 'Breakthrough' boards, and together they offered endless scenarios and set ups in beach landing, grass, desert and winter theatres. The two Breakthrough boards are deeper than the standard board at 17 hexes deep x 13 wide, printed double sided and supplied with suitable Breakthrough scenarios. The game could be set up quickly, played to a conclusion in reasonable time and then quickly packed away again, that appealed to me then and still does. I simply replaced the supplied plastic figures - 4 to a hex- with a base of 15mm figures and marked off losses with a micro dice on the base. Tanks were a single model rather than the 3 small ones supplied, and again a micro dice recorded hits until such time as the tank was destroyed. I enjoyed myself, and began to slightly expand the rules to introduce HMG bases, anti tank teams, mortar teams etc, but still retaining the simple play of the game. I allowed each side to make two attempts at an Air Strike during the game, which were rolled for, and introduced slightly improved armour rules where a heavy tank hitting a medium tank got to re roll to see if it immediately exploded (as per the  FoW Firepower check). Infantry could only damage tanks if in adjacent hex and designated as having anti tank weapons and indirect firing weapons required a spotting team with line of sight to the target. All very simple and in the spirit of the Memoir 44 rules, but adding a little more variation.

As it was long enough ago to be lost in the mist of past blog posts I thought I would add a few images of some of those games here because with a bit of free time due tomorrow I'm going to have another crack at a scenario.

Memoir 44' boardgame played with 15mm miniatures - April 2015.