FoW: Early War Escalation League Part 1

With the Operation Market Garden Firestorm campaign coming to an end, our local gaming club decided to aim at something new for the Spring season of 2011. As the numbing cold of the Finnish winter continues to linger in the air, we saw it appropriate to focus on the German campaign in France during the warm summer season of 1940.
 
The Early War period (1939-1941) was a very new thing to all of us, as the Blitzkrieg book had only just been released the previous Autumn. Up until now, everyone had been enjoying the equipment, skill and composition of later period armies, such as the mighty Königstiger, the stubborn and fearless yankee paratroopers and the might of the Red Army and its IS-2 tanks. All of this was to change, as the early war period provided quite exotic and less powerful units than we had been accustomed to!

The idea was to paint a small force of 600 points to start off with, which would then grow in size every two weeks by 300 points. At the end, we would have 1500 or 1750 point armies depending on the enthusiasm. This way we could get players old and new to join us in a new project. Upon first reading the Polish & French campaign book I was instantly drawn to the German Blitzkrieg mentality and way of war conducting strategic offences.

Rommel and his 7th Panzer Division equipped with the captured Czech Panzer 38 (t) tanks were an iconic unit in the French campaign for me, and Rommel became quite famous for his daring tactics. As both of the tanks and the man himself were a playble force in this game, I immediately made my mind on where to start. The Ghost Division would be my project for this spring! More on this force later..

The first gaming day was a success and many showed up with top notch armies for both the french and german sides. My first game against the British Armoured Brigade was a disaster, as the lightly armoured but heavily armed behemoths managed to wipe out my army with a decisive concentration of firepower. Watch this space for pics and an army list depicting my rocky road through the EW EL!

 

If you were interested, please check out some of the pics from our first games!
 http://www.nopat.fi/2011/tapahtumat/blitzkrieg-flames-of-war-escalation-league-osa-1/


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