Lead Adventure Forum
Miniatures Adventure => The Second World War => Topic started by: fred on October 03, 2024, 06:00:19 PM
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What are people’s initial thoughts about Eisenhower by Sam Mustafa?
I’ve not bought it yet, but do intend to, just been a bit busy the last couple of days.
From a look at the sample materials looks a lot like Rommel - which is no bad thing, I enjoyed Rommel games. But not quite sure where the differences are in game play - other than the obvious change in representational scale.
Seems pretty big forces involved, 4 Divisions per side, each of 9 stands of infantry plus supporting armour - seems common on the example scenarios.
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I didn't know Sam had a new game out, so zero knowledge here. His stuff is always interesting so thanks for the heads up.
On a superficial level, invoking the name of 'The Great Golfer' seems an odd choice unless the game's mechanics deal with massaging the egos of competing Army commanders and getting everyone to rub along and pull together. Four Divisions on the table suggests either a large Corps or Army Group, so calling it Patton, Bradley or Dempsey might have been closer to the mark. I look forward to his take on the SW Pacific: Eichelberger. :)
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I suppose the chances he might bring out a set for Burma are probably rather slim.
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I suppose the chances he might bring out a set for Burma are probably rather slim.
Ba dum!
Link to the web page https://sammustafa.com/eisenhower
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I really Mustafa look at this.
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Hopefully this one gets some decent play through videos (unlike the dreadful counter-productive ones for Rommel).
I like the idea of this scale of game and have used both Megablitz and Assault Gun in the past but it comes very close to something better as a hex&counter game rather than miniatures.
The necessary abstraction of terrain would seem to take away unique aspects of a particular operation (see the Epsom scenario in the downloads as an example).
I want to give this a go but need to see some convincing sample games first.
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It looks interesting. It’s got me thinking - would it be possible to do the whole of Market Garden as s multi player? Scale looks about right and terrain should fit.
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For anyone who hasn’t already got the POD edition in their Amazon basket, the price has just gone down from £35 to £26.95. Amazon prices can fluctuate a lot, so this may not be permanent.
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It looks interesting. It’s got me thinking - would it be possible to do the whole of Market Garden as s multi player? Scale looks about right and terrain should fit.
As XXX Corps had 64 miles to get to Arnhem Bridge at the commencement of the operation you would need a table minimum 32 squares in length so 16 feet, (assuming 6" squares as per Rommel).
You would probably want to go slightly longer to get the Rhine on table rather than just nominate it as table edge. Plus manipulate the distances between bridges slightly as the Rivers and Canals must run on the boundaries between squares not within them.
Certainly feasible and probably the sort of operation the rules are designed for.
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I’ve bought the rules and plotted a possible table. 15 ft by 6 ft would do it missing xxx corps first day (so coming on as reinforcements on day 2.)
It will need a couple of rule tweaks otherwise XXX corps can’t travel quick enough to match history if it rains.
My big task is figuring out the German OOB.
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I’ve bought the rules and plotted a possible table. 15 ft by 6 ft would do it missing xxx corps first day (so coming on as reinforcements on day 2.)
It will need a couple of rule tweaks otherwise XXX corps can’t travel quick enough to match history if it rains.
My big task is figuring out the German OOB.
This is an interesting idea. For many years I’ve wanted to do table-top OMG.
Fitting all the ad hoc German units in the Eisenhower command system might be tricky - it might be a case of allocating ‘divisions’ to certain geographical areas and the various units that come along to attack the corridor from that location become part of that ‘division’. There is also such a mish-mash of kit on the German side, knowing what should be of a certain quality could be quite tricky.
Certainly interested to see how you progress this - I would be happy to contribute - but seem to be stupidly busy with work atm
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This is an interesting idea. For many years I’ve wanted to do table-top OMG.
Fitting all the ad hoc German units in the Eisenhower command system might be tricky - it might be a case of allocating ‘divisions’ to certain geographical areas and the various units that come along to attack the corridor from that location become part of that ‘division’. There is also such a mish-mash of kit on the German side, knowing what should be of a certain quality could be quite tricky.
Certainly interested to see how you progress this - I would be happy to contribute - but seem to be stupidly busy with work atm
Yes - I’ll try to have the divisions with the various smaller kampfgrupe as battalions.
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A lot of the work on the German ad hoc formations has already been done by Colin Rumford for the original Rapid Fire Market Garden Campaign Guide (The maroon coloured one NOT the Battlegroups re-write which is not nearly as good). The pdf is very cheap on the Rapid Fire site.
Helpfully the units are broken down at Battalion level and allocated where and when they were committed/formed/reformed. It is a very useful reference and usable for many sets of rules.
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Good shout on the RF book - as I’ve already got it. Did take me a couple of hours to find it though, as it had slipped into a gap between another book!
But in looking for it I did find quite a few other OMG resources I collected over the years. Including the old SPI hex and counter game which goes for Eindhoven to Arnhem as the game area. But the RF book is much more accessible
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Having read through the rules, they look very promising. I like Rommel, but they do play quite slowly; these rules, being at a higher level, are more streamlined. No unit labels needed, and simpler mechanisms; I love the ability of airstrikes to hit not just frontline troops, but the opponent’s rear support, eliminating artillery dice or possible airfields if you roll well enough. With one day per move, and rules for airborne and amphibious invasions, the scope is huge
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For those asking about Market-Garden you can just use 4" squares instead of 6". If you're doing 6mm it works fine with that size. That's what I do for Rommel where I base my figures on 40mm x 35mm bases and 3 bases per square fit well. I put 2 tanks or 1 vehicle and 4 infantry for armored/motorized units and just the 4 infantry for leg infantry.
I was going to look at Market-Garden as a project, I have a 12' x 6' table, after I finish my Bastogne project for Rommel.
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For those asking about Market-Garden you can just use 4" squares instead of 6". If you're doing 6mm it works fine with that size.
That is how I do Rommel also but base everything of 30mm square bases. That way I can use the same figure collection for Crossfire, Spearhead, Panzer Korps, and Lightning War/Bewegungskrieg depending on the scale of scenario we are playing. I will be adding Eisenhower to the list in due course.
For Rommel with 3mm or 6mm figures the smaller square works perfectly well and gives a bigger battle area on the table. It also means the terrain pieces are a more manageable size for storage.
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(http://blob:https://wordpress.com/5e181306-a721-40f5-8f2e-b5f59f3bd215)
hmm, the image is not showing up likely due to my incompetence :). A direct link is https://carnivalempire.wordpress.com/2024/10/17/rommel-using-4-squares/ (https://carnivalempire.wordpress.com/2024/10/17/rommel-using-4-squares/)
For the curious, this is what Rommel using 4" squares looks like.
If anyone is interested in how I'm converting the GDW Bastogne campaign from the `80's to Rommel here's a couple links on my progress.
https://wordpress.com/post/carnivalempire.wordpress.com/897 (https://wordpress.com/post/carnivalempire.wordpress.com/897)
https://wordpress.com/post/carnivalempire.wordpress.com/915 (https://wordpress.com/post/carnivalempire.wordpress.com/915)
Currently I've finished printing all the vehicles and the urban areas. I'll start printing rivers today. I was going to print the forests, and they turned out well, but doing 167 forest squares would take almost a month so I'm just going with 3" square bases from Litko that I'll put some craft moss on to make those. I should be receiving the infantry and artillery from Baccus in the near future along with the Cigarbox mats and hopefully will have this ready for the table by the end of November.
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Without wishing to derail the discussion, some may be interested to hear - always assuming they’re not already aware of it - that Frank Chadwick is working on a WWII set at a similar scale to Eisenhower, or at least that’s what I infer from the limited info I have, i.e. one stand = a battalion. It will be interesting to see what it’s called, though I think we can rule out theatre commanders’ names.
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(http://blob:https://wordpress.com/5e181306-a721-40f5-8f2e-b5f59f3bd215)
hmm, the image is not showing up likely due to my incompetence :). A direct link is https://carnivalempire.wordpress.com/2024/10/17/rommel-using-4-squares/ (https://carnivalempire.wordpress.com/2024/10/17/rommel-using-4-squares/)
For the curious, this is what Rommel using 4" squares looks like.
If anyone is interested in how I'm converting the GDW Bastogne campaign from the `80's to Rommel here's a couple links on my progress.
https://wordpress.com/post/carnivalempire.wordpress.com/897 (https://wordpress.com/post/carnivalempire.wordpress.com/897)
https://wordpress.com/post/carnivalempire.wordpress.com/915 (https://wordpress.com/post/carnivalempire.wordpress.com/915)
Currently I've finished printing all the vehicles and the urban areas. I'll start printing rivers today. I was going to print the forests, and they turned out well, but doing 167 forest squares would take almost a month so I'm just going with 3" square bases from Litko that I'll put some craft moss on to make those. I should be receiving the infantry and artillery from Baccus in the near future along with the Cigarbox mats and hopefully will have this ready for the table by the end of November.
That looks pretty epic. I do take it you do mean the Rommel rules, not the newer Eisenhower ones?
I think for the forests I would just go with the moss, and not worry about that many bases. Where the forest covers multiple adjoining squares it will look more natural to have the trees across the box boundaries.
Without wishing to derail the discussion, some may be interested to hear - always assuming they’re not already aware of it - that Frank Chadwick is working on a WWII set at a similar scale to Eisenhower, or at least that’s what I infer from the limited info I have, i.e. one stand = a battalion. It will be interesting to see what it’s called, though I think we can rule out theatre commanders’ names.
The more the merrier! One of the great things about WWII game is that figures work for pretty much all games - as RobH says!
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It seems to me that there’s a major gap in the level of command represented by our wargames, or rather in the way of representing all facets of command beyond the purely tactical and strategic, specifically staff work (the boring but essential aspect of military operations at least at divisional level and above, though it is also relevant at lower levels). Many senior commanders relied heavily on their chiefs of staff, or if not, should have done, as history all too often attests. I therefore propose a new series of wargames devoted to this badly overlooked sector. To accompany Eisenhower, then, and for that matter to complement it, we need Bedell-Smith. Similarly, any game purporting to simulate Montgomery’s campaigns at the macro level should incorporate De Guingand. (If I could remember the name of Rommel’s CoS I’d mention him too though it seems to me he was among those whose contributions were generally ignored).
P.S. My own lack of a trustworthy chief of staff frequently costs me dear and I can now illustrate this with the embarrassing admission that my composition of this post caused me to miss my bus home, leaving me with a difficult choice to make.
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I for one would embrace a game that came with 30 pages worth of staff tables and a series of complex flow charts showing how the tables can be put into effect. I say go for it!
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Unfortunately, I doubt I’ll be the one to produce such an item, though I’ll try to get my thoughts in order and possibly come up with some suggestions. Another thought that occurred to me when Eisenhower came to my attention was that, rather than operational and strategic matters per se, most of his attention was on dealing with political issues and especially the peculiar - and enormous - challenges of coalition warfare. This would be fertile ground for introducing a roleplaying element. You are Eisenhower - how do you balance the overriding requirement to end the war promptly, preferably before the Russians occupy the whole of Western Europe, with the need to placate your proud but increasingly insignificant European allies? Perhaps this is too much for a game focused on miniatures and best approached in a board game, but this is among the questions Mr Mustafa has raised by choosing to name his game after the Supreme Commander.
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I'm rather hoping that Mr Mustafa attention will move back towards more 'tactical' games. I'm hoping to see games like ENSA/USO Concert Party or Mobile Bath Unit.
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I'm rather hoping that Mr Mustafa attention will move back towards more 'tactical' games. I'm hoping to see games like ENSA/USO Concert Party or Mobile Bath Unit.
Well Mr la di da Gunner Carlos! You be wanting a game does you? Lovely boy, lovely boy.
Whoever yells “Shut up!” the loudest goes first.
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I think we can guess what a game based on the US Army Motor Pool is likely to be called, CBS permitting.
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I think we can guess what a game based on the US Army Motor Pool is likely to be called, CBS permitting.
Ooh, ooh. Ooh, ooh. I know this one.
Is it Doberman?
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Close but no cigar.
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I think we can guess what a game based on the US Army Motor Pool is likely to be called, CBS permitting.
Legion 4? After that twat on TMP who ended up in the motor pool? I think The Phil Silvers' Show has already been taken. :D
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Sorry, Carlos, I was out of the loop on that one.