Battlegroup NORTHAG; Fighting in the Baltic

[SJWi]

Having last week tried NORTHAG as a big multi-player game, yesterday I put together a much smaller game to play at home on my 6 x 4' table. Wanting something a bit different the scenario was set of the Danish island of Bornholm, and pitted my mate's Soviet Naval Infantry against my plucky Danes.  The forces were less "high tech" than last week with the Soviets fielding T55s and BTR60s, and the Danes Centurions and modernised M41 Walker Bulldogs.

With less armour on the table, infantry played a more prominent role in the game, particularly for the Danes who dug-in to defend the objective, the NATO listening post and communications tower shown in the photo . The Soviet Naval infantry had a hard time of it as they lost thinly-armoured BTR60s to artillery and mortar fire which also destroyed some on the embarked fireteams. However the Danish armour found that even the 100mm gun of the T55 was a potent foe, and was almost wiped out with just one tank left broken down away from the combat.

Once again we thought the rules played well. It was nice to see infantry finally having a role in a Cold War game, and the infantry rules pretty slick and feel right .The smaller size game also seemed to pose more command and control challenges as each side only had 8-9 orders to play with each turn , which meant hard choices about what to activate.

Once again the models were all the land forces were Heroics and Ros, with the newer models such as the M41, Centurion and T55 being particularly good. The large hovercraft was by Scotia and the smaller a 3D print. The buildings were Timecast, with the Communications Tower an old out-of-production sci-fi model. Finally, the mat was my new 1/300 coastal mat by Tiny Wargames.           

[carlos marighela]

Looking good!

[BeneathALeadMountain]

This looks great SJWi! I’m hoping the zoomed out WW2 Battlegroup version coming soon uses a similar approach to Northag  (I’d also really like the sci-fi version).

Andrew
BeneathALeadMountain

[SJWi]

Andrew, agree with you about what I understand will be called "Battlegroup Commander".  I have masses of Skytrex 1/200 WW2 and have been looking for many years for a set of rules that hits the "sweet spot". I'm hoping these will do it, albeit I suspect it may be a few years before all the theatres I have troops for are covered.

[bluewillow]

Fabulous, last game I played against the Danes my Soviet marines had their asses handed to them, not enough air cover or artillery support!

Cheers
Matt

[SJWi]

Matt, thanks for the kind comment. My mates and I have invested quite a lot in 1/300 moderns over the past few years, but have hardly played it. This was the first outing of the Danes post-COVID and last time they fought the Soviet Airborne using the "unofficial" Cold War BG rules that were doing the rounds. The Soviets didn't stand a chance. ASU85s vs Centurions??  However under the NORTHAG rules they aren't a very powerful force with pretty limited options, and the Soviet Naval Infantry are a pretty well-matched opponent. For my next game I plan to use my shiny new Yanks. A mix of M60s/M113s painted in MERDC and a lesser number of early M1s/M3s painted in forest green. It will be interesting to see how the NATO L7 105mm gun fares against the T64-equipped Russkies.

Regards.

   

[Deedles]

Nice set up - looking good

[LouieN]

A good looking game.  Nice watercraft

[SJWi]

Not my hovercraft, but they really added to the game.

[mendoza]

Nice game. I love 1/300 modern games, what about the infantry? Do you buy GHQ?

[Mako]

Nice!

I hope/plan to do this in 1/144th scale, but need to get a few jeeps/landrovers and some infantry. Have the other minis for some good games.

The M41s are an interesting match against the PT-76s and T-55s. They should be able to easily deal with the BTR-60s.