Last night was games night

The Rotorua Irregulars haven't got together for a good while (as befits our name), so we thought that we would organise a Fast Flames tourney evening. There were eight of us playing (if you count Chris and his son Connor as one player), so that gave us 4 Axis armies and 4 Allied. We used the Blitzkrieg book for our lists, apart from the Soviets who used the Invasion of Poland PDF, and put together 800 point armies which could not include air support or artillery.

It was interesting in that we haven't played Flames of War for a while and it took some time to get back into the swing of it. The basics were easy enough, but some of the special rules like one man turret and Hen and chicks had us scratching our noggins a bit.
There were three objectives placed on the centre line - one dead centre, the other two 15cm in from the table edge. Each of these was worth 3 points if you had troops within 5cm and no enemy within 10cm at the end of the game. You also gained two points for destroying an enemy platoon. The games were played on 4' x 4' tables.
Turns lasted 1 hour exactly, when the clock stopped dice went down (I'll never know whether the hits on Chris' tank went through the armour or not). This actually worked really well, and some tables had finished their games within the hour.
We made up all the lists using Easyarmy.com which meant that we had all of the stats and special rules handy to us, and this sped things along, because we drew our armies at random. This is a great way to learn the rules and also to discover the strengths and weaknesses in armies that you may not usually play.

Nathan as French  Escadron de combat vs Chris and Connor as German Czech Panzerkompanie

John as British Armoured regiment vs Adam as German Czech Panzerkompanie

Terry as French Infanterie vs Jeremy as German schutzenkompanie

Richard as Russian Strelkovy vs Shane as German Schutzenkompanie

Ohh - vineyards - I like fighting in France comrade! 

Is this where we park Comrade?

The French learn to park up in close formation - well they are in a ditch...

Go away! This my objective! Grrr!

British infantry about to find the shelter of a dilapidated building

British blowing up Germans - how did they lose the real Battle for France again?

It looks like the French and Germans are in a swirling melee, but it is in fact two separate tables (delineated by the blue tape).

"Oi, Bert! I think we might be on the wrong side."

The French and Germans square off for a Russian village. We'll call it an away game for both of them.

"Comrade, I've come to your party and brought my friends, da?"

When in doubt - advance!

If we use American dice that might mean that they show up and help us like in the last war...

Ahh, the Soviets finally discover how to space out their tanks.

Finally the BAR stumble against the dug in infantry of the Shutzenkompanie

The end results after three rounds were that John came first with 29 points, Richard second with 22 points and Nathan and Chris & Connor were tied  for third on 19 points. Terry brought up the rear with a grand total of 9 points.

Overall the Allies scored 71 points to the Germans' 53, so it was a pretty decisive victory in the battle for France/Russia.

John provided us all with buns and a Christmas Ham which we had been meant to have in a pre-Xmas game that had to be postponed. The beauty of playing wargames with a chef! Another fantastic night.

The Ham - the real hero of the night

For those that don't like Flames of War, they can give plenty of reasons. But we always have so much fun with these games, and it is the one period and rule system that we all have in common.  We do find that we don't play it enough, though, and there are probably plenty of rules that we are blissfully unaware and situations we fudge to make sure that the game keeps flowing. But no-one complains about that, and no-one is that keen on gracing the tournament scene, so we are happy in our little world.

Nate