Battle Report: 4/6/2014 Flames Of War Introduction

It has been about 12 years since I have tried to get into the game Flames Of War by Battlefront, and yesterday was the very first time I actually had a 1 on 1 game.  I have always loved the WW2 era and really wanted to get into this game (hence all my models for Bolt Action now).  I bought the original rulebook (version 1) and some US Tank models originally and tried to find some players in Chicago, none of my gaming friend were into the game, so that did not go very far.  A few years later they released version 2 of the rules and of course I went and purchased the rulebook with hopes of playing.  During this time we have moved back to Chicago for a year and my son and I played in a few 'large' games where each only controlled 1-3 tanks.  Never a real 1 on 1 game.  During that time I also added a few Soviet tanks, and completed painting all my US models.  After a year we moved back to Phoenix and never picked it back up.

Now that I am back into gaming (2 year hiatus with other hobbies) and playing/loving Bolt Action, I decided to give Flames Of War another try.  A lot of people ask which game is better, "Bolt Action or Flames Of War", yes they are both WW2 games, but they are completely different games.  Bolt Action is more of a skirmish game and based on platoons, while Flames Of War is more of a Company/Battalion level of a game.  My thought going into yesterdays game was that I would play FOW for larger 'tank battles' and keep Bolt Action for my 'infantry' game (though this Summer, Bolt Action will be releasing a Tank Battles rule book.)

So I reached out to one of my friends (Robert from "Drunken Samurai Painting Blog") and asked if he could teach me an intro game to FOW.  We ended up meeting yesterday at Imperial Outpost Games and Robery brought with him about 1200 points of Mid-War Germans and Americans.  Robert elected to play Germans, and since I already have a US Tank Company, I played the Americans.

Grant it we only played with tanks, but Robert taught me a lot of the rules and now I can go back into the rule book as a reference and know what he was talking about.

The mission we ended up playing was "Hold The Line" (Defensive Battle) and the Germans were the Defenders and the Americans were the Attackers.  I know Robert is an experienced player and could have easily out played me, but somehow the Americans were able to capture and hold the objective and win the game.

In all honestly, I really enjoyed the game and Robert taught me a lot.  "Will I expand my current collection ?" that I am unsure at the moment.  I can see myself playing the game as larger Tank Battles like mentioned above, but with Bolt Action releasing their new rules soon, I may use the 15mm models and play the Bolt Action rules.  My son and I will play another game this weekend (smaller 600 points so we can both get more familiar) and we shall see how we feel about the game.

More than likely I will probably also be playing this game, but keep it to Tanks.  If I want Infantry based, I'll keep playing Bolt Action.

Here are just a few photos of our game.

View of the battlefield from the American side.

View of the battlefield from the German side.

US Shermans destroying the German HQ.