Force on Force

Buceph

Anyone playing this around Ireland? Or know much about it?

I've looked on the Ambush Alley site and it looks like there's a good following in the Arkham Gaming Centre up north, but I'm not sure about the republic (I'm in Cork.)

It looks pretty decent. A modern infranty/skirmish war game. It can be played with any military models from 15mm, 20mm and 28mm. So it looks like it should be a lot cheaper than the GW/PP offerings. Also, it's based on scenarios, rather than straight out deathmatches between armies. The idea for the game seems to come from AA first game which was about a normal army fighting against guerrillas and insurgents. The rules for that are included in the Force on Force book, along with the rules for normal army v army.

I think, at the least, I'll be buying the rule book. If I grok that I'll probably be splashing out on two forces and paints to get me set up. Two forces because I doubt anyone I know will want to splurge the cash on one, but would play if they had the models available to them. All in all I think I could get the books, paints, and two forces for about €120. So that's nice.

Any info on this would be appreciated.

quozl

I don't know it but if that sort of thing is your cup of tea then also check out Flying Lead by ganesha games. I think those are also played in Arkham and it's also mini and scale neutral. Plus very cheap.

I play their fantasy rules.

Cy_Revenant

Shane from The Adventuring Party (that Irish gaming podcast) has sung the praises of Force on Force and Ambush Alley a few times. It certainly sounds like great stuff.

quozl

Thanks for posting this up BTW, Buceph.

It looks very interesting, and I do love skirmish games.

I think I'll wait till September and get their upcoming Sci-Fi games. Mainly because Sci-Fi will probably be an easier sell around here, and I have tonnes of fantastic Infinity miniatures that I can use

hagbard

I've got Flying Lead arriving in the next couple of days, and I have some Irish War of Independence and Wild West figures ordered as well. Will try to get some reports up soon.

quozl

Interesting, Hagbard.

I bought the PDF version of Flying Lead myself. Where do you play - I think I recognise your name as a sometime Infinity player but it can be hard putting online and real-world personas together

As to the thread topic, I've pre-ordered the up-coming Force on Force Sci-Rules book. Out in 2 months

hagbard

Quozl,
I've played Infinity a few times, I'm the tall beardy guy who took part in your Aliens inspired scenario at the first All Ireland Infinity Day. It's a great game, but I wanted something more suitable for historical stuff, and also something less complicated than Infinity, so I can get some of my friends to try it.
I've played a few times in Gamersworld since getting back into this hobby earlier in the year, and I have almost enough scenery for the home table I've built.
Which is to say, more than enough for mass historical/fantasy games, and enough for a small table skirmish.

quozl

Ahh yes, I remember you

Flying Lead looks fun, you'll have to give me a game some time.

hagbard

No problem.
I've been looking at some of the VBCW threads on the Gentleman's Wargames Parlour, and it's giving me some ideas for a second Irish civil war. That'll be fun.

quozl

Good pod-cast review of Force on Force by Meeples and Miniatures - http://meeplesandminiatures.libsyn.com/meeples-miniatures-episode-73-force-on-force-road-to-bahgdad . He's extremely enthusiastic. He's also a huge SoBH/Flying Lead fan.

I'm now struggling to avoid buying Force on Force

Buceph

Just received my FoF book today, and have read about 50 pages so far.

First off, the game really stands from being published by Osprey. The book is a little smaller than the standard RPG book size, the binding, cover and paper quality are fantastic. I've gone to turn a page a few times and thought there were pages stuck together, but instead it's just been that the paper is thick enough to withstand punishment.

While the production quality of the book is great, the layout of the rules isn't great. They come in a narrative form (not fiction, just not cold, hard rules.) I think I am benefiting greatly from having read their downloadable sample play sequence, because it isn't entirely clear in the first section how play occurs. That being said, the rules are quite simple at first. The basic mechanics of the game are similar to Savage Worlds if you know it, strength is represented by dice type, so basic units/insurgents are D6, standard military units are D8, elite unites are D10, units they'd end up making an action film about are D12. You roll your DWhatevers to attack, 4+ is a success, defenders roll their DWhatevers to defend, then match 4+'s to the attackers and see what wounds are caused. (So a defence of 4,5,8 and an attack of 5,7,9,10 would end up with the defence 5 neutralizing the 5, the 8 neutralizing the 7, the 4 not neutralizing anything and going against the 9, so they attackers 9 and 10 would get through and cause wounds.) That's as far as I've gotten in the book but there are further rules for morale, confidence, supplies, casualities, vehicular combat, suppression fire, etc..

The turn mechanics are quite interesting as well. The person with initiative moves and attacks, but if he comes into line of sight of an opponent unit, they can start a firefight, so the opponent whose turn it isn't can interrupt your turn. Then that fight is resovled until someone moves away, or until you can't fire anymore (this being done with the unit having one less dice with each "round" of fire.) Then the initiative player moves onto their other units. If the opponent player has any actions left (interrupting a player's move takes away the interrupting unit's action(I think)) they can take them on their turn, where again the player whose turn it isn't can interrupt again. It makes for very interesting turn/movement play, because turns are very fluid, and represent active firefights across the battlefield, rather than the simplistic, move, fire, opponent takes damage, end turn, next person moves, fires, opponent takes damage, etc..

All in all I'm quite happy with the book, and looking forward to getting a game of it. Which I figure will be done with little plastic army men, seeing as I'm broke now. If this plays as good as it's shaping up to be, I'll be a convert, and will definitely take the plunge on the Sci-Fi rules.

quozl

Heh, sounds good.

I'd already cracked and ordered Force on Force myself

If you like the turn interrupting thing then you may also be interested in Infinity - http://www.infinitythegame.com/infinity/en/ . Similar reaction idea, free rules skirmish game. I intend to use the miniatures from it for Tomorrow's World if I like it, as well as continuing to play Infinity.

Do you know what scale they play Force on Force at in Arkham? I have some 28mm stuff that could work for this, also from the Infinity range - Haqqislam look like a modern army, but if everybody else is playing in 15mm for example then I might as well get a small 15mm force.

Buceph

Nope, no idea what scale they play with at Arkham. I only know they play from reading the Ambush Alley forums.

I think I'm going to go with 20mm. 15mm sounds just that bit too small, especially as I've never painted models before (this is my first wargame.) 28mm looks to be too big for where I'll end up playing this (a small kitchen.) So 20mm sounds like a nice balance between model detail and table size.

Edit: And the Ganesha Games stuff looks good. I'd be less interested in Flying Lead, but the SoBH with the dungeon crawl expansion looks interesting. Might be able to bloodlet some of my gaming groups bloodlust and keep the RPG games for more social based intrigue.

quozl

From googling, there seems to be be more 20mm than 15mm going on there. It sounds like both are around though.

Very helpful thread on starting a 20 mm force from the Arkham Asylum forum.

http://www.arkhamgamingcentre.com/index.php?option=com_kunena&func=view&catid=36&id=243&Itemid=489

quozl

My 'Force on Force' and 'Road to Baghdad' books arrived in the post today

Only had a quick glance in work and have to agree about them looking good. Hope to get a chance to actually read them some time soon

quozl

And I have the willpower of a small winged insect...

I just ordered a 20mm US Army force, and a Taliban force from Elhiem miniatures

I don't have Operation Enduring Freedom, but I'm comfortable playing US versus Taliban for the Road to Baghdad, and I think Taliban style forces will be more generically useful than Iraqi guard!

Buceph

quozl wrote: »

And I have the willpower of a small winged insect...

I just ordered a 20mm US Army force, and a Taliban force from Elhiem miniatures

I don't have Operation Enduring Freedom, but I'm comfortable playing US versus Taliban for the Road to Baghdad, and I think Taliban style forces will be more generically useful than Iraqi guard!

Yeah, that's why I went with the Afghani book. It seems like a more involving war than fighting against IEDs.

I still haven't read past the infantry combat section of FoF though. The guy I'd be playing it with was on holliers. He's back now though, so hopefully after I buy a few plastic army men we'll be able to get a game in. Might be as soon as tomorrow.

Then I'm expecting a bit of cash to come in late september so I'll be splashing out on a force, 20mm probably. And it'll be the first time I get into painting miniatures. You can expect a lot of questions in this forum.


Edit: You don't know what's going on with Gaelcon do you? Their website registration seems to have elapsed and I was hoping to watch a few veterans play there.

quozl

No idea about Gaelcon, sorry.

Piers, posting on the Arkham Gaming Centre forum said he may try and run a demo day in Gamersworld, as did Donogh. So hopefully it'll happen. I'd like to see it played.

Buceph

quozl wrote: »

Piers, posting on the Arkham Gaming Centre forum said he may try and run a demo day in Gamersworld, as did Donogh. So hopefully it'll happen. I'd like to see it played.

That'd be cool. Although I doubt I could justify heading up to Dublin just for a demo of a game.

quozl

Due to real life constraints my progress with this is slow but on-going.

I've got 19 c. 2003 US army 20mm models painted up, and twenty 20mm Taliban from elhiem finished too.

Just started work on another fourteen 20mm Taliban from underfireminiatures - they look like they'll fit in well with Elhiem once finished.

I've ordered some of the Wartime minis Taliban too (Elhiem is their UK distributor). Those look like they'll also fit in well and seeing as there are a number of good 20mm manufacturers I figure I might as well have no duplicate models.

I even got a box of about 45 1/72 scale Caesar miniatures modern (c2003) US soldiers. These are a pretty good match for the Elhiem 20mm soldiers and were about 9 euro delivered from ebay. I'm going to paint up a few of those too and add them to the Elhiem models to increase my US force without adding any duplicates.

I've still not played the game, except one trial game on my own. Very hectic schedule at the moment but I've got a game arranged with a friend for tomorrow week I better get some more Taliban finished up!

quozl

Progress continues

I played my first proper game last Wednesday, against Khorne_dogg. We played the asymmetrical mission, 'Contracting Troubles' from the rule-book, twice.

Highly enjoyable with both games going down to the last turn, and victory turning on a couple of inches in one game, and a face to face reaction roll on the final turn in the other.

I've finished my Underfire Taliban (apart from the tripod mounted GPMG team). So I've now got 34 Taliban to play with my 19 US.

Currently working on an additional 17 US - a mix of more Elhiem and 8 Caesar miniatures plastic 1/72 for comparison purposes. That'll get me up to platoon size.

Once I get that done I'll be pretty much sorted apart from a need for some snipers for US, and some GPMG guys for both sides.

Painting 20mm is a fun change. I've decided to really try for speed and I've gotten the 19 US and 34 taliban so far fully painted, based and sealed with 18 hours of work. That's blindingly fast for me!

quozl

My copy of Ambush Alley's Sci-Fi version of the Force on Force ruleset arrived in the mail today

I'm really looking forward to getting a good look at it, stuck in work currently.

a fat guy

Sounds cool man.

I do believe that I'm seeing quite a few faces from Wargaming Ireland here...

quozl

I'm on W-ired, alright. No discussion of Force on Force going on there that I know of though.

hagbard

I'm quite annoyed to say that I've seen quozl's Force on Force models. There should be a law against people painting 20mm models better than my 28s.

quozl

Thanks, Hagbard. I'm very pleased with them, particularly as I was going for speed over quality, I got all 53 of them done, including basing and varnishing in 18 hours

I don't have the time to do anything but speed-painting miniatures these days. All you need is some neat base coats, then a wash of black which will black-line things, shadow the recesses, and meld the base coat colours a bit more together.

And get some acrylic paint thinner - it comes in a tube in art stores - it makes it much easier to paint smoothly and quickly.


I've another 17 US almost done - just awaiting varnishing and basing. And a Taliban recoilless rifle (SPG-9), and trailer mounted heavy machine gun (DHSK) assembled and awaiting priming.

It's all coming together nicely Just a shame that their vietnam supplement came out a few days ago and now i'm kind of tempted to paint up some Charlie!

a fat guy

I got a few Marines from The Assault Group myself over Christmas.

But I plan to use them for zombie games, rather than actual wars.

I should really paint them sometime...

quozl

Ambush Alley do a version of their rules called 'Ambush Z', which is zombie fighting.

I think that a re-vamp Osprey published version of it is coming out next year. Including werewolves, grey aliens, and some other stuff to go with Zombies.

What Zombie rule-system are you planning on using?

a fat guy

I could swear that I already answered this...

I was going to use the Inquisitor rulebook minus things like psychic powers and the like.

quozl

I put some thoughts on the Sci-Fi version of Force on Force here - http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056453898

quozl

The latest supplement - Cold War Gone Hot - is out now. It's covers what-if scenarios for an invasion of europe by Russia in the 80s.

I've attached a few cool photos from it - they were taken at last year's Kildare GMG hosted big games day - more photos at http://www.guildwargamers.com/phpBB3/viewforum.php?f=187 if you're interested.

greenshoots

anyone still playing this? in the cork area?