PG Campaigns & Commanders - Played them? Like them?

[broadsword]

Avalanche has offered an operational level for adding another dimension to PG with its campaigns for Cassino '44, and the Campaigns & Commanders supplement books War in the East (Vol. 1) and The King's Officers (Vol. 2).

Have you tried any of these campaigns? Why or why not?
Have you tried using any of the Leader Character rules in them?
How have you liked/disliked them?

[I have The King's Officers, and I find its "War in the Hedgerows: Operation Epsom" campaign really adds a lot to PG Beyond Normandy. For one thing, the play seems far more fluid and less "canned" than the original game scenarios. And this is just the ticket for those who hate PGBN because the scenarios seem so impossible for the British player. The OOBs and setups are plausibly historical, yet there's really a feeling that anything can happen. Leader characters are fun because I start caring about the individual counters and how they perform. Plus, a truly heroic skilled leader can turn the tide at a critical spot in a battle. Finally, the supplement book contains special rules that bring PGBN into the 3rd Edition era and clarify/simplify some of the ones that PGBN shipped with. One example: There's no more formation morale rules, just one level for the entire side.]

[Diocletian]

I have played them and like the rules a great deal. I think they add much to the game. Now, I have some sort of leader character participate in every game I play. I feel it helps to connect one to the battle. You can imagine the leader character fighting in the battle, making decisions, and leading troups through comabt operations. It adds alot of fun and imagination to the battle. It becomes more than an abstract movement of counters on the board. It does become a role playing adventure.

I find having too many leader characters on one side can swing a battle a great deal. So I personally limit it to one or two per battle.

So far I have taken a Red Army lieuteneant from June '41 to December '41 and he has been promoted to Captain. I have also taken an Italian officer in the Desert War from September '40 to May '41 and he is a Lt. Colonel.

Another part that I really like is it gives you rules to design your own scenarios. Scenario design interests me and I find it fun to think about a new scenario to place my leader character in.

All in all, I would not play Panzer Grenadier without the C&C supplements.

[broadsword]

I think the rules suggest a limit of 3 Leader Characters per side, per battle.

Here's an example of how a Leader Character in a current game of mine, and how it can make play interesting, stimulate the imagination, etc.:
---

More British heavy artillery falls ahead of the advance. The retreated 2nd Platoon/2nd Company gets hit just as they reach their new fallback the E-W highway. They’re wiped out. Now 14 German steps lost to the British 5.

But Ostfr. Klaus MULLER (leader character), who was guiding the grenadiers to their new positions, survives. [This is due only to his “Nine Lives” skill attribute, which turns a fatal 2 on the leader elimination dieroll into a survival result of 3.] But Muller is disrupted. His stunned and deafened state cost him 2 Leader Points on his service record.

[Which suggests that Muller’s superiors would have thought better of him if he’d died in the bombardment. Unfair to Muller, but perhaps it looks suspicious for him to have survived in such a deadly situation. “Instead of showing an example of courage for his troops, Muller probably dived into a hole when the first shell landed,” muttered one Nazi at HQ, a decorated Ostfront veteran.]

[Matt W]

I have not completed a campaign with the C&C leader characters but I have been scouting through other games/supplements to find other campaigns where such characters could be used. Suffice it to say that there are quite a number of possibilities. I enjoy the process of improving the leaders and the variability they give to the opposing sides.

[upintheattic]

I'll be inserting an LC per side into many of the Eastern Front and France 40 scenarios I'll be playing in coming months. I'll only let a given LC play in scenarios involving the division in which he first made an appearance. That way, when I get around to Kursk, Bulge, and Elsenborn, I'll have some seasoned LCs to add to those scenarios, and by the time I get to Road to Berlin and the Invasion of Germany I should have a few high-ranking LCs who could do a lot of good in desperate situations.

[campsawyer]

I have played one of the CC1 campaigns and like it alot. I did find the record keeping hard and I believe I missed some LC's during the battles. Getting a leader demoralized is really bad when try to move up the leader ranks, but helping out demoralized and disrupted units can get you points quickly.

[Blackcloud6]

I do not have any of the C & C books. I am not sure if I would stay interested in campaign long enough to play more thn a couple scenarios or so.

[JayTownsend]

I don't own either of these anymore: Campaigns & Commanders supplement books War in the East (Vol. 1) and The King's Officers (Vol. 2). I just don't think I could follow leader counters this long, maybe for a scenario but not a campaign. I also don't want to add record keeping to my game play especially with so many unplayed scenarios. If i do try this out someday, I'll try it with Kokoda Trail which I already own but you don't have to play just Campaign & Commanders with them.

Cassino '44 and Winter Soldiers have Campaign games but not the Campaign & Commanders where you track leaders thing in them, just to set the record straight.


I can see why some guys like to play different things with the PG series, like the Campaign & Commanders even though it's not for me, kind of like I love the Cold War games in the series but others don't.

[Shad]

I only played three scenarios of the Kokoda Trail leaders campaign, but got a lot of gaming mileage out of them...

My Australian Backstory
My Japanese Backstory
Scenario 1 - The Escape
Scenario 2 - The Defense

The bookkeeping essentially doubled the playing time, but I didn't mind.

I will restart that again someday... it made the game about 9000% more interesting to me.

[vince hughes]

it made the game about 9000% more interesting to me.

Wow, 90 times more interesting ... wahooo ! Can not wait to see the rating on PG where an average '3' rating will become a '270' .... Impressive stuff