Detailed Play Examples?

[fanghawk]

This may not be the correct forum but it seems the likeliest place to start.  I am wondering if there are any detailed examples of play available?  I am talking about more than just examples of rules and such, and am more interested in whole set-ups, and/or turn-by-turn play-throughs of games.  Something on YouTube would be awesome, or anything with pictures with an explanation of what the thoughts were behind a move or set up.  Kind of like (or exactly like) the Series Replays from the old General magazines would be perfect.

I cut my wargaming teeth on PanzerBlitz back in 1973 and have played a lot of tactical level games including some of the old SPI games like October War or MechWar 77, and finally in the 1980s settled into Squad Leader/Advanced Squad Leader rather heavily.  I've played miniatures and civil war games where leadership was often key as well.  None of my experience has truly prepared me for PG and its leadership/activation system.  Sometimes virtually very stack having its own leader...activation clusters and activation chains...all of these are pretty foreign concepts compared to what I've dealt with in the past.  Exactly how many units should I be activating at a time...or is it better to try and activate a whole string at once (through subordinate activation) or does it make more sense to cover a broader front and worry less about activating a whole bunch of stuff at one time?  I realize a lot of that is situation dependent but I'm missing a basic enough understanding to really appreciate the more subtle tactical trade-offs.

So anyway...if I could just see  some examples in action...I would feel a lot more comfortable.  I've fiddled around with it a bit and played a couple scenarios but I'm not convinced I'm really grasping it.  I am often the guy that introduces games to others so I want to make sure I'm firmly gounded before I bring anyone else into the fold. 

Anything you guys can steer me to would be greatly appreciated.

[plloyd1010]

For videos on youtube, search for Avalanche Press Panzergrenadier. The are are some samples of Airborne, C of Ethiopia, and Afrika Korps.

How many units to activate is very situational and reliant upon your ability to manage the command structure. I usually aim for 4-6 in a fire team. Usually less for advancing, but more on a march. My more miserable leaders get placed strategically for road marches. My leadership usually focuses on captains directing and lieutenants doing the grunt work.

[Hugmenot]

I did i a few illustrated examples of play for the Land Cruisers supplement and they were time consuming to produce.

I might be able to produce one longer example in July when I am taking some vacation. We'll see.

[Shad]

Nearly a decade ago (holy shit!) I wrote a few highly illustrated AARs for BoardGameGeek. They don't give you maximum unit by unit detail, but they should give you a taste of the overall strategic approach and the diagrams are surprisingly good (I say that having forgot what they even looked like).

Here you go:

• Eastern Front Deluxe #68 - National Socialist Ardor, part 1
  
• Eastern Front Deluxe #68 - National Socialist Ardor, part 2
  
• Afrika Korps #50 - Fort Capuzzo
  
• Road to Berlin #1 - "Fuck the Danube"
  
• Road to Berlin #5 - Tank Battle at Bajna, part 1
  
• Road to Berlin #5 - Tank Battle at Bajna, part 2
  

Hope that helps. It's fun reading 10 years younger me's AARs

[fanghawk]

Those illustrated AARs are actually very helpful.  I'd used defense-in-depth in other games but really wasn't sure what the alternating activation would mean if I spread my units out versus packing them together to get more units activated at a time.  In other words, if I activate a couple stacks of 2-3 units and then the other guy activates 20 stacks of 2-3 units and/or transports, just how screwed would I be and how quickly would I be overwhelmed.  I know a greater understanding will come with practice but it's really helpful to see a few examples for at least a rough idea of how it works.  I've played a couple small scenarios and a larger one with fewer leaders (which more or less dictates how they have to be set up)...I'll see if I can give a more meaty one a go this weekend...or at least start it.

On a related note...I see a lot of people PBM or possibly PBEM.  I wonder if there are any play records of PBM/PBEM games that somebody might be willing to share...at least as far as set-up and maybe a couple turns?

[plloyd1010]

Drew did a PBEM game a few years ago. It took months! that awareness became part of my incentive to make VASSAL modules.

[fanghawk]

Yeah I could see it taking some serious time.  I made my own VASSAL module for March on/Siege of Leningrad and Invasion Germany just so I could try different things out more easily.  It's a great learning tool.  You can try alternate set ups, move things around, go full stacking limit in a hex without worrying about knocking over that 10 unit stack, roll dice, etc.  The biggest plus is I can leave a game "set up" without eating up most of my gaming or dining room tables for weeks on end.

[plloyd1010]

Perhaps we should compare notes sometime.

[fanghawk]

Well...I didn't bother to optimize anything since it was for my own use.  It works great but they are HUGE files since I went for image quality over anything else.  Wanted to get as close to the real tabletop experience as possible. 

I'm also pretty sure I modeled it off the first VASSAL module that Drew did for Airborne...all I did was load the graphics and tweak some behaviors here and there...mostly to work with my graphics.  Created my own counters but scanned the boards...which was probably the hardest thing...i.e., getting them all approximately the same size with more or less the same hexagonal grid pattern since they are from several games and are invariably cut and scaled differently.  Everything lines up within a game but matching RtB boards to BotB boards for instance was more than a tad frustrating.

[plloyd1010]

That is kind of why to compare notes. IoG would be a logical step from Elsenborn, that was the one that Drew started and I finished.

I have an Inkscape template I work on my maps with, then I save them at 220dpi. Counters come in at 120dpi. Yes, BotB boards can be frustrating. If there is any set I would like to just redraw, that would be it.

I would be interested in seeing your Leningrad module. We might be able to turn it into a Leningrad/BlueDivision thing.