Twilight in the East - more moves, more rubbish photos

Mildly long time between posts, all of which are to be blamed on 'real life' getting in the way of gaming and blogging.
AWB returned to Club Dave last Wednesday for another night of Twilight in the East. Again no Second Army player (curse you 'real life') and, due to distractions by the completely farcical circus of the current Australian government, only one turn was completed in the game.
So where are we again?
AWB, as the Germans, is still not completely convinced he isn't about to get his Blog handed to him on a gaming platter. Historically the Germans had disengaged from the Russian 1st Army and were mauling the 2nd Army by this stage. In the game, while it is felt that 1st Army has been more or less stopped and, in a perfect world, would be ripe for a counter offensive, the 2nd Army is gradually getting to a stage where the scattered German units available can't contain it. The Russians are also up a respectable amount of the VP count and the reinforcements from France are still several turns away. True the Germans are, unit for unit, rather better then the Russians and normally come out in front from most combats, but AWB is still not entirely convinced everything isn't about to go completely pear shaped.
So to the photos, again taken very cheap and nastily with the Samsung.

First up First Army. While the front hasn't moved all that much there is movement at the station. Behind the lines 17th Corps is about to be railed south to counter the right shoulder of Russian 2nd Army. This is the Corps that was mauled a few turns ago after being over extended and spent the best part of turn 5 recovering.
Also of note is the Russians trying to force the north and south flanks. While the German centre still contains the largely full strength and rather strong German 1st Corps, being outflanked is NOT a good thing. Expect a German reaction in the very near future.

Meanwhile, in the south some rather critical combats have been taking place. German 20th Corps, in their attempt to backhand the Russians the turn before, managed to rather foolishly pin the 41st Division with it's back to a lake. The Russians moved up the best part of 5 divisions and were unlucky not to force the Germans to have to retreat. What was more lucky for the Germans was being able to force march a brigade around the flank of the Russian 15th Corps to cut communication. Even then, the Russians nearly got away with it, surviving the combat a lot better then expected only to have their nerve break.
While visually we have only a single hex retreat, what we are not seeing is the three CE drops both divisions suffered which is much more significant. Combat Effectiveness (think of it as morale if you like), doesn't so much effect the ability to attack, but more the desire to stay in the line. If this rating drops too low then the division starts to break up.
So why has these combats been critical? Pretty much because had luck been favouring the Russians it may have been 20th Corps that had been smashed wide open. Instead, largely by bad luck, the Russian 15th Corps is very close to breaking.
German phase of turn 6 is next.

Twilight in the East - the slow advance continues

A few real world problems for our game of Twilight in the East these last few weeks. Second Army commander, while claiming repeatedly that he is NOT off scouting forest locations, has been otherwise out of the gaming shed at Club Dave, resulting in one night of non gaming and another of First Army commander bravely agreeing to control the entire Russian side for another.
Again with soddy pictures, let us recap where the game has progressed to at the mid point (Germans to move) of turn five.

First, the First Army front. Main thing to note is that the front has moved westward a respectable amount. As predicted, the Russians ganged up on the over extended German 17th Corps and in a mutually bloody combat, the 17th Corps was forced to withdraw. This made the question the rest of the German forces had been musing over, namely 'fall back or try and delay another turn?' a lot easier to answer and promptly moved off to the west. The Russians, bloodied themselves, have been cautiously following up and, after the massive multiple division combat in turn 4 mentioned earlier, this front has been bloodless for a while.

Experimenting with font colours for the best contrast, we move to the slightly more dynamic Second Army front. In the top right corner we can see the rail line the Russians are gradually trying to get into service to open a second line of supply. With this in mind the entire Russian 6th Corps has been attempting to work over the minor German units defending the land bridges between the lakes and finally got that entire sledge into walnut effect going.
To the left of the picture, on the other rail line of advance, 1st Corps has managed to advance to just off the image after the defending Germans decided to pull back. Also off view is the three German brigades facing off over a river line. Numbers favour the Russians but supply the Germans.
In the middle we see the heroes of earlier turns, German 20th, come down a peg or two. After swatting Russian 1st Division earlier and causing that to retire and regroup, the Germans decided to attempt the same thing against the Russian 2nd. While not a complete farce, sharp eyed readers may notice the white step loss marker with the German stack that wasn't there earlier.
Controlling the Germans in this game, AWB must confess to being slightly dissatisfied. The fallback was always on the cards across the front, so trading the ground has not been an issue. However the few combats made this last turn and a half have been disappointing. TitE, despite being a monster game, has a few bit of almost tactical feel. Putting in a good attack and coming out ahead in the step loss exchange 'feels' important to the overall result. AWB confesses this may not actually be the correct mind set and that maybe instead should be trying to butcher everyone, but the 'feel' is that the Germans did not do well this gaming night.
Germans to move in their part of turn five.
Real life may get in way of gaming again this coming Wednesday and next game night may not be for another week.

Projects - More Fallout game planning

In an attempt to push forward the dream of playing Fallout in 15mm, or maybe just as an excuse to avoid painting, AWB has been making some more cards to use within this project.
This current batch (no photos this time as once you have seen one homemade card printed onto 90gsm you have seen them all), are 'Stuff Cards'. This is an AWB idea that is not from the Tomorrow's War rules and an attempt to add a bit more Fallout type flavour. There are 18 cards (as that is what fits nicely onto a single A4 sheet more then anything else) and the theory is that each player will draw between 1 and 3 at the start of the game based on their sides Supply Level.
Most are things such as Chems that can be used as desired to give temporary bonuses to units while 1 in 6 are dud cards such as Teddy Bear and Mystery Meat (don't eat it, please) that serve no in game purpose. These cards will hopefully reflect on the sort of amounts of semi useful junk the average Fallout universe type character might be found carrying about.