"FoW WW1Flyer" Topic

Is this the first release of Fow WW1?

PDF link

TMP link

I think so. Been hinted at for ages, since sometime in 2013, finally coming out. I hope they do nice minis for it; their early WW2 line is dreadful. Same with the miner lamp NVA. They do have the people to do it right…

PDF links seems not to work. :(

I believe it is. Definitely 1918 rather than 1914.

My apologies for reposting

I think it's pretty cool….but right now I have Martians to contend with…..

Surprise, surprise, it has to have tanks in it…

1918 is quite like ww2 because platoons matter, you have automatic weapons e.g. Lewis and Chauchat and you can have mortars and a few tanks.
1914 has riflemen , machine guns and field artillery and cavakry and that is it. The manoeuvre formation in 14 is the battalion and at minimum the company. It dies not fit the all arms kampfgruppe battles that are the heart of FoW. 14 also has the difficulty of very large numbers of infantry to paint which is a distinct deterrent. Having tanks and mortars in the army gives you some units that eat up points and give tactical variety.

I'd think whatever BF come out with rules wise for WW1 will be very easily adapated to 1914 if that's where you really want to be at.

In 1914, you'd have to go with some level of figure compression. Say, 1:20 or so, with a stand of 4-5 being a platoon instead of a team of 4-5.

Looks fantastic to me. I'll bite.

Lewisgunner, I respectfully disagree with the idea that 1914 does fit with the all arms tactical approach. There were fewer 'arms' (specifically no tanks and no ground attack aircraft) in 1914 but the concept of all arms teams was well understood. Armoured cars were used in place of tanks, when available. Combined arms teams also included cavalry, infantry, artillery and MGs. These teams operated in both advance guard and rear guard roles. These types of actions are best suited to FoW in 1914 IMHO.

The infantry section was the smallest manoeuvre element. All sides recognised that the closer the attack came to the enemy then the smaller was the unit of manoeuvre, under cover of fire support from infantry, artillery and machine guns. It is perfectly appropriate to represent early war teams in the same way as 1918, though the variety is not the same (no infantry bombers or rifle grenadiers – though German pioneers fulfilled the role of bombers in 1914; no LMGs). There were smaller numbers of MMGs available and no mortars to speak of. Field artillery was used in direct fire support.

Robert

The early period of WW1 fits into the FoW rules better to my mind, more fluid battlefields without all the trenches.

1914 … just an updated version of FPW with deadlier weapons … that's why the trenches were dug in 1915 onwards.

The early period of WW1 fits into the FoW rules better to my mind, more fluid battlefields without all the trenches.

The battlefield opened up again in 1918, especially during the Spring Offensives and the Hundred Days.

The descriptions I remember reading of 1914 have the Germans (sometimes) coming on at the British still in dense columns. Presumably they had been caught before they could deploy into thick skirmish lines with a supporting formed company. I don't see this working too well with FoW because realistically the assaulting infantry form into lines of companies, sometimes two or more from the same battalion and then they advance in line with the field artillery firing over open sights if they are British or French. and often if they are German.
My experience of trying forces that. are infantry and artillery heavy in WW2 with FoW has been that the advancing troops get massacred by artillery and machine guns and that the defensive reigns supreme. Now I am not about to say that massacre is unrealistic, but it will require quite a bit of rule tinkering to get a good game of 1914 from these rules. 1918 will work a lot better because of the tanks and mobile small guns, LMGs, mortars etc. In 1918 platoons acting on their own are a lot more plausible. In 1914 it is companies. Now you could, as someone suggested frig with the scale, which, without tanks, is much more practical.
I have cavalry armies for 1940 and they really suffer from MGs, mortars etc.

I see that B/F are starting with 1918 and that looks sensible.

Apologies Monk if I was a bit brusque.
As I understand it British tactical, offensive doctrine ,in so far as it exists, in 1914 is to go forward in small platoon columns in a line of columns with arty support. At 200 yards, ir when the enemy obtain effective fire, the columns move into one long open order line. This advances until it can take cover and deploy rapid fire after which the line charges in with the bayonet. By now I expect that everyone is dead!
In 1915 the assault is by sequential lines on a company basis with the men in an open order advancing after a barrage and the equation being that four lines or more will generally succeed, whereas below that one line will certainly fail, three lines might work . The lines have to be close enough together that the preceding line stops the bullets for those following it.
My view is that, even though they have maxims in 14/15 they are not being brought up with the advancing troops, they are a defensive weapon. The Germans are largely defending with interlocking maxim fire and planned counter bombardment with hidden guns.
My experience of FoW is that the scenarios might enable us to set up such assault.
ts with the attacker having all his force and the defender only a few, but , if the defender has plenty of dug in confident vet Mgs it will be a massacre. If the attacker is using maxims rushed forward in the advance then that is inventing a new paradigm for the Western Front.
In 14/15 the attackers do not have the flexibility or small weapons to advance by platoons and do not have the support weapons to bring along with them to deal with defenders.
Most of this is based on Paddy Griffiths book on WW1 Infantry tactics.
If you have other examples that challenge this view please put up a couple of references?

With 4 HMGs in each 1500 point pack, they might be very short games.

It is also a little amusing that such a small German force gets 10% of the total number of combat prepared A7Vs. In reality, 14 A7Vs (there should have been 15, but one broke down) supported four divisions of infantry over a 6.4km frontage.

However, I suspect that I will be buying this.

Jurgen

Well, hands down… I will be buying this also…. I just hope the figures blend well with the ones I already have from PP & vehicles form OG.

The absolute HARDEST thing about gaming WW1 ground is scaling… as was discussed elsewhere, there are so many levels to WW1 that no one rule set can do it all. I am very curious to see how BF does it…

This is very good news. Without wanting to hijack this thread I'd just like to say that for anyone interested in looking at the war at a larger scale do check-out Great War Spearhead II.

They use a stand to represent approximately a company and a ground scale of 80 yards to an inch. I think their basing is broadly comparable to Flames of War, tho, so the same figures could be run in parallel under both systems, allowing different aspects of the war to be reproduced.

I discovered the Spearhead rules about six months ago and find them fascinating and realistic. They work as well for 1914 as they do for 1918.

Alan

Kyote, Caliver Books still run the Minifigs Molds. You can order from them via the web.