"which cold wars rules are available?" Topic

I have just bought 3rd Generation Warfare which looks interesting but has peaked my interest.

I am looking at a game played on a 6X4 board within 3 hours with a reinforced company of models on each side at a 1:1 scale.

e.g. flames of war kind of scale.

My preference is for a fairly fast moving simplistic set of rules.

Used to love Challenger/2/2000 back in the day but much too complex for me now

Any bright ideas?

It does not seem to be a very rules rich arena?

Andy

"Tankwreck" would be suitable.

If you want to get in arty and air power i like Cold War Commander. For more of an infantry focus I would go with Iron Ivan's stuff.

Not available right now but I Ain't Been Nuked Mum should be out soon.

Nothing at 1 to 1 that I know of that is fast moving/simplistic. Force on Force moves fast but is not simplistic. Fistful of Tows may work but the base is platoons rather than 1 to 1 (treat a vehicle as a single tank and infantry as squads and it probably works well and is quick).

If you want to go back to old wargames the "Team Yankee" game, Battlefield Europe, and Test of Arms from GDW were fast moving simplistic games that could be used for miniatures battles.

Try 'Panzer 8's simple 2 page rules………

panzer8.weebly.com/rules.html

It does not exactly fit your criteria. You might want to try Fist Full of Tows 3.

Here is a two part review of the game.

link

link

Mike

There is us, Maneuover Group available on Wargames vault. By all means load the free stuff to see if it's your thing. Rules are simple, game can be complex. Definitely no points system as they do not work with realistic terrain. Ground scale depends on scale of models. We do have army lists if this is your thing, but you can build your own and the vehicle specs from basic data.

You can also try WRG 1950-1985. The price is pretty good, too:

PDF link

Another vote for the WRG set. Lovely rules, fast playing in my experience m

Another vote for Cold War Commander. We like it and have run demo games with it in your suggested time scale.

The only one i have played, and sorry i did not like was cold war commander. Better suited to smaller scale models, but the command system really ennoyed me :)

Why not use the new modern FoW rules?

Mark

If I want to Brigade or Division level at 1:1 any recommendations?

What about Close & Destroy by Timeline? It works well with company sized units, it is a 1 to 1 basing. The only possible problem is at first understanding the combat charts, though with a couple of rounds it becomes quite easy.

Fistful of TOW's 3 works well or if you can find it Modern Spearhead

There are FoW rules for vietnam or something like that aren't there, do they go as far as 1980, chobham armour helicopter gunships etc?

Division at 1:1 scale, I presume that was not very serious?

Am reading the Sabre Squadron rules and impressed so far.

Cpt, very serious. Our battlefields are very large. Usually 18-20' x 8'. We feed the units in when needed. Some never make it because of strikes by aircraft.

This next year I would love to do a portion of the Fulda Gap and use a gym floor.

Modern Spearhead is great and all but it's certainly not 1-to-1 and it's not a company level game.

FFT3 can be played in one-to-one scale, though it isn't the default. Very quick to play too.
Rules are somewhat reminiscent of old Epic from GW.

The FOW guys are making something that should fit, but some people feel strongly about their rules, positive or negative.

It would be interesting to hear a review/summary of Third Generation Warfare. I didn't realize it was out yet.

I have also been looking at 3rd Generation, they look ok, Sabre Sqn also look fine, the WRG set look ok and have been playing with my own adaptation of the Battlegroup rules.

The choice you want will also depend on the level of abstraction you want, by 1:1 do you want to be able to move tactically with individual vehicles or move an entire troop together and accept that the rules deal with the finer details of manouvre?

Tally Ho!

Sabre Squadron looks very good, seems to be exactly what I am looking for.

3rd Generation Warfare is quite unusual, some things like troop quality morale etc are simplified or ignored entirely and yet other things such as the blind zone behind a building is in a big complex table. I am not toally sure it is at the right level for me……

But 20mm does seem to be my scale of choice for Cold war :)

What is "3rd Generation"? Never heard of it. Always looking :-)

I like Cold War Commander, a ton of dice…. but I do like many of the mechanics of the game. Not knowing for sure if a unit will get to move is something I really really like

Sabre Squadron and IABNM are the two I'm most hopeful for, with my own adaptation of Strike Legion to moderns being my fall back.

3rd Generation:

3rdgenerationwarfare.co.uk

Made a debut at Salute,

Tally Ho!

Just to reinforce the point that Battlefront are bringing out Flames of War Cold War gone Hot rules later this year. A mate of mine has been involved in the play testing, and of course he couldn't reveal anything but said the whole Flames mechanic has been revised for Cold War combat, it sounds very exciting!

The WRG rules are free btw, so the cost is literally nothing.
Certainly written in an old-fashioned kind of way but you get lots of weapon tables.

Best suited to a large table, I find.

Division level at 1 to one is going some. Even allowing for the fact that you will have about 1/3 the unit fighting at one time it's going to be hundreds of items to move each turn. A low count ifv company dismounted would be 27 elements even in MG where the infantry is on fire teams not single infantry bases. Three would be several of them operating at once.

Plus I would not want to be the one planning something that big. One thing wrong and it would be a disaster. A small road and stuff comeing and going and it would be like the re all thing utter chaos. Get the arty plan wrong and it's would be disastrous. One good urban Area even at the MG level of about 1 house equals 25 houses and you would be there for days. We stick to model villages less than 20 buildings to keep the fighting to a sensible time frame, that models a really very small real scale village.

Would love to see the terrain it must be awesome in its complexity (just like the real world).

The Rumor Mill is speculating Fulda Gap for FoW Cold War Gone Hot, and blue skying a possible starter box.

All that is fairly certain at this point is Battlefront plan a FoW Cold War Gone Hot expansion. So, if you like FoW and don't mind waiting a bit, that is a possibility.

Force on Force offers a Cold War Gone Hot sourcebook as well. I am not sure what the availability is as Osprey is no longer publishing it, rights have amicably reverted to Ambush Alley Games. Copies may well still be available in the distribution chain. 6x4 table and reinforced company is a big FonF game. But it is 1:1 and fast playing.

If you want actual Cold War 1:1 rules (as in, written during the cold war), then WRG as above, and the military version Contact! Plus the US Army Dunn-Kempf rules. The latter two are available from the history of wargaming project.

It is feasible to play a division sized 1:1 game with WRG, I have seen it done, but you get some very silly time distortions and it takes a…very…long..time.

Reinforced company is much more satisfactory.

I think my favourite at the moment is Sabre Squadron, though 3rd Generation Warfare is also very interesting.

I would be interested in reading a FOW gone hot rules set though I am sure it would insist on 15mm models and I am going 20mm.

Once I get enough stuff painted up I'll be using Mein Panzer for the rules. To me it plays fast enough but has enough detail to make elements unique (it's 1-1).

Thanks everyone. Sounds like I need to look at WRG rules and see how they fit. Playing a division level is a lot of toys but we usually have several people on both sides. In some cases the results can be determined pretty quick. If the Soviets do not push through, then they will usually throw there follow-up forces somewhere else. On the other side, if they blow the NATO forces out then the follow-up units would be saved for another battle.

Going to try and put together a campaign game for next year with the Russians attacking Poland, very modern. Since many of the EU forces are far from their highs this should be interesting. US forces at this point do not have any heavy formations in Europe so NATO must hold on tell reinforcements come.

>>What about Close & Destroy by Timeline? It works well with company sized units, it is a 1 to 1 basing. The only possible problem is at first understanding the combat charts, though with a couple of rounds it becomes quite easy

I used to play Close & Destroy back in the '90s and enjoyed it quite a bit. It does have a few issues. Mainly the infantry rules are not very good. They feel as if they were tacked on as an afterthought. But it handles armoured combat fine. Ideally, I would tinker with the armour and penetration tables a bit as they reflect our Cold War era understanding of Soviet vehicle and weapon capabilities and are thus incorrect in some cases. They also lack any provision to reflect composite and reactive armour types, which makes ATGMs much more deadly than they should against later generation tanks.

But that all being said, with a little tinkering they would work.

Martin