Wargame SITREP 231025 N3 Ops – Armchair Dragoons Fall Assembly AAR

I was very fortunate to attend the inaugural Armchair Dragoons Fall Assembly hosted at the Gamer’s Armory in Cary, North Carolina over the weekend of October 20-22, 2023.

Fall Assembly was a small affair. Brant has the final attendance numbers but there was maybe two-dozen wargamers present at most any given time.

Friday night and the world is at war

After a 4-hour drive I arrived Friday afternoon and played in my first event, a teach-n-play of World at War ’85: Blood and Fury (Lock n’ Load Publishing, forthcoming) led by the designer, Keith Tracton. Keith explained this was the first public look at Blood and Fury outside of the LnL playtest bubble. Like myself, my opponent Keith M. (“the other Keith”) had played the game before so our time spent playing was less on how to play the game but more of a design philosophy discussion. The battle lived up to the name of the game; very bloody with lots of fury on both sides. One part of the World at War ’85 game-design philosophy I really enjoy is the way each national military uses the same core rules, but are just different enough in how they are portrayed that the players get a real sense of national flavor. Here it was the British with their Chieftain main battle tanks that mount an awesome main gun but are under-armored compared to their Soviet T-80 counterparts which also can move and fire better. Even designer Keith was unwilling to call the final battle when we ran out of time. In the ensuing dice-off I was lucky enough to win a Player Mat for the game. Later that night I also went ahead and ensured my Gamefound BackerKit was properly updated for the forthcoming delivery…

I wasn’t signed up for any games Friday evening and instead just hung around talking to fellow wargamers. The highlight had to have be listening to Bruce Maxwell and Keith Tracton talking Cold War in Europe. Bruce was cleaning up his Friday evening game of NATO: The Cold War Goes Hot – Designer’s Signature Edition (Compass Games, 2021) while Keith was setting up for a 4-mapper World at War ’85 scenario on Saturday. Those who say amateur historians don’t make good game designers would have to swallow their words if they were fortunate enough to listen to these two talk.

Saturday maneuvers briefly in the littoral

Saturday was a more complete schedule for me. I started the day off playing the latest version of Ian Brown’s Maneuver Warfare card game. I played a much earlier version at Circle DC back in April and am happy to say the game has come a long way. My only real question is do I grab a copy off Gamecrafter now or do I wait for a publisher?

My midday game was the Football War scenario of Brian Train‘s Brief Border Wars (Compass Games, 2020) played against Mike E. Mike was the furthest traveling Dragoon flying in from points far west. The smaller scenarios of Brief Border Wars are great for convention games as they can be setup, taught, and very likely played to completion in even a 2-hour block.

My capstone game for the 2023 Fall Assembly was “The Beachhead” scenario for Littoral Commander: Indo-Pacific (The Dietz Foundation, 2023) by designer Sebastian Bae. The game was hosted by Peter Robbins who I know for his support of the Admiralty Trilogy Group and Harpoon 5 on YouTube and streamed the first turn of the game American debacle. “The Beachhead” scenario is the invasion of Taiwan and it didn’t go well for me as the U.S. defender. Pro wargamer tip – don’t let a co-designer of a wargame take the side with initiative on the first turn.

The rest of the gang

There were plenty of other games at Fall Assembly. According to Regimental Commander Brant wargames tabled through the weekend included:

• Bayonets & Tomahawks
• Brief Border Wars
• C&C Ancients
• FAB Bulge
• GCACW
• It Never Snows (tho it was long enough to count for 3!)
• Maneuver Warfare
• NATO: Cold War Goes Hot
• Littoral Commander
• Oceans of Fire
• Struggle for Zorn
• Shores of Tripoli
• Triumph & Tragedy
• Vive L’Empereur
• World at War ’85
• yet-to-be-named WaW85 air game

Make sure you check out the Armchair Dragoons website for Brant’s postings to see more photos.

Budget wargames

Well…you can’t have a wargame convention (heck, ANY game convention) without some “acquisitions.” In addition to a nice t-shirt and my Player Mat for World at War ’85 my take-home games were a combination of Swap Table gains and purchases from Gamer’s Armory. I managed to round-out my collection of Advanced Squad Leader Starter Kit from Multi-Man Publishing and picked up the core rulebook for War Stories: A World War 2 RPG from Firelock Games.

A real Gamer’s Armory

A huge shout-out to Gamer’s Armory is also needed. Not only did they open up earlier than normal for Fall Assembly, on Saturday they actually did not allow any “warboards” for the 40K and other minis crowd in order to not compete with Fall Assembly for table space. That was (potentially) a decision with costs. All the more reason to throw some of my gaming budget their way. As Brant reminded me, they have a mail-order business too…

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Feature image courtesy Regimental Commander Brant

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