Avalon Hill Wargames

I know I am a Luddite...but I still love to play the old Avalon Hill board games instead of video games. Anyone on here still play the Squad Leader series or some of the more strategic games like Third Reich, Fortress Europa, etc?

 

I have Panzerblitz and have made different game pieces from Panzer Leader and maps from some on-line sites.

tom

 

Those are two I don't have...they came out about the same time as Squad Leader and as a teenager on limited resources in the 1970's...I couldn't afford both.

 

Do you still have the SL games? We should try to play one of the easy first scenarios via email sometime. I have done it with various Civil War games and it works pretty well.

 

A friend of mine got Panzerblitz in the early 1970's. I found mine around 1989 or so. It was new in a bookstore, probably was there for years.

tom

 

I cut my wargaming teeth on SL back in 1980. Followed the game for years...CoI, CD, GI....up through ASL and then just got fed up with the whole thing in the late 90s...to long to play and more complicated than I wished to play in a game.

Found another system (Advanced Tobruk System) a few years later and found that it was a much easier and smoother system and it gave me what I was looking for in a squad level system. I can get a game in of ATS in the time it would take me to do 1 or 2 turns of ASL Been with it ever since. Even went so far as becoming a designer for the company.

Got no grudges against ASL-just not the system for me anymore.

I still have my copy of PB, PL, AIW and break them out on ocassion-War at sea, Anzio, Russian Campaign-alot of the old classics. Probley still have 30-35 of the old AH games. Good times...

Devin

 

first wargame I ever Play was AH's tactics 2 in HS i worked in a hobby shop In minneapolis that specialized in Wargames.... I got into SL and ASL... and modern minitures

 

Squad Leader? The original system! Sure, I started playing that in the 70's, bought a few extensions too, GI Anvil of Victory at the time was already beyond my budget, but I bought the other ones before. Great game that was

Many an evening did I spend, dice in one hand, cognac glass in the other We (I and the wargames group) at a time even applied the system to a hex-less regular wargames table with micro-armour, and it worked rather well.

I know there's some system allowing to PBEM, and I don't mean VASSAL... I used to play other Strategy & Tactics mags games with a guy or two, but I suppose good old SL is feasible too, even if a pain in the posterior. I might be interested. Might, said I

Right now I'm looking at the Campaign Series formerly from Talonsoft, still from the Windows 95 days, but Matrix Games resurrected the thing and gave it a thorough workover. Well worth it for platoon scale gamers!

 

Anyone remeber Cresendo of doom LOL

 

Sure, that's the extension with the Brits, French, etc, right? I remember playing a scenario with the queen of Holland fleeing the Germans, and another one with the Norwegians stuck in the middle and fighting both Brits and Jerries at the same time

 

I have dozens of their titles along with probably over 100 S&T titles, and dozens of other company's boardgames.

 

I had an AV game, Luftwaffe i believe it was called when i was a kid, but could never find an opponent who would have enough patience to deal with the complexity of it. Chutes & Ladders were more their speed.

 

Ah, much better to share some beer and pretzels with your live opponent rather that exchanging emails

Although I recognize this era of electronic communications has both brought people closer and at the same time helped separate them.

 

I was an avid Squad Leader player, I really enjoy the game BUT, as you say. Finding anyone to play with is near impossible these days.

So I moved on to Axis & Allies and A&A miniatures

 

I started with France 1940, and then Panzerblitz before moving on to Rise and Decline of the 3rd Reich. To me, 3rd Reich was the best wargame ever made, as a 14 year old anyway. I even devised my own versions of 3rd Reich that focused on the war in the Pacific, and then a similar one on the US Civil War. Pretty soon I got involved with football and chasing girls before going in the army, so wargaming fell by the wayside. It was a simpler time in the old days.

 

I too played Squad Leader--but only once. I was playing against a neighborhood kid who bragged about never losing a game. Scott (the kid) only wanted to play the Germans-so I was forced to be the Russians. With great luck of the roll of the dice--his bass was grass and the dice were the lawnmowers. I thought it was an easy game to play. Never could find that game in any local store-and the only board game I could get-was one I THINK was called: Richthoffens War--which I never found anyone interested in playing that game.