Prototype AirLand Battlegroup Army List

OK – so here it is – my first prototype/sample army list to show what I’m thinking in terms of new lists for AirLand Battlegroup.  As I was just re-jigging the West German Panzer/Panzergrenadier Division Battlegroup list, I thought I may as well re-jig it yet again to show you want I mean.  You can have a look at it here.

Before you jump in and have a look here’s the comparison to the current lists which are of course based on the original Battlegroup rules for WW2:

FRONTLINE ASSETS

Forward HQ Units

Infantry Units

Tank Units

Artillery Units

Defences

SUPPORTING ASSETS

Reconnaissance Support Units

Engineer Support Units

Logistics Support Units

Specialist Support Units

Additional Fire Support

The new sample list has the following structure:

FRONTLINE ASSETS

Forward HQ Units

Infantry Units

Reconnaissance Units

Tank & Armoured Anti-tank Units

Defences

SUPPORTING ASSETS

Headquarters Support Units

Artillery Support Units

Aviation & Air Defence Support Units

Engineer Support Units

Combat Support Services Units

Additional Fire Support

So, first the obvious changes.  Recon units are now a frontline asset, while Artillery has been moved to supporting assets.  AFVs, that are not tanks, but are still armoured anti-tank vehicles are moved from the old specialist category into the tanks category.

Units from the Forward HQ that I considered to not be “frontline units” have been moved to a new category Headquarters Support units.  Artillery has been moved supporting assets.  While I see them as a fighting unit, they fight in support of other units – so they got moved.  I got rid of the Specialist category but added Aviation & Air Defence support units.  Looking through the current lists, the specialist category usually contained anti-tank and air defence units.  I’ve split them apart as it made more sense to me and represents a better way of showing the differences between WW2 and WW3!

Another new thing is that several of the support units allow choices from the Additional Fire Support option.

I guess the major change is that Recon units are now a first-choice option rather than just a support option.  I haven’t yet prepared a new Unit Availability Table and accompanying explanation but my thoughts that rather than just having an infantry unit as a must have option, you should be able to choose between either an infantry unit or a reconnaissance unit as your compulsory unit when constructing a list.

As I thought about the types of games I like to play and the battles I’ve read about (real and fictional) for some reason I quite enjoy the covering force where 2 recon forces clash.  I like playing on a pretty big table without necessarily having too much kit on the table at one time.  This works really well with games centred on recce forces.  Modern vehicles move really quickly too, so you don’t need too much stuff to be able to get around much of the table.  I wanted to be able to better represent those games – and so moved the Reconnaissance units from support into the Frontline.

One of the other major changes is the way off-table artillery is represented.  I’ll probably go into more detail in a later post, but again the changes are to represent something I like!  I like artillery systems, but they just shouldn’t be on the tabletop except under very specific purposes.  I can really only think of 1 artillery unit that should be on the table and that’s a 3 gun 2S1 battery that’s been attached to a forward detachment and is either sitting right at the back of the table or is undertaking a direct infantry gun type support role.  Even then the argument is a bit thinly stretched!

The new list pretty much allows you to buy barrages – rather than buying a battery of guns that blats away for you every turn.  This does make it a bit more like the additional fire support section of the list, but it is a lot more flexible – at least it will be for NATO forces.  The first 3 are pretty expensive, but still much cheaper than the current points value of buying the battery.  After that, any subsequent barrages are much cheaper.  Youi can of course buy other more specialist artillery rounds which again can be expensive.  These are limited in the game, so your platoon can’t be supported by a whole bunch of DPICM barrages every turn.

I want to create a system of displaying my off-table guns and the barrages I’ve paid for in a good looking but fun way – where I still get to display a model.  It will be an aide-memoir.  It just won’t be sitting on the actual table.  I have plans – but we’ll see how that turns out.

Finally, as I discussed on Facebook recently - I've included quite a lot of Speculative units/weapons systems into the list.  Based on the poll results - and it turned out to be a much easier option - they are spread out through out the list.  I've marked the speculative units in Red to make it easy to spot them for everyone and again it saves space doing it this way rather than having to write Speculative next to everything.

Anyway – that’s enough explanation for now.

I really-really need feedback on this.  So don’t hold back!

Thanks

Richard