#Dropzone Commander

[teensywars]

Why Tiny-Scale Wargames?

For me, a wargame succeeds or fails based on how it makes me think. When I look down at the pieces on the table, am I thinking about strategy? About the drama of my little guys? Or am thinking about little plastic toys on a table?

The default scale for miniatures games is just close enough that you can see your individual figures doing things. That makes sense. The companies want to sell toys, so you want to make a game where the toys do cool things.

But, once you zoom out far enough that individuals no longer matter, something amazing happens. Your perspective shifts, and you begin thinking of your little tabletop battle in the same way you'd think of a real battle. The game is no longer about individuals, but lines of battle, flanks, and C&C.

Space Marines in Epic Armageddon don't win because Lieutenant Ironpecs is really good at hitting things with a sword, they win because they follow orders when other armies would be struggling with morale.

Battles in Drop Zone Commander aren't won on shooting, they're won by seeing ways to use the terrain to create a place for your transports to land.

Darth Vader may be terrifying, but in Star Wars Armada, he's one guy in one TIE Fighter among hundreds.

That's something you can't get from squad-scale wargames, and that's why you should care about games with tiny miniatures.

[owlbear33]

I'm also bothered by how much of the official Dropzone commander city terrain looks fundamentally 20th-century

100% does not look like a sci-fi city, even with the monorail

[maniakminis]

I'm just kinda curious, I'm not really sure what I want to start working on building and painting next.

[shocktrooper262-blog]

Free System Wargames 2348

August 10th 2348 SOF Exercise PA-89 Time: 11:50

"We're running Albion this week." That's what they were told earlier this week. Several days and multiple dry runs later, they were ready.

The Platoon's Droppod was not cramped, even with the extra charges they were bringing. The pressurization cycle began, and the lights switched to red. Weapons clicked and clacked as they were readied and placed into their storages. People took their places, including the Xian Infantry who were earning their drop quals. HUDs flashed as some took one last look at the planning or the DZ or even just one last gear check. With an agreement that all their gear was set they signaled the drop officer. His nod and salute gave the greenlight for this wargame to officially begin.

"Dropping in three….two…one-" came the Pilot. The clicking and controlled descent began right away as they clawed their way down from the heavens. All were steady, and all were secured as they were buffeted by strong reentry forces. The Pilot flew the craft exceptionally well and they watched as the plasma of reentry became the plasma of stealth- before cutting away to their dropzone, still some seconds from landing.

Enemy anti-air rose to meet them, it being more accurate as they exited stealth- though it was easy to fly through when it was coming from a direction planned out. Some pods were simulated damaged, though they were durable enough to shrug off most heavy cannon bursts. The time to descend also added safety as the first pod skidded in at 12:04- Pilot and Infantry piling out.

Then came the next pod, rocket system going. It landed next to the first pod and the same procedure played out.

Rifles grabbed, combat settings enabled, radio call outs and the updating of the chalkboard. Platoon Able/Baker/Charlie/Dog/Echo- on the move and added to the Aspen-ER System. ----

Aspen-ER, like Aspen-E before it quickly disseminated the information right up to the Company Commander who had just landed. Time now 12:06. Forces landed, all of 2nd Recon Commando- plus their Xian and Venusian support elements.

Objectives, drive into enemy ICBM field. In-progress. Casualties, light: 15 of 60 attacking. Enemy force, falling back into the base, engaged with 30-40 of 180 personnel.

The Commander moved to throw in his Assault Troops now, their speed and aggression being much more needed than their firepower- but that'd help. It was 12:13 now and they had a new plan instead of going through the front door.

Breaching the ICBM bases vents was a strategy- a rare one, last pulled off by a UK-US team some decades ago. Now as the 4th Platoon- descended the piping they had just one last thing to do.

12:26 was the target time. It was 12:20 as they hit the floor. The enemy had not expected the vent fight as they were still stalling them at the door- and they certainly had not expected the Assault Infantry to bounce a thermobaric off the wall and tag out half a group of people getting organized. What followed was four minutes of charging and fighting in the War Room- only stopping as they reached the Control Room and seized it.

Final tally, Attackers 80 of 210 committed. Defenders 120 of 180.

ICBM status, unused.

Company fighting strength 62% combat effective.

Now the real planning and new tasks could be modified for better training.

[rotterdamvanalles]

Ter hoogte van korenmolen de Vier Winden aan de Terbregse Rechter Rottekade vliegen geallieerde vliegtuigen met voedselpakketten die uitgegooid zullen worden bij Terbregge in verband met operatie Manna, 1 mei 1945.

Na maanden van overleg tussen de geallieerden en de Duitsers werd na de Hongerwinter op 1 mei 1945 het Akkoord van Achterveld gesloten en ondertekend. Tijdens de eerste voorbespreking op 28 april was reeds overeenstemming bereikt over voedseldistributie, waarmee de voedselhulp toegelaten werd door de Duitsers. De Duitsers waren met de geallieerden overeengekomen, dat deze uit bommenwerpers het voedsel en de noodrantsoenen op geringe hoogte mochten afwerpen.

Na 1 mei 1945 hadden de RAF en de USAAF hun eigen zones. De zones voor de RAF waren: Vliegveld Valkenburg, renbaan Duindigt, Vliegveld Ypenburg, Terbregge, Vliegveld Waalhaven en Gouda. De USAAF had de volgende zones: Luchthaven Schiphol, Vogelenzang, Vliegveld Bergen, Hilversum (Westerheide) en Utrecht (Lage Weide). In deze acht dagen werd meer dan 11.000 ton aan goederen afgeworpen boven bezet Nederlands gebied. RAF Bomber Command voerde 3100 sorties uit en de USAAF 2200 sorties. Voor de bevolking was toen het ergste leed geleden, ook al doordat inmiddels veel voedsel per schip kon worden aangevoerd, waaronder broodmeel uit Zweden.

Met alleen voedseldroppings was men er niet, want men had bijvoorbeeld in de bij Rotterdam gelegen dropzone Terbregge al 4000 man nodig om de voedselpakketten van de velden af te halen. Dit kwam doordat er onvoldoende vervoermiddelen voorhanden waren.

De inhoud van de voedselpakketten bestond uit: zakken meel, blikken scheepsbeschuit, legerrantsoenen, thee, eipoeder, bonen, Spam (nu bekend als Smac), sigaretten, chocolade en margarine.

De Britse droppings kennen we onder de naam Operatie Manna en de AMerikaanse droppings onder de naam Chowhound.

De fotograaf is Hendrik Ferdinand Grimeyer en de foto komt uit het Stadsarchief Rotterdam. De informatie komt van Wikipedia.

[ironedsleeper]

Red lights flashed and alarms wailed as walls of the command bunker shook. A light rain of debris dropped onto Major Sarasota’s cap but went unnoticed by the veteran officer focused on the holomap before him. A huge wave of red circles, the map’s generic symbol for Enemy, rushed towards three clustered blue squares. The walls shook again causing another round of debris to fall onto the Major who finally took his attention off of the map and looked up at the various command staff assembled nearby.

“We aren’t prepared to withstand an assault like this, however we’re unprepared to deal with enemy aa fire in the event of an evacuation.”

No one else in the room spoke but an unspoken question still hung in the air. Taking a moment to brush the accumulated debris off his uniform the Major scanned the room one last time.

“We counterattack. I don’t know who has the balls to crash my gate but I intend to serve them back to him on a platter. Our pilots will handle the bulk of the enemy’s forces, there was only one heavy dropship detected on approach so we have a maximum of four enemy mechs. Im expecting them to be dealt with in short order at which point our own mechs will turn their attention to the rest of the enemies forces. In the meantime Captain Harriet get your men working on that artillery. I want a recon scan on the enemy dropzone, as soon as we take out their aa guns Lieutenant Cassidy get your birds in the air and mop up the stragglers.”

[lobo7922]

Un fascinante juego de combate con miniaturas a escala 10 mm.

[owlbear33]

Malifaux is very much still around, or at least the website and web store are still up, and I can find at least some stuff in UK online retailers

but as with so many games finding other people to play with may be a challenge unless you can get some friends into it at the same time

and ordering online may be the only way to get miniatures if there's no local local community

the big wargame outside of anything GW is Infinity (from Corvus Beli), it's very tournament-focused, crunchie (although they have released a new lighter ruleset - I've not read it), it's less wacky than 40k, more of a near future (though not that near) sci-fi

Frostgrave looks pretty cool, it's a game about wizards (with a band or mercenaries) exploring a frozen ruined city (Published by Osprey it's mini-agnostic ish, Northstar Minis does produce an official range) and Oprey publish a whole bunch of mostly Mini-agnostic games

TT Combat make a pair of wargames in a shared sci-fi setting, one (dropzone commander) is a 10mm scale big army game, the other a space fleet combat type game

what are the best tabletop wargames that are not warhammer/warhammer 40k? i played a bunch of warhammer 40k back in high school, and i'd like to get a feel for alternate approaches to the genre.

[enbypandamonium]

Flinging Some Paint!

Today I found some time to paint up a few of my Shaltari tanks

The detail work was particularly onerous and I painted the turrets and chassis separately but the end product looks pretty good if I was to toot my own horn a bit.

[alienbastelt]

The painted part of my Scourge Army for Dropzone Commander.

[mikesbrushwork]

They're Coming... More Scourge are finished, and there's more on the way! Above we have the first new infantry squad from my recently acquired extra starter set. I need to do their transport, but the grunts are done so... Second, a small squadron of Reaver Gunships. I've had these guys almost as long as I'd had the Destroyers, and it's taken about as long to paint them thanks to the Destroyers killing my joy for Scourge for a while. Done now though, and another jump in my counts!

Acquired:142 Painted:190

[owlbear33]

I guess what also attracts me to smaller-scale sci-fi wargames (Battletech, DZC), but also Infinity (beyond their specific attributes), is the idea of building a city in miniature and replicating at least in some way the gameplay of Halo 3: ODST

that game really has left a mark on me

[s-punk013]

A new Challenger Approaches!

So, on Sunday I was asked if I’d be interested in taking a start Dropzone commander army off my friends hands, as he’d have one going spare. Always up for a challenge and something new, I said sure. Last night I went round to play another quest of ‘Descent’ and was gifted the rulebook and UCM start Army, as promised.

They’re so frickin’ tiny. Looking forward to painting these this week! I’ll be taking the rulebook to work to have a look through and painting will start tonight!

With this army acquisition, my count has been boosted to:

Acquired: 52 Painted: 50

For the first time this year, I’m in negative figures. It’ll not last long, I’m planning on knocking this army out fairly quickly.

As always, thanks for stopping by!

[empressxmachina]

Now, this is how you game.

Source sauce. (Steven McDaniel aka Steve Famine)

[rotterdamvanalles]

Ter hoogte van korenmolen de Vier Winden aan de Terbregse Rechter Rottekade vliegen geallieerde vliegtuigen met voedselpakketten die uitgegooid zullen worden bij Terbregge in verband met operatie Manna, 1 mei 1945. 🆕️

Na maanden van overleg tussen de geallieerden en de Duitsers werd na de Hongerwinter op 1 mei 1945 het Akkoord van Achterveld gesloten en ondertekend. Tijdens de eerste voorbespreking op 28 april was reeds overeenstemming bereikt over voedseldistributie, waarmee de voedselhulp toegelaten werd door de Duitsers. De Duitsers waren met de geallieerden overeengekomen, dat deze uit bommenwerpers het voedsel en de noodrantsoenen op geringe hoogte mochten afwerpen.

Na 1 mei 1945 hadden de RAF en de USAAF hun eigen zones. De zones voor de RAF waren: Vliegveld Valkenburg, renbaan Duindigt, Vliegveld Ypenburg, Terbregge, Vliegveld Waalhaven en Gouda. De USAAF had de volgende zones: Luchthaven Schiphol, Vogelenzang, Vliegveld Bergen, Hilversum (Westerheide) en Utrecht (Lage Weide). In deze acht dagen werd meer dan 11.000 ton aan goederen afgeworpen boven bezet Nederlands gebied. RAF Bomber Command voerde 3100 sorties uit en de USAAF 2200 sorties. Voor de bevolking was toen het ergste leed geleden, ook al doordat inmiddels veel voedsel per schip kon worden aangevoerd, waaronder broodmeel uit Zweden.

Met alleen voedseldroppings was men er niet, want men had bijvoorbeeld in de bij Rotterdam gelegen dropzone Terbregge al 4000 man nodig om de voedselpakketten van de velden af te halen. Dit kwam doordat er onvoldoende vervoermiddelen voorhanden waren.

De inhoud van de voedselpakketten bestond uit: zakken meel, blikken scheepsbeschuit, legerrantsoenen, thee, eipoeder, bonen, Spam (nu bekend als Smac), sigaretten, chocolade en margarine.

De Britse droppings kennen we onder de naam Operatie Manna en de AMerikaanse droppings onder de naam Chowhound.

De fotograaf is Hendrik Ferdinand Grimeyer en de foto komt uit het Stadsarchief Rotterdam. De informatie komt van Wikipedia.