Map and Counters

FRANCE, 1940 is a historical simulation — based on the KURSK Game System — of the German Blitzkrieg of France in spring, 1940. The game spans the crucial first twenty days of the invasion during which the outcome of the campaign was decided. FRANCE, 1940 was designed by James F. Dunnigan and was originally published as the magazine ‘insert’ game for S&T #27 in 1971. The rights to the design were purchased by the Avalon Hill Game Company (TAHGC) and the game was reissued, in the sleeved-box format profiled here, in 1972.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

Fortress of the Maginot Line

As the sun rose on 9 May, 1940, the “no-man’s-land” that separated Germany and France was still, as it had been for over eight months, eerily quiet. Hitler’s two remaining enemies, France and England (at this time, still called the Entente), had been at war with Nazi Germany since 3 September, 1939; but, except for a shallow five kilometer incursion into German territory in the region of the Saar in September-October 1939, the front had been largely inactive since the outbreak of hostilities. In fact, the noticeable absence of offensive operations from both the Germans and the Allies during the fall and winter of 1939-1940 had prompted newspapers in the west to sarcastically dub this protracted period of inaction: the Sitzkrieg or “Phony War.” Moreover, the one Allied attempt to interfere with German offensive plans — the ill-fated expedition to support Norway — had been a humiliating debacle, particularly for Britain. Thus, as the days turned longer and the weather improved, all eyes were fixed expectantly on the Franco-German border.

General von Manstein

This was not to say, it should be noted, that either the Allies or the Germans had been idle during the months that followed Poland’s capitulation. Both sides had worked feverishly to amass huge numbers of men and materiel in anticipation of the inevitable fighting that was bound to come. In the case of the Entente, by spring of 1940, the combat forces that the Western Allies had managed to build up along France’s frontier with Belgium and Germany were — at least by conventional reckoning — quite formidable. In fact, if the manpower of neutral Belgium and Holland were added to the forces of France and England — a reasonable supposition given previous history — the combined Allied armies now numbered 144 front line and reserve divisions, 13,974 pieces of artillery, 3,383 tanks and 2,935 aircraft, for a total of approximately 3,300,00 men. Opposing this impressive host, the Germans had, by early May, assembled nearly 3,350,000 troops on the western front. These German fighting men comprised a force of 141 divisions, 7,378 guns, 2,445 tanks and assault guns, and 5,638 aircraft. Thus, at least on paper, German prospects for victory did not look particularly promising. The Allies possessed rough parity in total manpower and enjoyed a significant numerical advantage in both artillery tubes and tanks. Only in the category of airpower did Hitler’s forces have a distinct edge. Besides a more powerful air force, however, the Germans also had two other less obvious, but important advantages: a proven and well-honed, ground-air doctrine for mechanized warfare; and Lieutenant-General Erich von Manstein’s audacious plan, code-named Fall Gelb (Case Yellow), to pierce the Allied front at its weakest point near Sedan and, once a breakthrough had been achieved, to then send the bulk of the Wehrmacht’s mechanized forces racing west to the Channel Coast. This surprise stroke, the German Führer hoped, would produce another stunning victory like that which his army had achieved, only months earlier, against Poland.

The 'Manstein Plan' was simple in concept, but breathtaking in its daring. It was also controversial because the Führer had personally chosen it over what appeared, at least on its face, to be the safer, more conventional operational blueprint preferred by many in the German Army’s senior leadership, the Oberkommado Des Heeres (OKH). Both plans had their advocates, but only one offered any prospect, however small, of a rapid and successful end to the campaign in France.

General Franz Halder

The plan of campaign preferred by the OKH was known as the ‘Halder Plan’, a title it had acquired because it had been prepared under the direction of General Franz Halder. It called for the German Army to direct its major offensive effort through the Low Countries and into France as far as the River Somme. The German attack against France, Halder suggested, could then be resumed in 1941! In essence, this was an unimaginative replay of the ‘Schlieffen Plan’, but with armor and air power now used to support the broad front advance of the German infantry. Hitler, having personally been in the trenches of the Western Front during World War I, was not impressed by Halder’s cautious proposal. Neither was General Gerd von Rundstedt who took it upon himself to instruct his chief of staff, Erich von Manstein, to produce a more creative and, it was hoped, more decisive alternative. In January 1940, a copy of the ‘Halder Plan’ fell into Allied hands when a plane carrying a Luftwaffe major made an emergency landing in Maasmechelen, in Belgium. This event, known as the "Mechelen Incident" is popularly thought to have been the reason that the Germans abandoned the ‘Halder Plan’; but, in point of fact, Hitler had already signaled that he was ready to reject the OKH plan in favor of the alternative proposed by Generals von Rundstedt and von Manstein well before January, 1940.

The Manstein Plan
 
Lieutenant-General von Manstein’s version of Fall Gelb called for a multi-stage offensive: in the south, the nineteen divisions of Army Group ‘C’ would demonstrate in front of the Maginot Line to prevent French forces from shifting to reinforce other sectors, once the offensive actually began; Army Group ‘B’, with thirty divisions, would push into the Low Countries and hopefully draw substantial Allied forces north and east into Belgium; the third and most critical phase of the offensive called for the forty-five divisions of Army Group ‘A’ to rapidly push through the Ardennes and to breach the Meuse River defenses before they could be reinforced. This meant, however, that for the ‘Manstein Plan’ to succeed, the senior panzer commanders of Army Group ‘A’ would have to be audacious, almost to the point of foolhardiness, because the pace of the armored drive would have to be maintained no matter what. Such a rapid rate of advance in turn would mean that the mechanized forces would inevitably leave the regular, non-motorized forces farther and farther behind as the offensive progressed. Thus, the plan’s success would also depend on the near-flawless coordination of the fast-moving panzer forces and the Luftwaffe. This seamless ground-air ollaboration would be essential because, as the German armor raced ahead, it would be impossible for the artillery to keep up. Therefore, the dive bomber pilots of the Luftwaffe, by working and communicating directly with the panzer commanders on the battlefield, would have to take over the role of the armored forces’ (airborne) artillery.

Maginot Line Anti-tank Fortifications

The Allied high command, of course, could only guess at the broad operational outlines and intermediate goals of the German plan of campaign. The pronounced numerical superiority in the Luftwaffe fighter arm made Allied aerial reconnaissance flights over German territory difficult, if not impossible. Nonetheless, despite the clear signs of an ongoing enemy build-up to their front, the Allies remained confident that the section of France that directly bordered Hitler’s Third Reich was secure. Any German attack that came in this sector would have to breach the Maginot Line: a twenty-five kilometer deep belt of strongly-garrisoned fortifications, strong points and anti-tank barriers that covered the French border for approximately 145 kilometers. Unfortunately, these powerful fixed fortifications only extended from the Swiss border in the south, as far north as the city of Montmedy near the Belgian frontier. This meant that the rest of the Franco-Belgian border, which meandered some 435 kilometers, was more-or-less exposed to a German attack. And, in 1914, it had been through Belgium that the Kaiser’s troops had stormed, seizing vast tracts of French territory and, in the process, laying waste to many of the French Republic’s northern cities and towns. Moreover, a whole generation of Frenchmen had been maimed or killed in the four bloody years of the “Great War.” When it finally ended, it had been the fervent hope in both London and Paris that the just-ended conflict would, because of the terrible toll it had taken on all of its belligerents, be the "War to End All Wars."  And yet now, barely twenty-years later, the unbelievable prospect of a new German invasion of France seemed immanent.

General Gamelin, Commander-in-Chief, French Army

Not surprisingly given the lessons of the previous war, the very real threat posed by Germany was not lost either on the Belgian people or their government. Thus, although officially neutral, Belgian civilian and military leaders had, in the period following the fall of Poland, already made secret arrangements for Allied troops to enter Belgian territory at the first sign of a German move against the Low Countries. The leaders of the Entente had been quick to accede to Belgium’s confidential request; however, their willingness to come to Belgium’s aid was rooted in more than their altruistic impulse to help a weaker neighbor. From the standpoint of London, a rapid Allied move into the Low Countries would deny Hitler advanced airfields from which to launch bombing raids against England; for the French, such a northern advance would, it was hoped, shift the sites of the heaviest fighting away from French and into Belgian territory; in addition, both British and French military leaders believed that a powerful Allied lodgment in the Low Countries would pose a direct threat to Germany’s industrial heartland, the Ruhr. Thus, given the several strategic advantages of a military move to help the Belgians, preparations were immediately begun for just such an advance; and the final operational plan for the rapid Allied redeployment into Belgium was codenamed the ‘D’ (for Dyle) Plan, in honor of the Belgian River east of Brussels behind which the Allies hoped to form their line against the advancing Germans. Hitler’s attack might fall anywhere, but, based both on sound military principles and on past history, the majority of the Allied generals expected the Germans to again come through Flanders, as they had in 1914.

General Lord John Gort

By late spring, the Allied high command considered that its forces were generally ready to meet a German blow wherever it might fall. The southern section of the Allied front was rendered secure by the Maginot Line, while the northern section of the French border — that part that ran from the North Sea along the Belgian frontier to the northern edge of the Ardennes — was now manned by the First Army Group: a powerful, largely-motorized force composed of the British Expeditionary Force (B.E.F.), under General Lord Gort, and many of the best, most mobile formations of the French army.

Only the central part of the front was, compared to the northern and southern portions of the Allied line, relatively weakly-held; a situation that raised worries even within the Allied High Command, itself. However, General Maurice Gamelin, the Supreme Commander of the Allied Army, countered these concerns by pointing out that, although this central sector looked vulnerable when examined on a map, it was actually much safer from German attack than it appeared, primarily because it was shielded by the forests, streams and broken ground of the Ardennes. Moreover, not only did the bad terrain and primitive road net make even unopposed motorized movement awkward and slow in this area, but the paucity of east-west roads wide enough for two-way traffic would make resupplying a large attacking force once it had traversed the Ardennes exceedingly difficult, if not impossible. During the Polish campaign, Gamelin reminded his fellow generals, the Wehrmacht had demonstrated its heavy reliance on its mechanized forces to spearhead its offensive operations; thus, it seemed obvious to the Allied Supreme Commander that the lack of paved roads, the numerous (easily destroyed) bridges that crossed the many streams in the area, along with the generally poor off-road tank terrain that characterized much of the Ardennes, ruled it out as a possible site for the main German attack. [Interestingly, General Gamelin’s appraisal of the limitations of the Ardennes road net was actually quite accurate: in the case of the 41,000 vehicles that were assigned to Kleist’s Panzer Group, for example, only four roads could actually be allocated by Army Group ‘A’ headquarters to Kleist’s entire command for its passage through the Ardennes.] And finally, even if the Wehrmacht did make the colossal blunder of attempting a major armored thrust through the Ardennes, the Meuse River just inside the French border was fortified with pill boxes and field fortifications to a depth of over six kilometers. For this reason, the Allied commander was convinced that, in the unlikely event that an attack did fall here, the Germans would be unable to attempt a cross-river assault until supporting infantry and artillery could be brought forward: a process that would require a minimum of seven to ten days. In the meantime, General Gamelin and his staff were confident that the Meuse river defenses would be more than strong enough to hold back a hastily-organized German attack until Allied reinforcements could be transferred by rail to the threatened battle area. Thus, although far from perfect, the Allied defensive arrangements — when viewed as a whole — appeared both solid and sensible. And because the Allied high command believed that their own forces would not be ready for a sustained offensive against Germany before 1941, they bided their time and waited for Hitler to make the first move. And, after eight months, that move finally came.

German paratrooper drop

At dusk on 9 May, 1940, word reached Allied headquarters that German units had begun rolling unopposed into Luxembourg; moreover, a noticeable jump in the number of infantry patrols, as well as other military movements along the Dutch and Belgian frontiers, indicated an unusual amount of German activity; but what all these enemy movements actually meant, no one at Gamelin’s headquarters could be sure. Sudden spikes in German patrol activity had occurred before, and nothing had come of it. In any case, while the Allied high command was far from unanimous in their estimate of German intentions, the senior officers of both the French and British armies were nonetheless confident that the combat power of the Allied forces and their plan of battle would, together, be sufficient to stop the Wehrmacht if it did attack on this day, or on any other. Unbeknownst to these Allied officers and their men, however, these last few hours were the calm before the German storm.

Eben Emael Fortress Entrance

In the early hours of 10 May, Hitler’s Luftwaffe began ferocious airstrikes against airfields in France, Belgium and Holland, and the Wehrmacht soon followed-up with attacks of its own. These early German air and ground operations initially served to confirm Allied expectations: strong German attacks had quickly swamped the border defenses of both Holland and Belgium; while, at the same time, the Wehrmacht appeared content to maintain a mainly defensive posture in front of the Maginot Line. Thus, to meet these initial German moves, the “Dyle” Plan was put into effect, and the Allied First Army Group began to rapidly advance north into Belgium. It was soon depressingly obvious, however, that several important elements of the German plan had not been anticipated. The first unexpected shock arrived when disturbing news gradually began reach Supreme Allied headquarters that certain key objectives in Belgium and Holland, and even the powerful Belgian fortress of Eben-Emael, had been captured by German airborne troops; this was unsettling, to say the least. In fact, the unwelcome and premature loss of Eben-Emael was a major jolt to the Entente planners. But also worrisome to the Allied high command was the flurry of confused and sometimes contradictory reports beginning to come in from the central part of the front. These communiques, given battlefield developments farther to the north, were both unexpected and unsettling. A sizeable number of German mechanized units had already been encountered in the early fighting in Belgium and Holland; yet, in spite of this fact, several advanced Allied detachments deployed farther to the south were reporting that a very large German force, accompanied by armor, was slowly pushing its way, against light resistance, through the tangled forests and narrow lanes of the Ardennes. General Gamelin, although still convinced that a German armored attack in this sector was highly improbable, nonetheless issued orders on the 12^th for several reserve infantry divisions to begin moving to reinforce the Meuse defenders; then, satisfied that events were generally proceeding as expected, the Supreme Commander and his staff sat back to allow time for the battlefield situation to develop. As it turned out, neither he nor his staff had long to wait.

Panzer II, France, 1940

On the evening of the 12^th, the first elements of the XIX^th corps of Kleist’s Panzer Group debouched out of the Ardennes near Sedan. By the afternoon of 13 May, a full seven days sooner than anyone in Allied headquarters had thought possible, the unbelievable happened: motorized infantry from the 1^st, 2^nd and 10^th Panzer Divisions and from the SS Grossdeutschland Regiment — without waiting either for supporting artillery or for additional infantry to come up — attacked and fought their way across the Meuse at Houx, Monthermé and Sedan. In these river battles, the Luftwaffe, as Manstein had intended, was crucial to the success of all three of the German crossings. Moreover, in spite of often tenacious initial French resistance, the momentum of the German advance did not slacken. Instead, sappers immediately began building pontoon bridges as soon as both river banks had been secured and, within hours, the first vehicles from seven panzer divisions and four motorized divisions were streaming across the Meuse and into the Allied rear.

Germans Bridging the Meuse, France, 1940

The successful crossing of the Meuse was the decisive moment in the entire campaign. Once the Germans had broken the river defenses near Sedan, panic quickly spread to other French units near the point of the breakthrough. With local morale crumbling, an immediate French counterattack could not be organized, and the breach in the Allied center steadily widened. It would never be closed. In desperation, the increasingly frantic Entente high command ordered planes to bomb the German crossings. However, repeated Allied bombing attacks, despite heavy aircraft losses, failed to destroy the temporary bridges, and German troops continued to pour across the Meuse.

On 16 May, General Maxime Weygand was appointed to replace General Gamelin as Allied Supreme Commander, but the change in command had little effect on the Entente's fortunes on the battlefield. With Kleist’s mechanized units now loose in their rear, the Allied position deteriorated rapidly. Just five days after Gamelin’s dismissal, on 21 May, 1940, Guderian’s panzers — after beating back repeated Allied counterattacks on both flanks — reached the Channel Coast near the mouth of the Somme not far from Abbeville. To the north and east of Guderian’s panzers, the survivors of the once-powerful Allied First Army Group, along with several Belgian units, now found themselves with their backs to the Channel, encircled by the Germans and under constant air attack from the Luftwaffe. Even worse, a breakout by these trapped Allied soldiers was no longer militarily possible; it appeared that, given their predicament, only a miracle could save them from annihilation or capture. However and against all odds, between 26 May and 4 June, 1940, just such a miracle actually took place. In the space of nine days and nights, a fleet of over 850 naval and civilian vessels took part in the Royal Navy’s “Operation Dynamo” and, by making trip after trip to and from the French coast, succeeded in rescuing over 338,000 British, French, Canadian and Belgian troops from the harbor and beaches of Dunkirk. The British Expeditionary Force was forced to abandon its heavy equipment and artillery in France, but its soldiers, thanks to the success of "Dynamo," had managed to avoid German captivity and, instead, would live to fight another day.

DESCRIPTION 

FRANCE, 1940 is a two-player operational-level (division/corps) wargame of the decisive first phase of the German invasion of France: the critical three-week period during which — in the historical campaign — German panzers broke through the center of the Allied front and then lunged west to cut off and encircle the substantial British and French forces that had advanced north into Belgium. The three-color hexagonal grid game map depicts eastern France, the Low Countries (Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg), and western Germany from Switzerland to the North Sea. Each hex of the game map is roughly equal to 12.5 kilometers from side to side. The various game counters represent the historical German, French, British, Belgian and Dutch combat units that took part — or that, had circumstances been different, could have played a role — in the actual campaign. FRANCE, 1940 is played in game turns, each of which is divided into a German and an Allied player turn. The Allied player always sets up his units before the German player places his own counters on the game map. A complete game turn is equal to two days of real time. The game focuses on the days from 10 May, to 29 May, 1940: the time period during which the decisive events of the campaign actually transpired. Game turns in FRANCE, 1940 are symmetrical and are further divided into a German and then an Allied player turn. The German player always moves first, and each player turn is sequenced as follows: Initial Movement (and reinforcement) Phase; Combat Phase; and once all combat is completed, the second Mechanized Movement Phase. The Allied player then repeats exactly the same sequence of player actions. At the conclusion of both player turns, the turn record marker is advanced one space, and the next game turn begins.

The actual mechanics of play for FRANCE, 1940, like the other titles in the KURSK family of games, are comparatively simple, but nonetheless bear looking at. Stacking, for both players, is limited to three combat units per hex; however, only one corps or corps equivalent (any three divisional-sized or smaller units) may attack from, or defend in, a single hex. Interestingly, stacking limits apply at all times. Therefore, friendly units may not pass through hexes that already contain the stacking maximum during either of the two movement phases; moreover, any units forced to retreat because of combat onto other friendly units in excess of legal stacking limits are eliminated. Combat between adjacent enemy units is always voluntary. As noted earlier, only a single corps-sized unit in a hex may defend against attack; in those cases in which two or more corps-sized units are stacked together, the defending player chooses which corps or corps equivalent will actually fight. In contrast, different component divisional-sized or smaller units in an attacking stack may choose to attack the same or a different adjacent hex, or even to make no attack at all. Zones of control (ZOCs) are semi-active, but not ‘sticky’. This means that, in FRANCE, 1940, all units must pay a penalty of three movement points to move adjacent to an enemy unit, but may exit an enemy-controlled hex at a cost of two additional movement points. Thus, a unit with sufficient movement factors can move directly from one enemy ZOC to another. In addition, ZOCs block both supply paths and retreat routes; however, the presence of a friendly unit in the affected hex negates the ZOC in both cases.

The terrain and movement rules for FRANCE, 1940 — except for one significant innovation — are familiar and quite conventional. Terrain types are relatively few, and their effects on movement and combat are intuitively logical and hence, are easy to keep track of. All units, for example, expend one movement point to enter a clear terrain or city hex. All non-mechanized units also expend a single movement point to enter forest or swamp hexes. However, mechanized units and ground support elements — unlike infantry and cavalry — expend two movement points to enter forest and swamp hexes. Movement by ground units into all-sea or flooded hexes is prohibited; rivers, oddly enough, have no effect on movement. Terrain effects on combat are also comparatively simple. For instance, units that are defending in forests, swamps, or are attacked exclusively through river hex-sides receive a minus two die roll modification (DRM); units defending in clear terrain or in cities, on the other hand, receive no defensive bonus at all. The one unique aspect of the FRANCE, 1940 terrain rules pertains to the special characteristics of the hexes of the Belgian fortress of Eben-Emael and the French Maginot Line: Allied units may move freely through these hexes without penalty, but German units may only enter a fortified hex — thereby permanently destroying its defensive value — when a Defender Destroyed (DX) combat result is rolled. In addition to being barriers to German movement, these Allied fortified hexes also increase a friendly occupying defender’s strength by 10 combat factors when attacked exclusively from the front, or by 5 factors when attacked from the rear or from both front and rear, in combination.

The rules for resolving ground combat in FRANCE, 1940 are, in most ways, quite familiar; they do, nonetheless, contain a couple of elements that are unique to this game. Among the things that are familiar: all terrain, supply and other effects on combat are cumulative. And regular ground battles are resolved, as might be expected, using a traditional ‘odds differential’ Combat Results Table (CRT). Also, in the case of retreat results, the victorious player chooses the retreat route for all defeated enemy units. Among the several design features that are unique to combat in this game, the most noticeable are undoubtedly the changes to the Combat Results listed on the FRANCE, 1940 CRT. It is this set of new combat results that most clearly sets this game apart from its many World War II era cousins. To begin with, while the CRT includes Attacker Destroyed (AX), Defender Destroyed (DX), Both Retreat (BR) and Attacker Retreat (AR) outcomes, it does not show either Exchanges (EX) or Defender Retreats (DR), at all. Instead of these familiar combat outcomes, the game designer has substituted a set of new, defender Counterattack (CA) results to take their places. This is no trivial change. The FRANCE, 1940 CRT itself is, as is typical of all of the KURSK family of games, relatively bloodless; without the CA result, battle odds of 5 to 1 or higher are required before a Defender Destroyed (DX) result even appears as a possible combat outcome, and most combat results will take the form of AR, BR or CA, until very high (7 to 1 or better) combat odds are attained. Because of the CA result, unmodified odds as low as 3 to 1 can produce a large (66% chance) of a CA result. Moreover, the introduction of these alternative CA results — with their varying accompanying DRMs — heavily favors the Germans by dramatically increasing Allied battlefield attrition. This is because of the strength disparity between German infantry corps, which are 7s, and French corps, which are 6s; a German infantry corps forced by a CA result to counterattack one of its original attackers, typically does so at 1 to 1 odds, but French infantry usually must counterattack at 1 to 2 odds. This difference in counterattack odds increases the likelihood of a French AX over that of a comparable German result by 16%. Another intriguing feature of this title is that, unlike virtually all of the other KURSK-based games, German panzer and motorized divisions are not replaced by weaker kampfgruppe units when they are eliminated in battle.

The air war in FRANCE, 1940, as is typical with several of the other KURSK-based games, is highly abstracted and, at least in the Historical Game, heavily favors the German player. The air rules, themselves, are comparatively simple. Air units are composed of an ‘Aircraft Element’ and a mobile ‘Ground Support Element’. Aircraft elements may fly one of five different types of missions: Close Support (this mission adds ‘2’ to the attacker’s combat die roll); Interdiction (aircraft exert the same effect on a hex as a ZOC); Combat Air Patrol (friendly aircraft operate over a specific hex to prevent enemy air missions against it); Air Superiority (aircraft attack enemy Ground Support Elements using the ‘Air Superiority Table’); and Interception (friendly aircraft intercept enemy air missions flown against a specific hex). The German air advantage in the game is two-fold: German Aircraft Elements have a range of twenty hexes, whereas Allied aircraft units have a maximum reach of only eighteen hexes; more importantly, the Germans enjoy a significant advantage in numbers of aircraft. This pro-German bias varies depending on which ‘Orders of Battle’ the players are using, but in the Historical Game, for example, the Germans start the game with eight air units while the Allies’ possess only two. The end result of these disparities in air strength and range is that the Allied Aircraft Elements will spend much of the game attempting to stay beyond the reach of German Air Superiority missions, while the Luftwaffe devotes the majority of its aircraft to assisting ground forces with Close Support missions.

The supply rules to FRANCE, 1940 impose slightly different requirements on the two sides. German units are in supply if they are able to trace a supply path, unblocked by enemy units or zones of control, of any length to the east edge of the game map. Allied units are in supply if they are able to trace an unblocked supply route of any length to the western map edge. Also, on the first two game turns after the Netherlands enters the war, Allied units may trace a supply path to the north edge of the map. In addition, Allied units may, under certain circumstances, also draw supply from several other alternate sources. Any single Allied unit that occupies an undestroyed fortification hex is always considered to be in supply. The city of Antwerp can also be used as an Allied supply source, but only if the following conditions have all been met: Belgium is an active belligerent; no German units have entered or passed through the city; and no German units are adjacent to any of the river hexes that connect Antwerp to the North Sea. Both German and Allied supply status is determined for movement purposes at the beginning of the first movement phase; and for combat purposes, at the instant of combat. Supply effects are comparatively simple: supplied units move and fight normally; unsupplied units are halved for both movement and combat (fractions are rounded down), and in the case of stacked units, each unit is halved individually, athough no unit’s combat strength can ever be reduced to less than ‘1’. Finally, aircraft units whose Ground Support Elements are unsupplied may not fly any air missions until supply has been restored.

In addition to the already enumerated standard rules, FRANCE, 1940, also includes several additional special rules that reflect other important aspects of the campaign. These are: German ‘ranged’ artillery units which can, when attacking enemy fortifications, fire up to two hexes; restrictions on Allied movement based on the belligerent status (neutral or at war) of Holland and Belgium; and German ‘off map’ movement which requires the Allied player to match, in terms of total combat strength, any German units that exit play from the south map edge by exiting Allied units of his own.

The winner of FRANCE, 1940 is determined at game end by a comparison of the opposing sides’ victory points. Both players accrue victory points for the destruction of enemy combat units; in addition, the German player also gains victory points if he captures the three hexes that comprise Paris. In addition, for the Germans to actually win the game, the Wehrmacht must accumulate 80 or more victory points by the end of the tenth game turn, and he must also achieve a three-to-one or greater ratio over the Allied player in victory points. If the German player fails to satisfy these conditions, the Allied commander wins.

Maginot Line interlocking pillboxes.

In a much-needed effort to expand both the game’s variability and its playability, FRANCE, 1940 offers, besides the Allied and German Orders of Battle (OoBs) presented in the Historical Game, ten additional Allied OoBs and five alternate German OoBs for players to experiment with. These optional orders of battle suggest historically plausible ‘might-have-beens’ to the pre-war policies actually adopted by the belligerents. For example, several of the alternate Allied OoBs posit a French decision not to construct the Maginot Line, but, instead, to pursue alternative pre-war armament policies aimed at increasing the combat power of the regular French army and air forces by building more tanks and planes. For the Germans, one example of a hypothetical Wehrmacht OoB rests on the possible choice, by Hitler, not to invade Denmark and Norway. Each of these several alternate OoBs is rated by the designer in terms of its relative strength and, based on this numerical rating, can be matched against one another according to the relative experience and skill of the opposing players. In addition to this collection of different orders of battle, the game also offers a set of additional ‘Optional’ rules for those players who would like to add a little additional simulation detail to their games at the cost of increased complexity. These optional rules include: German Paratroops and air-landing units (the German player may conduct airborne assaults against Allied positions); Mild Winter Fortifications (posits a less severe 1939-40 winter than occurred historically; permits the construction of stronger Allied field fortifications from the Maginot Line to the coast); Variable Victory Conditions (this rule stipulates different levels of player victory); and Sea Evacuation of Allied Units (allows the Allies to conduct a ‘Dunkirk’ style naval rescue of Allied coastal units).

A PERSONAL OBSERVATION 

Stuka dive bomber.

Any discussion of FRANCE, 1940 always carries with it the temptation to join the ‘pig-pile’ of previous criticism that has already been heaped on this title. Even Dunnigan acknowledged, pretty early on, that he had basically ‘whiffed’ when it came to simulating the 1940 battle for France. Of course, in the eyes of many of his most determined critics, Dunnigan did more than ‘swing and miss’ when he designed FRANCE, 1940; instead, quite a few disgruntled players have argued that, when it came to this title, he actually let go of his bat completely and let it ‘brain’ the TAHGC team mascot. That, I think, is just a bit overblown. And although I am certainly not a big fan of this game, some of the criticism that has been directed over the years at FRANCE, 1940 still seems a little too harsh. Besides, back when the game first appeared, I personally found the hopelessness of the Allied position in the Historical Game quite interesting and — much to the delight of my regular opponents — almost always volunteered to command the out-classed Allies. That being said, nostalgia will only carry a title so far, and even after thirty-eight years, a game that was disappointing when it was originally published, is most likely still going to be disappointing, today. Such, alas, is the case with FRANCE, 1940.

General Weygand

Part of the problem with FRANCE, 1940, when looked at purely from the designer’s vantage point, is that the totality of the historical situation is extremely difficult to simulate. In fact, a large share of the blame for the very real shortcomings of Dunnigan’s design can probably be traced directly to the facts surrounding the conduct and outcome of the actual battle. The speed and lop-sidedness of the German victory over an Allied force that was technologically equal and numerically equal or superior to the attacking Germans in every category except that of airpower is, viewed in retrospect, almost incomprehensible. Not surprisingly, since the appearance of FRANCE, 1940 other designers have attempted to model this campaign, and a few of them have even succeeded a little better than Dunnigan in meeting the challenge posed by this historical puzzle. I would argue, for example, that John Prados’ THIRD REICH (1974) and Frank Chadwick’s 1940 (1980) both do a better job of reproducing some aspects of the German blitzkrieg than does FRANCE, 1940; however, neither of these two design alternatives, despite their cleverness, is really any more likely to match the actual battlefield events of the historical campaign than is Dunnigan’s botched turn at "at bat." Thus, the main difficulty with this game, and, in fact, with almost all simulations of the 1940 German campaign against France and the Low Countries, is that the historical result — barring the imposition of arbitrary ‘idiocy’ rules on the Allied player — is exceedingly difficult for a game designer to replicate. I personally believe that the wheels came off of FRANCE, 1940 because the final game design ended up being the result of a decision, by a frustrated Jim Dunnigan, to work backwards from the historical outcome to a plausible starting point, rather than from beginning to end. And while this ‘reverse-engineering’ approach might be useful for mapping out design solutions for some simulation problems, it clearly did not work for this one.

French CharB tank.

One of the characteristics of the games from the 1970s and 1980s that I have always admired is that the designers of that era approached their simulations with a distinct point-of-view. An individual player might agree or disagree with the designer’s take on a specific battle or campaign, but at least the player usually had a clear understanding as to what the designer considered to be the critical elements that led to the ultimate historical outcome. In the case of FRANCE, 1940, I don’t think that Dunnigan was able to come up with a simulation narrative that really worked in conveying the essence of the historical campaign. And his default position — the Germans were simply unbeatable in 1940 — sounds, when one reads the "Designer’s Notes" an awful lot more like an excuse from someone suffering from designer’s block, than it does a carefully reasoned historical judgment about the 1940 campaign. This oddly-deterministic conclusion, by the way, also makes Jim Dunnigan the only serious student of history that I have ever run across who actually argues that the ‘Halder Plan’ would have produced a better result for the Germans than the historical ‘Manstein Plan’! I suspect that this eccentric historical judgment may, however, actually explain a few (if not, most) of the design problems that surfaced in FRANCE, 1940. Thus, it could be that when it came to this game, the designer’s creative well had temporarily run dry. It is abundantly clear, for example, that the regular KURSK game platform (with its relatively bloodless CRT) didn’t work for this situation; so, in the end, I think that it is possible that a desperate designer latched onto the concept of the compulsory Counterattack — perverse and unrealistic though it might be — as a way of artificially producing the outcome that he wanted. After all, this pernicious little design ‘slight of hand’, particularly when combined with the carefully-chosen disparity in the combat strengths of the German and French infantry corps, accomplished what Dunnigan set out to do: it virtually guaranteed that the Germans couldn’t lose. Sadly, this trick on the designer’s part meant that clever play was made as irrelevant to the outcome of the game for the German player as it was for his hapless Allied opponent. Since virtually any German plan will work; why even bother to set the game up? Needless-to-say, both from a simulation and from a gaming standpoint, this choice by the designer was not well-received by the more skeptical members of the hobby when the game first appeared. And it still isn’t, today.

BEF Evacuation, Dunkerque

In the end, the story that Jim Dunnigan chose to tell with FRANCE, 1940 turned out, I believe, to be both fundamentally flawed and woefully unsatisfying. Thus, the most important reason for the game’s failure as a simulation — in the view of most critics, myself included — is that his design solution actually has no logical connection to the main factors that most students of military affairs generally accept as having led to the Allied catastrophe in 1940. The Allies did not lose the 1940 battle for France because their troops were cowardly or inept; nor did they lose because the French poilu (ordinary soldiers) insisted on throwing themselves against the advancing Germans in wave after wave of suicidal frontal attacks. On the contrary, the Allied defeat was rooted in other, more commonplace and readily identifiable causes; some of the most notable of which were: the impossibly optimistic (and militarily lethargic) view that Germany might be defeated through the imposition of a naval blockade without any major Allied ground fighting even being necessary; a strategic emphasis — at least until significant additional forces could be mobilized by spring of 1941 — on static, defensive battle; an inflexible, painfully-slow and poorly-coordinated system of command and control; an underdeveloped air doctrine that made the effective coordination of ground and air operations virtually impossible; and a senior leadership with only the most rudimentary understanding or appreciation of the true shock value — both psychological and military — of massed armor formations, particularly when those powerful, fast-moving units were closely supported by air power. Finally and perhaps most importantly, the Allies lost in 1940 because the Germans, although they made their share of mistakes, got almost all of the major things right; while the Allies seemed to get most of the same things terribly and tragically wrong.

RAF Spitfires

Perhaps, the kindest thing that can be said about FRANCE, 1940 is that the graphic design of the game — given when it was published — is really top-notch. The map is a little plain, but unambiguous, and the rules booklet, unit counters and other play aids are all very nicely done. Moreover, FRANCE, 1940 was one of the last titles published by the Avalon Hill Game Company to use the ultra-sturdy, sleeved-box packaging format. Nonetheless, as either a historical simulation or simply as a game of the 1940 battle for France, Dunnigan’s creation offers very little of real value to the contemporary gamer. The design elements that make it unique, also, unfortunately, make it unsatisfactory as a game. For this reason, I believe that this title, while it may be of some interest to serious collectors of World War II games, is probably a poor choice for either casual or experienced gamers.

Finally, for those readers who are interested in a very nice, after-market redesign of the map and counters for FRANCE, 1940, upgraded versions of these game components are available for download (in PDF file format) at:  http://www.jrcooper.com/france1940.htm.

Design Characteristics:

• Time Scale: two days per game turn
• Map Scale: 12.5 kilometers per hex (estimated)
• Unit Size: battalion/regiment/brigade/division/corps
• Unit Types: armor, mechanized infantry, armored cavalry, infantry, artillery, cavalry, paratroops, air-landing troops, air units w/ground support element and information markers
• Number of Players: 2
• Complexity: average
• Solitaire Suitability: above average
• Average Playing Time: 2-3 hours (depending on scenarios, and whether the basic or advanced version is being played)

Game Components:

• One (three section) 22” x 24” hexagonal grid Map Board (with Turn Record Track and Victory Points Tracks incorporated)
• 224 ½” cardboard Counters
• One 5½” x 8½” map-fold Rules Booklet (with Terrain Effects Chart and Play by Mail Combat Results Table incorporated)
• One 8½” x 11½” x 2” Inner Box Lid with Combat Results Table
• One 5½” x 8½” FRANCE, 1940 Historical “Dyle Plan” Set-up Instructions and Special Rules
• One 5½” x 8½” Designer’s Notes and Campaign Analysis Booklet
• Three 5½” x 7½” back-printed Alternative German Order of Battle Cards (6 Alternative Orders of Battle, in all)
• Six 5½” x 7½” back-printed Alternative Allied Order of Battle Cards (for a total of 11 Alternative Orders of Battle)
• One six-sided Die
• One 8½” x 11½” x 2” Bookcase-style sleeved cardboard Game Box with plastic tray

Recommended Reading

See my blog post Book Reviews of these titles; all of which are strongly recommended for those readers interested in further historical background.





THE WEST POINT ATLAS OF AMERICAN WARS (Complete 2-Volume Set); edited by Brigadier General Vincent J. Esposito; Frederick A. Praeger, Inc. (1959); ASIN: B000MTBTEU

FORTRESS AMERICA is a strategic level simulation — based very loosely on the AXIS & ALLIES Game System — of a fictional future invasion of the United States. The game was designed by Michael Gray and published in 1986 as part of the Game Master Series by the Milton Bradley Company (MBC).
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HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

2031: The United States, for the first time since the War of 1812, faces a direct invasion of its own soil by foreign enemies.

“After nearly three years of planning and careful preparing, the three superpowers (the Asian Peoples’ Alliance, the Central American Federation, and the Euro-Socialist Pact) are ready to strike. Since the United States would see any conventional force coming over the oceans at them in time to reactivate many mothballed naval units, the invasion force will travel by super-transport submarines. This will allow the invaders to surprise America and give her no time to react before the first divisions are on the coast. On the downside, the three superpowers will be unable to bring their full military might to bear. However, even America can’t hope to hold off the combined firepower of nearly 20 divisions of armor, infantry and aircraft that takes them by surprise …

There is great risk however. Though the three superpowers control many countries in their part of the world, they are NOT the entire world. If this invasion does not succeed in the first few weeks, world opinion would turn against them. Also, the looming fear of America’s ability to produce war material in vast quantities is a factor in invader plans. Finally, there is the question of the American solar sats themselves. Are they only dangerous against orbital and sub-orbital targets, or should ground and air forces also be worried?”

May 22, 2031: The Invaders strike! Here, now, the fate of America will be decided.

From the “FORTRESS AMERICA PRE-BATTLE TIMELINE” courtesy of:
http://www.grognard.com/info1/fortress.doc .
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DESCRIPTION

FORTRESS AMERICA is a strategic level (brigade/air wing) simulation of a hypothetical future war between the United States and a hostile coalition made up of ground and air forces from Asia, Latin America, and Europe. The game begins with America’s enemies poised to invade the United States from three sides: the Asian Peoples’ Alliance from the west; the Central American Federation from the south; and the Euro-Socialist Pact from the east. The players control one or more of the four ‘Major Combatants’ that, as the game begins, are about to begin the life-or-death struggle to determine the future destiny of the United States. The area-style game map depicts the continental United States and, for purposes of regularizing movement and combat, is divided into ninety-six territories or spaces. These spaces combine to form five distinct geographical sections or regions: the East; the South; the Plains; the Rocky Mountains; and the West. Running along the U.S. border are three separate enemy staging areas each of which is further divided into six invasion zones: one set of invasion zones runs along the east coast; one set is along America’s southern border; and one set of invasion zones covers the west coast. All invading hostile forces must enter play from one of these invasion staging areas. Only the northern border between the U.S. and Canada is completely free of enemy invasion zones. The plastic game pieces represent mobile ground and air units — four identical sets of sixty assorted units per side — as well as important fixed locations, such as major cities and ‘Laser’ satellite weapons sites. In addition, the game includes ‘random event’ Partisan Cards which the U.S. player draws at the beginning of each player turn.

FORTRESS AMERICA is played in game turns which are further divided into four player turns, each of which encompasses the game operations of one of the four major belligerents in the battle for America. The order of player turns — whether two, three, or four players are involved — will always follow the same basic pattern: Western Invader; Southern Invader; Eastern Invader; and finally, the United States player. In the two-player game, all invading forces move first; in the three-player game, the Western and Eastern Invaders move first, followed by the Southern Invader, and, only after all invading forces have completed their moves, does the US player complete his turn. No matter how many players are participants in the game, however, each of the four belligerent’s game operations must be completed before the next player begins his move. A typical individual player turn will proceed in the following strict sequence of game operations: Reinforcements (the Invader players bring new units into play via their respective ‘invasion zones’, and the U.S. player receives one new Laser site and draws random events cards) ; Declare Battles (enemy territories are targeted for attack or occupation); First Movement; Fire Lasers (USA player turn only); Combat; Second Movement; Supply Check (Invaders’ player turns only); and Capture Territory (units move into vacant enemy spaces and convert to friendly control).

Play in FORTRESS AMERICA always starts with the three-pronged invasion of the United States. On the opening game turn, certain rigid ‘invasion turn’ deployment requirements are in effect for each of the four sides. The U.S. player’s forces begin the campaign dispersed across the map with two units (of any type) assigned to each of the thirty American city territories. During this critical first game turn, the three Invading armies are also restricted in what they can do: each is required to attempt to push twenty units (of any type the phasing player chooses) into border territories of the continental United States. Because ‘stacking rules’ (more on this later) apply during every turn of the game, including the first, each invader can use five or six, but no fewer than four of his landing zones to stage for this initial invasion move. Starting on the second game turn, the three Invading players may each bring eight of his remaining off-map units into play; these additional units continue to enter the game until all of the uncommitted Invader reserves have entered the map (turn six). The American player’s reinforcement situation is very different: starting on turn one and continuing through to the end of the game, the U.S. player receives one new ‘Laser’ satellite site at the beginning of each game turn; more importantly, during his reinforcement phase, the American commander also randomly draws two ‘Partisan Cards’ which stipulate the numbers and locations of incoming forces or, alternatively, provide a special ‘one-turn’ combat capability to U.S. forces. Also, the American player is allowed to draw an extra bonus Partisan Card for each City Territory that he recaptures during his previous player turn. Unlike the Invading players who will ultimately run out of reinforcements, the U.S. commander will continue to receive new Lasers and Partisan Cards until the game ends.

Game mechanics in FORTRESS AMERICA, once players become familiar with the somewhat unorthodox game system, are fast-moving and comparatively simple. The rules for movement are a little unusual and vary according to unit type: foot units (all infantry and US partisans) may only move one space to an adjacent friendly or vacant (hostile) territory, and only during the second movement phase; mechanized units (mobile units and hovertanks) may move one area during both the first and second movement phases (but may only enter a friendly-controlled territory during the first movement phase, and — just like infantry — a friendly or unoccupied enemy territory during the second movement phase); air units (helicopters and bombers) may move two and four territories, respectively, during both the first and the second movement phase, and both types of units may fly over both friendly and enemy spaces during either phase. In addition, helicopters may conduct a special type of offensive operation during the first movement phase, only: these units — at the sacrifice of their second movement phase — may conduct an ‘airmobile’ assault against any vacant enemy non-city territory within two spaces of their starting position. Only one type of combat unit in the game has no movement capability at all: US Laser sites, once placed in a city space, are completely immobile.

Unlike AXIS & ALLIES (1981), FORTRESS AMERICA includes rules for both stacking and supply. Stacking restrictions apply to all players at all times: no player may position more than five combat units in a single territory at any point in the game turn; moreover, units forced to retreat in excess of this stacking limit are eliminated, instead. The one exception to this rule involves the use of bombers: an attacking player may stack up to five bombers directly in an enemy-occupied territory (they are bombing the space from above) during a battle. However, bombers performing this mission cannot capture the enemy space even if it is completely cleared of defenders; capture of the vacated enemy territory may only be accomplished by adjacent supporting combat units. Supply requirements differ significantly for the two sides: American units are always in supply, no matter what; Invader units, however, must trace a supply path from the territory they occupy through friendly-occupied or controlled spaces back to an appropriate (force-specific) ‘landing zone’. Any Invader units that cannot trace such a route during the Supply Check phase of the game turn are eliminated immediately.

The combat rules of FORTRESS AMERICA are, quite probably, the most interesting feature of the game system. Unlike AXIS & ALLIES, combat in FORTRESS AMERICA is sequential and NOT simultaneous: the defender fires first and surviving attackers are not allowed to fire until all defending units have completed their attacks and losses (if any) have been subtracted from the attacker’s engaged forces. The actual resolution of individual battles is vaguely reminiscent of the combat procedures for AXIS & ALLIES and WAR AT SEA (1975): a die is rolled for each unit involved in a battle and the outcome of this attack can be either a miss, a hit (the target unit is eliminated) or a retreat/disengagement result (roughly comparable to a ‘disabled’ result in WAS). However, unlike the battle procedures in AXIS & ALLIES and WAR AT SEA, there is only one round of firing in a battle. Moreover, the game’s procedures for resolving combat are different from these alternative titles in a couple of other ways, as well. To begin with, FORTRESS AMERICA includes three distinct (four, if you count Lasers) classes of combat units: infantry, mechanized, and air. Each of these three classes differs in terms of which types of hostile units it may attack: infantry may only attack enemy infantry (if present); mechanized may only attack other mechanized or infantry; only air units (and Lasers) may engage any enemy unit that the attacking player chooses. In addition to these restrictions, each class of unit uses a different type of die to resolve combat: a six-sided die is used when infantry attacks; an eight-sided for mechanized; and a ten-sided die for air units and Lasers. Since hits are typically scored with a die roll of ‘five’ or higher, this use of alternative dice for the three categories of units translates directly into significant variations in the different types of units’ combat power. When resolving battles, fires are conducted, when possible, against enemy units which are equal to or of a lower ‘class’ than that of the firing units. This means, for example, that while infantry can typically only target enemy infantry, mechanized units could — at the owning player’s option — shoot at either mechanized or infantry units. Interestingly, two types of terrain, City Territories and Mountain Territories — although they have no effect on movement — can directly influence combat by increasing the die roll necessary for an attacker to hit a defending unit. The attacking player can negate this defensive advantage, however, by conducting a ‘combined arms’ attack; that is: an assault that, even after defensive fire, is still composed of infantry, mechanized, and air units. The American Lasers, which steadily increase in numbers as the game wears on, represent a special case. These powerful units can attack any Invader unit on the game map and are unaffected either by the defender’s terrain or by the range of the attack. There is only one limitation on the U.S. commander’s use of these weapons: no more than one Laser attack may be conducted against a single territory on any given game turn.

Victory in FORTRESS AMERICA depends on the control of American City Territories. Thus, the game is won — in the case of the Invading player or players — by capturing and holding eighteen of the thirty U.S. city territories through the end of the American player turn. In those games in which there are more than two players, the invader who controls the most cities (assuming the eighteen city requirement has been met) is the winner. The American player wins by simply avoiding the Invader conditions of victory.

FORTRESS AMERICA, like its ‘distant cousin’ AXIS & ALLIES, does not offer any alternative scenarios. However, what it does include — in addition to the several multi-player versions of the game — is a number of optional rules to balance play in those games in which either the skills or the experience levels of the opposing players differ markedly. These handy designer suggestions make it particularly easy to introduce brand new players to the game and, at the same time, to still insure that such an introductory match is both a challenging and enjoyable contest for everyone involved.
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A PERSONAL OBSERVATION

As anyone who has taken the time to read my game profiles of AFTER THE HOLOCAUST (1977) and DUNE (1979) can surmise, I am not, as a general rule, particularly fond of Sci-Fi wargames. Hypothetical conflict simulations like FULDA GAP (1977) or THE NEXT WAR (1978) which are — ostensibly, at least — based on good faith estimates of (then) existing force structures and contemporaneous military doctrines fall, in my view, into a completely different category; these types of games, because they are moored to reality, I often find both informative and fun to experiment with and play. In contrast, my feelings about most pure science fiction games usually falls somewhere between mild dislike and outright loathing. There are probably a number of reasons for my prejudice against this speculative genre of wargames, but the most compelling is probably that, with very few exceptions, these titles tend to be both poorly conceived and sloppily executed. I don’t know why, but even good designers seem to get a little silly when they work with science fiction topics. Even more importantly — for me, at least — these game designs rarely turn out to be either particularly interesting or even much fun to play.

There is, of course, always the exception to any rule. And in my case, that exception is the (near future) science fiction game, FORTRESS AMERICA. Against all odds, I have to confess that I really like this cleverly-designed, and nicely executed ‘hypothetical invasion of the U.S.’ board game quite a lot; which is, I have to confess, a bit surprising because I really detested SPI’s tedious and poorly-conceived treatment of virtually the same topic, INVASION: AMERICA (1976). Although the older Dunnigan game attempted to break some new ground, the novelty of using ‘untried units’ added nothing of real value to the SPI game and the air rules were a shambles. Not everyone, of course, will share my deep disappointment with the 1976 SPI title, but at least it appears that, when it comes to FORTRESS AMERICA, I am not alone in my positive opinion of the newer game. According to http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/99/fortress-america, FORTRESS AMERICA currently holds an impressive ‘Geek’ (approval) rating of 6.70/10. This is no mean accomplishment for a game that was published almost a quarter century ago; and that, when it first appeared, was referred to dismissively by more than a few old-time players — myself, included — as “RISK (1959) on Steroids.” That all changed for me and, I suspect for many other players after my first real attempt at playing the game as it was actually intended, with three experienced opponents. The plastic playing pieces may have given the title a CHUTES AND LADDERS (1943) look, but the actual game, I discovered, played very well.

I also suspect that one of the reasons that FORTRESS AMERICA has held up as strongly as it has over time is that the game can be either as simple or as subtle as individual players want to make it. For the casual gamer, it is a fast-moving and exciting slugging match between powerful and relentless Invaders and out-numbered, but tenacious Americans: a sort of board game version of the movie, “Red Dawn.” On the other hand, despite this game’s (hopefully) unlikely premise, its simple game system along with its sometimes wild unpredictability both combine to increase its ‘beer and pretzels’ appeal to the more adventuresome among hardcore players. Of course, for some people in the hobby, games like FORTRESS AMERICA that use little plastic figures of infantrymen, planes and tanks are never going to be that appealing; I understand this prejudice only too well as I was once guilty of it, myself. Nonetheless, speaking as someone who has actually played hundreds of different titles over the years, including a variety of monster games — I and several of my friends, for example, belong to that very small band of dedicated (crazy?) players who have actually played both DNO/UNT (1973) and WAR IN THE EAST (1974) to some sort of historically legitimate conclusion — I personally think that the game architecture of FORTRESS AMERICA contains a number of elements that should intrigue seasoned players. Nor do I offer this endorsement of the game without a bit of thought.

For one thing, FORTRESS AMERICA has a surprising amount of variability and depth built into its relatively simple design platform. Starting with a dystopian ‘future war’ invasion scenario, the game presents its players with a classic military situation: a dispersed, unprepared defender suddenly forced to fight against powerful enemy forces which are all attacking simultaneously on several separate and unconnected fronts. For another, the action-packed, easy-to-learn game system of FORTRESS AMERICA along with its simple ‘move-fight-move’ turn sequence allows players to focus on the strategic elements of the individual battles for control of territories, rather than become bogged down by complicated and confusing rules, and overly-detailed game subroutines. In short, the logical simplicity of the game system allows players to focus their attention on the type of campaign that they want to wage, their short-term and long-range strategic goals, and the territorial gains necessary to fulfill their strategic goals as the game progresses.

Every game of FORTRESS AMERICA will tend to follow its own unique slightly different trajectory because every game will see the U.S. player draw his random ‘Partisan Cards’ in a different order. Nonetheless, some events will repeat themselves in game after game. For example, competent play on the part of the Invading forces’ different commanders will almost always produce rapid Invader territorial gains; famous American cities, one after another, will fall. However, as the campaign grinds on, the once irresistible invading armies will gradually lose combat power through constant battlefield attrition, and the interlopers’ garrisons in the rear areas will steadily become more and more vulnerable to sudden, violent attacks from American partisan forces. Because of this built in game dynamic, most contests will become a ‘nail-biting’ race by the foreign attackers to crush the last pockets of American resistance before the steady influx of fresh units, Lasers, and partisans finally turns the tide against the invading armies. Often, as the game approaches its conclusion — sometime between the sixth to eighth game turn — victory or defeat will hang on the outcomes of a few final, all-or-nothing battles fought for the control of one or two key cities in the American heartland. In addition, unlike many of the more complicated, denser invasion games that have appeared over the years, FORTRESS AMERICA requires only a few hours to play, and not the many, many hours of concerted table-time that most of these other, more detailed, titles demand.

FORTRESS AMERICA, despite its many good points, is still probably not for everyone. Traditional players with a taste for complicated, richly-textured simulations with elaborate, multi-phase game systems will undoubtedly find this title both too simple and, because of its use of plastic game figures, just a bit too juvenile for their liking. Nonetheless, I heartily recommend FORTRESS AMERICA to almost any other type of player, from rank beginner to seasoned expert. In short, FORTRESS AMERICA is a great introductory game, a blast to play for casual players, and still manages to deliver an exciting, surprise-filled change of pace for experienced gamers.

For those players who are interested in game variants or would like additional information relating to FORTRESS AMERICA, or to any of the other AXIS & ALLIES - based games, visit: http://www.grognard.com/ .

Design Characteristics:

• Time Scale: 1 week per game turn (estimated)
• Map Scale: not given (area movement)
• Unit Size: brigade/division, air wing (estimated)
• Unit Types: infantry, partisans (USA only), mobile unit, hovertank, helicopter, bomber, laser complex (USA only) and city markers
• Number of Players: two to four (best with four players)
• Complexity: average
• Solitaire Suitability: above average
• Average Playing Time: 3 + hours

Game Components:

• One 19½” x 33” area movement Map Board (with Terrain Key and Invasion Zones incorporated)
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• 313 plastic Military Pieces (extra replacement pieces are included)
• 45 City and Laser Pieces (extra replacement pieces are included)
• One 8½” x 11” FORTRESS AMERICA Gameplay Manual (2nd Edition)
• One 8” x 10” back-printed Reference Card
• 30 USA Partisan Cards
• 90 back-printed cardboard Control/Battle Markers
• 12 back-printed cardboard Laser Markers
• 12 six to ten-sided Dice
• One 8½” x 11” Game Piece Removal Instructions
• One 8½” x 11” Milton Bradley Product Ad Slick
• One 4½” x 12” x 20” Game Box (with 32 compartment Storage Tray)

Recommended Related Viewing

This MGM feature film directed by John Milius and released in 1984 stars Patrick Swayze, C. Thomas Howell, Lea Thompson, Jennifer Grey and Charlie Sheen with Powers Boothe and Harry Dean Stanton.  It envisions a similar invasion of America and is available in both a Collector's Edition and Blu-Ray.

AUTOMATIC VICTORY AND CAPTURED SUPPLY

INTRODUCTION

After forty-six years, it would be logical to assume that the rules of few games are as free of controversy or as well understood as those of AFRIKA KORPS. Reams of paper have been devoted in the General to answering rules questions, as well as to analyzing — down to the tiniest detail — virtually every aspect of the play of the game. Thus, I was surprised, in the course of a recent PBeM match with a very accomplished and skilled opponent, to discover that an AFRIKA KORPS tactic that I had thought was generally well-known to seasoned players was, in fact, only vaguely familiar to my adversary. The tactic in question is that of using a captured enemy supply to overrun a second enemy line that would, were it not for the use of the opponent’s own supply unit, be safe from a conventional attack. In the case of this particular tournament match, the use of this offensive tactic brought about the almost total collapse of my opponent’s position; his resignation followed one turn later.

Ignorance may well be bliss in some things, but it is usually a recipe for defeat when sitting across from a knowledgeable opponent at the game table. So it was in the aforementioned match. The sudden, decisive end to this particular PBeM contest did, however, start me thinking. If a player as experienced as my adversary was unprepared for the tactical ploy that beat him in our game, then it is highly likely that more than a few other AFRIKA KORPS aficionados might also be ignorant of both the dangers and the opportunities presented by this type of battlefield situation. That being said, this essay will consider the specific AFRIKA KORPS rules that, when taken together, make this tactical approach possible. It will then conclude with a specific example of just how this type of offensive opportunity might arise in a typical game and, more importantly, how it can be exploited by the attacker.

THE CORE OF THE ‘AFRIKA KORPS’ GAME SYSTEM

The play of Charles Roberts’ classic game, AFRIKA KORPS, is largely driven — for those newer players who are unfamiliar with this venerable old title — by two design elements which, when taken together, give this game its unique character and special appeal: mobile supply counters and automatic victory. Of course, the presence of these design features does not seem particularly unorthodox by today’s standards; nonetheless, they were both startling innovations when they first appeared on the gaming scene over four and a half decades ago. Moreover, the critical roles performed by both the supply and automatic victory (AV) rules in controlling the flow and tempo of the game — and not nostalgia for the “good old days” — are, without doubt, the main factors in maintaining this game’s ongoing popularity among long-term players like me, even after all these years.

Beans and Bullets: Supply in AFRIKA KORPS

Interestingly, Avalon Hill took something of a chance when it published the first edition of AFRIKA KORPS in 1964. This is because, although a design that pitted Rommel’s Deutsches Afrika Korps (DAK) against Montgomery’s British Eighth Army was a natural subject for a conflict simulation, the introduction of a much more detailed supply subroutine into an otherwise fairly conventional World War II game — notwithstanding the game publisher's earlier experiment with somewhat more complicated supply rules in the first version of D-DAY (1961) — insured that AFRIKA KORPS still represented a significant break from Avalon Hill’s previous commercial offerings. Nonetheless, the gamble paid off, and Charles Roberts’ decision to incorporate a limited number of mobile supply units — three for the Axis and four for the Commonwealth — into the AFRIKA KORPS counter-mix turned out to be exactly the right choice when it came to giving the game its own distinct simulation feel. In addition, the game’s ground-breaking logistical rules also required supporting supply counters to be within five hexes of all units attacking at 1 to 2 or better odds, and for any supplies used by the attacker to be removed from the map after the combat phase. This set of requirements made the task of the attacking player a lot more interesting and, because of the challenges that it created, proved to be a valuable addition to the design architecture of Avalon Hill’s first game on the North African Campaign.

Another truly clever aspect of Roberts’ approach to the battle in the Western Desert was the imposition of chance — through variable supply tables and die-rolling — on the availability of Axis supplies. In essence, the designer made the arrival of supplies automatic for the Commonwealth, but he made incoming supplies a function of changing probabilities for the Axis. This feature, besides being a persistent source of aggravation to countless Axis players over the years, also added a nice bit of uncertainty and a distinctly historical flavor to the cardboard battle for North Africa. What this intriguing little wrinkle in the supply rules really meant, however, was that — unlike the other Avalon Hill games of the day — AFRIKA KORPS absolutely required the Axis player to stockpile supplies in preparation for each major offensive effort. Moreover, the severe limitations imposed by the game’s logistical rules also obliged the DAK’s commander to carefully weigh the pros and cons of each battle before actually expending any of his precious and often difficult-to-replace supply units. This unavoidable ‘cost-benefit’ calculus inevitably created an offensive 'balancing act' for the Axis player because every time a would-be Rommel launched an attack, he did so with the knowledge that it might be a very long time before a replacement for his newly-expended supply counter made its way back to the front.

The final and, in some ways, most interesting feature that Roberts incorporated into his supply rules for desert warfare was the ability of an opposing player to seize and then use captured enemy supplies. In AFRIKA KORPS, an unaccompanied enemy supply counter can be ‘captured’ and immediately converted to a friendly supply unit anytime that an enemy player’s combat unit moves adjacent to the unprotected friendly supply. Moreover, even when a supply unit is stacked with a friendly unit, it can still be captured by means of a soak-off attack, by conventional combat, or through an automatic victory attack. Still more nerve-racking for a defender: any unaccompanied or AV’d supply counter that is seized by an enemy unit can be moved and used by the phasing player — on any game turn, including that of capture — to support other attacks within the ‘captured’ supply unit’s movement range and supply radius. This section of the AFRIKA KORPS supply rules, as we shall shortly see, can produce some very promising (for the attacker) and equally dangerous (for the defender) game situations. However, before moving on to consider the opportunities for creative play that the AFRIKA KORPS supply rules make possible, a brief look at another critically important feature of the game system is probably in order. And a good place to begin is with a further review of the somewhat unusual history of Avalon Hill’s classic game on the battle for North Africa.

Automatic Victory: The Rule that Revolutionized Wargaming

In the course of finishing his design work on AFRIKA KORPS, Charles Roberts ran into a seemingly intractable problem during the new game’s ‘play-testing’ phase: time after time, one or two weak British brigades would completely block the eastward progress of the Deutsches Afrika Korps. No matter what the Axis player tried — when faced with a competent Commonwealth opponent — Rommel simply could not win. The problem was that there were simply too many British units, too few Axis supplies, and too many map hexes between Tripoli and Alexandria for the DAK to cover in thirty-eight game turns. Something radical needed to be done.

Enter Thomas Shaw. Shaw’s solution to Roberts’ problem was as simple as it was ingenious: unlike the combat rules in previous Avalon Hill titles such as WATERLOO (1962) and STALINGRAD (1963) in which weak units could be sacrificed — whatever the odds against them — to effectively block the advance of much stronger enemy forces for a single game turn, Shaw came up with a radically different approach to combat for AFRIKA KORPS. Shaw’s innovative rules change stipulated that attacks at 7 to 1 or 5 to 1 (surrounded) immediately eliminated the effectiveness of the defending unit and cancelled its zone of control; he decided to dub this special type of combat with the somewhat eponymous title: ‘automatic victory’ (AV).

Tom Shaw’s inspired creation of the ‘automatic victory’ type of battle — basically a form of attack in which the hitherto separate game operations of movement and combat are combined — has to stand as one of the truly great innovations in the history of game design. Moreover, this dramatic change in the combat rules of AFRIKA KORPS completely transformed the play dynamics of Roberts’ creation and, at the same time, also laid the groundwork for virtually all of the many ‘overrun’ movement/combat systems that have become widely-accepted within the hobby, today.

The inclusion of ‘automatic victory’ as a new type of combat went a long way towards opening up the battlefield in AFRIKA KORPS. However, subsequent AV rules interpretations, culminating in the publication by Avalon Hill of the game’s Third Edition rules in 1980, transformed it. The most important 3^rd Edition rules clarification pertaining to ‘automatic victory’ was in the realm of establishing supply to units performing AV attacks. What happened was that, in the course of clarifying and expanding the AFRIKA KORPS game rules in 1980, Don Greenwood made explicit a unique characteristic of AV supply that had first emerged in the Q & A section of the Avalon Hill General many years before.

This special AV rule had to do with when and how the mandatory five-hex path between AVing units and their sustaining supply counters was to be traced. On this point, Greenwood was clear: any units performing an ‘automatic victory’ attack were required to be within the legal (five-hex) supply range at the moment that the ‘automatic victory’ was first established; however, the sustaining supply could then move out of range of the AVing units, so long as attack supply was restored before the conclusion of the phasing player’s combat phase. This AV rule, when used in concert with the rules governing the ‘capture’ of enemy supplies, can produce a devastating ‘one-two punch’ for the attacker. Moreover, this combination of AV and supply capture is not just a threat to the unwary novice; more than a few seasoned players — in games both past and present — have also succumbed to this bit of tactical ‘slight of hand’. For this reason, I counsel AFRIKA KORPS players, whatever their level of experience, to always be on the lookout for the battlefield conditions that create these types of opportunities: they may occur infrequently, but when they do, they are almost always ‘game breakers’.

USING CAPTURED SUPPLY FOR AUTOMATIC VICTORIES

Setting the Scene: A ‘Real World’ Example

To help readers visualize what can happen in the course of play when the special type of AFRIKA KORPS combat situation that permits an 'AV supply capture breakthrough’ arises, a series of game maps have been included to illustrate both this unique battlefield opportunity and its offensive exploitation. These maps are not, by the way, hypothetical examples. Instead, they are the exact records of the moves that occurred in the course of the previously mentioned tournament match between me and the other expert AFRIKA KORPS player who, despite decades of experience, had never personally run across this tactic prior to our game. Also, for brevity’s sake, only map illustrations for the final three moves from the match in question have been included; thus, the locations of the Axis and Commonwealth forces are displayed beginning with the unit positions prior to the British September II ’41 player turn and culminating, two turns later, with the unit positions at the end of the Axis portion of the October II ’41 game turn.

September II ’41 Positions Prior to the British Move

West Map Section September II '41 Game Turn

The September II ’41 game turn finds the British commander in very difficult straights. During the just-concluded Axis player turn, the DAK has eliminated three British units (all 1-1-6s) in hexes Q62, L60, and K59 at a cost of a single supply counter. Moreover, the Axis player has enjoyed fabulous luck with his supply rolls: in fact, he has two more supply units racing towards the front, and an extra captured supply counter already in the battle area; and he has yet to lose a single unit in combat. The Commonwealth commander, on the other hand, has suffered very heavy casualties and finds himself with his back to the wall: he is rapidly running out of both space and units; moreover, desperately needed reinforcements are still three turns away. Rommel is virtually guaranteed to launch three more attacks before the Allied portion of the November I game turn, so, unless the British player does something dramatic, Alexandria is doomed to fall. With his Home Base on the verge of capitulation, the British player asks himself the obvious question: "What can be done to dramatically turn things around?"

October I ’41 Positions Prior to the British Move

October II ’41 Positions Prior to the British Move

Tobruk Front October II Game Turn

The German retreat is both welcome and expected by the Allied commander. However, with Rommel now apparently poised to strike at Tobruch, the overly-ambitious British player makes a fatal blunder during his October I player turn. He has become mesmerized by the possibility of holding the fortified port through the Axis portion of the November I ’41 game turn (two more Axis attacks), so he sends the 7/7 Mechanized Brigade out to sea. At the same time, he brings Supply #2 and 4I/7 into Tobruch and swaps the weak infantry brigade for the 2/3 Armored Brigade in H25. Because Rommel only has a single supply unit that can reach the Alexandria battle area, he confidently walks into the Desert Fox’s trap by first moving 5I/29 into the blocking position at K49 and then by establishing a second line anchored on the Alam Halfa Ridge. The Allied player has grown steadily more optimistic about his chances: the dispatch of a powerful unit to reinforce the fortress garrison may yet preserve British control of Tobruch until November, and with his El Alamein line beyond the reach of any Axis supply that is supporting an attack against K49, the Commonwealth player feels that the worst has passed. He is wrong; the weakness of the El Alamein position along with the unprotected supply counter garrisoning Alexandria will be his downfall.
The British move creates just the opportunity that Rommel has been waiting for. The Desert Fox seizes the chance both to restore the Axis position around the Allied-controlled fortress and, at the same time, to crush the British forces defending at El Alamein. Rommel strikes without hesitation. As his first order of business, the Axis commander moves to reestablish his siege of Tobruch by attacking the British outpost unit (4I/7) on H25 at 3 to 1 (surrounded). An exchange is not particularly worrying as Division Savena will reach the fortress perimeter just in time to completely seal in the port’s garrison on November I, even if one of the attacking divisions is lost in combat. The real action, however, is in the east. Here the DAK begins with a 6 to 1 (surrounded) AV attack against 5I/29 on hex K49. This critical first combat is sustained at the moment of the AV by captured Supply #4 which then proceeds past the now ineffective Allied block to its final position on M59. The rest of the DAK surges east through the Matruh Gap right behind Supply #4. The next target on the Axis “hit parade” is 7/3I Motor which is overwhelmed by the two German panzer regiments at 7 to 1. This attack, like the preceding overrun is also sustained at the moment of the AV by the ‘hard-working’ Axis captured Supply #4. This second attack allows 15/115 and 15/33 to advance past the main Commonwealth block at M61. The 15/33 Reconnaissance Battalion continues on to end its move adjacent to the Allied Home Base and British Supply #4. Because the Allied supply unit in Alexandria is unprotected, it is automatically captured, converted to Axis captured Supply #5, and is then promptly dispatched west to restore supply to the original overrunning Italian divisions on hexes L49 and J49. To complete the destruction of the British forces around El Alamein, Rommel posts 15/115 to complete the encirclement of the two Allied brigades covering the Coast Road and, at the same time, orders his last two remaining units to attack 7/7 S.G. at 5 to 1. Rommel’s communiqué to Berlin and Rome is a short one; it reads only: “Alexandria ist gefallen.”

CONCLUSION

Recommended Reading

See my blog post Book Reviews of these titles; both of which are strongly recommended for those readers interested in further historical background.