I have finally found the computer war game I have been looking for all these years. Strategic Simulations Inc. (SSI) has published Steel Panthers, a tactical simulation of all the fronts of World War II. This game combines all of the factors necessary to make a great game. The graphics are beautiful, the interface is easy to use, the rules make sense, and the battles have a realistic feel to them.
The ground scale is one hex equals 50 yards. Units are individual tanks, guns, and aircraft, with infantry squads and crews. There are off-board artillery batteries, and for beach landing, destroyers, cruisers, battleships, and battlecrusiers.
To quote SSI: The game has "over 200 tanks, 120 types of weapons, and over a dozen unique infantry squads....There are over 60 individual scenarios, eight set campaigns,..and one 'Long Campaign' in which you choose any one of the major nations, a starting year of the war, and play vs. the computer until the end of the war. . ." In addition to the scenarios included, there is a game editor so that you can make your own maps and scenarios.
The map contains many types of terrain. You can have the basic grass terrain, or swamps, rough, streams, rivers, woods, jungles, wheat fields, green crops, high grass, beach, and three hill heights. To the natural terrain, you can add man made buildings and roads. The wooden, concrete, and government building can then have light or heavy damage added to them. Finally, to speed your movement, there are dirt and paved roads.
To get you started there is a tutorial using the first campaign, the invasion of Poland. The tutorial walks you through choosing you force, deployment, and the initial moves for the first battle. The graphical user interface is excellent. The icons are mostly intuitive, and have a explanation on the screen for which ever one your pointer is on. As you get familiar with the game you can use the keyboard instead of the icons for quicker play.
Besides the Polish campaign, there is a France 40, a Russian Front, a Western Front, including Africa, and a Pacific campaign. The progression of scenarios in each campaign makes sense, and are accompanied by some excellent full motion video. The rationale for each scenario makes sense, and the victory conditions are reasonable. Each individual unit has its own information graphic. This graphics provides all of the data needed to use the unit. The unit's leader and his rally capability, along with his skill at commanding infantry, artillery, and armor is listed. Types and current quantities of ammo are listed. Technical information, such as gun type(s), armor, and speed are listed. Finally, each unit has its own experience and morale levels which are tracked on this chart.
Battles
Now for the most important part, the battles. Each battle takes place on a large map which allows plenty of room for maneuvering, feints, and flanking attacks. A top- down view provides an excellent look at the battlefield. You can adjust the magnification to get close ups of the action, or pull back to get the big picture. As the battle progresses, the battlefield becomes clogged with smoke from burning hulks, gunfire, and smoke rounds. The terrain ends up being significantly different by the end of the fight. Heavy artillery and bombs create a cratered landscape where fields and buildings stood before. As woods and buildings take hits they may catch on fire, adding to the confusion, and blocking fines of sight.
Fighting can cause several different results to units. As units receive fire and take casualties they become pinned, begin to retreat, rout, or even surrender. Units can be rallied and pushed back into the fighting. One of my small personal successes was rallying a 88mm flak crew and getting it to reman its gun after they ran
The game is one of combined arms, with each unit type having its place in the overall scheme of things. Individual armored vehicles have limited visibility and are susceptible to close infantry assault. Infantry has the ability to see better, moves through rough terrain, and performs specialized tasks. One of the special things infantry can do is clear minefields and use demolition charges to attack units and fortifications. Artillery can soften up suspected enemy positions and provide smoke screens to cover your advance. Aircraft acts as mobile artillery, and will attack enemy units it sees during its attack run.
Whatever you do, do not forget the transport vehicles. Important things like 88mm flak guns have no movement capability. If you want them to keep up with the advancing units to provide support, they need prime movers.
Besides the fun of just playing and fighting the battles, the game has had a number of highlights for me. Using engineers to close assault enemy infantry and tanks is a hoot. As part of the attack, engineers use demo-charges. You see the charges go off, and the resulting smoke and craters. Then a message flashes across the bottom of the screen, enemy squad destroyed. When the bombs and artillery lands, buildings turn to rubble or burst into flames. Tanks can rumble through buildings, which also reduces the buildings to rubble. I also enjoy forcing enemy units to surrender.
I felt the fighting to be realistic. During the Polish campaign the results of the fighting seemed realistic. Polish infantry and cavalry, which had little if any anti-tank capability, was easily killed and routed by armored vehicles, even machine gun armed halftracks. However, the Polish tanks were able to knock out German tanks, and were more than just targets for the Germans. For the German player who gets caught up in blitzing enemy units there are the hazards of minefields. In several scenarios my heaviest casualties were from mines, not enemy fire.
Finally, you can watch your units gain experience and skill. As they continue through the campaign the units can achieve veteran or elite status. Leaders get promotions and improve their skill levels. Of course, especially in the long campaigns, you must preserve your leadership. New leaders are nowhere near the quality of the originals. I must say I love this game.
The only weakness is the instruction booklet. While it covers most of the necessary items, it is light on the details. This, however, is a minor quibble. I would recommend this game to any World War II gamer, anyone interested in combined arms, or people who just like a good challenge.
Miniatures
Miniature manufacturers continue to expand their lines. Quality Castings released several new items in November. The German PZ V, Panther A has been redone along with new versions of the Panther D and G. The JG PZ V TD has also been redone. The four vehicles each sell for $6.75. Four German flak units have been added, an 88mm flak 36 ($7.50), a 2cm flak 38 ground mount ($3.00), a 3.7cm flak gnd mt ($5.00), and a 2cm quad flak grid mt ($5.00). All come with trailer units and crew.
Three American items have also been released, an US 105mm howitzer ($4.75), an US 3 inch ATG, ($3.50), and a modem US 7.62mm MG vehicular pedestal mount ($1.50 for 3). Rounding out the weapons are a UK 17 pdr ATG and a Russian GAZ AAA heavy truck for $3.50 and $6.00 respectively.
To help you organize units, there is Gamer's Guide to WWII Small Unit Organizations & TOE's for $7.00. Finally, there are three new figures for .50 each, an Italian officer firing pistol, Russian advancing w/ATR, and a German flak crewman holding a 37mm ammo clip. Quality Castings address is: P.O. Box 11714, Alexandria, VA, 22312, USA
Figures Armor and Artillery from England has several new releases. For the BEF in France in 1940 there are eleven new items. Platoon Command (4 figs.), NCO w/rifle & bren team adv, riflemen advancing, NCO w/rifle & bren team firing, riflemen firing, 2" mortar team adv/firing (4), Boyes A/T rifle adv/firing (4), gun crew (5), Vickers MMG & crew firing (4), 3" mortar and crw firiing (4), and a command Post (5). The Waffen-SS have three new items, a 5cm mortar team adv/firing (4), a A/T rifle team adv/firing (4), and a field/ATG crew (5). Additions to late war German infantry are casualties (4), skirmishing MG42 team in smock, and 8cm mortar crew moving. Two guns have been added, a 2cm flak30 w/trlp. and crew, and a 6pdr MK4 ATG. For a complete listing and prices the address is: 17 Oakfield Drive, Upton Heath, Chester CH2 ILG, phone is 01244 379399.
By now I guess you hve noticed our new format. We have a lot of new and exciting projects coming up this year and I would like to devote this first editorial to explaining what they are. We are trying to make Combat Simulations the best war game magazine on the market. We hope you stay with us during our growing pains and if you do, were going to give you hours of good reading and gaming fun.
We are going to have new departments headed by an Editor, whose job it is to keep you (hopefully) entertained, informed, and involved with their columns. We will have a wonderful new column called "SCUTTLEBUTT". In this column you may ask any questions of any of our Editors or you may take them to task on something that they messed up on when they were writing their columns. That's right we want feedback from you about what we are doing. Don't be afraid to drop us a line about something that you may take issue with us on.
Please remember everyone makes mistakes at one time or another and we're no exception to that rule so please feel free to point them out to us. Some times we'll make those mistakes just to see if your on your toes. Anyway, write us so that we can get some dialogue started in this column.
Our next column will be "Paint it, Fix it, Build it" and wait till you see the work that Marty does. After a few columns you will be painting and scratch building stuff that you have never dreamed about.
Marty has built replicas from the Napoleonic era and Midevile Castles and is the Chief Architect of VOGELSDORF which is a 6 foot by 4 foot section of a completely blown up town. You'll be seeing a lot more of this town when we do articles on street fighting. Move over Ian Weekly, Martin Baber is in town.
Just as any group that plays with one set of rules, our group has added some new house rules that seem to play well. Battalions in Crisis are the best WWII rules on the market and all games reported on in this magazine will be using these rules.
And that brings me to our next future column. The "Rules Lawyer's Corner", we will discuss some of our house rules and some of our rules interpretation that make our game flow well. We, also would like to hear about your house rules and discuss any holes you might think are, in the rules.
Tactics, tactics, tactics that's what wins wars and war games. We have found that using sound battlefield tactics on the War Game table usually help us win . Our next column is on tactics and organizations. Please read this column carefully, it'll help you win a lot of games. And again we welcome any letters from any of you who feel that you can contribute some information on tactics or combat information. Angelo Giardano is our general and will be writing this column, he's the first one killed when we played paint ball.
Mike Kelly, our founder will still be doing Historical articles and scenarios that will challenge even the best war gamer around. He will also be guiding us through the maze of publishing rules that we know nothing about.
Also helping to guide us will be Mitch Freedman. Mitch is a very accomplished writer and historian and will also be jumping in and writing sorne historical articles and also do some narrative on some of the games that we will be recreating for your reading pleasure.
Jerry Lannigan is another of our distinguished staff of writers and will be doing narratives on games played and also historical articles. Jerry is also an accomplished figure painter.
We also have a fine photographer on staff. Kirk Gostkowski is well known for his work. He will be
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© Copyright 1996 by Mike Vogell and Phoenix Military Simulations.
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