with Andrew Haught
V4 Late War is here with loads of ways to get into playing Flames Of War— so where do you start? Well, if you want to just get a feel for the rules the FURY is an amazing box set for you, or if you want to get into the game with a friend, Hit the Beach gives you two awesome armies to play against each other. If you have some idea of what force you want to run, then picking up the corresponding Starter Force box set is what you want to do.
This German Box gives you a lot of stuff to play around with right away, like all the V4 boxsets you get a lot for your money. The German Starter Force has a total of 14 vehicles, 2 big 8.8 AA guns, a rocket artillery battery and a full Grenadier platoon, with the whole army adding up to 95 points using the German D-Day book. On top of models you will get a complete A5 rulebook, a Start Here booklet, and your Unit cards, so you can start playing games as soon as you’re done building your force.
In The Box
Panzer IV Tank Company HQ with 2x Panzer IV (7.5cm) Tanks (11 Points)
Panzer IV Tank Platoon with 3x Panzer IV (7.5cm) Tanks (16 Points)
Tiger Tank Platoon with 2x Tiger (8.8cm) Tanks (24 points)
Armoured Panzergrenadier Platoon at Full Strength (12 Points)
Fallschirmjäger Stug Assault Gun Platoon with 3x StuG (7.5cm) Assault Guns (17 Points)
15cm Nebelwerfer Rocket Battery with 3x 15cm Nebelwerfer Rocket Launchers (9 Points)
8.8 Heavy AA Platoon with 2x 8.8cm AA Guns (6 Points)
Total 95 Points
Creating a 100 Point List
This box gives almost a full 100 point list, only 5 points shy, so there is not much you need to add to make it a full 100 point list. I think after playing around with your Starter force you may get a good feel for what you want to add but for those who want to start off with a full 100 points I would simply add a Puma Scout Platoon, this only gets us to 99 points, so adding a 1 point Command Card (starting with D-Day: German) gets us to a total of 100 points. So to get to 100 points all you need to add is the following,
Puma Scout Platoon with 2x Puma (5cm) Tanks (4 Points)
Lucky Command Card (1 Point)
Total 5 Points
Army Tactics
This army is well rounded with artillery, infantry, heavy anti-tank guns, and a great selection of tanks. With the core of your force I would recommend attacking with this force. Your mix of tanks gives you loads of good options to knock out your opponent’s tanks. The Tigers being some of your best anti-tank should focus more on your opponents heavy armour, supported by the 8.8 AA guns. Use your artillery to soften your opponent’s defences and use your German Halftrack infantry and Tanks to assault their objectives and to win the game.
Hobby League
If you are looking to get in on the Hobby League at your local store or club the Starter Forces are ideal starting armies for the league. If you add the units I talked about before in the Creating a 100 Point List section you can easily use it for the hobby league.
If you do not know what the hobby league is or want to learn more check out our video about the Hobby League above.
The main goal of the Hobby league is to create a Flames Of War community where players can come together to play games and work on their armies. To this end players are rewarded for hitting certain painting goals throughout the league. The first month players aim to paint 50 points, at the end of the second month players will aim to finish another 25 points and at the end of the third month players aim to finish their final 25 points and end the League with a fully painted 100 point army. The League also feeds into the upcoming TableTopGaming Global campaign, so if you finish painting your army for the League you will be ready to participate in the Global Campaign.
Month 1 has a 50 point goal; it also ends in a 50 point tournament, so you will want to focus on your core formation to make sure you have a legal list to run in the tournament. For this I would paint the following units first,
Panzer IV Tank Company HQ with 2x Panzer IV (7.5cm) Tanks (11 Points)
Panzer IV Tank Platoon with 3x Panzer IV (7.5cm) Tanks (16 Points)
Tiger Tank Platoon with 2x Tiger (8.8cm) Tanks (24 points)
Strictly-speaking, this is 51 points but fine enough for the 50 point tournament as it is close enough, it will be up to your event organizer to make the final call on these things but all the core set 50 point armies listed in these articles are fine to run in the Hobby league 50 point tournament.
Month 2 you are looking to paint another 25 points, you just painted core so let’s work on some more support and some Recon,
- Armoured Panzer Grenadier Platoon at Full Strength (12 Points)
- 15cm Nebelwerfer Rocket Battery with 3x 15cm Nebelwerfer Rocket Launchers (9 Points)
- Puma Scout Platoon with 2x Puma (5cm) Tanks (4 Points)
For the Final month I would focus on the last bits, tactically you can add your 1 point command card here to your list’s HQ, and this will round out your 100 point list,
- Fallschirmjäge Stug Assault Gun Platoon with 3x StuG (7.5cm) Assault Guns (17 Points)
- 8.8 Heavy AA Platoon with 2x 8.8cm AA Guns (6 Points)
- Lucky Command Card (1 Point)
Now at the end of month three you have another tournament this time it’s a 100 point tournament so you will get to use your full army and get used to how it works in games. After that the Global TableTopGames Campaign begins having you and your friends fighting over Europe, you club or store with the rest of the world will be sending in their game results to contribute on the global scale making this one of the biggest campaigns you will ever participate in.
My final word of advice is to take time to enjoy painting your models your way and to learn as much as you can from others in the league to get the most out of the Flames Of War community.