Combined Arms Campaign

 Winter War

Bought Warlord Games Combined Arms -campaign system / game already last June and eventually last fall we kicked off a campaign with three mates from Nopat & Taktiikka club. Martin joined me as a brother in arms fielding Finnish forces fighting off the onslaught of Soviets steered with iron fist(s) byt Marko and Johannes. We chose to play Winter War (1939-40) themed campaign. Read on to learn about ou experience.

We chose this map to present the border areas of Finland and Soviet Union, including lake Laatokka (Ladoga) and the Gulf of Finland. Grey for Finland and green for CCCP.

War in the Air, Sea and Land

One of the drivers to get a WW2 campaign going was to get a narrative for Blood Red Skies games. Earlier in the year we had started playing BRS with JOhannes and I was eager to paint Finnish air forces, that is Messerschmits, Brewsters (3D printed), Sal-Molniers (3D printed) and Hurricanes (and yes, not all of them were available during the WW).

Brewsters WIP

Soviet horde of YAKs, Polykarpovs and Hurricanes

YAKs and Messerschmits

Best fun was to play 2 vs. 2 team games

Marko wears a shirt with a Finnish flag, but fights for Soviets...

...what the heck!

Soviet attack on Finnish oil resources in the archipelago

Cruel Seas

We also tried out Cruel Seas, but as neither side deployed any naval units, any sea battles didn't happen (and my Kriegsmarine starter remains unpainted)

On the Road to Raate

I guess the main motivation for the campaign was to play relevant games of Bolt Action. Both us players and our club is well equipped to present fights of Winter War.

 

So whom won?

Campaign started pretty well for teh Finns, whom were able to capture 3/5 target areas on the map

(grey miniatures are controlled by Finns and green ones by Soviets)

But then the war grinded to bit of a halt, with neither side being able to push forward and both sides losing units

Currently (end of Feb 2023) our campaign is drawing to it's final battles are being fought and then points scored - result hangs in the air, currently Finns are leading 2-1, but Soviet's massed air power has taken a heavy toll on Finns - 3 out of 6 field / air units currently destroyed.

Heavy action in the North, Soviet planes destroying 2 Finnish assets on our most recent round

STAY TUNED TO FIND OUT HOW IT ALL ENDED 

Hobby

Painted some new minis for my Bolt Action Finnish forces too

T26 "Postijuna" by Trenchworks Miniatures and some Finnish WW infantry by Parkfield Miniatures

T26 before and after the white wash

Conclusions

All things considered I think CA is a decent setup for combining different WW2 games into a campaign, here are some pros and cons we found

Pros

• Simple enough (in some cases a bit too simple) rules for campaigning
• Campaigns always gives better motivation and interest for gaming 
• Cards add a nice feature and another tactical level to rather simple rules

Cons

• Rules need some further development or at least a FAQ
• Definately shuffle Resolution cards when you start the game, RAW states to place 5 non scoring Resolution cards on top of the deck, which means 5 rounds of campaign BEFORE scoring any points
• Loads of air battles happened, but less land battles... as our main driver was to play BA games, this was not ideal  
• Map with quite a bit of water focused most of the action to the north, units boarded on sea transports will be destroyed by air raids on 2+, which is too risky. We felt, that not enough happened in the map, due to this

Operations board in action

Good times!