Lots of discord and rancour about the company on BGG of late. Poor scenario design, lack of customer support, limited pseudo functional Vassal, undelivered pXXX, the list goes on.
Mike takes the approach of less is ….good enough perhaps. Well in this newsletter we see some stark and startling changes.
Apparent excellent new thick soot free laser cut counters. CHECK!
Jay Townsend designing scenarios for Saipan – Pacific theatre warfare! Jay is a veteran Platoon scale gamer of The Gamers series TCS. That credibility gets my attention. CHECK!
Cleaner? Well a new version of the rules V 4.0. Here there is some ambiguity. Are these cleaner, tighter, distilled and refined? Or just re formatted and seeking another dollar from another release? No Check..yet!
4 maps for Kursk…..hmm 40 scenarios and 4 maps.. a quick combinations assessment, that seems a bit light. 517 counters! Nice. Worth the risk -small check.
Saipan seems like a solid no brainer however. Get above squad level and see what the heck happened on Saipan. Again a mountain of scenarios and a wonder why? Why so many? Are these all HISTORICAL approximations? Or invented?
This looks encouraging! Then there are these visual tour de force maps:
Counters in standard format look nice also:
So lots of positive check there.
Oh… and available NOW. Yep. both between 74 and 79.99 USD.
Am I buying? Sadly no. I think I have enough on my plate with TCS to scratch the tactical platoon scale itch. That said I think this is a step forward in the right direction. If Mike can produce on demand? Or near enough perhaps the company has hope.
The Newsletter:
Avalanche Press: News from the Front15 July 2014:
The Birthday Edition |
 Now AvailableKursk: Burning Tigers
You’ve wanted it for years, even if you didn’t know it: the game that will remind you why you play wargames in the first place.
Kursk: Burning Tigers is the first new game to carry the Fourth Edition rules for Panzer Grenadier, and it’s – at least in our opinion – the best game in the series to date.
To start with, it’s the Battle of Kursk: history’s fiercest tank battle. Mike Perryman has crafted 40 scenarios of the savage tank battles and close-quarters, no-quarter infantry fights waged by the German regular army against the Soviet Red Army of Workers and Peasants regulars and Guards. Mike has designed hundreds of Panzer Grenadier scenarios (Liberation 1944, Black SS, Panzer Lehr and many others) and is now a designer at the top of his craft.
 Next, there are the pieces. We’ve been experimenting with laser-cut pieces for some time now, with steadily improving results. We’ve now hit on what we think are the best wargame counters ever made. They’re laser-cut, and thus smooth and free of the heavy damage inflicted by a die-strike’s pounding on them with thousands of pounds of force. They’re thick, about two and a half times the thickness of the usual die-cut piece. There is absolutely no scorching or soot residue as seen on some laser-cut pieces.
Then there are the rules. Burning Tigers has the NEW Fourth Edition rules, with brand-new markers and full-color charts. And the rules themselves, which distill a decade and a half of Panzer Grenadier play, design and development into an interactive system that’s easy to learn and fun to play.
 And there are the maps. Four of them, with artwork by Guy Riessen. They’re beautiful. You can see them right here.
Simply put, we’ve published a lot of games. Burning Tigersis right there at the very top of them. You need this game.
You can order Burning Tigers right here.
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The Gold ClubYou need to be a member. It’s $35 for the rest of the year, and you get this stuff:
• The Golden Journal. Several times a year, whenever we feel like it, we issue a little rag with real, laser-cut pieces for a variant or two or three. They’ve even included a map. Someday soon we want to include a complete game. You can’t buy them, you can only get them free as part of your membership. It’s about the coolest thing ever.
• Everyday Discounts. Gold Club members get 20 percent off all the time.
• The Insider Newsletter. Once a month or so, we send out a newsletter with all the detailed workings of what’s going on here – upcoming games, production progress and stuff like that.
• Early Orders. Only Gold Club members can place orders for games before they’re released, at a sweet 30 percent discount. That’s the best discount that we’ll ever offer on a new boxed game.
• Early Shipping. And Gold Club members get those Early Orders shipped before we open up sales to everyone else. It’s a pretty sweet deal.
Sign up right here. We’ll send you the latest Insider, with all the info you need to get your paws on all that good stuff. Be sure to read it all first. Please read it all first.
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Now Available
Panzer Grenadier: Saipan 1944
With 4th Edition Rules
Designer Jay Townsend brings Panzer Grenadier back to the Pacific Theater. Saipan 1944 has 40 new scenarios, 495 playing pieces and four new maps showing the beaches, jungles and cane fields of Saipan. Saipan is a big island, and it saw all sorts of fighting: from bitter small-scale infantry fights to massive assaults to tank battles. Yes, tank battles in the Pacific!
You can order Saipan 1944 right here.
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| Now Available: Marianas 1944
Panzer Grenadier: Marianas 1944 is a new 64-page Panzer Grenadier book, with scenarios by Jay Townsend and background by Dave Lippman. It adds on to Saipan 1944 with 30 new scenarios, 24 new laser-cut, scorchless/sootless pieces and two new Guy Riessen maps.
You only need Saipan 1944 to play. Repeat. You only need Saipan 1944 to play.
You can order it right here. |
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I have never played any but their naval games and their first edition of Third Reich. The Avalanche components are of the highest quality and very well rendered. Regrettably, at least as far as their naval games go, the rules provide a simple but unrealistic combat system notable for the absence of rules for “smoke,” a critical tactical weapon during war at sea before the advent of radar. This want alone creates a hideous spectacle for sea battles at this scale during the era. So for all their glittering beauty, pairing these wonderful components with these cartoon-like rules is akin to “putting lipstick on a pig.”
Classic