Get Old School Tactical On Kickstarter
February 15, 2015 by stvitusdancern
If you are a fan of the classical tabletop hex and counter based games, this Kickstarter, Old School Tactical from Flying Pig Games might interest you. This project harks back to the glory days of companies such as Avalon Hill.
In this game there are 24 scenarios to help simulate combat on the Eastern Front of 1941-42, the creators of the game claim this is an easy rule set to learn with only a 16 page rulebook. In this game activation is determined my the use of impulse points and the winner is determined by victory points achieved by each player during the game.
The game is based on what they are calling the Shayne Logan's Old School Tactical. Of course there is firepower against defence values and a die roll with the results compared with a chart. The maps look really nice with high detail printing.
Looking at this game is bringing back memories of many a day sitting with my Dad and brother playing games similar to this. Those were very special, because they did not happen as much as I would have liked. This game will definitely be on my list of must haves and I wonder what Oriskany thinks about this?
Do you do old school too?
"The game is based on what they are calling the Shayne Logan’s Old School Tactical"
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"Looking at this game is bringing back memories of many a day sitting with my Dad and brother playing games similar to this"
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What do I think of this? Oh, man, these maps look awesome. The only regret I have in general with the hex-and-counter genre is that when these games were really in their heyday (1950s-1970s), publishing and printing technology was nowhere near what it is now. Map graphics were simplistic, hexes might not even line up when you combined boards. And these counters look amazing, too. I’m also interested in the “victory points” system for determining victory. Very Panzer Leader, and creates games where one side breaks or is outmaneuvered rather than simple collision of annihilation. Definitely very interesting!
I thought you might get a kick out of it.
Absolutely! Thanks for the great feature! 😀
Hex board games are great to transport around on holiday etc. They were also a good model to adapt to early (non-3d) computer war games in the 80s & 90s.
Totally get oriskany’s comments about print quality having improved over the years
I’ll be watching this one – modern printing and old school gameplay. Could very well be a winner
Ohhhh well just gave in and put in a Delux pledge (Should I be conserned that the tablet suggest “Pledge” as one of the first words?)
This reminds me a bit of some of the old Yaquinto games as well as West End’s Eastern Front
For anyone interested Lock n Load and GMT to name but two still produce some great hex board games
Or if you want to play online try
http://www.vassalengine.org/
There is even a 40K mod out there for it
http://vassal40k.tripod.com/
Still have all of them: Panzer Leader, Panzerblitz, Arab-Israeli Wars, and all the Squad Leader stuff. @oriskany and I were discussing this a few months ago. If we lived closer I’m sure we’d be blasting each other off the map on a regular basis!
What do you mean, @cpauls1 ? Our countries share a long border! We’re practically next door neighbors. 😀 (just with really . . . REALLY big yards). On a more serious note, @amphibiousmonster and I have been experimenting with electronic long-distance versions of these PB, PL, AIW games. The Vassal option torros gives is also great. Ampmonster and I, however, like to design our own counters, units, and scenarios, so we play via graphic images floating in MS Excel files. The next step is to get some kind of Google+ or GoToMeeting shared web space to allow both players to… Read more »
It’s good to see some old school tactical still being made.
I’m very tempted to back this game.
While not bad looking, I do have concerns. Like how good quality the pieces are. In the demo reel the graphics look ok, but seem to be rather thin. And then how many of those cards are involved in a particular scenario. Which leads me to the big concern: the two (three with Stalingrad) maps look like they’ll lead to rather generic scenarios. The beauty of the ASL beast IMHO is the scenarios. They’ve got the back story behind the battle, special rules, a photo and even the historical finish for the flavorful cherry on top. It make the game… Read more »
I never had a problem with the generic mapboards… or any of the game pieces: lots of configurations and an almost infinite variety of scenarios that could be played on them. The improvement in graphics could only make what was already a great gaming experience even better.
Loved the simple elegance of PL, PB, and AIW, and Squad Leader up to Cross of Iron. After that the rules got in the way of the game.
So @oriskany , we’ve really just been talking over the fence, then? 🙂
Things did get a out of control after Cross of Iron, but I still have a weakness for Crescendo of Doom. Heck I even like the name. Those odd early war scenarios, complete with Char B’s. And that epic cluster of a final scenario (was it Prelude to Crete?). It was what five maps? With glider and paratroop drops? Units everywhere, dropping in unexpected places. IIRC, I usually aimed for the paratroopers to land on the river, expecting the scatter rules to put them safely anyplace else but in the drink.
@cpauls1 – yes, a very long, very wide, and very tall fence. 🙂 I also agree that ASL was an awesome system, up to a point. I mean, I pump liquefied counters for blood through my hexagonal-shaped veins, after a while even I was like “oh, for ****’s sake, can I just shoot something already?” ASL wasn’t the only one. GDW’s Assault could get a little obnoxious depending on the scenario. @bigterp – augh! Your post brings back so many memories of old airborne games in PanzerLeader. Crete, Norway, Sicily, Italy, even “SeaLion 1940.” That actually sounds like an amazing… Read more »
@bigterp sez: “In the demo reel the graphics look ok, but seem to be rather thin.”
A true hex-and-counter gamer speaks there. THICK counters. The amount of improvement that comes to a game’s playability simply by having THICK, easy to pick up (and stack) counters . . . is huge.
Interesting starter 🙂
love the look of the maps.
Sounds a bit cheeky calling it old school
I thought Hex and Counter games still had a solid following?
It is something that I have wanted to add to my collection.
This game would need to be , a) solitaire player friendly and b) Easy to learn.
and c) about £30 quid cheaper including postage /tightwad! lol
oh and d) good replayability. I need bang for my buck /tightwad take two
“I thought Hex and Counter games still had a solid following?” Certainly. I’ve been one of the “banner men” of this following since **** knows when. 🙂 I’ve wargamed constantly my whole life, yet never really got into miniatures at all until I signed up with Beasts of War about a year ago. You can have a rich and complete wargaming hobby all your life and never pick up a paint brush or a miniature. Until relatively recently, I was one of them. I just thought “we” were something of a minority these days. Maybe I’m spending too much time… Read more »
Even some of the big designers like GMY look for upfront orders of approx 500 before they start producing the game though if you do order up front you do get a good discount
I meant GMT of course
I just don’t get it. They seem to imply there aren’t any of these anymore. That’s just blatantly wrong. There’s loads from quite a few companies. Heck, even Heroes of Normandie qualifies, just no hexes. I’m quite fond of the Band of Brothers series and don’t see how this system could be better. Heck, I even just got the Panzer Expansion 3 from GMT. I mean, come on. There’s loads. Go ahead and try, but don’t come to the party claiming there aren’t any or the current ones are all boring with no art or there are none with good… Read more »
Been playing hex and counter games since 1983, so no . . . they’ve never been completely “extinct.” But their heyday was definitely in the 1950s-70s. However many were there in the 90s and 90s, there were many more before that. Between Avalon Hill’s “Tactics / Tactics II,” “War & Peace,” and others, up to the end of the PanzerBlitz/Panzer Leader line and the ascendancy of Advanced Squad Leader (mentioned so wistfully above), these were a much heavier presence in the market, at least here in the states. Bear in mind this is before Gary Gygax bought DragonQuest and vivasected… Read more »
I thick in the end just like with D&D they were add rules for rules sake while claiming it was making it better. But what they forgot about was playability and enjoyment. They killed both.
That why we stopped buying SPI games and started looking for simpler but fun games and ones you could finish in your own lifetime. 🙂
Those counters in the video are protos.
And the video was done with my IPad, hence low quality. ( Please don’t hold it against me )
The game has everything a tactical player wants in his fights, without a lot of rules overhead.
The rules will fit like an old shoe to players after a couple of plays.
It just reached its initial funding level, so it will be on tables this summer 🙂