|
|
Chris' OCS List
|
Chris Farrell
United States
Cupertino
California
|
As inspired by Doktor Glaze OCS list, here is mine ... Usually I am inspired to write these lists when I see a question ("which OCS game should I start with?" asked enough times, and I have written a reply often enough, to put me over some mystical threshold ... as has just occurred. So, here you go. OCS is one of my absolute favorite wargames, despite the usual time comittment involved, just because it is *so* immersive. The game really throws you into running many aspects of a WWII campaign in a way that seems much more realistic than any other operational-level game, barring perhaps GMT/von Borries' Barbarossa series of games. While the rules to OCS are not, in fact, that difficult in the main - as I've said before, I could teach you the rules to the ground game in 20 minutes - the flexibility they give you is high and the implications of all this are tougher to learn than many. This is a good thing, really, but you'll need to ramp up. So, here are the OCS games in the order a new player might try to tackle them.
|
|
|
Posted Wed Oct 22, 2003 8:51 pm
|
|
1.
Board Game: Tunisia
[Average Rating:7.73 Overall Rank:459]
|
|
|
Chris Farrell
United States
Cupertino
California
|
Tough call on which one to start on, all of Tunisia, Burma, and Korea were candidates. Tunisia has a number of advantages though: it's simpler, with no naval power and not too much air. The game is more "like" all the other games than Burma, as Tunisia is a combined-arms battle with both sides having tanks & infantry, and both sides having potent striking capabilities. You get to experience both the more fluid battles (in the West, a la Kasserine) and the set-piece battles (in the East, at the Mareth line). The lower counter density makes the game highly playable by two players, which is good - although once both the Americans *and* the British 8th Army are hammering on the Germans, you might want to split the campaign three ways.
The Kasserine scenario in this game is a classic introductory scenario, and there is at least one other good scenario around the Mareth Line. Like most OCS games, though, the replayability comes in the campaign games, not the scenarios. This is one area where the vonBorries' Barbarossa games from GMT really score, with easily 3 times as many (or more) good smaller scenarios per box. Although there are many good, shorter games throughout the line as a whole (especially in Korea, Burma, and DAK), OCS is really designed mainly with the longer games in mind, as typified by GBII which contains essentially no small scenarios. That being said, as long as you can find some mechanism for storing the games - and Tunisia only has 2 maps - the longer campaign scenarios are not as daunting as it might first appear, and are well worth the effort.
There are some downsides. Firstly, the game was designed to an older rulesets, and some innovations (like fractional trucks and non-rebuildable units) are not around yet, but probably should be. More importantly, the air refit costs changed significantly between 2.0 and 3.0, of significant benefit to the Germans. Secondly, the game is a little more at the whim of the dice than many OCS titles, as a lot of Mud weather (or too little mud weather) may be more of a deciding factor than anything else, like good play. I can live with this though, given the uncertainty surrounding the weather is so important.
All in all, a great game to break into the series with, and it's still available easily from MMP, while many OCS games have sadly gone OOP.
|
|
|
Chris Farrell
United States
Cupertino
California
|
It was a toss-up between Korea and Sicily for the next slot. I went with Korea for a few reasons. Firstly, it's still easily available. Secondly, it's less rules intensive - the naval stuff is present but less central than Sicily, the air war is more one-sided and so you have to worry about it less, and the whole thing is generally more infantry heavy, so you don't have quite the overhead of Sicily.
Like Tunisia, Korea is quite manageable for play by 2 players. There are quite a few scenarios available, and the character of the war changes as it seesaws back and forth at UN and Chinese intervention. By the end of the day, both sides have had their chance (although the UN of course get somewhat more cool stuff). Like Tunisia, the somewhat constrained terrain and the general shortage of armor means that it isn't quite as subject to the impression of "one slip sudden death" that some of the eastern front games can feel like. Korea is a 3-mapper, but the northernmost map is out of play for most of the game, and there are rules for abstracting it.
|
|
|
Chris Farrell
United States
Cupertino
California
|
It shocked me a little bit that Sicily is already OOP, but I guess it is three years old at this point. Anyway. This is the first game that you'll probably really want 3 players for the campaign games, as the commands split nicely (Americans/Brits/Germans ... give the new guy the US and the more experienced player the Germans. The Germans have a lot of units early, but that'll change quickly as the Italians vaporize). There is a whole lot of cool stuff about Sicily, because more so even than the regular OCS games you get to run the whole show, from invasion to securing the entire island - there are no artifical boundries. The Allies get a lot of tools, from a large airforce to airborne to amphibious units to do the job. The Germans have a hard core of excellent units, and the punch packed by the Stukas is still quite impressive.
Some players at Conquest were suggesting that this should perhaps be renamed Sicily: Fantasy Island in honor of the ludicrously overpowered German-Italian airforce, BUT this does happen to make the game more interesting and the Axis more competitive - the Allied player just need to be aware that they need to run the air war very carefully. Tied to this, there is also a glitch in the game system unfortunately: due to the halving of the standard OCS time scale for this game, all construction activities take twice as long in Sicily as they do in other games. That's OK, and makes sense, but the system didn't compensate on the *de*struction end, and so the rate at which Stukas can bomb your ports is the same. This makes it very difficult for the Allies to keep their ports sufficiently open unless they can turn the air war, especially in light of severe on-island basing restrictions. Just stuff you need to be aware of, if you go into these games trying to run a "historical" strategy. As a final little thing, the rules unfortunately are written such that Allied airborne landings are basically unworkable, in light of the historical difficulties. It would be nice if it didn't *have* to happen that way, and the Allied commanders were encouraged to at least try albeit with the historical debacle being a possibility, but this is a sadly missing optional.
Still, all this said, Sicily is still one of my favorite OCS titles. The campaign games are easy to play to completion, and so I've played them far more than the other campaigns. The Allies have a decent, quality, balanced force to use, and the Axis pack plenty of punch. There are some OK smaller scenarios.
|
4.
Board Game: Burma
[Average Rating:7.89 Overall Rank:768]
|
|
|
Chris Farrell
United States
Cupertino
California
|
Burma is actually still my favorite OCS game, but there are two reasons it doesn't rank higher. Firstly, it's OOP and I gather modestly expensive via eBay. Secondly, it's very different from the other OCS games. The terrain is murderously tight, armor is virtually irrelevant, supply is a monster headache due to the frequently impenetrable terrain and lack of roads, and air is used mainly for transport.
What makes this game such a huge winner for me is just that it absolutely conveys how operations in the jungle work, and for that reason is amongst the most immersive games I've ever played. It's all about maneuver, infiltration, blocking positions, getting the supplies to the right place, and forcing your opponents to attack under frequently ludicrous conditions. Allied airpower can frequently be decisive simply for its abilities to deliver supplies to otherwise isolated units. Likewise, the Japanese ability to go without supplies for far longer than their Allied counterparts gives them an important edge. Another nice thing about this game is that there are three very different subgames going on at once - the whole Imphal-Kohima offensive, the Chindits, and the Chinese-American Ledo Road operation.
Due to the absense of naval power, and the absense of any meaningful air on the Japanese side, this game is very rules-light and so amongst the most basically approachable of the games. But it is tough to play well, which is the hallmark of a great game; to help you out on this count, Burma includes an excellent range of smaller scenarios, best in the OCS line.
A complaint about Burma is often one of playbalance, and it's true that the Japanese have a tough time of it. I've played the full campaign game only once (Allied win), and it somehow seems that I've played the Allies disproportionately in this particular title, although I admittedly always play the Good Guys by preference. Still, I've felt that every Japanese player I've played has relied too much on direct attack and not enough on infiltration, so who knows. Regardless, another strength of Burma is that it includes a *lot* of historical "options" which allow you to customise the campaign in various ways, from assuming that the Japanese high command doesn't act like a bunch of morons and either supports the offensive properly or calls it off to various permutations of the Chinese offensive going on to the north (including Allied access to some Chinese units of truly stunning mediocrity).
All in all, this is a fabuolous game, one of the best ever. *Way* better than Puerto Rico 
|
5.
Board Game: DAK
[Average Rating:8.19 Overall Rank:857]
|
|
|
Chris Farrell
United States
Cupertino
California
|
DAK is another game that may rate amongst the best ever. In common with Sicily, it has the advantages of comparatively low unit density and the ability to run the entire campaign, front to back, without worrying about the "edge of the world". There are a few things that derail DAK from being higher on the list, though: firstly, it's got *by far* the beefiest "specific rules" booklet, and has significantly higher complexity than the other rules. Secondly, it is not current with the 3.1 rules, and the shipping capacity and airbase refit costs are off. Thirdly, the leader & KampfGruppe rules are not entirely to my liking, and do rather change the flavor of the game from other titles. None are really major problems, but both are enough to make it somthing to move on to once you've played one or two other titles.
The really great thing about DAK, though, is the number of shorter & smaller scenarios included. There are tons of them, and while the big ones like Crusader & Gazala are going to be way more interesting than the lopsided encounters at Compass or Battleaxe, still it's good to have such a wide range of games.
DAK also has a great "random events" chart that has all kinds of cool stuff on it for the campaign game, from Rommel's constant comings and goings to the option to bring on Patton and his US Armored Division instead of just shipping the Brits tanks (bringing on Patton and his crappy Amerian units would be generally questionable at best ... but you can do it).
|
|
|
Chris Farrell
United States
Cupertino
California
|
Now we're getting into the games that made OCS, for whatever it's worth ... the huge, monster games. To play the full campaign of Enemy at the Gates you will need *at*minimum* 4 players and more like 6. You'll need to figure on a year to play it. Seriously, this is stuff that makes Empires in Arms look modest.
The upside of this is that the game has a real "clash of titans" feel - two huge armies struggling to the death on the Russian steppes. Panzer Divisions and Tank Corps crash and burn. The tidal wave of Soviets roll over the outstretched Germans. Katyushas pummel fortified positions. This is total war; this is not 1941, when the Soviets were outclassed, outmaneuvered, and outgunned - this is late 1942, when they've learned their lessons and are repaying the Germans in kind. Sure, the German arsenal is still superior in most ways, but the Russians are quite competant now and much more numerous.
I aspire to play this campaign game sometime, but when that will be I don't know. Enemy at the Gates is much too large even to play at conventions. The Winter Storm scenario was one of the first I played, and it was fun although I don't know how the Germans can win in retrospect. A lot of the other scenarios are big, and I don't know how they would play standalone, but the overall situation is so appealing, I should look into it.
|
|
|
Chris Farrell
United States
Cupertino
California
|
GBII is a mixed bag. I haven't played that much of it - just the Typhoon and the "Summer 1942 German Fantasy" where the Nazis put their effort into taking Moscow rather than Stalingrad. It's generally less appealing than Enemy at the Gates simply because the Soviets really don't have much hitting power - they're just trying to stay alive. The Tank Corps are still in the future, all you have are a bunch of independant brigades, which don't pack much punch. I've played the Germans both times I've played this, and their situation is quite interesting - can you get to Moscow, literally wading through a sea of Soviet infantry? - but I think the Soviet position is less so. I think the game also seriously underestimates the Soviet ability to replace infantry (I understand Dean is working on a fix for this). Another significant drawback is that the big games require 6 people, but probably at least two will end up short of activity - there is only enough supply really for one major and one secondary sector, so somebody will get shafted.
Combine this with the lack of decent, or even plausible, smaller scenarios, and GBII doesn't work for me as well as the other games.
|
|
|
Chris Farrell
United States
Cupertino
California
|
Hube's Pocket is the only game I haven't played even a scenario from. While not spatially large, the counter density is very high. This is a facinating campaign - Mark Simonitch's much more manageable Ukraine '43 is high on my play list - and it's good to see Soviets abusing Nazis for a change. But my impression is that this ranks among the least playable OCS titles, and so playing it is still a ways off even for me, and it's likely that if MMP keeps producing OCS games, it may be on the back burner forever.
|
|
|
Posted Wed Oct 22, 2003 8:48 pm
Asheville
North Carolina
Perhaps the big campaigns can see some playing time for me now.
Scarsdale
New York
Go to www.vassalengine.org and download the OCS DAK2, Tunisia, Sicily, EatG and Hube's Pocket modules. The site also has a listing of players interested in playing the games live online or via PBEM.
Minster
Ohio
It’s been a while since I gave readers a report on what’s up with the OCS, but these have been busy times for the series. Since the sale of the company, I’ve been at work on making what we are now calling the OCS v4.0 rules (it was v3.2, but by draft 25 I decided it was time to give it a bigger job title), making Case Blue, and laying the first foundation stones for the OCS-Bn system. I’ll discuss these in detail in this article.
OCS v4.0
This project started slowly and out of necessity. First off, I never had a computer file of v3.1. I had v3.0 and wanted to make the errata corrections that built v3.1 in the first place. So, I set about doing that “little” job. In the process, I enlisted the able help of John Kisner to do a more formal rewrite of the rules (cleaning up my grade B English) and to fill in the weak areas that seemed to draw questions on-line (basically, to make sure everything was covered).
That relatively simple job grew in the telling to include some additional terminology standardization and a rather complete review of the entire system looking for areas that needed “fluff” removal. The rules are clearly marked so that changes will be easy to spot and a list will be included that will allow experienced players to come up to speed very rapidly.
About the only “major” change was the change in air unit interception. Rather than execute this as an event caused by enemy air movement, interception now occurs as part of the flak resolution process itself. Flak itself has been simplified and the need for a table has been removed.
A number of nickel and dime changes have been made to eliminate concepts that tend to be either no-brainers or things guys specifically use to ruin otherwise good games. Things like the inability to bomb extenders and the elimination of the separate railroad destruction monkey drill are examples of these.
At the suggestion of Elias Nordling, I tore apart the entire set of air rules and re-organized them. It seems that over the years, they had been revised but the organization remained true to the way they were laid out back in 1992. As a result, the sections that should be together were not, duplications resulted, and the thing just read poorly. Regrouping the air rules into a more intelligent outline helped them be much more user friendly. At the same time, terminology was simplified and standardized throughout.
The rules have settled down nicely (Feb 2006) and I’m in the process of putting in some additional edits from guys looking at the rules from the outside (not players already versed in the system and able to ‘read between the lines’).
I have a hunch the last long pole in the tent (naval) is due for some serious rewrite and simplification, but haven’t decided just yet if it worth doing so (given the handful of games that need those rules and players are used to working with them anyway).
As you can see, the OCS v4.0 rules have been a team effort and I’m deeply in debt to those who have spent so much time arguing, word smithing, and playtesting the proposals (of which there has been no stone left unturned, enough to drive the group to distraction.)
Case Blue
A long time in the making, progress is being made in getting this game done and ready for Pxxx. I’m currently marching through the set ups and OOAs to make sure every unit is properly accounted for (nobody shows up twice, needs to be on the map before it arrives and so on). Since I’m trying for 100% accuracy with this, it is taking quite a bit of time to finish, but I think the results will be worth it.
The rules are working smoothly, scenario testing is coming right along, and the game itself works very, very well. All in all, testing of this game has been far smoother than any previous OCS title.
Along the way, I made a number of decisions regarding the way the final product will be presented.
First, many GBII counters drifted onto the EatG and CB maps. Rather than make ownership of GBII a requirement to play the game (never my intention), I’ve sought to identify every counter that shows up and will reproduce them in Case Blue so that every Case Blue purchaser has all the counters needed without owning GBII.
Second, to speed the process, the final Crimean scenarios will be issued separately. All the units and the map needed to play the Crimean campaign will be in Case Blue, but the stand-alone Crimean scenarios and miniature campaign game will be issued in a separate rulebook later so as to not slow the release of Case Blue to allow for their development. This will allow me to do that and to release the map and needed counters as a separate item as well for those wanting a small OCS game but not wanting to purchase Case Blue to get it. For the guy owning Case Blue, he’ll merely need to get the Crimea rulebook to play those scenarios.
So, Case Blue is designed in several modules, of which, you can customize its final size to your liking. Case Blue alone will allow the player to run the campaign into the Caucasus Mountains south from Rostov, and play on the Crimean map. Add the EatG maps, and you can play the 1941-1943 campaign in all of the area south of Army Group Center or play the new EatG scenarios. Add GBII and you have the whole burrito. Lastly, get the Crimea rulebook and you’ll have separate scenarios for that campaign OR buy Crimea by itself and be able to play that one-map campaign.
After much discussion, we established victory and economic conditions that will urge the German player into a southern offensive without stringing his hands together and forcing him to follow the historical plan by idiot rules. The goal was to keep the Russians confused as to the actual goal of the 1942 campaign (going south for the oil, going to Stalingrad, or going north to Moscow). Added to that, there are some very real benefits to be gained from doing things like taking Voronezh and Stalingrad (both places Russian reinforcements show up and Voronezh is dangerously close to the rail lines the German needs open to be able to use Kharkov for his own reinforcements). Lastly, in linked games, there are some major economic incentives to go for the oil (not so much it what if gives the Germans, but more in what it denies the Russians). This last includes not only taking the actual oil fields, but also in cutting the transportation routes north from them into Russia. There is lots of fodder out there for nifty campaign thinking.
I’m very happy with the way this monster is turning out.
OCS-Bn
This is a system I’ve long planned. Basically, an expansion of the OCS that fits a scale of 1 Km hexes and 3 turns per day. To do this, some functions of the OCS will need greater abstraction (air being one), some will need greater detail (supply will come in two flavors, fuel and ammo, while trace supply will not be needed except for some form of “Out of Communication” functions). Units will be battalions for the most part with some units as companies (tanks, AT guns), the mix of both will be decided as the system gets developed.
The three turns per day will generally be two daytime and one nighttime turn for each calendar day. This will change with the season, in the winter there might be only one of each to account for the short days. Also, since armies of the time had great difficulty in night actions, what the player can do at night will be fairly restrictive.
More tactical emphasis will be needed in both armor/AT effects, combined arms interplay, and artillery handling. At the same time, the goal will be to bring the traditional OCS playability and player decision conundrums down to the new level; in other words I can’t go overboard in tactical detail. There will need to be more, of course, but what makes it into the final product will need to be very carefully controlled.
On the other side, I see that air campaigns and the major interactions between air forces will be outside the scope of the play area. All of the air force interactions will occur outside the map, leaving only what amounts to the occasional air strike availability or interdiction patrols.
So, what kind of games do I have in mind for this system? Frankly, there are tons of wonderful situations that are just too small to make it as traditional OCS titles that would make wonderful games at this level. Just to name three: Normandy, Market Garden, and the Ardennes. Those are just the easy, West Front ones. With the scale curtain this much lower, the number of excellent situations (all over WW2) is a great pool to draw from.
More OCS…
Not to leave out original OCS, John Kisner is working on the final development of Baltic Gap (always a bridesmaid, never a bride), I’m still looking for the final submission of both Italy and Beyond the Rhine (maybe now that Case Blue is under control, Roland can get his own game done rather than helping me with mine). I’m also looking at the possibility of doing a one-map game covering the final drive on Paris and the Marne in 1914 as well as a game covering the France 1940 campaign (no these would not come in the same package).
Now, that Case Blue is making fast progress, the whole system will be able to move forward on a number of fronts again. I know everyone has been so patient during this seemingly glacial process and I really appreciate it. You will not be disappointed with the results of your forbearance.
Unspecified
Unspecified
Eden
North Carolina
Unfortunately, I can't help but think that the Luftwaffe is over rated in DAK, specifically. The great Air Craft Carrier of Crete with overrated He 111 just seems totally wrong.
I wonder why the HE 111s are so overrated - Wellington;s get 8 bombardment and the 111s a 12 - while the Wellington carried nearly twice the bombload.
These games seem to be very German centric, so far.
A quick look through Case Blue, and one starts to get the same feeling.
Even the Italian fighters are overated compared to British stuff in DAK!