Its funny how the brits only have 8 tanks in total when the US and Germans have lots (well the Germans do US still have enough for a good tank battle. I would have thought more tanks would be given to the Brits in the days of the fox to make for some massive tanks battles, and i also would have thought with the Normandy expasion we might have seen the sherman firefly, cromwell or ever the churchill, anyway thats just what i was thinking so I thought i would post it. What do all you guys think?

Not getting those tanks was a bummer. But you could get some from World Tank Museum or someone else and make up your own stats for them. I have not sat down to give these stats any thought yet but perhaps you and others here could.

I agree...WTM and also Strange Cargo Games (for the Firefly).

I believe KlausFritsch has already developed stats for those units.

also remember that the british forces used a lot of Shermans as well.

And the M10 with an upgraded main gun.

Bazookajoe said:

Yes, he has.

http://app.fantasyflightgames.com/cgi-bin/quests/quest.cgi?command=comment&game=toi&scenario=2008070906483915297&admin_id=0

Please let me know what you think.

I live and die by it, Brother. I've compared it to several different sources (both primary and games) and find it near perfect.

Have you considered expanding the armour stats with side and rear values?

Bazookajoe, perhaps I should give you an analogy to help you see why I don't think side vs rear armor should be modeled in TOI. Have you ever played D&D? In this system and many others there is a roll to hit, then if you hit you follow with a roll for damage. Say we used such a system in TOI. Tanks would then be harder to hit in the rear than the side because the profile exposed would be smaller. So side is easier to hit back is harder. Then if either of these areas are hit you roll for damage. The rear, in general, has the least armor on it, so a hit here would do more damage. So in summary one face is easier to hit and one face is more fragile. Modeling front side rear armor under such a combat system would make sense because you separate the hit roll from the damage roll.

Now in TOI however only one big roll is made. Damage and hits are actually one in the same. So if one side of the tank is sturdier but easier to hit, and the rear is fragile yet harder to hit the two kind of counter each other out which is why I suggested a -2 armor penalty for both the side and rear. In other words side and rear have both their pros and cons and therefore I just put them into one group and call it the flank.

Now you can try and split hairs, but how much could you really? Say you wanted the rear to suffer a -3 armor penalty instead of -2 because you say the rear has less armor. True, but then I can come right back at ya and say the rear has a smaller profile than the side and thus is harder to hit so give it a bonus of 1. Then are we not right back at -2 for either the side or the rear. And if we are at -2 for both then just combine the two into the flank. So IMO under TOI's combat system it only makes sense to have a front and flank nothing more. BTW due to the simplicity of Conflict of Heroes combat system the same is assumed. If you really want to model the fragility of the rear of a tank you will have to create a new combat system for TOI that separates the to hit and damage rolls into separate entities so that the additional difficulty of hitting the rear vs the side can be taken into account before damage is determined.

Bazookajoe said:

I have been thinking about it, but as long as there is no official change to ToI to include facing, I won't. My stuff is intended to add to the game, not change it.

That said, I think that at the tactical level such as in ToI, facing rules for tanks are a must (not for trucks, halftracks and armored cars though, their armor is thin enough as it is).

Lebatron said:

I'm aware of the various games that roll to hit and then for damage, but would caution against using D&D as an example (when talking to historical gamers).

A better example might be Warhammer 40K since FFG seems to be attuned with GW on several subjects. This system also uses the hit-then-damage dice rolling system. It also differentiates between front, side and rear armour faces.

I much prefer the TOI rolling system that quickly and elegantly gets to the heart of the matter...breaking things!

KlausFritsch said:

Well, it won't be too difficult if you ever commit the time (never enough of that for playing or designing. More than enough for winging about rules though, eh? )

Hopefully FFG will do something about facing in the near future...fingers crossed.

Aussie_Digger said:

I was surprised that there were no Churchill tanks with the Normandy expansion. Churchill tanks were also used in the desert, but saw action later.

As for the Firefly, well, I'm not going to lose any sleep over it. A Sherman substitute works just fine for me. After all, there very similar. If someone wanted to convert one of their Shermans (like what the British did) into a Firefly, then its would be easy peasy. All a longer gun barrel, attach that box to the back of the turret, and remove both the hull MG and turret mounted AAHMG. See, easy peasy. Finding the right color plastic to makethe box and longer barrel is a little harder, but look at the sprue you get from 1:72 scale plastic figures from the various manufactures. And if you paint the figures, then it doesn't matter what color or material you use to make the mods. Its all painted anyway.

Wish there had been some on board artillery pieces too like the 25 pdr howitzers, or 17pdr AT guns. Maybe could have given us some kind of 3d entrenchments,blocks. And what about some wrecks? Stuarts?

VanCamper said:

I'm getting off topic here but, yes, wrecks (generic) would be cool...

Stat wise most of the British tanks from the late war are covered. Achilles and Fireflys can be covered by M10s and Shermans with the long barrel card. Cromwells... are not covered by they are identical to shermans but should be a bit faster. That covers most of the British AFVs in the late war. Trucks... were not much different from anyone elses, and they used American halftracks and universal carriers. There are some of the more esoteric vehicles which are not covered, but they are not covered for other nations either.

It is more early/late war thats the issue, and it is mostly the American lend lease stuff we don't have (official) stats for (Lee-Grants, Stuarts and the like) as we already have the Matilda and the Crusader (which is a suitable counts as for most of the early/mid cruiserg and with the long barreled card can count as the later ones armed with the 6 lbrs). The American 57mm anti-tank guns were a copy of the British 6lbr so thats already covered. The 2lbr and 25lbr are not covered though.

Model wise of course is another issue, and if people don't like using the green American units for British that is also an issue.

I don't think having a seperate "rear" area for tanks is really necessary. Most tanks of the period didn't really have much less armour on the rear than they did on the sides.

side rear armour has no place in TOI imo.

I don't get why the british inf in Normandy expansion still wear shorts and having no churchill or carrier models (iconic brit kit ) is also very dissapointing.

Not sure what other models I could substitue that would fit with existing models (all painted now!)

well hypothectically wouldn't you want the British tanks to appear in an expansion more geared to them like Caen, Arnhem, Belgium or the Rhine river crossings? Days of the Fox is a 1941-42 expansion most of the British tanks really missing need a late war expansion.

BJaffe01

BJaffe01 said:

What, no crappy early-war cruiser and infantry tanks?

I agree, introducing more brit tanks in those expansions would be great (if they are a possiblity) Just would have been nice for a few more than 4 each of the tanks in DOTF to allow for some nice large tank battles. The USA and Germans recieved alot more in the way of armour, which makes for some nice tank scenarios.

well the fewer tanks may have been do to component restrictions at the time. the bad early war crusiers should be in a France 1940 and a desert 1940-41 expansion

BJaffe01