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Seitenabrufe

237138832 Seitenabrufe seit dem 30.06.2003


Pfad: 

HauptseiteCosimsProduktlinien (Cosims)World War IIClash of Titans: The Tank Battle of Kursk (Boxed Edition)


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Clash of Titans: The Tank Battle of Kursk (Boxed Edition)

 

Hersteller: 

Moments in History

Produktlinie: 

World War II

Bestellnummer: 

MIH COT-14

Produkttyp: 

Grundregeln

Sprache: 

Englisch

Preis: 

66,00 EUR

Anmerkungen:

 

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Produktbeschreibung

It's back in VERY limited supply! Yes, we're talking about CLASH OF TITANS—THE TANK BATTLE FOR KURSK. This is the original counters, map, play aids and rulebook, plus an errata sheet...and newly printed replacement counters to deal with the errata!

The game simulates Operation "Zitadelle", the German attempt to cut off the front bulge at Kursk - history's greatest tank battle ever! Clash of Titans uses the popular Ring of Fire system. It comes with one 22"x34" map, 600 counters, player aid cards, and a ziplock style bag.

HERE IS A DETAILED REVIEW OF CLASH OF TITANS:

One of the perks resulting from having shelf space for an extensive game collection and table space for several games in progress is getting to choose more than my fair share of what-to-play-next. With three expected last week, I pulled out MiH’s CLASH OF TITANS, a Kursk game that seemed like it would play conveniently with two Germans and one Soviet. A late cancellation (and a case of D-Day anniversary fever) resulted in a switch to XTR’s VICTORY IN NORMANDY, but all that early-AM counter clipping and rules reading left an impression.

CLASH OF TITANS, for those of you who missed it, has turns of two days duration. The map is drawn at eight miles to the hex, limiting stacks to one Soviet corps or two German divisions. Given the scale, a separate combat phase for resolution of gun duels between opposing tanks is the last thing you'd expect. But there it is: just prior to the regular combat phase, adjacent tanks -- and just tanks -- exchange AP fire.

Tank combat is kept very simple. Terrain, armor-thickness, etc., are factored out of the equation. Basically, all a tank counter need do is roll against its "tank effectiveness" (TE) ratings to inflict a loss, with higher-rated tanks getting first-fire advantage. After all tanks have fired, the action carries forward to the traditional combat phase, with surviving tanks adding their regular combat factors into the fray.

The two-tiered combat is an indirect philosophical descendant of the soak-off attacks in games like AFRIKA KORPS. In both cases, in many combats units which are stacked together do not support one another in battle. I'll assume you all remember how the soak-off attacks of AFRIKA KORPS work. For the newer game, an example is needed to add concreteness to this discussion:

Let us assume Soviet 3 Tank Corps (three tank units plus an infantry brigade with no TE factor) takes on German 5 §§ Panzer Division (three tank units). German tanks have higher TE ratings, and so get to fire first. Each step (two per full-strength counter) has 30% chance of inflicting a step loss (these are the least effective German tanks; many are rated with 40%+ chances). Anyway, six rolls at 30%... let's assume two hits are inflicted. Now the Soviets fire back. Four steps remain, each with a 10% chance of inflicting a hit (all Soviet tanks are this pathetic in tank combat). Odds are that no loss will be inflicted.

How does this echo the old-fashioned soak-off attack? Most obviously, in the way that attached Soviet motorized infantry brigade (not a tank unit) contributes nothing to the tank combat. The German is thus able to engage just part of the enemy stack in our example. But it runs deeper than this, since supporting infantry is also cut out of the tank combat equation at the individual unit level. To better show this, we'll again turn to our sample engagement.

The three German kampfgruppen of the 5th §§ are rated '7' in regular combat; the trio of Soviet armored units in 3 Tank Corps are given a '6' strength. These ratings suggest that the overall strength (from the component armor, artillery, and infantry) of these sample units is very similar: the German units are just 11% stronger than their counterparts. This is a lot different from a comparison of the separate tank effectiveness ratings, which rate the Germans a 300% superiority.

I have mixed feelings about the two-tiered combat featured in CLASH OF TITANS (as well as its sister games from MiH, TRIUMPHANT RETURN, EASTWALL, and the one that started it all, RING OF FIRE). To the good, it offers the illusion of a more tactical battle than would otherwise be possible given the scale -- and that's almost always a tabletop blessing. A very concrete image is conjured, one of the Panthers and T-34s engaging at the forward edge of battle prior to the general attack on the defending line. I would be more comfortable with this image of battle if the tank counters were just tanks: why should losses from tank combat destroy counters that also contain substantial numbers of infantry, etc., whose strengths were not factored into the battle? I also have some doubts about the accuracy of what seems to be happening in no-man’s land during separate tank combat step -- why do the tanks seem to rush out from support range of the attached infantry? -- but I can live with that because...

Because I think what the designer, John Desch, does not want us to take this "tank combat" too literally. All he is really trying to do is add to the unpredictability of armored warfare. His Ring of Fire system models history by making it very likely that a single panzer division, because of its superior tank effectiveness ratings, can take on several Soviet tank corps. But rather than rigidly portraying the German superiority by giving a kampfgruppe double (or triple) combat strength, he includes a preliminary combat step in which the true degree of their superiority is variable. I think it's important to note my initial dismay over the degree to which Soviet armor seems to have been short-changed in tank combat (or argue the flipside, "were the Germans really that good?"). But Desch's "tank effectiveness" is based more on training and performance than gun velocity and armor thickness, so even though it's fun to quibble with the designer on the ratings, it's hard to argue with him on the results.

More than just making the CLASH OF TITANS more exciting, tank combat also makes it more interesting to run the tactically inferior Soviet armor. True, the T-34s are likely to burn like so many chunks of charcoal at a summer barbecue, but given some luck in the tank combat step, given their high regular combat ratings they'll create their share of hot moments for the panzers. There is much less sense of German invincibility here than in games which feature a single overall combat rating.

Along with the "surprise" rolls in The Gamers' Operational Combat Series games (e.g., GUDERIAN’S BLITZKRIEG), CLASH OF TITANS' two-tiered approach to combat represents the cutting-edge of my recent WWII gaming experience in the way it introduces more variability to a combat than what's possible with a single dieroll. Like so many aspects of the wargames we love (and sometimes love to hate), there is every reason to think Desch could have streamlined his game to make it play faster (and yet produce the same results). But let's face it, that second tier of combat is why the game's worth playing (and writing about). It's a lot more interesting than the old-fashioned alternatives.

Die Panzerschlacht von Kursk, Juli 1943.
3 Szenarien, Schwierigkeitsgrad: niedrig bis mittel,
Solospielbarkeit: hoch,
8 Meilen/Feld,
2 Tage/Runde, Bataillon, Regiment, Kampfgruppe, Brigade, Division, Korps.
600 Counter, 1 Karte, Regeln usw.
Im Ziplock

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