Recruitment: New Players and Old new players

[flyingryno]

This past week I was at the LGS. I introduced a Father and his 9 yr old son to the game. It was a pickup game. but I think I sold them on the game. They didn't buy the game but I'll know in the next two Mondays if they show up at the Monday night game.
Now I got a Father and his 13yr old son, are suppose two show up this Monday night at our game. This might access a group of 4-6 13 year old kids. We'll have to wait and see. My years of being a BSA adult leader stand (20+ years) me in good sted
when dealing with Kids. I'm always on the hunt for new players for any of my games.
Its been a good week.

I play by the rule of new players. Let the wookie win.

[CappyTom]

Good job. I started a game day at my church after services. I invite the college students and high school students. I have about 6 regulars that show up and I hope this fall it grows even bigger.

Tom

[richard m schwab]

Micheal!

I recall years ago i was picking up after a WW2 Armour game! One of the players a 13 or 14 year old asked me why i had only used certain tanks, it was a 1943 east front game with MK IV`s vs T-34`s! He saw some MK III`s and a KV-1 and said we should have used them. I replied that we had played a balanced game, that a MK III was not the equal of a KV. I was informed that the Germans had used the MK III in Russia and he wanted to play me one to one, with me taking the KV. I told him it would be a short game and he would lose. His father came in the shop to pick him up and take him home. He told his father he wanted to lay one more game, to prove his point. I told his father it would not be a fare game, his son was a chip off the old block and said his son should take three MK III`s. I told his father that even three to one was not going to help! Not wanting to back down the two of them sat down and challenged me to beat them.
I did all i could to prolong the game, including attempting to drive around their flank and give them a slight chance of flank shots on me. No that did not work they just came straight at me. Firing away and watching the 50mm rounds bounce off my tank. I finally got tired of being nice and knocked out the sons two tanks. You would think the father being an adult call it a night. No he took cover behind some trees and waited till i came in close, based on his sons lack of success this made for good tactics! When i finally got near him he charged me, i went into reverse and gave him the first shot. We both missed the first round but i hit and destroyed him on the next round. His shot hit me but bounced off!
The father to his credit told his son that i had been correct all along that. I told his father that the Russians had few KV tanks early in the war and the Germans could not stop them. The Germans designed two tanks to fight them and the T-34. The father a Naval officer thanked me for the game and winked at me, he told his son to thank me and listen to me in the next game! The son did come in and played some more games. They moved to a new duty station not long after that. I remembered his name and ran into him at a local gaming shop five years latter! His dad was stationed back here and he was starting college! last year i ran into someone i thought i knew at the local convention. I had not seen him in years, we were both running games in two different rooms. Yes his was a WW2 Eastern front game!!

Rich

[flyingryno]

I've played a lot of Micro armor. Where you using the Battleline (Panzer) rules?
flames of war?
We had many simular games with newbies and Engineers.

[Tommy Z]

I've heard many micro-pings from KV's myself. My buddy always insisted on playing the Russians.

[flyingryno]

I've seen a KV-2 that had over thirty hits by 75mm rounds none punched. It knocked out two 88's try to set up for a shot finally after holding up an armored division for 4 days. I t was finally set on fire the crew escaped out the hell hole. Years later I read of a tour of Moscow that it was stored in a warehouse there. Yes it was sitting on a bridge with no fords to be found.

[richard m schwab]

Micheal!

That was a 1:72 scale encounter,to introduce gaming with easy a to use size! On a side note i picked up my first GHQ Micro Armour in 1970. It was a sample pack of five items they made, we were gaming in 1:72 scale at the time. It was an eye opener!


Rich

[flyingryno]

What happen to my reply, it didn't post? Lets try that again?

At some conventions I've played 1/72nd scale its fun but Micro-armor allows bigger formations for less money. Twice it was on 24'x30'.(on the floor). I even saw 1/72 scale Tarawa IL. (Benito actually) that game lasted two days.
My home games where Micro on a ping pong table with a divider (cardboard) down the fold of the table for a double blind game.

[richard m schwab]

Micheal!

At the time of the Micro Armour conversion, we were using a ping pong and Pool table in a friends basement for a table! That was with the 1:72 scale battles, it always felt like a small area. With the Micro Armour it felt like the steeps of Russia! We started small with maybe twenty tanks on each side. When we were not doing that we played corps level Panzer Blitz games! Today i have boxes of complete 1:285 divisions gathering dust!


Rich

[greenalfonzo]

Micheal!

I recall years ago i was picking up after a WW2 Armour game! One of the players a 13 or 14 year old asked me why i had only used certain tanks, it was a 1943 east front game with MK IV`s vs T-34`s! He saw some MK III`s and a KV-1 and said we should have used them. I replied that we had played a balanced game, that a MK III was not the equal of a KV. I was informed that the Germans had used the MK III in Russia and he wanted to play me one to one, with me taking the KV. I told him it would be a short game and he would lose. His father came in the shop to pick him up and take him home. He told his father he wanted to lay one more game, to prove his point. I told his father it would not be a fare game, his son was a chip off the old block and said his son should take three MK III`s. I told his father that even three to one was not going to help! Not wanting to back down the two of them sat down and challenged me to beat them.
I did all i could to prolong the game, including attempting to drive around their flank and give them a slight chance of flank shots on me. No that did not work they just came straight at me. Firing away and watching the 50mm rounds bounce off my tank. I finally got tired of being nice and knocked out the sons two tanks. You would think the father being an adult call it a night. No he took cover behind some trees and waited till i came in close, based on his sons lack of success this made for good tactics! When i finally got near him he charged me, i went into reverse and gave him the first shot. We both missed the first round but i hit and destroyed him on the next round. His shot hit me but bounced off!
The father to his credit told his son that i had been correct all along that. I told his father that the Russians had few KV tanks early in the war and the Germans could not stop them. The Germans designed two tanks to fight them and the T-34. The father a Naval officer thanked me for the game and winked at me, he told his son to thank me and listen to me in the next game! The son did come in and played some more games. They moved to a new duty station not long after that. I remembered his name and ran into him at a local gaming shop five years latter! His dad was stationed back here and he was starting college! last year i ran into someone i thought i knew at the local convention. I had not seen him in years, we were both running games in two different rooms. Yes his was a WW2 Eastern front game!!

Rich

You can make a fair fight out of anything.

In your case, you could have given the KV a goal of crossing and exiting the board, and then made sure your rules were good enough to provide for the chance option of the Pz.III's disabling the tracks by targeting the suspension, or maybe providing for the rare (but actually occurring!) 5cm shot hitting and disabling the KV's gun barrel.

[flyingryno]

Yeah I sold it all of I thought going through some boxes the other day I found another two hundred of Mixed nationalities. I've been told that no one wanted to play rule to complicated.

[richard m schwab]

Kev!

They did allow for disabling of tracks. If memory would serve i disabled one of the MK III`s before i knocked it out. The case of my hits they were all frontal hull and turret hits. Like i said i tried hard to expose a side shot for them, they always maneuvered to come straight at me!!

The real lesson is. That despite the hard lesson he learned, he kept on coming back to game. That was thirty years ago and he is still a gamer!


Rich