1985 Company MegaTest - Team Yankee

 

I've never actually played Flames of War, or have a copy, but I bought Team Yankee partly because it was another WW3 set, but mostly because of the excellent looking Iron Maiden BAOR supplement. There's some quite nice scenario chrome in both books, but having got the sense of FOW/TY being a bit of a tank-park game I realised I ought to actually try it out myself.

Presentation

122pp full colour hardback main book (Soviets and Americans) and 50pp full colour hardback BAOR supplement. 2pp QRS at the back of main book, reasonable layout of rules.

Set-Up

Essentially the same as the last two, but I swopped the British and Soviet board edges round. Company Group on either side as before. No attempt to use points!

How It Played

With the swop of sides the Brits got to Semmenstedt first. Again Chieftain vs T64 tank duels dominated the early game - and I kept the same "tactical" separations as before so no tank parks. Again the Chieftains came of worse. As the Brits dug in around Semmenstedt an artillery strike mauled the units in the woods. A direct assault out of Remilingen ended up with a lot of burning BMPs. Two platoons of BMPs then rolled in from the West, supported by the artillery and took the wood, and it was time to call a halt. yet again with the MBTs gone the Soviets are left with an armful of BMPs with 73mm/ATGW and the Brits just have a few Milan and Carl Gustavs (roll on Warrior!).

Rules Impression

To be fair, not as bad as I'd feared. That said....

Very old school IGO-UGO. For some reason all Brit units are 4+ to hit and all Soviet 3+ with no real reason for it. Once you've hit you roll for save, then you often have to roll for firepower. Tank ranges seem short (4x AK47, so 800-1200m?). Similar Gun Factor+D6 > Armour Factor to 7DTTR. Repeated "free" attempts to get your artillery on target. No real difference between ATGW and gun fire. No suppression. No friction, no spotting. Nothing seemed really broken though.

Overall

More playable than I expected, but nothing innovative or to lift up from being a very simple rule set with one to many dice rolls. If I was looking for a "starter" set I think I'd prefer 7DTTR. Overall 5/10.