June 27, 2014 by brennon
Video Sponsors: Battle Foam - Mercs
We're back for episode two of Flames of War For the Win in this new season! This time our dynamic duo are having a look at the basics of artillery and the finer points of lobbing high explosive rounds of death at your opponents forces. Surely it's more subtle than that right?
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Great video, thanks guys. Dave you are awesome as usual! I was an artilleryman so this is my video! Can’t wait for the next one, keep it up!
Ciao!
I’m just starting Flames of war and i’m loving these, clear bitesize chunks. Can’t wait to see more
always so much fun to watch your guys videos keep up the good work
There is no such thing as too much firepower.
Nice shirt, lovely and blue 😉
Great show Dave & Warren! Getting dug into the rules deep!
Nice video. You guys are going to break me and I’m going to end up buying into FOW.
Another wonderful episode.
I could see the Nachtwulfen getting a few nebelwerfers…
would love to start Flames of war
Nebelwerfers! Very nice. A little vulnerable, though, and in most games the range is a little short. By the time the enemy’s in range, you’re sometimes in range yourself. Some games also require a reload time which can be annoying . . . and you can’t hide them, once they fire it’s very obvious where they fire from. But damn, that FIREPOWER!
Great video as always.
(Nice to see Dave presenting with Warren on a regular basis again!)
I think Flames Of War captures the ‘combined arms’ approach warfare really well.
And the depth of game play from working out how to use elements in effective synergy is one of F.O.W. most appealing aspects IMO.
I am eagerly awaiting for the next installment of this great series!
Once again, great job lads. Really useful as I am starting up and trying to get a gaming group up and running. More please!
P.S, are Knerbal Wothers (?) some sort of German boiled sweet aimed at the elderly? Perhaps they were used by the Volkssturm?
Funny, @intelligentmistertoad , but actually not too far off. “Nebelwerfers,” or “smoke thrower.” I think the Germans initially saw them as a smokescreen device, but once they saw how effectively they could deliver high explosive . . .
At home I have an account of a Polish rifleman, serving with a Soviet infantry division on the Central Front in White Russia, 1944. He battalion was hit and almost wiped out by a few batteries of these things. His account is pretty terrifying.
arrrrggghhhh nebelwerfers…..I HATE them!!!! At least when I’m playing the Russians 😉
Okay, watched the video again . . . and NOW I see what you’re joking about. Or more to the point, I HEAR what you’re joking about. 😀
Thanks guys!
5:45 . . . Dave wants to “bring down the rain!” Epic! 😀
It’s always the little rules that make the biggest differences. But I suppose this is true with War in general. Support teams, planning and coordination bring results.
I’m not really sold on FOW, I’d have to try some games before I dive into it
The OpenFire kit is not expensive, gets you two armies to play and has a pretty decent resale value if you decide you don’t like the game. Eh, my two pfennings.
Might also be worth seeing if anyone local plays it and can give you a demo.
at 17:30, Dave mentions Allied spotting planes calling in artillery missions. L-4 Grasshoppers and L-5 Sentinels? I read a German officer’s account once where he and his men HATED seeing these things, much more than even the P-51 Mustangs, P-47 Thunderbolts, or Typhoons. When the Germans saw these little spotter planes overhead, they knew an avalanche of artillery was only minutes (or seconds) away. And unlike flash-bang air strikes, artillery barrages can hammer down on you ALL DAY.
Would be awesome if you guys did a how to video to make that awesome snow theme table but with some ruined buildings or something so I can build my dust tactics winter table. Also when is dust to dust coming out can’t wait to start watching that.
Hey guys, enjoyed the video very much. Flames of War seems like an awesome game and with each video I understand a little bit more about the game. Thanks for all the hard work, keep these video’s coming!
Great video guys, thank you. Hey Warren, what brand of building is that large one you put down to demonstrate how far artillery must be from structures?
excellent walkthrough guys it does help. And remember “I don’t care what you play… just play it LOUD!”
Great series of videos.
Very didactic. A good approach to FOW.
Guys, your FOWFTW videos are awesome. Everyone of them are excellent, but Recce ad Artillery have opened new avenues in FOW for me. You guys do a great job explaining the rules in a simple to understand way. Thanks Guys
Really liked the video and all the stuff you have done to help support flames of war as a hobby (and the terrain board by the way).
For follow up videos I think it would be good to explain more about rocket launchers and the number of guns in a bombardment (which allows you to get a larger template/rerolls, especially the latter as is a really important concept for using artillery).
Would like to also see a video about using aircraft and anit-aircraft.
Anyways keep at it, You all are doing a great job.
Another great tutorial, would like to see the ‘Katyusha’ rocket batteries in action I think it’s four templates if you have the battery to the max, that’s almost the size of a dustbin lid. I’d also like to see the different attributes the gun batteries of the various armies have like the British and American Artillery. Am I right in thinking that the British HMG teams can also do a bombardment?
Great ‘how to’ lessons will be learned from poor use of artillery 🙂
your petty artillery dont stand a chance against my Königstiger! (which i dont have)
which is a shame
cuz it would be awesome
any goood tips on getting into flames of war?
Check local clubs for demo games and/or find a friend interested in FoW and split the Open Fire starter box with him/her.
These videos make me wanna get into FOW so much…..
Good job once again
Now all we need is for them to say “fire the Cannons!” each time they place artillery templates.
nice work guys.
Great tute guys, really good stuff!
Great video, very informative.
So many games so little time -I might just have to give FoW a go sometime soon
The most egregious display of artillery I’ve ever “ran” in a game was Patton’s Counter offensive to relieve Bastogne 31DEC44 – 1JAN, 45. The US had 155’s, 8 inchers and 105’s for days! P-47’s were also present but the L-5, as Oriskany said, was the one to worry about,
Love the Video, would love to check out this game in person. Btw … the table is ..just awesome. Great work!
I am new to FoW so this video was very helpful. Thanks and keep them coming guys!
@warzan…. you have seen the devastating template, same 1 from Vietnam Choppa’s…
Obviously I need to get some artillery in my army.
Great video guys – everytime i see FOWFTW i wan’t to rush out and buy the game. I think i am going to crack pretty soon.
Question for anyone else – would it be worth buying any other source books just for the fun of reading them before getting the starter box?
Great video guys. Like the way introducing some of the further rules in an easily accessible manner. Keep up the good work!
Thank you for another great tutorial. It’s great to see the enthusiasm.
Love FoW FTW!!!
Thank you, guys, good video. Waiting for the weekender 🙂
Thanks for another great show , really helpful
Great series.
I’d like to know about merging mortar batteries- ie if I get HQ plus observer team and two mortars as a section, and can get three sections, can I fire all three sections as one battery?
Staff teams are my fave. They are always cool to paint with all those tables and papers. 😛
I hope we get more on rules like time on target and combined fire etc.
FoW is next on my list I think as soon as I have cleared my painting pile (the end is close this time trust me!! 🙂 )
The great thing about these videos is the theories can equally apply to other games systems, so keep them coming guys, very impressed so far
(This is also a shameless post to try and win a starter set 😉 )
Same here ( i mean winning not the pile)
I got some nebelwerfers waiting to be painted. Suggested to me as a good all rounder that can fit into a wide range of lists
Still not a FoW player, but still enjoying this series as so much of the advice applies to every game. This week the importance of the combined arms approach. Bravo fellas.
PS Daaaave!
I do like thee big guns
Very good video enjoyed it a lot
nice nice nice
Any thoughts on the best artillery nation? US Howitzers look impressive but 88s might win the day based on their direct AT capability. Any Artillery is good artillery I suppose?
Well I think that depends mainly of what time in the war your looking at, though there is a nice couple of stories one which is some captured German generals in 44 asking to see the automatic loading 25pdr’s the British used and they manged to put so many barrages down quickly
And the other is a Canadian Lieutenant who when faced witha a stubborn German position called all the divisional artillery plus a naval bombadment on top of it
After it went in and the 2 dug in HMG’s had been destroyed his Commander went a bit nuts on him for wasting all that artillery on such a minor position, on hearing about it the Canadian General went to him and said ‘Son, as long as there is something to hit you just call in whatever you want’
In FoW I’d say best nation with defensive artillery is US with Time on Target, combined bombardments and AOPs. Pulling off a successful attack is damn hard when you cannot focus your troops because of the fear of massive bombardments hitting the troop concentrations.
Place for best offensive artillery is a close race between US and Brits, US in general brings bit more firepower to play but Brits excel in softening positions with repeated barrages. Both can combine batteries to cover lots of ground making effective defensive positioning much harder.
Soviets have option for massive batteries, but limited amount of observers which makes their artillery somewhat unwieldy. Soviets and Germans both have access to rocket artillery which is handy for covering large areas quickly, but are less effective in hammering holes to specific parts of enemy line and are also quite tempting targets for counter battery fire.
Oh noes ! It becomes harder and harder to resist getting into this …
This is great for people learning to play.
Season 2 ftw ! when do you play another game ?
Great video as always. 😀
Thanx for a great one – again!
Easy, inspirational and fun.
I really need to add good artillery to my list
I wish my eyesight was good enough to do a half decent job of painting at this scale. Unfortunately if I try to paint anything under 28mm it ends up looking like it belongs to the Mr Blobby army.
Yes…more Diamond Dave. Love these vids guys…thanks! Warning for all new Flames players…..this game is frigging addicting! I am going on my 5th Battlefoam bag of goodies! I love tweeking my lists and coming up with cool game scenarios. Cheers!
nice advices guys :).
I’ve started FoW because of Warren 🙂 so it’s always a pleasure to see you guys having fun discovering rules and synergies, as I do with my friends 🙂
a Question though, you said mortar may smoked, i looked and find out that my 120mm GW43 doesn’t have the note : Smoke bombardment. so i suppose it’s just artillery as usual with mortar ? am i right ?
again thanks for your hard work 🙂
Another great video, thanks guys! 😉
Superb video as always.
Hey, another educating and entertaining video -as usual. Sometimes when both of you get excited over the rules or game mechanics it becomes problematic to follow. 😉
I think my next purchase will be the Nebelwerfers
Happy to see these back. Very informative, thanks guys ;0)
Thanks guys. Enjoying season 2 so far
My Grandfather was in the 8th – North Africa, Sicily, Italy … he was apparently a RA gunner, and fired 25-pounders, according to my Dad … He apparently never talked about his time served very much …
Looking forward to getting round to looking at the self-propelled artillery – the Sextons, Bishop, Priests and so on …
Ahhhh! there is nothing like painting some HermanGöring Panzers and watching Dastderdly Warren and the magnificent Dave explain how to arty them form the table surface^^!
great stuff!
The more I watch these Flames of War For the Win videos, the more I want to get started in this game. Thanks for the insight!
Good report again, flamethrowers pin RV night attacking Brits quite nicely 🙂 One pioneer platoon can have up to 3.
Thanks for the tutorial. I like how warren acts a little bit new to the game. He always asks the questions newbies might want to know. Its good to see him go from open fire to more advanced play. Artillery will be my next purchase it hink, and recon 😉
Really good episode starting to understand how the game should be played now, well done and thanks.
Fantastic video, I’m Dave’s biggest fan! Give us a wave in the next video, please!
Great show as usual. The explanations were very well paced. The overlay texts were a bit long though. They distracted me from the dialog on a few occasions so I had to rewind and play again to understand what was said.
line of _site_ ? lol
Two words: combined arms.
FoW makes a real effort to bring this to the tabletop. I like it alot. Looking forward to the next episode.
All ways great to have another FOW FTW and yet more opportunities to see Dave show up Warren with the snazziness of his outfits, love the blue glasses.
I really need to get into this game but the lack of starter armies puts me off.
this game looks extremely fun 🙂 would to play a game of it
Great show, Im really glad your doing another season.
Thank you for this great episode. Continue like this and I have to start this game too 😉
Enjoying the FOW FTW series keep it comming
These videos are really useful, I’m just starting to play flames of war after having been painting for a while so been watching these to learn how to play. Thanks guys, looking forward to the next video
makes me want to get back into this
Great video guys!
Artillery is very cool
Another good video lads, I have started to collect FOW having seen the first series.
Very interesting. Thanks for the pointers.
Flames of war is a game I would love to get started in and to win the starter set would be a perfect way to do that.
Those sneaky Night Fighters.
nipplewurfers/nibblewurfers: it took me a bit that you meant Nebelwerfers.
As mentioned before in the previous video’s comments, a smaller, less cluttered tabletop, would make it clearer for rule explanations. They are very pretty tho!
Very good at explaining the rules tho, very handy to help to get through the thick rulebook.
Being relatively new to BoW, it’s only over the last couple of months that I’ve watched the older FOW FTW videos, and Nam Week, and other random FOW vids. But now it’s nice to be able to watch the new series ‘live’ as it were.
Wonderful video, and I love how at the end it shows just how recon and artillery work so well together to make infantry assaults easier. This game has much more tactical depth than I had realized at first glance.
Thanks so much for these videos!
gotta love FoW FTW
Great video like always….. really helpful as I too have always used arty as a separate tool to try and take out targets, I never considered using them with recon units to improve their performance!!!!
The future looks much brighter now 🙂
Great video can not wait for a more in-depth look at tactics for artillery.
Great video – time to invest in some artillery units!
there should be a rule so you can fire artillery trough a window……..
A great video with a lot of insight on the artillery. It is great for a FoW newcomer like me 🙂
Great video, glad you are still making these!
A great look at arty, looking forward to seeing the section on smoke as well.
Awesome snow terrain. Comment FTW. Enjoyed this so much that I’ll be going back to watch the old vids. Cheers
Sweet ;0)
So happy to have found these informational video’s, Keep up the great work.
K
Amazing video, and it’s a great series. Keep up the work, guys 🙂
Fabulous show again guys. Made me really think about artillery and actually useful i can be. Time to go back to the list builder x)
Another great video, I spent last weekend converting my Open Fire Shermans into Fireflys because after Dave’s recommendation I couldn’t imagine not having them in my army.
you guys have the best battles for flames of war
Another informative video
Fantastic vid. Artillery is devastating
Great job guys! I am trying to get my friends into flames of war, and I frequently use your videos as a training tool (and to brush up myself-you guys have explained some thing to where I finally understand them!).