Flames of War: Market Garden Tournament

Today was Tournament Day for Flames of War at Phoenix Games in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada. Twelve players came to the city to compete for bragging rights and prizes. I did not place well in this tournament, but I walked away with a Door Prize and a Prize for the army voted as best painted.

As my readers may know from my previous posts, I am a huge fan of Reaper and RAFM miniatures. I add their figures to whatever collections I can. I am sure that these two unique objective markers are what helped me win the prize for best painted army as voted by the players. The Demon being summoned on the left is a Night Gaunt by RAFM and the Blood Pool Fountain with Dead Russian Soldiers around it is a Fountain of Chaos by Reaper Miniatures.

Above is another view of my Demon being summoned by a German commander. It always gets a few looks while the armies are on parade. Below is a picture of my list for the tournament. Although it did not perform well, I am more than happy that people enjoyed my work. Thanks for the votes guys.

It was fun to squeeze 10 platoons into a 1420 point game, but next time, I will take fewer units.  It was a lot to set up for each match. My first opponent was Phil. Below is a picture of his army.

I lost this game big due to bad deployment and my opponent being clever enough to wrap around the side and attack my flank when I deployed fully anticipating a frontal assault. I also made major mistakes in double-timing teams to his objectives (only to get blasted to pieces), and in using soft-topped transports in range of his guns.

I voted Phil for the tournament’s best painted army. His army looks fantastic and I love that he used a display board. I am told that he took the detail to such a level that he even painted their eyes. Being 15mm, I never investigated to see if that claim was true, but his army looks great!

Below is a picture of someone else’s army. I don’t know whose this was, but I like it. I considered voting it as my favourite painted army.

My second game was against an extremely friendly fellow named Kevin. He was very enjoyable to play against and a great opponent in that he helped teach you play the game better as you played. Despite being friendly, he went for blood. Kevin’s list contained 8 Panthers.

The only thing that I had of threat to these monsters’ front armour were my 88s. Kevin decided to leave the 88s’ side of the table alone and concentrated his efforts where he had little to fear.

My Infantry, PaK40s, 105s and Stugs were only mere speed bumps to Kevin’s forces while my 88s did nearly nothing. Kevin was able to earn a 6-1 victory off of me.

My final game went a lot better. We both had German Grenadier Companies. His were Veterans and mine were Trained, but I was able to score a 3-1 draw on this game.

I learned from my first game and did not repeat the mistake of putting my transports in harms way. They got off the table before the enemy’s long range weapons fired.

I rushed forward with StuGs and Infantry for the objective, but my opponent was able to defend it and grind the game to a stalemate. Still, a 3-1 draw is a much better result than the two 6-1 loses that I suffered earlier. If time was not limited, I might have even squeezed out a 6-1 victory. 🙂

Overall, I had a great day at the tournament. It is always fun to get painted models onto the table and Flames of War is one of the many games that I thoroughly enjoy. Special thanks goes out to the Owner of Phoenix Games, Bill Kocher, and the Tournament Organizer, Brenden Brown. I had a great time and your efforts are appreciated.