We talked at length to our printers both last week and today and together we have fixed another print date (start) of June 12th. They
can not do the 22nd (today) and we were not entirely ready. This makes no one happy, though once again, we will save some cost.
The printers are staying with their estimate of 5-7 days to complete printing and we should begin shipping on or before the 20th of June. We will ship in the sequence that the order was taken. If the print shop has breaks in their sub-contracting, we will have material ready for
them but we cannot ship until all of it is done.
We’ll continue to post samples on the web site as soon as Mitch is back from vacation. The next sample will again be from the Axis OB and will give you an idea of the conditional reinforcements and OB options.
You can download the Axis Conditional reinforcements rules here.
Re Arthur Goodwin’s answer to Greg Sarnecki’s question of May 14th: what’s up with the 2 points of AA for a 1941 Panzer division? I understand 2 points of AA for a 1942 Panzer division (3 companies of AA in the artillery regiment, one company each for the two Panzergrenadier regiments, for a total of 5 companies). But a 1941 Panzer division I believe had only one company of AA (in the anti-tank battalion). What am I missing?
I was noticing in the axis OB options that the Ju88s are now 3B4.Have they been downgraded from 4B5 now? Looking very interesting so far.
Answers to previous questions:
to Del Favero re 2pts intrinsic AA in Pz XXs: Most divisions with AA units in their makeup usually come out somewhere between a quarter and a half-point of AA. However, there were also a large number of small independent AA units on both sides to be accounted for. For Soviets there were dozens (later hundreds) of separate flak divizias (very small battalions). For the Germans there were a large number of light AA battalions (both Heer and Luftwaffe). Many of these battalions/divizias were factored into various combat/motorized assets on both sides (others were left as independent units, or composites of multiple divizias for the Soviets – as each divizia is only about a 1/3 of a point of AA). This is the only way hardly any of these XXs rate a pt of intrinsic AA, plus it dropped several dozen counters out of game that we just didn’t have room for in OB. For the Germans, the flak units factored into the Pz XXs were the ones that (mostly) habitually ran with the Panzer forces and did not at some later point transfer to other theaters.
Douglas re Ju88s – Previously were two main types of Ju88As in game; Ju88A1 = 3B5 and Ju88A4 = 4B5. There are now three main marks:
Ju88A1 = 3B3
Ju88A5 = 3B4
Ju88A4 = 4B5 (and, yes, A4 came after A5).
The re-rating/new breakdown reflect several things:
Ju88A1 = 280mph max speed, initially only 3×7.9mm MGs (later upped to 4x 7.9, and then to 6×7.9 but only 4 gunners so only 4 could be fired at same time); very little armor; dive brakes problematic, inferior wing design compared to later marks, problems with undercarriage, wing/dive brake problems mean aerobatics were prohibited including steep dive-aways from enemy fighters, this resulted in dispropriate losses to Ju88A units during Fall of France – their loss ratios were higher than He111 units.
Ju88A5 – 4(6)x7.9 MGs from start (increased to 5(7)x7.9). some armor for pilot, greatly improved wing design, problems with dive brakes fixed, aerobatic restrictions lifted, meaning A5 could now use its superior dive abilities to dive away from fighters.
Ju88A4 – max speed increases to 292mph, 5×7.9mm MGs from start, later increased to 6(7)x7.9 or 1x13mm & 5×7.9mm, etc.; additional armor for pilot and some armor for gunners. Overall faster, better defensive armament, and extra armor meant more surviveabiltiy.