Rob Reviews: Blitzkrieg Commander First Look

[BobbieTheDamned]

Specialist Military Publishing's "Blitzkrieg Commander" A First Look

Price: £20 for the rules and reference sheet Link to BKC page


I'd decided the other week that I didn't have nearly enough rules for WW2 gaming. After a bit of looking I came across Blitzkrieg Commander. Billed as a fast playing set of rules with enough detail but not hundreds of modifiers. Does it live up to that promise? I think so. I spent the best part of a day reading the rules (not because they were long but because I took my time) and they seem as though they'd play very quickly, there are a fair few modifiers but they tend to just add or remove a dice from what you're rolling rather than having to do maths to work out the final modifier on the dice score. All the modifiers seem to be present on the reference sheet so no digging about for them. This is the second edition of these rules and you can tell there has been a lot of refining and effort put in to make them play well. These rules seem suitable for gaming with 6mm 10mm and 15mm figures, possibly 20mm figures if you've got a lot of space.



The presentation of these rules is fantastic. Full examples of play, with full colour diagrams of actual miniatures, are used thought. The core game mechanics include units acting on initiative within a small area, major moves are all command generated. There are comprehensive rules for pre-plotted and directed artillery and air support.

Full army lists for all the major (and most minor) protagonists, covering most theatres too. Basicly no added rule books are ever going to be needed, though other rule sets (ColdWar Commander and FutreWar Commander) are available and are apparently based on the same core mechanics.

There are a fair few stats for the units in BKC and I can't imagine being able to play without an army list or reference cards with my units stats on. There are 6 core stats which cover movement, anti-tank ability, anit-personel ability, close assault, hits and armour. There are also a few specialised 'traits' such as elite infantry and tough armoured units which affect the game mechanics without having to have additional stats.

All in all I'm very much looking forward to trying these rules out.

[MortiS-the-Lost]

Sounds like a good rule set

is there a Medieval or Fantasy version?
(sorry, you should have come to expect such questions from me)

[BobbieTheDamned]

There's not a specific fantasy or medieval version but I've heard a lot of people compare it to Warmaster so I guess that would be the fantasy  version and WAB would be the ancients/medieval equivalent.