SPI's Kharkov Wargame Live Play

 I just finished playing (solo) the first 5 turns of Kharkov The Soviet Spring Offensive from SPI. It is a game out of the magazine Strategy & Tactics May-June 1978 issue. After playing out the first two turn I fired up the YouTube channel and started a live stream. Played turns 3, 4, and 5 online. 

The Russian 28th army broke out easily in the north, and 6th army began enveloping the German units south-southeast of Kharkov. The high mark of the Spring Offensive includes taking (but not keeping) one of the Kharkov city hexes, scoring 2 victory points each turn for breaking the German front line, cutting supply to those German units in the pocket formed by the surrounding 6th, and running several units far out west threatening to take Poltava!

As the look of turn 6 shapes up it is apparent it is a race against time to take Poltava before these Russian units are cut off and out of supply. Operation Fredricus was unleashed on turn 5 and the Russian southern front line evaporated and Panzer spearheads cut straight to the Donets River. The German's historical result of bagging the whole Russian offensive and annihilating it is clearly evident on the game board!

You can see the video here. The live stream scheduled for tomorrow morning where I finish the rest of the game (turns 6-10) is found here.

Wellington's Victory House Rules

 I love almost everything about the TSR monster wargame Wellington's Victory. Except the ability to stack 9 skirmish units together and bulldoze through formed infantry. I, for some time, did not believe this issue actually existed and were just so much grognard grumblings. But then I found it, the rule in the book which allows this. I had missed this rule all these years. Probably because it isn't how I envision skirmish units being used in a Napoleon-era battle. 

The discussions and variants are legion on solving this niggling stone in the shoe of an otherwise great game. Last I had the game on the table was this time last year. Well, Vassal actually (it is a 'monster' game) because it is the only reasonable way for me to keep a game set up over a long period of time. And I couldn't move very far into the game with this issue weighing on my mind. 

Another year, as I have pointed out, has passed by as fast as summer in the Rockies, and I have a set of "house" rules I am going to try out and see how it modifies the game. The rules are as such:

Still playing the game right now RAW. I have some morale check questions for skirmish units I need to parse out answers for. Until then I cannot try variants because there as yet not be a "problem" needing fixing.

The Press on Nerd’s Variety Cast

 I get interviewed by Jason on all things USR and then some!

Nerd’s Variety Cast

Super Simple Death Save for Dungeons & Dragons

 This is an old-school take and most likely not relevant to 5e of the worlds most popular board game. But for your OSR game it fits the tropes of early play. Also, someone has probably already thought of this and has put it out there. I just haven't seen it yet. 

When the PC reaches zero Hit Points, instead of death they may choose to reduce their Hit Die to the next smaller die size. Only have a d4 Hit Die? To bad, no death save for you.

This means Magic-User and Thief class do not get a death save, they follow the standard zero Hit Points and you are dead. Outside of the Fighter, all other classes have a d6 Hit Die, so these classes get to cheat death once. With the Fighter having a d8 Hit Die they get to save from death twice. 

It should be noted the save is automatic, there is no roll to make. And just to be clear, this does mean, moving forward, the PC rolls this new lower die for all additional levels reached.