5th Corp Campaign Game Board: D-Day - Omaha Beach, Dog Red Sector Part One

So here we begin the journey that my Dad and I started down a few months back to build a WWII themed game board. I have let my father make many of the decisions on this project as it was originally his idea and he is mostly doing it to spend time with me and my hobby. He is not a gamer but loves history so my job is to assist him as much as possible while considering the gaming aspects of the board and help him make decisions that make the board playable while still reflecting history as much as is possible.

As I mentioned in the last post on this topic we will be following 5th Corp on Omaha Beach up the D-3 Exit in Dog Red Sector up to St. Laurent-Sur-Mer (passing Les Moulins). Some progress has been made on the table itself but I will cover that a bit later. Right now I want to talk about the table design. Like I said before there is a lot of conflicting information regarding what was were, not only in regards to units but the defenses as well. When I designed the map we will be using I tried to incorporate as many as the elements of the defense as possible without over crowding the table (mostly I am talking about the bigger elements like bunkers). There is still a lot going on to the table though. Here is the map that inspired my own...

The map from the German perspective. The legend is in French and not all the elements could be identified but it gives you an idea of what a daunting task taking the beach was for 5th Corp.

And my version from the American perspective. You can see that there is significantly less to the Resistance Nests here.

We have already started on creating the bluffs on the table getting the basic shapes and elevations worked out so now its about shaping the edges making them cleaner and working on the roads and pathways that run inland from the beach. The hill on the right in my drawing is WN68 which was positioned on a very steep bluff while the other bluff was more manageable. Apparently the fire from the defenders was so intense the Americans were forced to assault the position at WN66 (on the left) directly up the hill. Finally on to the part you have all been waiting for... the pictures!!!

The beach area is on the bottom right and will rise up at to a shale embankment where the seawall will be located. In the background you can see the first section of the bluffs. In all the elevation will raise from sea level up to 40m.

The bluff are nearly complete rising up from 10m to 40m in all. Each elevation change is 10 meters and will be represented by a section of 2" foam. Things are starting to take shape now!

Damn this is going to look sweet when its finished!

A daunting task awaits the American invaders! [pic taken from beach level]

The road to St. Laurent shall be costly for 5th Corp. At least it looks that way from this vantage point.

Army 5th Corp in Europe

Company E, 2nd Battalion, 16th Infantry Regiment, 1st Infantry Division disembark from an LCVP assaulting Omaha Beach Easy Red Sector on the morning of June 6, 1944. Photograph by Robert F. Sargent.

 So in a previous post I mentioned that my Father and I wanted to build a WWII series of game boards that took the Allies in Europe from Normandy all the way to the invasion of Germany. The plan is to follow the exploits of the American Army 5th Corp in Europe. What battles and actions we are going to cover remains to be seen but there are a number of options including actions of the 1st Infantry Division, 29th Infantry Division, 2nd Armored Division, 82nd Airborne Division which were all assigned to 5th Corp.

5th Corps Shoulder Patch

So like I was saying many, many options. Some of these campaigns and operations I am unfamiliar with so that in itself will require some research on my part. Personally I am up for the challenge and if anyone has some suggested reading I would appreciate it. Needless to say the obvious first choice is Omaha Beach which we have already started to plan out. The area we want to cover is the Dog Red Sector D-3 draw up the beach from Les Moulins to St. Laurent-Sur-Mer. At the moment we are planning to do this with the Crossfire rules although there are a number of issues that would need to be addressed in my opinion so that is not set in stone yet. Just for the record there is a lot, and I mean a lot of conflicting information about which units where were on Omaha Beach so unless someone has a definitive guide they could recommend most of the decisions made will be chosen around what will be easier to model/field. Stay tuned for further updates over the next few days as work has already started on the boards.

Table Update

Well as you know there was a mishap with the adhesion method that was first used to get our Grass Mat down on the foam. The second method work great however and there was no issue with shrinkage at all. So we finished off the final (for now) steps to protect the board which was to run black duct tape around the edges to help with the boards longevity as well as pull the edges of the board tight without trimming the mat itself. Here are the images from the final table with board. I'm sure you can see the second set of boards beneath the finished ones. These are the start of our Normandy Omaha Beach Landing boards.

 

Now all that remains to be done is litter it with tons of terrain. I figured the most sensible place to start is with the hills. While my father works on the Omaha Beach Sea Wall I can use the scrap pieces to add some flavor to my hills. Anyway, that is the upcoming project that I will be working on. I'm hoping to get started on that by the end of the week which will give me time to finish painting my Warmaster Trolls tonight and base the three units that are done being painted so I can get better pictures of them. I have decided on how I want to base them. I plan to do something rather generic which I saw on Balagan's Crossfire website. This is how I plan to base my WWII Crossfire figs as well. I like it because it is generic enough that they would not look out of place in any terrain, except maybe somewhere that is itself exotic. Anyway, I'll be off to the painting table now.

My Daunting List of Unpainted Lead

So I promised earlier that I would make a list of all that I needed to accomplish before I got caught up. Like I said before... I have a problem. That problem is collecting new things and then getting them just to the point where I can get them on the field at the local store, or at someones house that has a board and terrain. Typically this is getting them assembled and maybe so far as primed. I have decided that is not going to cut it any longer if I am going to remain sane. So that being said, I'm the kind of person that is more successful if I have a list of things to do, especially when I get to mark stuff off said list. So here in no particular order is my Gamer to do list.

Paint Warmaster Orc & Goblin army
Paint Warmaster Empire army
Paint Warmaster Dwarf army
Strip and re-paint Warmaster Choas army
Make 10mm Warmaster terrain pieces
Paint Alien Squad Leader (ASQL) "Stargate System Lord" army
Assemble and paint ASQL Alien Grays army
Assemble and paint ASQL "Harkonnen" army
Make 15mm ASQL Scifi terrain pieces
Paint Full Trust Kra'vak fleet
Paint Full Thrust Phalon fleet
Assemble and paint Full Thrust FSE fleet
Assemble and paint Full Thrust ORC fleet
Assemble and paint Full Thrust USNC fleet
Assemble and paint Full Thrust Civilian craft
Make Full Thrust play mat and terrain (ie planets, astroids, etc)
Assemble and paint Crossfire American Company
Assemble and paint Crossfire German Company
Assemble and paint Crossfire Russian Comapny
Assemble and paint Crossfire US Marine Comapny
Assemble and paint Crossfire Japanese Company
Make 15mm Crossfire terrain (European and Pacific)
Paint 30mm Legends of the Old West (LotOW) Outlaw Posse
Paint 30mm LotOW Lawman Posse
Paint 30mm LotOW Cowboy Posse
Paint 30mm LotOW Native American Posse
Make 30mm Old West terrain pieces
Paint 30mm Malifaux Neverborn Crew
Paint 30mm Malifaux Resurrectionist Crew
Paint 30mm Malifaux Archanist Crew
Build Macro Photography Light Box
Build generic game boards
Build gaming table

and finally... a special project I am working with my Father on. A series of game boards we are dubbing "From Normandy to Berlin". Which we know will take a while to finish but the hope is that we will be able to follow the allies as they advance across Europe. We are starting with the Operation Overlord basically recreating Dog Green Sector of Omaha Beach. We of course understand that we might have to sacrifice some realism to gain some playability but we are looking forward to the challenge. I will dedicate a post solely to this subject in the near future and hopefully you will read along!

I have quite the to do list don't I. This doesn't even include all the games I want to play. Such as Ambush Alley in 15mm, Battletech (the table-top version), All Things Zombies and my newest acquisition... Warmaster Ancients! I picked up Warmaster Ancients and Warmaster Ancient Armies up from Ebay for a song! Both books for $41 including shipping. Since they have been out of print for a while I could not pass on these even thought I am not yet ready to dive in. I also plan to get into 15mm ACW but have not yet decided on a ruleset to use. I'm still looking around and reading reviews and such. No rush since I have so much on my plate at the moment anyway. But the objective is to get my hobby to the point where I am working on the newest hotness instead of being eight games behind. And these are just my miniature related projects. I am also working on expanding the TRO data for a Battletech to Epic conversion (The original can be found here), Card Designs for "War of the States" and "Mobsters" (the rules can be found here), as well as designs for one of my own card games and soon enough playtesting and design work  for a miniature game designed by one of my close friends.