World War 2 toy soldiering with Xenos Rampant

With a comparison to Hammer of Democracy

As discussed in my first impressions post about Xenos Rampant, I could easily see the rule set being used for historicals, and once I checked in on a couple of Facebook groups operating for the game it became clear that people were very much using it for that purpose. I'd already had a go with the rules as such using my First World War collection, but thought I would have another go with my Second World War stuff to see how it played, bearing in mind what I'd learned from my previous test games. As such I put together a not entirely historically accurate North Africa engagement between a reasonably typical on-paper British platoon of the era against a slightly under-strength German platoon. These are the lists I came up with:

British

-3 Light infantry with increased squad size (rifle elements of the British sections)

-3 Heavy infantry (Bren gun elements of the sections)

-1 Unarmed light infantry with Delta-class psychic with concealment (2" mortar with smoke rounds)

-1 Recon infantry with sniper

-1 Green unarmed recon infantry with fire support, commander (Officer and his staff)

I'm not sure if it's actually rules legal for unarmed units to use fire support, but the rules do say that "it's not the unit itself that is doing the firing" and it doesn't use the unit's actual shooting value, so I figured it was okay. Here's the other platoon.

German

-3 Light infantry with increased squad size (rifle teams of the German squads)

-3 Slow support infantry (MG-34 teams of the squads)

-1 Slow green unarmed recon infantry with fire support, commander (Officer and his staff)

I had to take "Slow" with the German units to get points back. In the comparison, I figured that the minimum-size heavy infantry choice reflected the reliable but lighter Bren gun, while the support infantry choice reflected the notoriously high rate of fire of the MG-34 and MG-42. That being said, the intention was purely to reflect fire-and-manoeuvre squad/section elements as accurately as possible. If you were taking these on the basis of the whole squad/section operating together, it might become a bit simpler: British are light infantry, perhaps with heavy weapon, a regular German squad might be the same, and a unit like motorized infantry or Panzergrenadiers are probably heavy infantry with similar upgrades. If you really want to distinguish Allied MGs and automatic weapons from their German counterparts, however, it might get a bit abstract. I might have even been better off representing the Bren guns as Recon infantry with Sniper, although given their poor shoot value they would need a Commander nearby to be effective.

Regardless, in the test, as I expected from the First World War game I'd played previously, "smoke" (psychic powers in disguise, in this case) and artillery were a major contribution without any armour in the field. The support infantry choice, with its long range and high accuracy, is statistically highly likely to cause damage on any unit of heavy infantry class or below at any distance, even if in cover, and denying them their most obvious target with Concealment as they wait for the "smoke" to clear, or softening them up with Fire Support, was relatively effective at counteracting this. Giving the Commander the Fire Support ability was very useful for increasing the activation roll from an 8+ to a 7+. Further, it's worth remembering that light, heavy and primitive infantry units can Go to Ground as another way of gaining an additional point of armour against shooting. Purely focusing a lot of fire on dug-in enemy units is another way of counteracting them, as any hit regardless of damage necessitates a courage check. If a player can force a specific target to take multiple courage checks in a turn there is always the chance that they will fail and spend a turn suppressed, buying valuable time to advance.

In the end it was a relatively tame experience of Scenario Alpha, however, with the Germans losing one support infantry and one light infantry, to the loss (if I recall correctly) of a single heavy infantry unit by the British. It did work, but how effectively did it represent what I perceive as the combat of the era? I think the game gets a bit fuzzy around how to represent heavier weapons, especially since the game requires "increased squad size" upgrades to improve light and heavy infantry's shoot value to 5+. The support infantry choice is very good, albeit low-armoured and not too resilient. Perhaps the oddest thing was running the mortar team as a Psychic, which worked even if the wording sounds a bit strange. Regardless, this confirmed what I speculated upon in my initial post on the subject, namely that I can easily see this rule set being used for 20th and 21st century historical games, particularly with a bit of house ruling to tweak some unit stats a bit. But out of the box, as it were, it still works reasonably well, and there are optional "National Characteristics" in the "Weird War" section of the book to add further flavour if desired; I note that on one of the Facebook groups Richard Cowen suggested to simply remove the "weird" part. Someone, or multiple people, I'm sure, will come up with house rules for smoke, different kinds of machine guns, and different classes of armour. Others will crave the official sanction of a specific publication to do this. Whatever happens, it'll be interesting to see.

An addendum to this is that after my "Xenos Rampant" test of this battle, I replayed the exact same scenario with the exact same deployment using Ivan Sorensen/Nordic Weasel Games' Hammer of Democracy rules, my preferred World War Two rule set. It'd been a while since I'd tested those rules out and I was reminded once again of how fast and straightforward they are, with very easy-to-follow rules for things like smoke, return fire, artillery support and different types of weapons. Interestingly the result was quite similar, although the Germans were able to be a bit more mobile; you can move and shoot as a single action in Squad Hammer games. Units can be destroyed very easily by focused fire, but if they survive they can also regroup and recover. As a dedicated Second World War rule set I still, as I expected, preferred it, but it feels more like a streamlined version of Plastic Soldier Company's Battlegroup; if you plug in Officers, as I do, from Squad Hammer Man-to-Man, you get a bit of TooFatLardies Chain of Command in there too. All three I recommend above Warlord Games' Bolt Action, but if you want a fast, fun game without a lot of rulebook consultation I can't recommend Hammer of Democracy enough. Xenos Rampant isn't a dedicated historical rule set and isn't meant to be, but it'll do the job. If you want something equally simple, if not moreso, with dedicated period flavour, I definitely suggest giving Hammer of Democracy a try.