GAME REVIEW PREVIEW

Game: Army Group North 1944            Designer: Perry Moore

Reviewed by John Vinal
Formatted and quickly edited for Web-Grognards by Eric Pass

{Review is condensed.  Note: This is not the Army Group North
game designed by Paul Patten and published by SSG.}

AGN is an operational level game of moderate complexity studying the
beginnings of the Courland Campaign when the Russians had cut off the
16th and 18th armies. If you have played a Perry Moore game, everything
is photocopied, the counters are color but must be cut out. Either your
delicate sensibilites are offended  or you will shrug them off and
focus on the merits of the design.

AGN comes with 400 counters. the basic unit is division and there are
also brigades, regiments and battalions. Were the map in full color, it
would be something to behold. there are roads, major and minor rivers,
forests and marshlands. The towns and bodies of water have their German
names derived from German situation maps. AGN comes with four 11x17"
maps, the game scale is 6 miles a hex and includes all of Latvia and
Lithuania areas,with the Baltic sea on the western edge and Ostrov in
the east.

There are a few glitches and typos with the rules, but overall I was
favorably impressed. In most cases, players need to use only common
sense if a problem arises. The classic line is on page 3: "If this was
a normal wargame...However, this designer is not normal". Perry
contends that the reason the Red Army had so much trouble in forcing
the Germans back was problems with supply, direction from High Command
and the three C's: command, control and communications. This game has
many gimmicks and gadgets which simulate this. For starters, there is
movement. Motorized units receive 9 mps, while infantry, 4 mps. But to
be able to move, the unit must be able to trace a path of no more than
four hexes to the parent HQ. This movement is then prorated according
to a unit's distance from its HQ. The closer it is, the farther it can
move.

Supply plays a large role in AGN. The counters have no numercial
factors printed on the counters. Instead, each unit is assigned a
combat class.  This impacts their ZOC; battalions have none, while
regiments and brigades have fluid ZOC's, class one and two units have a
rigid ZOC. A unit's class affects its combat strength and does change
(depending what it has done) from turn to turn! This is rolled on a
table using a ten sided die.  Thus, a unit's strength can vary wildly
which is beyond the control of the Army commander.The better a unit's
class is, the greater its combat value generally is. It's different
with tracked vehicles. Their counters have a number in a circle which
represents their armor modifiers and when an armor division is in
combat its modifiers increases or decreases the die roll.

The combat results table is bloodless. The trick is to block the
retreat path with rigid ZOCS to eliminate the defender.

Artillery and air is portrayed in disruption results in two levels. A
disrupted unit cannot move and only defend. Other rules cover German
alarm units to to Riga, Russian objectives, unit activation, German
engineers and forts, attacks on "main sectors", surprise attacks and
German minefields.

There are two scenarios, the Campaign game of 21 turns which covers the
seesaw battle for Riga in July and August. The other one is six turns
which covers the Russian October attack which cut the 16th, 18th armies
off once and for all. The initial set can be a arduous task locating
the correct counters for the scenario.

AGN is not for everyone. One does not breeze through while playing this
game with all the computations one must make. Some may not feel it's
worth it.

I certainly would recommend AGN to a student of the eastern front, as
it allows you to recreate the campaign and experience the frustrations
the actual army commanders faced. I also recommend AGN for those who
want to try something different. Perry throws a lot of new concepts at
us.

AGN sells for $13.00  Checks payable to Perry Moore, 2136 Riesling Santa
Rosa CA 95401