From: RayFreeman@AOL.COM Subject: PanzerBlitz and Leader PanzerLeader and PanzerBlitz are good games although they are pretty old, PB was circa 1970, and was designed and produced by Jim Dunnigan and the SPI gang and sold to Avalon Hill. PL was an AH extension of the system circa 1974, with development by Randy Reed. Both games sold tens of thousands of copies, and PB may still be the all time best selling wargame. Blitz is much the simpler (and starker) of the two. All of the units are direct fire, meaning they can only shoot at what they can see and have a line of fire to. This and the lack of opportunity fire led to something called the Panzerbush syndrome, where units flitted from bit of cover to bit of cover, thereby avoiding immolation by German 88s or Russian 76s. Definitely a system that placed great emphasis on tank warfare. Most of the original scenarios were rather unbalanced, but there are fixes in the literature, some excellent, as well as numerous additional published scenarios. A lot of fun shoot em up. Leader is somewhat denser in the rules department, but much of this can be ascribed to more comprehensive rules writing and the development of the opportunity fire and indirect fire rules, which were barely mentioned optional rules in Blitz, as well as other specialized unit rules. Rules for amphibious invasions were also added so that D-Day scenarios could be added. The opportunity fire rules made it possible to blast the enemy in between "bushes" which made AT guns much more valuable than they were in PB, and the indirect fire rules made the big artillery units even more useful. The infantry factors were also better balanced, as those Russian infantry companies were impossible to kill without lots of artillery, while the German infantry was easily chewed by comparison. I'm not sure the scenarios were much better balanced than PB, but there were a number of fun ones. Elsenborn Ridge (#15) remains one of my favorites and is pretty balanced. Unlike the real battle, the US does not have overwhelming artillery, so the Germans have a decent chance to break through. One of my minor claims to fame is the development of a Play by Mail system for PL that was published in The General done with Al Thomas, a PBM collegue in NY. Guess the internet and PBEM will eventually make it obsolete. PL also generated a whole lot of variants, such as ParaLeader, and the PL 1940 variant mentioned by another poster. Both of these variants included numerous scenarios for parachute and glider attacks and France 40 scenarios. AIW seemed too driven by unit and technology quality differences. It seemed like more trouble to play than I felt it was worth. Realism nuts will not like any of 'em much. ASL type players may especially be turned off. They are, IMO, still good games and much more accessible than ASL, and, at a different scale. (platoon vs squad) West Ends answer to PB and PL was Eastern Front Tank Leader and Western Front Tank Leader. They are very similar systems to PB and PL except for the addition of initiative cards and initiative ratings for the units coupled with a more interactive movement sequence. (not quite IGO-HUGO as in the AH games) Basically elite units get to trump lesser units in a little side game of who gets to go (or shoot) first. Seemed like a neat idea, but I never really got into these games so I can't really say if they were an improvement or not. From: "David S. Bieksza" Subject: Re: More newbie questions (PB and PL) On Tue, 8 Jul 1997, Coen van Antwerpen wrote: > 1) What are AH's Panzer Leader and Panzer Blitz like? _PanzerBlitz_ = "tactical armored warfare on the Eastern Front" _Panzer_Leader_ = "tactical armored warfare on the Western Front" Tactical for these games means a common scale of 250 m/hex, 6 min/turn, and scenarios (12 in _PB_, 20 in _PL_) typically lasting ten turns. Unit size is platoon/battery (companies for the Soviets in _PB_). Unit types are infantry, artillery, transportation, and AFV's -- with the emphasis on the wide variety of tanks, assault guns, tank destroyers, etc. used by the Western Allies, the Soviet Union, and Nazi Germany (mostly late-war models). Units are modeled with attack, defense, movement, and range factors plus weapon type. The mapboards come in independent panels that can be combined geomorphically (terrain features along the panel edges match from board to board). Scenarios combine some or all panels in a specified orientation with some subset of the counter mix to portray (at a low level of fidelity) a historical firefight at roughly battalion level. _PB_ and _PL_ panels can be combined with the exception of a _PL_ beach board for amphibious landings. Combat includes direct and indirect fire, physical overrun by AFV's of targets, and infantry close assaults. The CRT is odds based and results are eliminations or dispersals (no step reduction). _PB_ was the first to be published. _PL_ followed with an improved rule set as well as an expanded set of features (such as engineer operations and fighter-bomber support). The third game of the trilogy, _The_Arab_Israeli_Wars_, improves the system even more. Despite shortcomings in the realism department, these games are fast moving and good fun, and can be completed in a reasonable length of time. For limited funds, I'd recommend _PL_ as the best choice. In fact, I'd nominate _PL_ as my all-time favorite wargame. ------- Dave Bieksza bieksza@aplcomm.jhuapl.edu ------- "Comet Hale-Bopp" is an anagram for "HTML be poop, Ace." -------