[Secrets of the Third Reich] Anyone Else Play?

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**stormwell**

Link for further details; http://www.westwindproductions.co.uk/catalog/secrets_of_the_third_reich.php

I've had the rulebooks and some models for this game for a while now, but never really got much of a chance to play it.

Recently I've decided to try and actually play it as some point, though I am pleasantly surprised to find that they'll bring out a second edition later this year.

So as the title says, does anyone else play this game?

**mdauben**

stormwell wrote:
I've had the rulebooks and some models for this game for a while now, but never really got much of a chance to play it.

Same here. I've got the rules and two starter boxes (Germand and USA) but I've never gotten a chance to actually play them. I like the minis, and from what I cansee the rules look pretty good but that's just opinion at this point. I've been thinking about placing another order to bulk my collection up into two more playable forces (the starter boxes are not very balanced) but one thing or another keeps distracting me.

**stormwell**

Gotten somebody interested locally, we've played the Sniper! mission and agreed to do a proper squad on squad battle.

Found this video useful with regards to explaining how the game works; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6BkCqjELQ8Y

**Azazelx**

Due to a mess-up on the part of the dearly-departed Maelstrom games, I ended up with the expansion but not the base rules, and most of the figures I ordered never came. With news of the 2nd edition coming out awhile back, I've just been holding off and waiting for the new rules and buying a mix of West Wind, Dust, Warlord, WGF, etc which can have multi-use across all these games (and also Incursion, Tannhauser, etc).

**doc1234**

I think Azazelx hit it on the head, the V2 rules have been announced for later this year. Alot of folk are holding off, but once they hit there may well be a boom in people playing.

**Alpharius**

I know that's what I'm waiting for!

Fingers crossed too, as Weird War II is my favorite wargaming theme, and SoTR did a lot of cool things...

**stormwell**

Certainly hope it picks up, though I guess its still a good thing I got the rulebook a couple of years back so I can least get a few games in and get people interested in the mean time until the new rules hit.

So what armies does everyone play?

I've gone with the British and working on a RAF Regiment based force using the normal British Order of Battle rather than the Paras one.

**Fenrir Kitsune**

I've been tempted by it in the past, but theres a lot of WWW2 games out there working in a similar area.

V2.0 is well worth keeping an eye on and the minis did look great at Salute.

**Alpharius**

WAIT!

There were pictures of new SoTR stuff at Salute?!?

**stormwell**

Alpharius wrote:
WAIT!

There were pictures of new SoTR stuff at Salute?!?

This should be useful; http://anatolisgameroom.blogspot.se/2013/04/salute-2013-part-2-of-3-west-wind.html

**Alpharius**

stormwell wrote:
Alpharius wrote:
WAIT!

There were pictures of new SoTR stuff at Salute?!?

This should be useful; http://anatolisgameroom.blogspot.se/2013/04/salute-2013-part-2-of-3-west-wind.html

Thanks for that!

Some interesting bits:

At the moment West Wind focuses on delivering Empire of the Dead and then on their 2nd edition of the Secrets of the third Reich rules.

and

We then talked a bit about how Secrets of the Third Reich version 2 is coming along and about the changes. At the moment there is no intention of altering the points cost of units in the game (I mentioned I thought that x10 of the points cost would make easier tweaking of upgrade values). However there may be a limitation to unit upgrades and how you build your units in the game. Other changes mentioned were the Soviet camo rules and Soviet's in general which will most likely end up having to buy their camo while retaining their other special rule. There will be a big overhaul of how you call in Drop Troopers, and the whole German Drop trooper list will be overhauled as it is over powered. The mech design chart will also most likely see some revision as it is easy to exploit with cheap light drop mechs with flamethrowers. Woods wil also no longer burn down completely from flamethrower attacks, but fire will instead make clearings - this is because forest heavy tournament games showed situations where the entire table was burning and made it unplayable.

Andy who was with us also mentioned that the version 2 will include Japanese and US Marine Corps, and how the Japanese rules will be different from the other factions - most likely there will be a "mech design chart" for demons/ghosts, and while it will be based on the old ideas written by John Bailey back a few years ago the Japanese will be less divided in sub-factions and instead have wider variety within the same unified army. Andy also said that the Temple will be fleshed out with additional troops. And we will finally see a Tesla cannon armed tank which he was working on.

I actually look forward to seeing how version 2 turns out after the chat with Ian and Andy.

**doc1234**

that actually doesn't sound that bad. With the exception of the drop troops, mechs and maybe the ruskies it sounds like they plan on keeping alot of the core units the same and just tweaking the upgrades if i'm reading it right.

**stormwell**

doc1234 wrote:
that actually doesn't sound that bad. With the exception of the drop troops, mechs and maybe the ruskies it sounds like they plan on keeping alot of the core units the same and just tweaking the upgrades if i'm reading it right.

Yep and having everything from the current rulebook and expansion all rolled into one book.

**Fenrir Kitsune**

Thats the minis cabinet I spent some time having a look at - far too much to see all in one go, but looked superb. I've no doubts I'll probably invest in the 2.0 book at some point as it sort of fits with my next upcoming project.

**ski2060**

I picked up the books and started building some armies up. I have been using alternate minis for my stuff, with just a few things I liked from West Wind thrown in the mix.
It's a cool game, I like the rules for the most part. I wish I could get some other people playing regularly though.

For my forces I'm working on US Paratroops (using either the Armored infantry, or Beta Paratroops list), and German Fallschirmjager / Droptroops (using either the Droptroop list, or Beta FJ list).

US started off with a box of US paratroops from Warlord Games, expanded with some Dust Tactics Russian mecha to fill armored support, and some CrowDog troops for the weird element so far.
Germans started with a box of FJ's from Warlord Games, expanded with 15 DreamForge Kriegsmarine as drop troopers, and finally 9x 1/35 Ma.K Melusines as drop mecha support. As an ultimate tech Nihl weapon I plan on using my DFG Leviathan Crusader for my Germans

I plan on adding more stuff for variety to each side.

I am interested to see what they do with Drop Troopers. I've heard they were overpowered, but I haven't actually put any on the table yet. I hope they don't invalidate what I plan on putting together.

Pics of my stuff on my sig blog link.

**stormwell**

Well I'm trying to organize a big game for SOTR, though it'll probably be in the UK and dependant on interest.

**larva_uk**

Got a game lined up in the next week or so I think. There are a few SOTR players who frequent the Wargames Workshop club night in Milton Keynes though none of us play it very often (which is a shame as I've got a couple of quite large forces).

ski2060 wrote:
I am interested to see what they do with Drop Troopers. I've heard they were overpowered, but I haven't actually put any on the table yet. I hope they don't invalidate what I plan on putting together.

I don't think they are as bad as a light drop mech. Like all drop units you can alpha strike a key unit to death when they drop in (especially if there is a flamethrower in there) but as all SOTR units are pretty lethal their heavy armour is unlikely to stop retaliatory fire from killing them shortly afterwards.

**stormwell**

larva_uk wrote:
Got a game lined up in the next week or so I think. There are a few SOTR players who frequent the Wargames Workshop club night in Milton Keynes though none of us play it very often (which is a shame as I've got a couple of quite large forces).

Would any of 'em be interested in doing a big battle by any chance?