2013 US Mid-war Nationals Report held 7 - 8 June 2013 at Wargames Convention in Austin, Texas. with Bruce Nemet This was our third Flames Of War National Tournament Event held in Austin, TX – our last two, including this one, being held at WargamesCon at the recently renovated Renaissance Austin Hotel.
This year we decided that Austin would play host to the Mid-war National. Although Mid-war Monsters were on the invitation list, they simply proved too scary for the majority of the players and weren’t brought en masse to participate in frontline action. Needless to say, I was a little saddened by their absence. There was certainly, however, enough enthusiasm from the players to make up for it!

The Award Winners

Overall Winner Jacob Mayer	Second Place Doug Rosson	Third Place Mark Bayne	Best General Chris Jackson

Best Sport Chris Fretts	Best Painted Roy Hayes	Best Axis Player Chris Jackson	Best Allied Player Mark Greenwald

The players were equally divided between German lists and everyone else. The army types (for the Germans) were also equally divided with six infantry, eight mechanised, and five tank lists.  All three Italian armies were infantry and the three Soviet lists included two Tankovy Batalons and one Cossack Batalon. The U.S. was solidly represented by nine players – two infantry, two tank, and five mechanised armies. In addition, we had one Canadian tank company and, of course, Doug Rosson brought his Finnish Infantry. Adam Rios brought a British company composed almost entirely of armoured cars!  Good for you Adam!  (He had a tough weekend.)

Roy Hayes' Best Painted Soviet Force

The missions we played were: Round One: Encounter Here’s a statistic for the number lovers:  we had nine 6-1 victors from this first round – only two of which ended up in the final top five!  (The fact that we had nine 6-1’s is, in itself, interesting for a fair fight mission.) Round Two: Breakthrough This was a tough fight for a couple tank-on-tank battles.  With only two platoons on table and reserves not forthcoming it can be a losing proposition very quickly.  My condolences to Hal Rudd for this round. Round Three: Hold the Line At the end of day one only one player had secured a 6-1 victory in all three rounds – Jacob Mayer with his seemingly unstoppable U.S. Armored Rifle company.

The Final Standings

Overall Placing Name Force Nationality Awards 1. Jacob Mayer American Overall Champion. 2. Chris Jackson German Best General, Best Axis Player. 3. Doug Rosson Finnish Second Overall. 4. Mark Bayne Italian Third Overall. 5. Jerald Springer German   6. Mark Greenwald American Best Allied Player. 7. Charlie Clay Italian   8. Eric Warren German   9. Joseph Paquette American   10. Byran Koches German   11. Byron Sinor American   12. Chris Fretts American Best Sportsman. 13. Ian Baker German   14. Rick Parrish Italian   15. Art Hayes German   16. Colin McKenzie German   17. John Armstrong German   18. Scott McKenzie German   19. Matthew Kibbe Soviet   20. Mike Callahan German   21. David Vigor American   22. Everett Chun German   23. Gary Overmyer German   24. Ben Floyd German   25. Clay Longino German   26. Jose Sto Thomas American   27. Kyle Miller American   28. Gerald Lane German   29. Jair Bobys American   30. Hal Rudd Canadian   31. Will Hanson German   32. Ed Rossman German   33. Gene Evens Soviet   34. Roy Hayes Soviet Best Painted Army. 35. Adam Rios British   36. Warren Silliman German   37. Michael Lewis German

Round Four: Counterattack Another 6-1 victory to Jacob Mayer.  He was running away with the tournament!  He simply crushed Art Hayes who at this point had accumulated 19 victory points after only three rounds!   Round Five: Surrounded A tough uphill battle for Charlie Clay with his Italian Bersaglieri against Jacob Mayer’s U.S. Armored Rifle Company.  I thought for sure this meant another 6-1 for Jacob.  But Mr. Mayer came out with only a 4-3 win for this one.  Quite an achievement I thought for surrounded infantry and a well-directed mechanised force. Round Six: Free-For-All This was to separate the men from the boys and give us a definitive winner.  Chris Jackson had begun the round paired with Jacob Mayer at the winner’s table believing he only needed a 5-2 win to best him for the Overall Championship.  Chris felt better about his 4-3 only after I explained that he would have actually needed a 6-1.  (Those pesky soft scores can sometimes make the difference.) On a separate table, sheer chaos had developed as Mark Bayne fought ferociously with his Italian Bersaglieri against Eric Warren’s Panzergrenadiers.  Time was running out and the dice was flying in all directions. Before one die had stopped rolling one side of the table, two more were being thrown on the opposite side!  One die bounced over two infantry teams; hit the board; bounced over an aircraft and caused the airplane die to fly off the board before landing on one of the side tables – the most spectacular round for air support in the history of Flames Of War!  (Mark, I’ve checked the scoring spreadsheet again just for giggles.  A swing of a lone Victory Point either way would have meant the same final ranking!)

The 2013 US Mid-war National Participants

I enjoyed hosting our 2013 Mid-war Flames Of War National Tournament.  For those that couldn’t make it you missed out on all the fun!  And for all the players who would like to try their hand at something new and a little different be sure to bring those Mid-war Monsters to next year’s Nationals as they will all be allowed. In meantime, I look forward to seeing everyone at Historicon later this year.  As a reminder, I’m still taking army lists for the Late-war National at Historicon in Fredericksburg, Virginia.  Be sure to get your name on that list! ~ Bruce.

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