More ASL on the way...

Okay so my ordering hasn't quite finished yet...the consequences of having to spend  a day at home sick or rather unable to leave the house for extended periods of time.So here's what I'm looking to buy this month including stuff that is on its way already:

Critical Hit:

• 1997 Special Edition Critical Hit "Dzerhezinsky Tractor Works" issue (Includes "Grain Elevator" Map and Campaign game [Currently shipping]
• Volume 6 Number 4  Critical Hit "Kursk" issue (Includes serious extras for Hell's Bridgehead Kursk module including extra map)
• Volume 7 Number 3  Critical Hit "Normandy" issue (Includes complete 3rd edition of Busting the Bocage) [Currently shipping]
• Action at Carentan Scenario pack (4 scenarios plus a custom mapsheet)
• Hell's Bridgehead 1st Edition (Kursk map + 8 scenarios)
• Hell's Bridgehead Upgrade (Extra two scenarios plus larger map)

Possible additional stuff coming:

• Tigers to the Front (Operation Bagration in ASL terms)
• Beyond the Beachhead (more ASL Normandy)
• The Killing Ground (Operational treatment of the post D-Day Normandy battles) - really like the core system used in this

I've pretty much decided on the three webshops I'll be using: Sentry Box in Calgary, Canada; Gamer's Armory in the US and Warchest in Australia as they've all been really responsive to orders and requests and they're gamers as well as being smart businessmen (read Professional).

Nothing like someone who understands that you are shopping around for the fastest delivery rather than best price - I hate stuff being on back order, preferrring to order something that I know is in stock. Unfortunately as I'm currently looking at OOP items in the main, this means I'm subject to a much more limited selection. The key here is minimising the shipping as much as possible by ordering multiple items from each. However I've also got to take into account that each retailer has different products in stock. :(

Oh well. At least I'm going to get a lot of VASL time out of this.

The Bells of Hell Go Ting a Ling Ling

So work's been busy as all getout lately. That hasn't stopped the deliveries of goodies from parts elsewhere thankfully, I'm now at the point where I've got 95% of my boardgame collection stable with very few more purchases needed. I finally got hold of the Stalingrad maps I referenced a while ago, and sure enough there's a significant difference in area covered betweren the large hex and the smaller hex versions, the latter actually reaching to the Volga.How did I pick these up? Through the auspices of Warchest in Melbourne, Australia. Must say I'm every impressed with the service from him. Fair prices to boot.

I bought the second edition of Critical Hit's Valor of the 37th Guards, which included not only the large hex map of the Dzerhezinsky Tractor Works but the original map from the 1997 DTW module and the original Grain Elevator minimap from the 1997 Critical Hit Special Edition. So I've almost completed the necessary accumulation of product.

I'm going to end up with some duplication of mapsheets but that's no hardship as I'm sure I can find a use for them. So basically all I'm after now is the original DTW module with its 2 Campaign games  and four scenarios and the 97SE with the Grain Elevator scenarios/CG. The latter is on order already from The Sentry Box in Canada, and I may have scoped out a copy of DTW although I'm paying the OOP premium :(

I also picked up one of the lesser items on my want list - a copy of the old Area-Impulse ACW game, They Met at Gettysburg which has a poor reputation but surely can be salvaged.

I even started playing some ASL again, Stalingrad natürlich, with my old adversary Jay White. We're now on Turn 3 of our game that was interrupted by me getting sidetracked by real life, and so far it's been one crazy rollercoaster ride once again, with the highlight for me being the critical hit I scored with a Molotov-Projector on one of the two StuIG33Bs Jay is fielding. One flank is almost completely secure through the blazes that have started up.

Anyway I really need to take some pics again (I've been slack - no change there) and posting again