Partisan May 2024 and 5 Minute Bulge

 The WD Display Team (North) went along to the May 24 Partisan in Newark, mainly to put on 5 Minute Bulge, but also to wander around the games and traders, and catch up with friends.

The hall at Newark Showground was rammed and sweltering within minutes of opening. It is certainly a popular show.

We'd brought along 5 Minute Bulge, the entire battle of the Bulge in 5 minutes. John, Tim, James and I took it in turns to run the game through the day.

6th SS and 5th Panzer Armies lurk in the Ardennes behind the Westwall, flanked by 15th and 7th Armies. Opposing them are US 9th, 1st and 3rd Armies. All 54mm toys from Tims collection. This is the first game I've done at 1 toy = 1 Army level. 

Antwerp, represented by Johns nice china buildings. Bradley is in Antwerp, but looking the wrong way. Nothing is happening in the Ardennes after all.

James runs a budding Von Runstedt through the game.

Worms eye view from the US positions.

The Panzers roll forwards. On this occasion they've been delayed by the US Paras in Bastogne and the important fuel supplies have escaped over the Meuse.

And to add insult to injury, the weather clears and the sky is now black with US Fighter Bombers. This particular effort very wisely called off the attack in view of the unfavourable circumstances.

We ran the game 21 times during the day, and five players managed to actually make it to Antwerp, though for how long, who can say. Amazingly, no players were actually shot for dereliction of duty by the Fuhrer, although one was sent to the Eastern Front. Two of the players even managed to convince Hitler to call the attack off when it was clear it was going to fail. The ability to roll lots of sixes isn't really the foundation of a sound military operation.

The game was also a magnet for various friends and acquaintances, who all turned up to play and have a chat, in particular Harry Sidebottom and Andy Grainger.  Various copies of the WD Nugget were handed out as prizes, and someone even threatened to join the society.

Chris Kemp had also brought along another quick NQM participation game.

This featured the assault by 78 Div on the Argenta Gap, the last major obstacle before the Po Valley. Sadly this battle took place at the end of April 1945, so breaking out into the valley wasn't really going to change the course of events in Italy. It had only taken two years to fight all the way up the Peninsular!

Although the whole division was laid out, including a brigade in Kangeroos, the players were concentrated on clearing Argenta itself. This had been reduced to a rubble strewn mess by the RAF, so required a Brigade level assault, supported by combat engineers, Crocodiles and the entire Divisional and Corps artillery.

My assault was slow going as the rubble provided excellent cover to the German defenders. Some of my units even ran out of ammunition in the intense urban fighting, but fortunately the heavy fire support ensured our losses were minimal and we eventually pushed the German defenders out. Hurrah!

With the communications node captured, the rest of the Division could press on to glory. That was great fun and very nice to look at as well. Chris has flocked his Hexon boards now and very good they look too, and I was very taken with his 2D buildings, which were extremely effective.

Like us, he had a steady trade during the day. Looks like people still like quick games at shows.

Otherwise the show still had a great selection of games, both participation and demo. I'd already seen quite a few of them at Hammerhead, so didn't take many game pics apart from one or two which caught my eye.

There was this magnificent 6mm Omaha Beach participation game, brought to you by the same team as the Gloucesters at Imjin.

Compare and contrast with this diminutive WW2 Italian participation game by Anschluss.

There was a lovely large scale WW1 participation game (54mm?).

This large Napoleonic demo game caught my eye, from Central London Wargames Group.

And Lincoln Wargames Society had this brilliant idea for three small games running in parallel, each in a different period, but all using small Hexon layouts.

A large 20mm WW2 demo game, looks like Operation Goodwood with the rail embankment, captured French halftracks and all the Cromwells.

And this lovely map/block Napoleonic game.

Very Kriegspiel!

The Omaha game attracted loads of players - I think each player commanded a short frontage of landing for the duration of 'their' game. Certainly people came and went through the day.

I liked the town square arrangement in another 20mm WW2 Normandy game.

This was a vast early 20th Century outing. Not sure exactly where it was, but it looks hot and there were biplanes flying around.

And I just loved this Mahdist Wars game.

Who doesn't like an Egyptian Square with panicking pack camels in the middle?

I didn't have a huge shopping list, just some more steel paper as I've been lining a lot of boxes recently. Impulse buys were another side cutter as I've worn out the blades on my current one and a book of brigade level WW2 battles set around the Seelow Heights in April 1945. A battle I've always been interested in, but never got around to doing, with plenty of late war silly heavy metal in evidence. None of the toy vendors sell anything that particularly interests me, although I had a rummage in the Caliver books discount box and even got as far as picking up two Ju 52s on the plastic model stand, then put them down again.

I think between all the desert stuff and the Persians, I'm a bit painted out at the moment, and I haven't even finished the desert stuff yet. Oh well.

Anyway, Partisan remains one of my favourite shows, and it was good to see so many well attended participation games.