Take a journey with us back to April 1976, when a small wargame club in Amarillo, Texas (led by Steve Cole) turned into a real company that produced an award-winning magazine filled with articles, variants, and reviews. The "Iron Age" of JagdPanther continued with color cardstock covers, one-piece multi-color maps, and die-cut counters.
The game in this issue was Siege of Leningrad, a typical WW2 game with German division-sized counters (some of which could break down into three regiments) battering their way through fixed Russian defenses to grab the city of Leningrad. The history article focused on the failures of Germany's Army Group North to get moving and take the city when doing so would have been easy.
The editorial said that this issue was one of those times when the editors had nothing to say, so the space was used to describe the next two games. The fact that they already existed as prototypes being playtested shows how the company had moved forward.
Rules variants included a fourth victory condition for Rand's Saratoga 1777, a revised command and control system for Panzer Armee Afrika, optional rules for the SPI pocket game Arnhem, random rules for generals in American Civil War, alternate rules for the SPI game Dixie (which set the Civil War in 1935), alternate rules for the four games of the SPI West Quad game, and true wargame rules for the SPI game Sorcerer.
Alternate history scenarios included a fascist France option for Origins of World War II, a US-China alliance against Russia in Mukden, a World War II scenario for Risk, an alternate Russian order of battle for Third Reich, and a non-intervention scenario for Spanish Civil War (originally published by JagdPanther but later bought by Battleline and then Avalon Hill).
Unusual new units included: a helium-filled missile-armed airship that could defend the US coast against Russian bombers in the 1970s for Foxbat & Phantom, tactical nuclear weapons for Modern Battles, reorganized brigades for Wurzburg, units from 1942 for the game Panzer 44, battlegroups (remnants of shattered divisions that are still able to fight) for Avalon Hill's D-Day, militia units for War in the East, Texas Towers (armed oil rigs) for the submarine game SSN, and Cuban troops in Egypt for the game Sinai.
New scenarios were provided for Kampfpanzer, the SPI game Bull Run, a scenario for the game World War 3 based on the novel 1984, and an alternate Tang Island scenario for the JagdPanther game Marine (in JagdPanther #10).
Written by Stephen Cole
