I have been keeping an "eye" on GOSS for several years. Its definitely a system I'm going to have to try at some point, unfortunately I'm not able to commit to the steep learning curve at this point so it's great that you are. I'll be following this with great interest. Good luck with it. Looking forward to more.
I also seek out intellectually stimulating game systems, and I believe G.O.S.S. pushes the boundary of where table top wargaming can go, and is no doubt an acquired taste. Once acquired however, a player discovers that G.O.S.S. covers all the bases, from beautiful maps, to the perfect amount of logistics involvement, to a wonderful tapestry of combat modifiers and a whole lot more. The danger in committing to learning this game series, is the way in which it taints your view of all others, as your expectations from the experience are raised considerably.
I have some friends that really love GOSS (and that's another reason why I've finally decided to fully commit to mastering this system). They have spoken about how fun it is, and I must admit that the detail I see in it really piqued my interest. As I mentioned in the video, my main concern is whether the potential extra effort to play the system is worth the payoff. I will admit, that as I continue to learn the rules and get more experience with the mechanics, many of the subsystem mechanisms are not all that complicated. We'll see how I feel after wading deeper into AW. And as for being tainted with a high bar, BCS has already done that to me. GOSS does appear, though, to be one of the systems that can meet those high expectations.
@@thetabletopsedge I desperately wanted to like BCS, I truly did but it's simply too abstracted for my taste. At battalion scale I want to position my artillery to support the battle for example, not abstract it with a marker. AW is the only D-Day game where a person can actually enjoy playing the German forces. Where German units are unique, and simply not just another allied unit in gray or black. Staging mobile forces is a very realistic aspect of getting from point A to point B in G.O.S.S. and it is simulated well. I'm particularly fond of Standoff Armor, high caliber Armor / AT bonus increases, as well as formation operational lanes. Fact is that after a decade of diving into this thing called G.O.S.S., I've become hooked on the ability to make command decisions and having at my disposal all the tools to carry it out, with a game system that is more challenging than most.
@@Joey--- I can certainly understand all that. BCS is a very different animal to just about anything else out there. GOSS is a much more traditional design, taken arguably to its ultimate expression. And by traditional design, I mean it has things like an odds based CRT, it's IGO-UGO, etc. Those aren't bad things in my book, and one reason they are traditional is that they've been around for so long, primarily because they work. But there's always been something about odds based CRT's that felt a little artificial. I see a lot of players spending more time scrounging the map to come up with that "one more attack factor" they need to hit the column break, rather than thinking about the larger operational issues. My other big bug-a-boo about most wargames is the amount of information and control they give the player. It's a limitation of the medium, and even the best systems suffer from it (including BCS). Players too often have the ability to carry out plans with a precision that their historical counterparts could only dream of. Which is the main reason why I chafe a bit whenever I hear gamers talk about "simulation". One of the things that impresses me the most about BCS is that it is able to abstract out a lot of the detail one normally sees in an operational level game, but retain the right feel for the stuff that actually matters, and to allow the player to make the kinds of decisions that a divisional commander would be faced with. What pushes BCS over the top for me is how playable it is. I've played a lot of big, traditional games over the decades (like OCS), and they always have a tremendous amount of downtime due to their size and nature. BCS avoids that. Because of the formation activation mechanism, and the fact that most activations can be completed in under 15 minutes, you never have to find something to fill a couple hours of downtime while you wait for your opponent to finish his half of the turn. GOSS has some elements that look really fun and interesting, and I'm hoping that proves to be the case as I get up to speed on the system. Most of the subsystems in the game make sense, and are not really all that complex once you figure them out. I've even reached the point where I can resolve a relatively simple GA in about 2-3 minutes time. I like the way the logistics system faces you with difficult decisions as to how you are going to expend your logistical assets (army TP's) to best support your subordinate formations in their efforts to achieve the goals you've set for them. I really like how the combat sequence allows the non-phasing player to fire artillery FS missions to try to break up incoming attacks. And the ADV mechanism forces you to evaluate whether or not the FS mission you are contemplating is worth the potential cost (either in AmP, or not having the arty unit available for something more important later in the turn). I'm sure there are all kinds of cool nuances and interactions in GOSS that I have yet realize due to my unfamiliarity with the system. I think GOSS has gotten a bit of an undeserved bad rap over the years, primarily due to development/publisher issues. DG has done itself no favors in how it has presented GOSS, at least in the first three games of the series. I know Joe Youst is very active in answering questions, which is great. I just wish the rule books were better, which could have eliminated a lot of those questions. I'm optimistic right now about GOSS turning out to be a great system, and if it is, then I definitely want to spread the word. Thanks for watching, and given your experience with the system PLEASE let me know if you see me doing something wrong, or I'm not quite explaining something correctly.
@@thetabletopsedge It's refreshing to hear the truth over what all too often sounds like a commercial in most videos. It is also wonderful to hear the thoughtfulness and mental preparation you convey. I admire your up front honesty and integrity in your videos, and is one of the many reasons I enjoy watching. As one who has done videos, I try to avoid being critical of what takes place in other videos, especially when covering a game as complex as this. I feel the proper etiquette is to make a mental note, and if necessary, make contact off line (in private) to point any corrections out, leaving it to you to point out or not as desired.
I am looking forward to watching this. Acquiring Lucky Forward prompted me to finally take up Atlantic Wall due to the improved rules and especially the vastly improved GOSS charts and tables included in LF. I am just finishing punching and organizing AW. That setup does look daunting :)
Excellent! I found the play aids included in LF to be extremely helpful to learning and playing the game. They cover all the major subsystems in enough detail that you usually don't have to crack open the rule book. The only problem with the play aids is that there are so many of them. It can be difficult to keep them organized, and I often spend more time trying to find the right play aid with the info I need than I do actually figuring out how the rule works. Still, they are definitely assets. For anyone interested in getting into GOSS, I would probably recommend starting off with LF, simply because of the much improved rule book, better charts, and excellent play aids.
So I'm very excited to see more videos in this series, and GOSS remains a great idea for Winterfest, at which it has been played several times (most recently Atlantic Wall). I think GOSS brings a lot to the table. And while the logistics system is indeed a fair bit to handle, it's *less* to handle than say the on-map supply of OCS. And you only do it once a day, so every third turn. So I think complaints that the bookkeeping (which is pretty much just logistics and command attachments, and in Atlantic Wall managing the flow of stuff onto the continent) is too high are actually masking complaints about the overall detail level, which is clearly very high. But consider that a lot of things that other games need special rules for, like bridges, road congestion, delaying actions below the game scale, and armor/flak/arty units broken up to support infantry are already built into GOSS. I think Market-Garden will be an ideal showcase for this, although the Bulge is good as well. And the new rulebook is about two orders of magnitude better than the previous rulebooks. The basic cut and thrust of gameplay takes some getting used to, but it's not as complicated as even the rules make it look. After a couple of turns it plays very smoothly, and while the combat is involved, you're really not making dozens of attacks each turn; the pacing mechanism (that I basically demand in any operational game) is actually built into the combat resolution because you want to be able to leverage all of the various factors like armor, arty, engineers, regimental integrity and so forth. You don’t make the bad attack... because it's a bad attack. The battle space decisions follow very naturally.
At this point, I would agree with pretty much everything you said. Now that I'm actually seeing the mechanics in action on the map and pushing pieces around, GOSS is not as complicated as its reputation would lead one to believe. There are also a lot things I really like about it. The thing about complex games is that you never really know how it's actually going to play out until you get it on the table and see the subtle nuances and interactions of the various mechanics. Many times, the natural "flow" of a game reveals a simpler experience than just reading the rule book would imply. I'm certainly open for a GOSS game next Winterfest. I would imagine discussions of that nature will start up around November or so on the forum?
I think they tried that in World at War #80 with the "Hannut" intro game, but it didn't really work. They managed to get the rules down to 16 pages, but I wasn't a fan of what they took out, or what was simplified. I don't know that I can put my finger on it exactly, but it just didn't feel right and wasn't terribly satisfying (even though I was very excited to see an early war GOSS game). There are a lot of things I really like about the combat system and how artillery works in GOSS, but I'm afraid it just may not work. The experience I get with GOSS, the more I think it would be a great system for WWI topics. I am particularly disappointed with WaR. The game specific mandated US retreat and lull rules take those decisions out of the hands of the players, where they properly belong. They're also apt to be abused by the US player to shut down a German player in the midst of a successful offensive. I'm hoping they can get GOSS figured out, because it does have a lot of promise. I'm not giving up on it, but the rules need a thorough reorganization, in addition to some good development work. If DG had the resources of other game publishers, I think GOSS could be polished up into a great system.
Oh I started learning with Atlantic Wall (doing a solo play on youtube currently) but I would highly recommend Hurtgen for learning, I fought that personally, wanted to do AW, but when I finally caved to my teachers, it was a great move, and for Hannut, I have not played it yet, the arty rules are way different, so Im going to use the full rules with the arty pieces. Logistics pieces easy to make.
I will almost definitely be moving on to Hurtgen at some point (as well as WaR and LF). As I said elsewhere, the topics for each of the games in the series interest me greatly, and the possibility of tying Hurtgen into WaR is very intriguing (as if the games weren't big enough as is!). If I had to choose right now, based only what I know and have experienced to date, I would probably choose Hurtgen to teach someone new the GOSS series. Hannut's arty rules are very similar to the way the intro scenarios handle arty in the full GOSS games. However, they do include the actual arty units, so it would be simple to apply the full GOSS arty rules to Hannut, I would imagine. The full logistics rules would be a little trickier, but still probably doable with enough ingenuity. As you mention, markers can be made/substituted. The biggest issue I see would be figuring out how many TP's each side has available each day. Do you know if someone, somewhere has come up with a (semi) official variant for this in Hannut?
I will follow you on your GOSS journey. I have the original SPI version of Wacht Am Rhein in my collection. I spent many hours in that game. And that experience led me to purchase the GOSS version of Wacht Am Rhein. I never got beyond initial rules reading before I became involved with play testing BCS. So I will look over your shoulder as you explore the current GOSS system.
Glad to have you on board for the ride, Lynn! Hopefully you'll get a good look at the system and what it does. While I don't plan for it to be a tutorial, I will be discussing various rules at certain points, and I suppose if one watches the whole series, they may well be able to sit down with some experienced GOSS players and not need much teaching in order to play. That's one of the goals at any rate. The other is to find out whether learning the system is worth it or not. While very close in scale to BCS, GOSS is coming at it from the exact opposite end of the design philosophy spectrum. So it'll be interesting for me to experience this having just recently played BCS.
Thanks! So far, mostly good. I don't want to spoil the upcoming episodes (the next one will be up shortly), but my experience thus far has only whetted my appetite for diving deeper into GOSS.
@@thetabletopsedge cool, Im sure I will watch them, love the work you do and GOSS so win win, same, Im done with all the airborne and beach landings just need to make the videos, but same, hard not to spoil stuff when Im putting up a video and Im like 3 turns ahead in real life LOL. Also you never know I might be doing something off so its nice to see what others are doing to make sure. I loved your BCS game, got me to buy all the games, love that system now too.
No worries! I just hope that's not also the case for me!😁 Although I will say that based on what I've seen so far (granted, it's extremely limited), I don't think GOSS is as complicated as its reputation would have people think. There's no denying it's a detailed game, but as I move through the various steps of the Sequence of Play I find that the individual subsystems are not as big as scary as they seem at first. I think much of this can be laid at the feet of the poor rule books. Time will tell.
Thanks, Marco! GOSS is a VERY different beast from BCS. I'm extremely curious to see how they compare to one another. By the time I'm done with AW, I expect to have the answer, and hopefully so will the viewers.
Would you say the GOSS games you showcased in the beginning there, are successors to Atlantic Wall and Wacht Am Rhein by SPI? I own both but have never broken them out to play (I can sadly say that for a number of other titles, too :(). I share your love of monster games, I always skip to the full campaign scenario no matter the system. I had ASL laid out and was playing some scenarios, but decided to try systems I've never fully played. At the moment, I'm learning The Longest Day, which was in my possession probably thirty years or more. I recently took it out of storage, then it sat on my shelf another year, then now its on the table. TLD is a monster and I don't have the space atm to play the full campaign but enough to play some of the bigger scenarios. I'm excited to see you play this series, it looks fantastic. I'm waffling to pre-order the Greatest Day. I downloaded the rules system and I really like some of the concepts and its also a monster of monsters. Thanks for posting this series for us!
I find it all intriguing, and really like the maps and graphic presentation. But most existing releases are a bit too...monstrous for available time and space. I'd like to see some more focused, smaller series entries like Hannut.
I definitely think there's an opportunity for that. I know there is another late war West Front game in development called "Over the Rhine", which will include Operation Market-Garden. I do not know the full extent of the game, though. Based on their offerings to date, I would expect it to cover the entirety of the fall campaign by British 2nd and Canadian 1st Armies (Scheldt Estuary, Market-Garden, etc.). I've also read where the designer (Joe Youst) would like to do some East Front GOSS. I would think there is opportunity for at least a couple of smaller GOSS titles there, as well as in the Med. Hannut is an interesting looking game. It has a single 22" x 34" map, which contains not just the play area but also all of the necessary charts. The Germans get a total of 5 (maybe 4?) divisions, but 2 of them are restricted to the flanks, leaving them with 2 panzer divisions as the major portion of their force. The French get a couple more divisions, but the initial 2 DLM's get withdrawn, while at least one of their reinforcing infantry divisions is restricted to the western map edge. So it's mainly 2 divisions vs 2 divisions on a single map sheet, which is VERY manageable. I will be interested to see if DG decides to do more smaller format GOSS games in the future.
Once you get it down its easier than it looks i think, I always tell people if I can figure it out, anyone can. I use a computer so I can search the PDF, but would be happy to help out if you got any questions, OR there is a great facebook page were you get quick answers. Yeah dont forget TSWW, that is a tough one for me with the rulebook so Im watching you to learn more about TSWW :)
Well I just purchased the bottom three trilogy a few weeks ago and that set me back a cool 400 and now I have to get this oh boy.Thank you for doing these video's,and btw how is wings of the motherland?
I've played the first 10 days of the campaign for LF and I really do enjoy the system, however the bookkeeping and tracking of fuel and movement points is annoying and is preventing me from exploring the system further.
That's EXACTLY the kind of thing that concerns me about GOSS. There seem to be a lot of clever things in it, and it looks like there are tons of interesting decisions to be made, but I'm worried that the detail brings along a lot of drudgery and busy work that saps the overall experience. I guess I'll find out as I get deeper into AW.
@@thetabletopsedge In G.O.S.S. a player is often in the Army Commanders seat, especially at the start of each game day when logistics or Command & Control are concerned. As an Army Commander your primary logistical concern is Campaign Mobility (trucks), and Fuel & Heavy Weapons Ammo. This game system gives a player that limited but essential responsibility, so they can make the critical decisions that will impact their day as the campaign unfolds. It's understandable that some players simply don't like logistics, but it's important I think, to fully appreciate that when you dive into something this complex, pushing a few fuel & ammo markers back and forth on a track isn't asking too much.
@@lbwstrategygaming I would tend to agree. The majority of the record keeping seems to be command related (ie - tracking attachments/detachments, as well as ZOP boundaries). The logistics system seems pretty straightforward, generally low maintenance (pardon the pun), and fun.
@@Joey--- I don't mind putting on the army commander's hat, especially when it is done periodically as in GOSS. I like the feel of the logistics system in GOSS, where you are forced to prioritize your allocation of available logistical means to best serve your tactical and strategic goals. The AmP and Fuel level mechanisms are actually not that complicated, easy to track and manage, but provide a meaningful and interesting challenge for players. I have yet to get heavily into the full logistics mechanics because in AW they phase in over the course of the first several game days, but just looking at the rules and what little game experience I have with them so far, I'd say they actually consume less time and effort than the OCS logistical system, and provide a reasonable outcome in the process. At this stage of my GOSS journey, I am eager to dive deeper into the system.
That's no joke! Not only did I punch the counters, but I also clipped them all. AW is the largest of the GOSS games so far, and it weighs in with 16 counter sheets (4,480 counters). Took me a couple of hours each night over 5 nights to clip the counters. Set up itself was right around 4 man hours. I did take some extra time when laying out the maps to figure out what would be the best option. When the maps are laid out in a single piece, they are about 6" too wide for my table (but there's plenty of room on the north-south axis). The setup wasn't much worse than setting up most other monster games. WiF, for example, takes at least as long, and even LB is pretty close. Something like GB2 from the OCS is also very comparable in setup time. But make no mistake, this IS a VERY large game...
Boundaries are a good thing. They can help keep you focused (as well as saving some cash). There has only been one game system I've encountered that I never really warmed up to, and that is the Death Ride series by Grognard Simulations. I may do a short video on my brief experience with the system.
@@clarkcommando1983 Going to have to cordially agree to disagree on the Deathride games. I very much tried to like these games (and at great expense), but despite having some clever mechanics (for example, the intel from patrols mechanism), ultimately this series was a major fail for me. The production value was awful (most particularly with the maps), the combat system was bad (an odds ratio based CRT at this tactical level makes no sense), and the scenario setup cards were the worst I've ever seen. In fairness, the DR: Normandy maps were an improvement over the DR:Kursk maps (but were still not good). "Crunchy" isn't the word I'd use for the system. "Overwrought" or "underdeveloped" are words that spring to mind. There may be a decent system in there somewhere, but it's in desperate need of a professional game developer to extract it. While I appreciate the ability to choose the difficulty level, the result in this case is a rule book that is a mess. The graphic design needs a complete overhaul, everything from the maps to counter layout to the charts and tables. At the company scale, the GTS is much better (and so is the Company Scale System from Compass Games), and for a tactical game featuring platoon sized units TCS gives a better much feel with a much less cluttered set of rules.
So im reading the lucky forward book now and its just an awful rulebook from start to finish. There is no intro help, no sense to the organization, no rhyme or reason to the setup in this thing. The very nature of this book is so off putting that any enjoyment you may get from learning it is instantly killed.
No truer words have been spoken about the GOSS rulebook. The scary thing is, the Lucky Forward rulebook is a MASSIVE improvement over the previous versions! I want to do some additional GOSS content, but right now it's difficult to get ANY content done. For me, as of now, the jury is still out on GOSS, but it's not looking good. And that's disappointing. GOSS has some interesting and clever ideas and mechanics, but it's in desperate need of a good developer. It's my understanding one has come on board for the publication of Lucky Forward (which is why the rulebook is as improved as it is, even though it's not very good) and is shepherding the current projects in the series. I can't help but think that if GOSS were with a different publisher, it would be a much better system. It needs more resources than DG appears to be able to throw at it. Of the games published so far, both Hurtgen: Hell's Forest and Lucky Forward cover topics which have not seen a lot of coverage at the operational level (maybe there's a good reason for that). I'd say H:HF is a bit of a misnomer, as the game covers far more than just the fighting in the forest (which is located at the southern edge of the maps). It's more about the campaign to capture Aachen and cross the Roer and get to the Rhine. Wacht Am Rhein is the Bulge game, but for my money Last Blitzkrieg (BCS) is far superior. The magazine game Hannut was supposed to be an introductory game with a scaled back rule set, but I don't think it's very good at what it tries to do. I'm also not a big fan of "intro" rules. I'd rather have a scenario, or set of scenarios, within the full game that gradually get more complex. Atlantic Wall covers more of the Normandy campaign than any other operational game I am aware of. It has a paradrop mechanic that I really, really like. Unfortunately, that's balanced out by an amphibious landing module that in theory is pretty good, but in practice becomes mind numbing drudgery (this is an excellent example of where further development work would have improved the game). I still hold out hope for AW that it can be a fantastic Normandy game, but I'm going to need a lot more time with it before I can say one way or the other. Lucky Forward is the game I have the least experience with (other than with its rulebook and charts). One of the hallmarks of GOSS games are enforced periods of "lulls" in the campaign games. It feels particularly scripted in WaR, and seems open to potential abuse. There were, in fact, considerable operational lulls in the campaigns covered by the GOSS games, but there's a much better way to handle them than through dictatorial fiat which is unconnected with the events actually happening on map. I think there is a huge opportunity within the existing supply rules for GOSS of creating the same kind of lull, but with a much more organic feel to it, and one that the player won't feel is arbitrarily imposed on him. All I can say is, good luck! I'll be interested to see what your experience with GOSS is like (assuming it survives the rulebook encounter!). While I'm no GOSS expert, if you have any questions about GOSS feel free to ask away. Hopefully some of the other videos may make your struggle with the rules a bit easier.
Wish I could afford these games and had 10 more years of life left to enjoy them.
I have been keeping an "eye" on GOSS for several years. Its definitely a system I'm going to have to try at some point, unfortunately I'm not able to commit to the steep learning curve at this point so it's great that you are. I'll be following this with great interest. Good luck with it. Looking forward to more.
Hopefully, I'll be able to confirm or allay your worst fears about GOSS, while giving you a good look at the system.
I also seek out intellectually stimulating game systems, and I believe G.O.S.S. pushes the boundary of where table top wargaming can go, and is no doubt an acquired taste. Once acquired however, a player discovers that G.O.S.S. covers all the bases, from beautiful maps, to the perfect amount of logistics involvement, to a wonderful tapestry of combat modifiers and a whole lot more. The danger in committing to learning this game series, is the way in which it taints your view of all others, as your expectations from the experience are raised considerably.
I have some friends that really love GOSS (and that's another reason why I've finally decided to fully commit to mastering this system). They have spoken about how fun it is, and I must admit that the detail I see in it really piqued my interest. As I mentioned in the video, my main concern is whether the potential extra effort to play the system is worth the payoff. I will admit, that as I continue to learn the rules and get more experience with the mechanics, many of the subsystem mechanisms are not all that complicated. We'll see how I feel after wading deeper into AW. And as for being tainted with a high bar, BCS has already done that to me. GOSS does appear, though, to be one of the systems that can meet those high expectations.
@@thetabletopsedge I desperately wanted to like BCS, I truly did but it's simply too abstracted for my taste. At battalion scale I want to position my artillery to support the battle for example, not abstract it with a marker. AW is the only D-Day game where a person can actually enjoy playing the German forces. Where German units are unique, and simply not just another allied unit in gray or black. Staging mobile forces is a very realistic aspect of getting from point A to point B in G.O.S.S. and it is simulated well. I'm particularly fond of Standoff Armor, high caliber Armor / AT bonus increases, as well as formation operational lanes. Fact is that after a decade of diving into this thing called G.O.S.S., I've become hooked on the ability to make command decisions and having at my disposal all the tools to carry it out, with a game system that is more challenging than most.
@@Joey--- I can certainly understand all that. BCS is a very different animal to just about anything else out there. GOSS is a much more traditional design, taken arguably to its ultimate expression. And by traditional design, I mean it has things like an odds based CRT, it's IGO-UGO, etc. Those aren't bad things in my book, and one reason they are traditional is that they've been around for so long, primarily because they work. But there's always been something about odds based CRT's that felt a little artificial. I see a lot of players spending more time scrounging the map to come up with that "one more attack factor" they need to hit the column break, rather than thinking about the larger operational issues.
My other big bug-a-boo about most wargames is the amount of information and control they give the player. It's a limitation of the medium, and even the best systems suffer from it (including BCS). Players too often have the ability to carry out plans with a precision that their historical counterparts could only dream of. Which is the main reason why I chafe a bit whenever I hear gamers talk about "simulation". One of the things that impresses me the most about BCS is that it is able to abstract out a lot of the detail one normally sees in an operational level game, but retain the right feel for the stuff that actually matters, and to allow the player to make the kinds of decisions that a divisional commander would be faced with.
What pushes BCS over the top for me is how playable it is. I've played a lot of big, traditional games over the decades (like OCS), and they always have a tremendous amount of downtime due to their size and nature. BCS avoids that. Because of the formation activation mechanism, and the fact that most activations can be completed in under 15 minutes, you never have to find something to fill a couple hours of downtime while you wait for your opponent to finish his half of the turn.
GOSS has some elements that look really fun and interesting, and I'm hoping that proves to be the case as I get up to speed on the system. Most of the subsystems in the game make sense, and are not really all that complex once you figure them out. I've even reached the point where I can resolve a relatively simple GA in about 2-3 minutes time. I like the way the logistics system faces you with difficult decisions as to how you are going to expend your logistical assets (army TP's) to best support your subordinate formations in their efforts to achieve the goals you've set for them. I really like how the combat sequence allows the non-phasing player to fire artillery FS missions to try to break up incoming attacks. And the ADV mechanism forces you to evaluate whether or not the FS mission you are contemplating is worth the potential cost (either in AmP, or not having the arty unit available for something more important later in the turn). I'm sure there are all kinds of cool nuances and interactions in GOSS that I have yet realize due to my unfamiliarity with the system.
I think GOSS has gotten a bit of an undeserved bad rap over the years, primarily due to development/publisher issues. DG has done itself no favors in how it has presented GOSS, at least in the first three games of the series. I know Joe Youst is very active in answering questions, which is great. I just wish the rule books were better, which could have eliminated a lot of those questions. I'm optimistic right now about GOSS turning out to be a great system, and if it is, then I definitely want to spread the word.
Thanks for watching, and given your experience with the system PLEASE let me know if you see me doing something wrong, or I'm not quite explaining something correctly.
@@thetabletopsedge It's refreshing to hear the truth over what all too often sounds like a commercial in most videos. It is also wonderful to hear the thoughtfulness and mental preparation you convey. I admire your up front honesty and integrity in your videos, and is one of the many reasons I enjoy watching. As one who has done videos, I try to avoid being critical of what takes place in other videos, especially when covering a game as complex as this. I feel the proper etiquette is to make a mental note, and if necessary, make contact off line (in private) to point any corrections out, leaving it to you to point out or not as desired.
I agree, although I have found the BCS system to be a 2nd favorite of mine lately, got all of those games too, but GOSS is my goto on WWII right now.
I am looking forward to watching this. Acquiring Lucky Forward prompted me to finally take up Atlantic Wall due to the improved rules and especially the vastly improved GOSS charts and tables included in LF. I am just finishing punching and organizing AW. That setup does look daunting :)
Excellent! I found the play aids included in LF to be extremely helpful to learning and playing the game. They cover all the major subsystems in enough detail that you usually don't have to crack open the rule book. The only problem with the play aids is that there are so many of them. It can be difficult to keep them organized, and I often spend more time trying to find the right play aid with the info I need than I do actually figuring out how the rule works. Still, they are definitely assets. For anyone interested in getting into GOSS, I would probably recommend starting off with LF, simply because of the much improved rule book, better charts, and excellent play aids.
I will follow for sure! If your commitment will be like the BCS one, it will be magisterial.
So I'm very excited to see more videos in this series, and GOSS remains a great idea for Winterfest, at which it has been played several times (most recently Atlantic Wall).
I think GOSS brings a lot to the table. And while the logistics system is indeed a fair bit to handle, it's *less* to handle than say the on-map supply of OCS. And you only do it once a day, so every third turn. So I think complaints that the bookkeeping (which is pretty much just logistics and command attachments, and in Atlantic Wall managing the flow of stuff onto the continent) is too high are actually masking complaints about the overall detail level, which is clearly very high.
But consider that a lot of things that other games need special rules for, like bridges, road congestion, delaying actions below the game scale, and armor/flak/arty units broken up to support infantry are already built into GOSS. I think Market-Garden will be an ideal showcase for this, although the Bulge is good as well. And the new rulebook is about two orders of magnitude better than the previous rulebooks.
The basic cut and thrust of gameplay takes some getting used to, but it's not as complicated as even the rules make it look. After a couple of turns it plays very smoothly, and while the combat is involved, you're really not making dozens of attacks each turn; the pacing mechanism (that I basically demand in any operational game) is actually built into the combat resolution because you want to be able to leverage all of the various factors like armor, arty, engineers, regimental integrity and so forth. You don’t make the bad attack... because it's a bad attack. The battle space decisions follow very naturally.
At this point, I would agree with pretty much everything you said. Now that I'm actually seeing the mechanics in action on the map and pushing pieces around, GOSS is not as complicated as its reputation would lead one to believe. There are also a lot things I really like about it. The thing about complex games is that you never really know how it's actually going to play out until you get it on the table and see the subtle nuances and interactions of the various mechanics. Many times, the natural "flow" of a game reveals a simpler experience than just reading the rule book would imply.
I'm certainly open for a GOSS game next Winterfest. I would imagine discussions of that nature will start up around November or so on the forum?
@@thetabletopsedge Yeah, typically that's the timetable.
System needs a skimmed down rule system. I know that Joe Youst had mentioned it awhile back. It would bring more people to the game.
I think they tried that in World at War #80 with the "Hannut" intro game, but it didn't really work. They managed to get the rules down to 16 pages, but I wasn't a fan of what they took out, or what was simplified. I don't know that I can put my finger on it exactly, but it just didn't feel right and wasn't terribly satisfying (even though I was very excited to see an early war GOSS game).
There are a lot of things I really like about the combat system and how artillery works in GOSS, but I'm afraid it just may not work. The experience I get with GOSS, the more I think it would be a great system for WWI topics. I am particularly disappointed with WaR. The game specific mandated US retreat and lull rules take those decisions out of the hands of the players, where they properly belong. They're also apt to be abused by the US player to shut down a German player in the midst of a successful offensive.
I'm hoping they can get GOSS figured out, because it does have a lot of promise. I'm not giving up on it, but the rules need a thorough reorganization, in addition to some good development work. If DG had the resources of other game publishers, I think GOSS could be polished up into a great system.
Great series! I too have dived back into GOSS.
Oh I started learning with Atlantic Wall (doing a solo play on youtube currently) but I would highly recommend Hurtgen for learning, I fought that personally, wanted to do AW, but when I finally caved to my teachers, it was a great move, and for Hannut, I have not played it yet, the arty rules are way different, so Im going to use the full rules with the arty pieces. Logistics pieces easy to make.
I will almost definitely be moving on to Hurtgen at some point (as well as WaR and LF). As I said elsewhere, the topics for each of the games in the series interest me greatly, and the possibility of tying Hurtgen into WaR is very intriguing (as if the games weren't big enough as is!). If I had to choose right now, based only what I know and have experienced to date, I would probably choose Hurtgen to teach someone new the GOSS series.
Hannut's arty rules are very similar to the way the intro scenarios handle arty in the full GOSS games. However, they do include the actual arty units, so it would be simple to apply the full GOSS arty rules to Hannut, I would imagine. The full logistics rules would be a little trickier, but still probably doable with enough ingenuity. As you mention, markers can be made/substituted. The biggest issue I see would be figuring out how many TP's each side has available each day. Do you know if someone, somewhere has come up with a (semi) official variant for this in Hannut?
I will follow you on your GOSS journey. I have the original SPI version of Wacht Am Rhein in my collection. I spent many hours in that game. And that experience led me to purchase the GOSS version of Wacht Am Rhein. I never got beyond initial rules reading before I became involved with play testing BCS. So I will look over your shoulder as you explore the current GOSS system.
Glad to have you on board for the ride, Lynn! Hopefully you'll get a good look at the system and what it does. While I don't plan for it to be a tutorial, I will be discussing various rules at certain points, and I suppose if one watches the whole series, they may well be able to sit down with some experienced GOSS players and not need much teaching in order to play. That's one of the goals at any rate. The other is to find out whether learning the system is worth it or not. While very close in scale to BCS, GOSS is coming at it from the exact opposite end of the design philosophy spectrum. So it'll be interesting for me to experience this having just recently played BCS.
Its my all time Favorite, have fun!! Ive done a handful of videos and working on more, enjoy!!!
Thanks! So far, mostly good. I don't want to spoil the upcoming episodes (the next one will be up shortly), but my experience thus far has only whetted my appetite for diving deeper into GOSS.
@@thetabletopsedge cool, Im sure I will watch them, love the work you do and GOSS so win win, same, Im done with all the airborne and beach landings just need to make the videos, but same, hard not to spoil stuff when Im putting up a video and Im like 3 turns ahead in real life LOL. Also you never know I might be doing something off so its nice to see what others are doing to make sure. I loved your BCS game, got me to buy all the games, love that system now too.
My kind of gamer !
Sadly GOSS is way above my brain capability, so I'm looking forward to future videos from you.
No worries! I just hope that's not also the case for me!😁 Although I will say that based on what I've seen so far (granted, it's extremely limited), I don't think GOSS is as complicated as its reputation would have people think. There's no denying it's a detailed game, but as I move through the various steps of the Sequence of Play I find that the individual subsystems are not as big as scary as they seem at first. I think much of this can be laid at the feet of the poor rule books. Time will tell.
I share your last questions and hope to experience the same inspiration i got from your BCS videos!
Thanks, Marco! GOSS is a VERY different beast from BCS. I'm extremely curious to see how they compare to one another. By the time I'm done with AW, I expect to have the answer, and hopefully so will the viewers.
🎉a system I have and need to learn
Now we're talkin'!
Would you say the GOSS games you showcased in the beginning there, are successors to Atlantic Wall and Wacht Am Rhein by SPI? I own both but have never broken them out to play (I can sadly say that for a number of other titles, too :(). I share your love of monster games, I always skip to the full campaign scenario no matter the system. I had ASL laid out and was playing some scenarios, but decided to try systems I've never fully played. At the moment, I'm learning The Longest Day, which was in my possession probably thirty years or more. I recently took it out of storage, then it sat on my shelf another year, then now its on the table. TLD is a monster and I don't have the space atm to play the full campaign but enough to play some of the bigger scenarios. I'm excited to see you play this series, it looks fantastic. I'm waffling to pre-order the Greatest Day. I downloaded the rules system and I really like some of the concepts and its also a monster of monsters. Thanks for posting this series for us!
I find it all intriguing, and really like the maps and graphic presentation. But most existing releases are a bit too...monstrous for available time and space. I'd like to see some more focused, smaller series entries like Hannut.
I definitely think there's an opportunity for that. I know there is another late war West Front game in development called "Over the Rhine", which will include Operation Market-Garden. I do not know the full extent of the game, though. Based on their offerings to date, I would expect it to cover the entirety of the fall campaign by British 2nd and Canadian 1st Armies (Scheldt Estuary, Market-Garden, etc.). I've also read where the designer (Joe Youst) would like to do some East Front GOSS. I would think there is opportunity for at least a couple of smaller GOSS titles there, as well as in the Med. Hannut is an interesting looking game. It has a single 22" x 34" map, which contains not just the play area but also all of the necessary charts. The Germans get a total of 5 (maybe 4?) divisions, but 2 of them are restricted to the flanks, leaving them with 2 panzer divisions as the major portion of their force. The French get a couple more divisions, but the initial 2 DLM's get withdrawn, while at least one of their reinforcing infantry divisions is restricted to the western map edge. So it's mainly 2 divisions vs 2 divisions on a single map sheet, which is VERY manageable. I will be interested to see if DG decides to do more smaller format GOSS games in the future.
Once you get it down its easier than it looks i think, I always tell people if I can figure it out, anyone can. I use a computer so I can search the PDF, but would be happy to help out if you got any questions, OR there is a great facebook page were you get quick answers. Yeah dont forget TSWW, that is a tough one for me with the rulebook so Im watching you to learn more about TSWW :)
Well I just purchased the bottom three trilogy a few weeks ago and that set me back a cool 400 and now I have to get this oh boy.Thank you for doing these video's,and btw how is wings of the motherland?
I've played the first 10 days of the campaign for LF and I really do enjoy the system, however the bookkeeping and tracking of fuel and movement points is annoying and is preventing me from exploring the system further.
That's EXACTLY the kind of thing that concerns me about GOSS. There seem to be a lot of clever things in it, and it looks like there are tons of interesting decisions to be made, but I'm worried that the detail brings along a lot of drudgery and busy work that saps the overall experience. I guess I'll find out as I get deeper into AW.
@@thetabletopsedge In G.O.S.S. a player is often in the Army Commanders seat, especially at the start of each game day when logistics or Command & Control are concerned. As an Army Commander your primary logistical concern is Campaign Mobility (trucks), and Fuel & Heavy Weapons Ammo. This game system gives a player that limited but essential responsibility, so they can make the critical decisions that will impact their day as the campaign unfolds. It's understandable that some players simply don't like logistics, but it's important I think, to fully appreciate that when you dive into something this complex, pushing a few fuel & ammo markers back and forth on a track isn't asking too much.
@@thetabletopsedge not a lot of bookkeeping, its all done with truck points and rolling for fuel.
@@lbwstrategygaming I would tend to agree. The majority of the record keeping seems to be command related (ie - tracking attachments/detachments, as well as ZOP boundaries). The logistics system seems pretty straightforward, generally low maintenance (pardon the pun), and fun.
@@Joey--- I don't mind putting on the army commander's hat, especially when it is done periodically as in GOSS. I like the feel of the logistics system in GOSS, where you are forced to prioritize your allocation of available logistical means to best serve your tactical and strategic goals. The AmP and Fuel level mechanisms are actually not that complicated, easy to track and manage, but provide a meaningful and interesting challenge for players. I have yet to get heavily into the full logistics mechanics because in AW they phase in over the course of the first several game days, but just looking at the rules and what little game experience I have with them so far, I'd say they actually consume less time and effort than the OCS logistical system, and provide a reasonable outcome in the process. At this stage of my GOSS journey, I am eager to dive deeper into the system.
I would be burned out just from punching the counters and setting that up, much less reading the rules and trying to play it. :)
That's no joke! Not only did I punch the counters, but I also clipped them all. AW is the largest of the GOSS games so far, and it weighs in with 16 counter sheets (4,480 counters). Took me a couple of hours each night over 5 nights to clip the counters. Set up itself was right around 4 man hours. I did take some extra time when laying out the maps to figure out what would be the best option. When the maps are laid out in a single piece, they are about 6" too wide for my table (but there's plenty of room on the north-south axis). The setup wasn't much worse than setting up most other monster games. WiF, for example, takes at least as long, and even LB is pretty close. Something like GB2 from the OCS is also very comparable in setup time. But make no mistake, this IS a VERY large game...
I will follow this for sure 🤣
Wait not played. Crazy man ?
Great job but GOSS is a step too far for me, kinda nice in a way given I struggle to draw boundaries re: game interests and purchases.
OK I watched the rest of the video, I'm in :-)
Boundaries are a good thing. They can help keep you focused (as well as saving some cash). There has only been one game system I've encountered that I never really warmed up to, and that is the Death Ride series by Grognard Simulations. I may do a short video on my brief experience with the system.
@@1CounterTerrorist Based on what I've done thus far with AW, it's going to be a journey. Where I end up at the end, I do not know yet.
@@thetabletopsedgeI love Deathride literally a favorite. It’s crunchy . I also like you can choose the complexity you want.
@@clarkcommando1983 Going to have to cordially agree to disagree on the Deathride games. I very much tried to like these games (and at great expense), but despite having some clever mechanics (for example, the intel from patrols mechanism), ultimately this series was a major fail for me. The production value was awful (most particularly with the maps), the combat system was bad (an odds ratio based CRT at this tactical level makes no sense), and the scenario setup cards were the worst I've ever seen. In fairness, the DR: Normandy maps were an improvement over the DR:Kursk maps (but were still not good). "Crunchy" isn't the word I'd use for the system. "Overwrought" or "underdeveloped" are words that spring to mind. There may be a decent system in there somewhere, but it's in desperate need of a professional game developer to extract it. While I appreciate the ability to choose the difficulty level, the result in this case is a rule book that is a mess. The graphic design needs a complete overhaul, everything from the maps to counter layout to the charts and tables.
At the company scale, the GTS is much better (and so is the Company Scale System from Compass Games), and for a tactical game featuring platoon sized units TCS gives a better much feel with a much less cluttered set of rules.
So im reading the lucky forward book now and its just an awful rulebook from start to finish. There is no intro help, no sense to the organization, no rhyme or reason to the setup in this thing. The very nature of this book is so off putting that any enjoyment you may get from learning it is instantly killed.
No truer words have been spoken about the GOSS rulebook. The scary thing is, the Lucky Forward rulebook is a MASSIVE improvement over the previous versions! I want to do some additional GOSS content, but right now it's difficult to get ANY content done. For me, as of now, the jury is still out on GOSS, but it's not looking good. And that's disappointing.
GOSS has some interesting and clever ideas and mechanics, but it's in desperate need of a good developer. It's my understanding one has come on board for the publication of Lucky Forward (which is why the rulebook is as improved as it is, even though it's not very good) and is shepherding the current projects in the series. I can't help but think that if GOSS were with a different publisher, it would be a much better system. It needs more resources than DG appears to be able to throw at it.
Of the games published so far, both Hurtgen: Hell's Forest and Lucky Forward cover topics which have not seen a lot of coverage at the operational level (maybe there's a good reason for that). I'd say H:HF is a bit of a misnomer, as the game covers far more than just the fighting in the forest (which is located at the southern edge of the maps). It's more about the campaign to capture Aachen and cross the Roer and get to the Rhine.
Wacht Am Rhein is the Bulge game, but for my money Last Blitzkrieg (BCS) is far superior.
The magazine game Hannut was supposed to be an introductory game with a scaled back rule set, but I don't think it's very good at what it tries to do. I'm also not a big fan of "intro" rules. I'd rather have a scenario, or set of scenarios, within the full game that gradually get more complex.
Atlantic Wall covers more of the Normandy campaign than any other operational game I am aware of. It has a paradrop mechanic that I really, really like. Unfortunately, that's balanced out by an amphibious landing module that in theory is pretty good, but in practice becomes mind numbing drudgery (this is an excellent example of where further development work would have improved the game). I still hold out hope for AW that it can be a fantastic Normandy game, but I'm going to need a lot more time with it before I can say one way or the other.
Lucky Forward is the game I have the least experience with (other than with its rulebook and charts). One of the hallmarks of GOSS games are enforced periods of "lulls" in the campaign games. It feels particularly scripted in WaR, and seems open to potential abuse. There were, in fact, considerable operational lulls in the campaigns covered by the GOSS games, but there's a much better way to handle them than through dictatorial fiat which is unconnected with the events actually happening on map. I think there is a huge opportunity within the existing supply rules for GOSS of creating the same kind of lull, but with a much more organic feel to it, and one that the player won't feel is arbitrarily imposed on him.
All I can say is, good luck! I'll be interested to see what your experience with GOSS is like (assuming it survives the rulebook encounter!). While I'm no GOSS expert, if you have any questions about GOSS feel free to ask away. Hopefully some of the other videos may make your struggle with the rules a bit easier.