Build An Ally, Not An Army

Build An Ally, Not An Army

Build An Ally, Not An Army
With Chris Townley

The release of Free Nations has gotten me thinking about the benefits of mixing up your forces by fielding an army with elements from a couple of nations. Free Nations gives you some basic ways to mix up your Force thanks to the Allied Support options the Canadians, Dutch and ANZAC Formations can access.

This is great if you are planning on building one of these new forces, but what if you already have any army? The answer is of course Allied Formations.

Allied Formations
With their integrated command structures, both NATO (US, British, West German, and any other Force with a NATO Allied Formation in its support) and the Warsaw Pact (Soviet, East German, and any other Force with a Warsaw Pact Allied Formation in its support) can field formations from allied armies as part of their force.

An Allied Formation obeys all the rules for its own nationality. An Allied Formation Commander can only join Units in its own Formation (see pages 25 and 57 of the Team Yankee rulebook) and only those Units benefit from its Command Leadership (see page 25 and 64). As they are Support, do not count Allied Formations when determining whether you have any Formations left or if have lost the game (see page 65).

Find out more about Allied Formations here…

Build An Ally, Not An Army

So Why Add A Formation From One Of Your Allies To Your Army?
Covering Your Weaknesses

One of the most obvious benefits is that by fielding a force based from two nations you can minimise any weaknesses as you see them. Adding a French AMX-10P Compagnie de Chasseurs or VAB Compagnie d'Infanterie can add some fairly large infantry platoons with integrated AT assets to your force for the cost of a handful of Leopard 2 or M1 Abrams tanks

Following A Theme
With such a variety of WWIII fiction out there perhaps you have come across an interesting “historical” account of two nations supporting each other that you want to replicate. Perhaps some stubborn West German Panzergrenadiers refusing to give ground and fighting to the last man find themselves mixed in with another nation fighting a rearguard action.

Modelling Opportunities
Did you just want to paint a few models from another nation either because the camo scheme looks good, or you have a cunning modelling idea that you want to try out, or perhaps you just want to paint some T-55AM2 tanks (that would be me!).

Building A New Army
With so many nations covered (and more to come) building a small allied contingent is a great way to start a second army. You can keep your model list tight by restricting your points level to something relatively low which means you can keep the budget tight and focus on painting a smaller number of models. Once they are complete you can add some Force Support to round out the army, or work on another Formation so you can swap between the two.

The French Escadron de Cavalerie that I’m thinking of building came out of this idea of building a small “expansion pack” concept. In this case 29 points of AMX-10 RC armoured cars and infantry, but it could easily be a company of East German T-55AM2 tanks supporting a Soviet force, or some Soviet T-64 tanks supporting some East Germans.

Build An Ally, Not An Army

Downsides. Discuss.
Realistically there is only one major that comes straight to mind and that is that the Allied Formation is a Support option. This means you do not count Allied Formations when determining whether you have any Formations left when it comes to checking to see if your forces stick around to fight some more. Cunning players may ignore your Allied Formations where possible, working on the theory that they can break you faster by focusing on your ‘core’ nations Formations.

Of less concern (as I see it) is that you have a Formation Commander that cannot influence other Formations outside their nation. Yes it is a downside, but one that is in your control so just bear it in mind when playing.

The key is to keep your Allied Formation to a manageable size, don’t invest too many points that you are taking away from the core of your army. If you find yourself wanting to add too much then perhaps it is time to look at swapping over the the roles, turning your Allied Formation in the core nation and vice versa.

Build An Ally, Not An Army

If you have a think about it you can probably find plenty of Formations you would like to try out and this is a great way to give some of them a go without commiting to building a full army (yet).
~Chris