I know that the title of this article is up to my normal puntastic standards but sometimes you just have to say what an article is and then get writing. If you wait for me to come up with a witty title you won’t get the article for another few weeks at least.
I’d like to go off on a bit of a side note here and say that the people writing articles about Hungary and Finland have it easy, there’s loads of puns you can do with them. Romania have it much harder.
Anyway, on with the list building. I’m looking to design a 105 point list, as that seems to be the standard at the moment. Then at the end I’ll add some musings about increasing to 125 points in case I fancy a bigger game.
Eeny meeny miny mo
Romanians have four formations in the book to choose from. These can be summed up as rubbish tanks, acceptable tanks, acceptable assault guns, and infantry.
So which formations shall I pick?
Well, I guess it depends what flavour of army I want. As this is Late War and we have plenty of T-34/85s and Panthers running around, the sensible choice would be either of the acceptable armour options to try and counter them, but where is the fun in that?! So, crap tanks and infantry it is.
Life is always so unpleasant; you must know that as a peasant
Let’s start with the infantry formation.
The first thing we need is a formation HQ and there are no choices here, so that’s simple.
The two black boxes have to be Motorised Rifle Platoons, and we have a few options with these.
Firstly, what size do we want? We have a choice of 5, 7, or 9 MG teams. I think 5 teams is a bit too small, but 9 seems a bit excessive, so let’s take them at 7 points. If I have a few points left over at the end with nothing better to spend them on, I can then always increase the size.
Next, it’s the optional extras. We have a choice of Panzerfausts, a Panzerschreck and a 60mm mortar. Panzerfausts and the Panzerschreck are always useful, but I’m never a fan of taking a single mortar. I miss the days when they could do direct fire; a single mortar bombardment is a bit pants.
So far the list is looking like this:
CHQ – 2pts
7 Team Motorised Rifle Platoon + Panzerfausts and Panzerschreck – 11pts
7 Team Motorised Rifle Platoon + Panzerfausts and Panzerschreck – 11pts
Total – 24pts
Fleshing out the Formation
That’s the mandatory requirements sorted, so now I have to decide what else to add to the formation. I don’t want a third infantry platoon, so no armoured infantry for me. However, some anti-tank guns and mortars are always useful. For anti-tank guns I have options for four 47mm and three 50mm at the same points cost. I’ll just take a unit for now and can always add in the second if I have points left at the end, but which one? The 47mm is AT 8 which is just about acceptable in LW, but I think I’ll go with the AT 9 50mm guns for a little bit more punch and reach.
Next up, how about some mortars? There are options for 81mm and 120mm mortars and, again, I can take both if I really wanted to. One unit will do fine for now and I’m going to go with the 81mm mortars, purely because they can fire smoke and the 120mm mortars can’t.
The infantry formation now looks like this.
CHQ – 2pts
7 Team Motorised Rifle Platoon + Panzerfausts and Panzerschreck – 11pts
7 Team Motorised Rifle Platoon + Panzerfausts and Panzerschreck – 11pts
3x 50mm Anti-Tank guns – 7pts
3x 81mm Mortars – 4pts
Total – 35pts
That’s a nice small infantry formation with all the main boxes ticked, so I shall leave it there for now. Time to look at the mighty Romanian tanks.
Early is the new Late
As many of you know I’m rather fond of rubbish tanks, and looking at the Romanian R-2 Light Tank Company, I’m in heaven. So many interwar tanks, plus the option of an in-formation acceptable tank unit just so you’re not laughed off the table.
The big question in the Light Tank Company is R-2s or R-35s? The HQ and mandatory black boxes can be either, so do I want all R-2s, all R-35s or a mix of both?
Well, I have a cunning plan.
Let’s face it, the R-2 won’t be much good in a tank duel; it’s overworked AT 6 gun is no match for the front armour of most Late War tanks. You might get lucky and take out some enemy recce, but that’s about it. So you’re more useful as a (semi) mobile machinegun platform that can bob around and threaten any enemy infantry that get close. The R-35 on the other hand has different issues. In the HQ you can take a unit with MGs and 37mm guns, but the 37mm gun is useless and at a tactical speed of 6” and a cross country of 12” you’re not going to be fast enough to intercept any enemy infantry.
So, for the CHQ I’ll take 3x R-2s.
Side note here, all the Romanian armour units in the book can have up to three vehicles in the CHQ which turns them into quite useful units rather then just having one or two hiding at the back.
Right, my HQ is three R-2 to pootle round the table and scare some infantry, but what about the black boxes? Well, the R-35 black box platoons are all 45mm version as standard, with the option to switch one to a 37mm. The 45mm R-35 is still fairly poor being only AT 7 overworked, and has no machine gun, but this is where the cunning plan comes in.
The AT 7 won’t do much to scare many Late War tanks from the front, but it can still cause problems if I get into the side armour. So, if I take a couple of units of 45mm R-35s and some recce to get them deployed further forward, the enemy now has the choice of investing time and effort into removing the R-35s or bypassing them and risk getting shot in the sides by AT 7. As the R-35s are hit on 4+ and have front and side armour of 3, it will take some dedicated AT weaponry to deal with them. Even if they do die fairly quickly, they can be a 6 point speed bump to slow the enemy down and give your reserves time to arrive.
What could possibly go wrong?
That makes my Light Tank Company look like this so far.
CHQ 3x R-2 – 3 points
3x R-35 (45mm) – 3 points
3x R-35 (45mm – 3points
9 points for 9 tanks, its like Team Yankee Iraqi T-55s all over again!
Comparatively good tanks
That’s the formation black boxes filled, so what about those grey ones?
The first grey box is like the black boxes, but with the additional option of T-38s. These are just like the R-2s, but with slightly more speed and enough side armour to make you actually bullet proof at short range, all for a mere 1 point more. Sold!
The final grey box is the unit that will probably be the most use in the Formation. It can be either T-4s tanks (Panzer 4s) or TA Assault Guns (StuGs).
StuGs vs Panzer 4s is the eternal debate, and generally I tend to lean towards StuGs for that extra bit of front armour. However, in this instance, I think I’ll have the slightly cheaper Panzer 4s.
That puts the formation at:
CHQ 3x R-2 – 3 points
3x R-35 (45mm) – 3 points
3x R-35 (45mm) – 3 points
3x T-38 – 4 points
3x T-4 (Panzer 4) – 12 points
Total 25 points
Add that to the infantry formation and it’s 60 points leaving 45 points for support.
Heavy Lifting
I’ve already mentioned that I need a recce unit so I can deploy my R-35s further up the table, so that’s the first choice on the support shopping list. My options are either a scout platoon that has some sneaky Rifle/MG armed chaps, or armoured cars.
I think I’ll take the armoured cars because, well, I like armoured cars, plus once the R-35s are in place the recce has done its job, there’s no point spending too much on them.
Next, I feel that I’m seriously lacking in high end AT. The most powerful AT the Romanians have is the 75mm M43 Anti-tank gun, so a platoon of those will have to do the job.
It’s always handy to have an artillery battery, and I have a choice of 75mm or 100mm guns. They are the same points cost with the 75mm having an extra shot over open sights and the 100mm having more range and power in bombardment. I already have the mortars for smoke, so I think I’ll go for the 100mm. If you’re taking artillery, you might as well take an observer, so I’ll add one in for an extra point.
3x AB Armoured Cars – 3 points
3x 75mm M43 AT guns – 11 points
4x 100mm howitzers – 8 points
Observer – 1 point
That’s 23 points, just over halfway through my budget for support. I’ve got all the basic options sorted, so what shall I spend my remaining 22 points on? Well, I think I’m still a bit low on mid to high end AT.
I could take another unit of 75mm M43s, but I think I want something a bit more mobile that I can put into reserves. A unit of TA Assault guns (StuGs) would do nicely, and at 14 points, that leaves me with 8 points remaining. This just so happens to be the exact points cost of that iconic Romanian unit, the TACAM R-2 – it’s almost like I planed this all out in advance.
The Final List
So the final list is:
Motorised Infantry Company
CHQ – 2pts
7 Team Motorised Rifle Platoon + Panzerfausts and Panzerschreck – 11pts
7 Team Motorised Rifle Platoon + Panzerfausts and Panzerschreck – 11pts
3x 50mm Anti-Tank guns – 7pts
3x 81mm Mortars – 4pts
Total – 35pts
R-2 Light Tank Company
CHQ 3x R-2 – 3 points
3x R-35 (45mm) – 3 points
3x R-35 (45mm) – 3 points
3x T-38 – 4 points
3x T-4 (Panzer 4) – 12 points
Total – 25 points
Support
3x AB Armoured Cars – 3 points
3x 75mm M43 AT guns – 11 points
4x 100mm howitzers – 8 points
Observer – 1 point
3x Stugs – 14 points
3x TACAM R-2 – 8 points
Total – 45 points
Grand Total 105 points
That’s my plan for 105pts, and I’m sure it will be able to be semi-competitive against most lists out there…. Who am I kidding? It will survive as well as an ice sculpture of a duckling before the mite of a combine harvester with a flame thrower. But I’ll hopefully have fun playing with it, which is what matters to me.
Powering up to 125 points
The list does have plenty of options for upping it to 125pts. The two main ones that spring to mind are increasing its AT punch.
Firstly, I could take a formation of Panzer 4s instead of just the one unit in the light tank company. Alternatively I can bump up my gun line with another unit of 75mm M43 guns, and the 47mm guns in the infantry formation. But I don’t think I need to plan that out too much yet, because let’s face it, I’m just going to buy lots of everything and change my list between every game.
But, first things first, time to order some crap tanks.
That is a fantastic list Andy, quirky with some very cool units, I look forward to a future article about its battlefield performance!
Remember that the Romanians can have Soviet or German Allies. That means your less than super Romanians can have some excellent support from each ally ( but you can not have soviet and german on the same list 🙂 ). Adding 3 SS Panthers (26 pts) too your above list with M43 AT + Scout AC still leaves you with 5pts to add something else. Or you can go the Soviet route for T-34/85m Hero Tank group ( 18pts ) plus the TASCAM-60 (11pts).
There is a huge amount of flexibility in the list ( when you add allies ). And last don’t knock the Mountain Rifle Company as you get the same base stats of the MIC but each Infantry unit is -2pts for a ROF 2/1 instead of ROF 3/2 ( That will save you 4pts ). The unit still assaults on a 3+ to hit.