Mark Wensnahan has been refining his ASL miniature rules for some time now, and can recently be found quite frequently at Gary's games, playing ASL with miniatures. Mark believes that using miniatures is a potentially powerful tool in recruiting new members into the ASL hobby.

During a recent game day at Gary's Games, Mark and Sam Belcher played a DYO scenario featuring Mark as the Americans defending a village against Sam's Germans. Mark picked 11 squads and an anti-tank gun. Sam took 15 squads, a Mark IV tank and a Mark III FT tank. Mark describes the action: "Sam came on board in a single massed spearhead along one edge and advanced up to my first line of defense. Luckily I immobilized his FT tank at that point and then caught him off guard when his infantry ran straight into a HIP squad. Unfortunately, we only had time to play 4 turns. As time ran out Sam had managed to badly maul my machine gun nest in the only 2nd level building and was just bringing his tank to bear on my troops who had withdrawn to my last line of defense."

During the game, Mark says he was really encouraged by how many people who were simply shopping at Gary's stopped, watched the game, and talked about ASL. "Sam was great as a good will ambassador, taking time to talk to everyone who came by," say Mark. "One highlight for me was a 12-13 year old boy at the store with his mother. He spent a long time looking at the game, asking how it was played, and comparing it to other games he has played. The other nice moment was a father with his young (8-9 year old) son. The two carefully examined the terrain and minis, with the father saying things like "Look at the miniatures son, isn't this cool!". This confirms in my mind that miniatures are a great way to recruit a more people to our hobby. Now if we just had a rulebook that was half as long and written in english...."

Mark provided some digital pictures of the action:

A peaceful village is about to be attacked by the fiendish German troops...

The Germans muster their forces!

The Germans attack!