Stripped Down for Parts: WWII Commander, Volume 2: Market Garden

  

 

The original photo from which the cover illustration for this game was drawn. 

John Butterfield’s WWII Commander Volume 1: Battle of the Bulge (Compass Games, 2020), was a physical iteration of a computer game by Shenandoah Studios (an arm of Slitherine UL Ltd), which itself was a digital implementation of an earlier unpublished boardgame design. I’m a fan of the game (I’ve written up some AARs, and you can find a review here), and for some time I despaired that the “Volume 1“ in the title was a hollow promise. Well, Mr Butterfield and the good folks at Compass Games have come through with WWII Commander, Volume 2: Market Garden (Compass Games, 2025). 

While not a perfect match, WWIIC: Market Garden’s box front is reminiscent of the Battle of the Bulge trade dress. Compass is always good at defining their series games, and a presentation in general. The cover features the famous photograph of British paras armed with Sten guns (the officer at the back carries a Browning pistol at the ready), picking their way through the ruined buildings of a Dutch town. Like its predecessor, the cover also announces that the game was indeed designed by John H. Butterfield (what game wouldn’t want to boldly declare this), that it is intended for two players and will require between one and three hours of your time.

The box-back. These days every Compass box is a sturdy construction. 

The top of the box-back features a quote I hadn’t come across before; Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands, saying, “My country can never again afford the luxury of another Montgomery success.” It’s a fitting epigram for the situation covered in the game.

The back of the box offers a teaser of the game map and some sample images of the “Premium oversize counters,” shown at pretty close to actual size (I’ll get to both of these in due course) and gives a brief explanation of the situation and the priorities for the two sides. The game-infographic tells us that the scale of the game-map areas (roughly) five kilometres (a tad over three miles) across and the turns are half a day in duration, and that the units are regiment to brigade level. It reiterates the two-player intention of the game, declares the solitaire suitability to be Medium, and advises, in contradiction to the other half of the box, that a game will likely run to 3-4 hours duration. After playing WWIIC: BotB quite a number of times now, I think this is the more trustworthy metric.

Besides the designer, the game credits single out Bob Heinzmann as the game’s developer (an important role in the creation of any game, and one that, to my mind, deserves more recognition), and the artwork was all provided by Bruce Yearian (who never disappoints). The Project Manager at the Compass-end of the endeavour was John Kranz. Mr Kranz, the founder of ConSimWorld.com and the ConSimWorld Expo, left Compass Games some time ago at time of writing, but I anticipate seeing his name name at least a few more games coming out this year or next. Hope things are going well, John.  

Both halves of the box enclosure are solid and, I’m pleased to say, cat-proof. What can I tell you? It’s a box, and we own a cat.

The rulebook. It's well laid out and very readable.

Market Garden's Rulebook is printed on the familiar, heavier-weight gloss paper we often see from Compass and runs to 28 pages. This might have been reduced to 24 with some cramming, but the rules are laid out in a nice, readable sans-serif font (the same as used in the previous volume), with plenty of illustrations and examples. Take out the Cover, Table of Contents/Introduction, components overview, two-page game set-up spread, Designer’s Notes and back-cover Terrain Effects Chart, and the actual rules come to a very easy to navigate 18 pages, which include a list of the differences between the earlier volume and this one.

Sample spread.

The differences between the two games are minor in and of themselves: a maximum two units from each side can be in a single area instead of three; activation is by individual units, not all units in a single area, but if you’re already familiar with WWIIC: BotB, most of the basics will be familiar.  

The game board. Once again, my crappy lighting doesn't do justice to the
stunning and beautifully utilitarian board.

Like its predecessor, Market Garden comes with a mounted map. Like a lot (though not all) mounted maps from Compass, this map-board sits out nearly perfectly flat right out of the box. I don’t know how the manufacturer gets this to work, but I’m hoping they can keep it up.

The Map-board is a full-sized 34” by 22”, a panel-width longer than the 25” by 22” Bulge map-board. The map itself takes up about two-thirds of the board space, with the rest accommodating the necessary Game-Turn and Time tracks and the pendulum Victory Point Track, as well as the Weather Result Table and a copy of the Terrain Effects Chart.

The play area represents the region along the Club Route from Luyksgestel in the south to Arnhem in the north (North is roughly the right-hand map edge). The game begins with paratroop units in place on the board at their historical landing places, catching the local German formations flat-footed. The region covered by the map is divided into areas. In a given activation foot units can move one area, while motorised and armor units can move two, assuming certain conditions are met. This isn’t going to sit well with everyone; I understand some gamers just don’t like area-movement games. Nothing I say here, or anywhere else on A Fast Game, is likely to change their minds on this. But if you’ve read this far, you’re probably not one of them.

The game counters come in two easy-punch counter sheets, and are very nice to use.
They are cut from a good weight board and, at an inch square, are very easy to read.
The Germans come in three greys (identifying their respective formations; the
II SS Panzer, 15th Army, and 1 Parachute Army), While the Allies wear
two shades of green (101st and 82nd), purple and rose (British
1st Airborne and 1st Polish), and khaki (British 30 Corps)

The counters are simple and effective, presenting the Unit name and type, starting space or arrival turn for reinforcements, the unit’s Strength (how many dice it rolls in attack/defence) and it chance of being hit (with a second to-hit for Elite Armor on armored units). And the unit counters are big – a full inch square – and pre-rounded. Some units are represented by multiple counters to allow a granular step loss.

Also included are admin for marking units Out of Supply / Low Supply (for the Airborne units), as well as Turn and Time markers and Weather reminder tokens. The game also features some wooden components that are technically markers but which I will get to shortly.

The German and Allied Orders of Battle. 

Each player has an Order of Battle card, with spaces for each unit and units with multiple counters are indicated by the counter templates showing counter stacks two or three deep. They are laid out with the starting counters in the top section, then grouped below by the turn entry, for ease of tracking. These sheets are a boon and I rejoice any time they appear in a game. I get that some people may find it tedious or double handling, and they do add to the footprint of the game, but I find it easier to stay in the flow of the game when I don’t have to rifle through the reinforcements looking for who is entering each turn – they’re already there and ready to be thrown into battle. Not literally thrown, of course; we're not barbarians - this isn’t Memoir ’44 (Days of Wonder, 2004).

Two identical PACs are provided: no excuse for squabbling.

Market Garden comes with two duplicate Player Aid Cards. The front presents a detailed Sequence of Play and a distillation of the Movement rules. The verso outlines the rules for Combat, Supply, and establishing Victory. At the bottom of the card is a helpful key to reading the counters, and a breakdown of the formation colour-coding and unit types represented.

This is what greets you when you remove the box top.

The game comes with seven dice which, based on my experience with WWIIC:BotB, will be enough for most incidents of battle; actually, given the reduction of units available in a given space from three to two, I doubt you will need to reroll any dice at all in Market Garden.

Two bags of wooden markers also come with the game. The green discs are Area Control markers. In the WWII Commander series, the aggressor marks areas captured and held with these discs. In WWIIC:BotB these were grey and screen-printed with a balkenkreuz; here, with the Allies attacking, a white star adorns the green discs.

Clockwise from top: black "Activated " markers and green Allied Control markers
(both of these are wooden components); seven d10s; and a bag of baggies,
sufficient in number for the needs of the game.

The second set is a bag of wooden cubes. These are used to mark units that have been activated in the turn. Each unit only gets one activation, so a black cube placed is on top after each has acted, then these are cleared from the board in the housekeeping phase at the end of the turn. Both components are very effective in appearance and function and add a measure of gravity to the situation. The purpose could have just as easily been accomplished with extra sheet of counters, but I’m heartened that Compass has persisted with the wooden components.

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That about covers it for WWII Commander, Volume 2: Market Garden. As I mentioned at the start, I really like Volume 1, and I’m very please the promise of a series has come to fruition. Apart from some minor amendments to the rules, Market Garden should keep the best characteristics of its sibling game, fast, engaging play and difficult choices with every turn. But this won’t simply be more of the same; looking at the map I can see different challenges to try to nut out over successive plays. T, my regular opponent, is also keen to give this a try, so look out for an AAR soon.