Onslaught

About this board game

Onslaught is a two-player World War II wargame for about 240 minutes, covering the Western Allied campaign from just after the Normandy invasion through the crossing of the Rhine.

Each turn begins with an unpredictable contest: players roll for turn order, and the highest result acts first. However, a tie ends that month’s play. Players draw fresh supply points each month, and the game lasts up to 20 months, making timing and flexibility central to every decision.

Supply points are limited, so players cannot activate every unit on every turn. Spending them generally allows a stack to move or attack, while a more expensive breakthrough activation combines movement and attack. Since you never know who will receive the next turn, plans must adapt to changing tactical situations.

• Allied objectives: Break out of the beachhead, capture additional supply ports, and advance toward Germany.
• German objectives: Contain the Allies in Normandy, delay their advance, and deny valuable supply ports before falling back toward the Rhine.
• Additional elements: Allied paratroops, the German Bulge offensive, reinforcements and replacements, and strategic movement.

Captured supply ports increase the Allies’ available supply points and therefore the number of activations they can make. This creates a tightening timetable for the Allies, while the German player faces an increasing disadvantage in supply points as the campaign continues.

Victory is generally determined at game end by the difference between German units west of the Rhine and Allied units east of it. A large mounted map with large hexes and counters helps reduce the fiddly handling sometimes associated with lower-production-value wargames. Onslaught was originally released in 1987 and republished in Command Magazine Japan #64 in 2005.