While attending the World Boardgaming Championships in 2017, we were able to meet up with designer Sean Druelinger and play a prototype copy of his upcoming card game at that time called Point Blank. The game was finally published in 2022 under the name Point Blank: V is for Victory and is a really good replacement for the classic WWII card game Up Front: The Squad Leader Card Game from Avalon Hill. Recently, we heard about an expansion to the game coming out soon called Point Blank: Winter Victory and we reached out to talk with the designer Sean Druelinger about the design progress. We did interview him in 2019 about Point Blank: V is for Victory and you can read that interview at the following link to get an idea about the mechanics of the game: https://theplayersaid.com/2019/09/09/interview-with-sean-druelinger-designer-of-lock-n-load-tactical-point-blank-from-lock-n-load-publishing/

Grant: What is your new design Point Blank: Winter Victory? 

Sean: Point Blank: Winter Victory is an expansion to Point Blank: V is for Victory from Lock ‘n Load Publishing, which is a World War II squad based card game. You will need a copy of Point Blank: V is for Victory it in order to play with the expansion.

Grant: What is the historic setting for the expansion? 

Sean: Winter Victory focuses on the conflicts that occurred during the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944 and part of January 1945. 

Grant: What was important to model from this important late war event? 

Sean: The Battle of the Bulge is a popular subject to cover in wargaming. Point Blank: V is for Victory has 20+ scenarios that cover the summer and fall of 1944. The expansion seemed like a good way to add on to the core game by providing scenarios that occurred in December 1944 / January 1945. This was also a great opportunity to add in some new toys and units as well as some new rules.

Grant: What does the expansion add to the Point Blank System? 

Sean: Winter Victory includes new vehicles, terrain and objectives. There are 12 new scenarios. There are additional rules that add foxholes, Pre Registered Artillery Fire and Airstrikes. Additionally, the game will include 45 game tiles (hard mounted tiles) to use as your mapboard. This allows players to configure the mapboard for smaller scenarios and will eliminate the typical issues players have with paper maps.

Grant: What new Terrain is included and how does it compare to the other terrain? 

Sean: New Terrain includes Forest, Broken Ground and Rubble. Each terrain has very unique rules. A sneak peek: Forest provides a DM of 2, Vehicles may not enter. Any Barrage or Mortar attack adds +2 to the FP attack that occurs against units in the Forest terrain.

Grant: What new units are included? 

Sean: There are 3 new units included such as the US M4A3 (76mm), German Puma and King Tiger. The game comes with 5 copies of each vehicle counter.

Grant: The King Tiger is such a massive vehicle. How does it compare in game terms to the other tanks in the game? 

Sean: This vehicle is heavily armored and has a very powerful ordnance weapon. It stands as king on the battlefield and American and British tanks will have to be careful how and when they engage or they won’t be able to stand up to its firepower for long.

Grant: What was your process of assigning its combat and defensive values as compared to other units? 

Sean: Much of the weaponry is similar in values that appear in Lock ‘n Load Tactical so much of the stats were lifted from there and used in Point Blank. It made sense to not recreate the wheel when there was already good research and experience with the values in an established tactical system.

Grant: How about the American M4A3 tank? What are its combat and defensive values? 

Sean: The M4 has an improved gun over the M4A1 with a penetration of 5 at close range. It also has the Long Range and Gyro unique abilities. It will also come with a .50 cal (5 FP) and .30 cal (2FP) MG.

Grant: How do these two behemoth tanks stack up against each other? 

Sean: The King Tiger clearly has the advantage on the battlefield if going toe to toe. However, a player with enough support from other units does stand a chance. Also there are scenarios that take into account the fuel issues that the Germans experienced and this plays a factor into the game.

Grant: What new objective cards are included? 

Sean: There is one new objective called a “Clearing’. It does not have any defensive modifiers but has an either or control criteria. You either need to have a unit with one Ordnance flag to control or unit(s) with 2 infantry control flags to establish control.

Grant: What are the specifics about the new snow and fog rules? 

Sean: Heavy Snow rules are included and referenced within some of the scenarios. There are some scenarios where units move face down and there are also Hidden Unit rules. These have some interesting outcomes when these rules are in place

Grant: How many new scenarios are included? 

Sean: The game currently is slated to come with 12 scenarios.

Grant: Which design challenges were the hardest to overcome? 

Sean: I do not think this design was as difficult as the original game. It was a little easier because there are many people now playing Point Blank and suggestions and volunteers have been available to playtest and give rules feedback and have made design much easier for the title. Sometimes working with an established system can be a bit tricky but this was really just an expansion into some new battlefields and adding new terrain and units.

Grant: Which aspect of the design are you most proud of? 

Sean: I am proud to provide new rules that can be added seamlessly to the original game. I also like the fact that there are 12 historical scenarios that sample a little bit of the entire battle.

Grant: What’s left to do before the game is finalized and when can we expect to get it? 

Sean: The game is prepared and is ready for production. I unfortunately do not have a lot of info on the production side of the house. I do anticipate that it will be introduced and produced within 2024. Maybe sooner than later.

Grant: What other projects are you working on that we can look forward to? 

Sean: In regards to Point Blank, there is going to be a redo of the rule book that will be made available within the next few months online and then a standalone title (working title) called Point Blank: First to Fight. This title will cover early war conflicts. So look for Polish, French, Dutch, Belgian, Norway, early war Germans and Brits, etc.

Thanks so much for your time in answering our questions Sean. I am very much looking forward to more Point Blank as the system is very good and creates some very interesting small squad battles. I will keep my eye out on the game’s production.

We did post a review video for Point Blank: V is for Victory and you can view that at the following link:

In the meantime, unfortunately you can’t really find much out there on the game but you can visit the Board Game Geek page at the following link for more information: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/382448/point-blank-winter-victory

-Grant