Merry July 4th

It's Independence Day, woo hoo! A day off in the middle of the week is kind of ridiculous really but hey, a day off is a day off. Any excuse to burn burgers and have a brew is a good one.

I've actually done a fair amount of gaming the last couple of weekend, it's gone undocumented here but I'm about to rectify that. The day after Zig and I played Firestorm a couple of weeks ago, I met David up at Morningstar Games for a Dystopian Wars Fleet Action battle.

I used a fun pairing of Prussians and Eclipse Company mercenaries. David brought along his Blazing Sun Japanese.

So the general setup was that I was defending a channel and the EBS forces were trying to clear me out and capture the large building in the center (next to the robot).

By turn two, it seemed that David wasn't moving quickly enough towards the objective building. I was fine with this.

My swarm of little boats and subs drew a massive amount attention and really helped the Prussian cause. While David was expending considerable resources killing the hard-to-hit little guys, I was knocking on his larger, more threatening units.

Ol' Stampy gets up close and personal with the Blazing Sun sky fortress. Sadly, I completely botched the attack and did not crush the thing mercilessly.

In the end, it was a solid Prussian victory. My aggressive defense paid off - I took the battle to the enemy a long way from their objective. It felt great to put the DW toys back on the table. They really are a lot of fun.

Last Sunday, Dave and I met again at Morningstar, this time for some X-Wing. David flew a by-the-book TIE swarm - 8 x 12-poit TIES, while I used a Rebel mix including Poe Dameron, and ARC170 and a new Resistance Bomber.

Early into the proceedings I just could make anything happen and I wasn't feeling good about it at all.

The shot of the week - Poe gathers the attention of seven TIEs. Poor shooting by the Imperials meant that Poe's luck held out.

The TIEs at the bottom had finished of the ARC170 while I'd managed to bump off three of the Imperials. Things were starting to fall into place for me.

An example of David's fine driving skills. Keeping it on the table like no one's business!

The final result. Poe kills yet another TIE - he turned out to be quite the killing machine - and the Bomber hangs on to its final two hull points. I had managed to kill seven TIE fighters and only lost the ARC170. The Bomber is very nice and a good pickup for the collection. I've been eyeing the Ghost for a while, but I'm glad I went with this ship.

I've been painting a bit recently and have finished up a few things.

Here's a fun little well / fountain with some creepy crawlies in it.

Another good pickup at Morningstar...

 I can't believe Jeff had one of these on the shelf. A very nice pickup for my Red Fleet for StarDust.

And they got painted up quickly. I haven't touched the fighters yet.

And lastly, some Malifaux minis.

 This is the "No Shelter Here" box set.

Creepy little girl and zombie baby

Three ghosts and a poltergeist

One of these days I'll put Malifaux on the table and try to learn the system, but until then, I just really love painting the models. Happy Fourth and stay safe!

Happy TANKSgiving - Two AARs

Over the weekend, Mike hosted his annual Tanks-giving gaming get-together and of course David and I had to make the 120 mile trek. On the menu this year were Dystopian Wars: Fleet Action and Blitzkrieg Commander.

DWFA was set up first. I'd brought two forces, French and Prussians, allies in the DW alternate history. Opposing them would be the British and Russians. Being a tank-themed event, it was a land battle with the minor exception of an Eclipse Company airship recruited by the Brits to pad their numbers.

So, managing the Brits and Russians were Mike, Alec, David and Lee. Ace and I split the French while James and Sarah led the Prussian contingent. I won't attempt a detailed battle report because most of what followed over the next three and a half hours was a series of insults and jeers as we all settled into our national stereotypes for a bit of roleplaying with our wargaming.

Our battlefield and two of our opponents.

Our patient host.

The French mobile airfield moves towards the hill in front of it, accompanied by many smaller tanks. It may be worth noting that one of my two artillery pieces, in the extreme foreground, had already been destroyed by the British arty.

At some point during turn 2...  Lee and Sarah showed up a bit late, but better late than never. After turn 1, the Anglo-Russian alliance were ahead 9-2. The Prussians had made a deep push on our right flank but appeared to be getting pulled into a Russian trap. The Brits in front of me and Ace were content to focus fire on my Danton landship.

Hey, it still has two hull points!

Sarah's small tanks get up the hill and begin flanking the Russian trap as the big Russian drill surfaces and disgorges its cargo of three more tanks.

Blimp's-eye view.

Big Stompy charges into the Russian line, destroying a couple of tanks. James knew the writing was on the wall for the big guy and wanted to get in a few extra kills before his big 'bot was destroyed.

I wanted to do the same with my Danton, except that Ace had parked a tank in front of it, restricting my movement.

 Mike's artillery then cut loose like a deuce on the ol' Bastille on wheels.

And it was no more...

Smiling faces of our opponents.

This was followed quickly by David putting paid to the Metzger. Two heavy hitters gone in the blink of an eye. To add insult to injury, when Ace rolled his airfield right up to the death zeppelin, he whiffed with every attack!

The final insult as Dave's drill smashes through a tiny stand of Prussian Walze tanks.

So, from that last picture you get a good sense of the class and graciousness of our opponents. I jest. It was a terrific game, marred by horrifying dice rolls on our side and good, if not great, dice rolling by our opponents. James was the only player on our side whose dice weren't completely miserable. Final score - 50 to 30 in favor of Mike, Alec, David and Lee. Congrats, and on to the next!

For BKC, we switched up teams a bit and a bit of a staffing change. Ace, Mark and Alec were on team Germany with me, while David, Mike, Matt and James for team Soviet Union. Though the game was technically set in 1944, we had a motley collection of equipment fielded and the battle amounted to a line-up and shoot. Given the feistiness of the players, it was just as well. Nothing too complex.

Most of the players... Matt has brain damage and can't control what his hands do.

My lovelies. I was to just hang onto the right flank as best I could with a mere seven Panzer IVs, two blobs of infantry and two PaK40s (in the wheatfield).

SU152s, T-34s and KVs across the map from me.

James' (behind the field) and David's (behind the buildings) tanks.

The battle began in earnest on our left flank with Ace and Alec pushing up the hill opposite David's 85s.

In the hour and eighteen minute-gap since the start of the game, I had passed exactly one command roll and my slackers had moved almost nowhere.

I was presented with some targets atop the central hill and began firing with my tanks. Finally, some fun!

Mark's Tiger IIs in our center, behind that pond, absolutely dominated the gumball alley in the middle - a good thing for us because I wasn't doing anything and about 2/3rds of our forces were on the left side cut off from us by the hilltop and woods.

Mike and Matt eventually got their tanks to the ridge in front of me and began hitting my position. My Mk IVs didn't stand up well to the challenge.

My two functional tanks hit the gas and re-deployed to the field to join with the anti tank guns that had actually been complete killing machines.

The far side of the table. Alec and Ace had made a significant push forward and made quite a mess.

By 10:00, with a two-hour ride home looking at us, we wrapped up the game. We tallied up kills and the Germans had won by a roughly 2:1 margin - quite shocking but I needed a win after the beating that was Dystopian Wars! I rather enjoyed BKC and am sure I'll be playing more of it in the future. David liked it as well. We've both purchased the 2nd edition rules PDF.

Another great Tanksgiving come and gone. James has a post on his blog too, here.  I'm psyched for Memorial Day now!

Dystopian Wars Fleet Action: First AAR

So, about a week before Spartan went under, I started looking through their quick-play rules - Dystopian Wars Fleet Action and Firestorm Taskforce. DW and FSA are terrific games but the fiddly nature of the rules limit how much of a game can be played in three hours. The new rules simplify things significantly but do a fabulous job of retaining the flavor of the original.

Ziggy and I got together for a battle Saturday evening to give DWFA a thorough workout. I used my Honorable Eclipse Company which have been in a box, painted, for quite some time but only minor elements of which have ever seen the battlefield (two years ago!). Zig used his British navy. One unintended matchup problem that Z didn't consider is that his ships rely heavily on torpedoes, which are useless of course against flying machines which make up 85% of an HEC force. Point values were just over 1700 each.

I'd have decorated the islands a bit more, but the decorations would have just gotten in the way of my fliers. Witness yet another bizarre deployment by Ziggy.

After a turn, there had been very little destruction. Lots of moving out and getting lined up.Oh, that white square on the left side was a minefield. I suppose I should craft a couple, more elegant.

A squadron of Hades interceptors takes a run at some frigates.

I'll note at this point that we were listening to 80's heavy metal and Slayer "Raining Blood" came on as I was getting the bombers lined up for a bombing run on the destroyers below. Just one of those fun memorable gaming moments. My bombers whiffed and we quickly turned the song into "Raining Dud."

The noose continues to tighten around the British. Their only element outside that top-right pocket is a corvette squadron visible (barely) on the left in front of the mines.

Turn 3 - I remember to launch the little guys from my undersea bases. Assault submarines make for the Hood battlecruiser and give it a good thrashing.

A view from the top. The immobile killing machine had just mashed up something or other in the distance. Pretty sure the gin & tonic inspired this picture.

Remains of a Hades squadron try to make an impression on the Monarch-class heavy battleship. They'd have done just as well lobbing water balloons.

The mini-subs finish off the Hood. During turn 4, Ziggy actually racked up a lot of kills but it wasn't enough to overcome the deficit. We called the game there.

The final score, just raw kills was 46 to 27 in favor of my HEC. I really do think that the lack of suitable targets for torpedoes was significant. Nineteen points different? Who knows? Next time I'll use something a bit more naval.

We're both very happy with the DWFA rules and they'll continue to be used. The game just plays better with less confusion, fewer rulebook dives and more toys on the tabletop.