Frontier Bash

Back to the North-West Frontier and some modified The Men Who Would Be Kings, as Matt's British get some reinforcements in the form of Ben's Gurkhas.

Rapid Fire Gold Rush

A Tanks Only game of Rapid Fire loosely based upon everybody's favorite silly WW2 bank heist movie, Kelly's Heroes.

Britsh, German, Italian, and American are trying to loot some gold from a bank in the village. It is defended by some French, who don't seem keen on being friends with any of the approaching vehicles.

Bolt Action - Off the Beach

A Trial Game of modified Bolt Action in the Pacific.

Keiron and Matt are planning a 'Big Game' of an American 'Island Hop' for later in the year.

This game was for testing stage\wave 2 - moving off the beach.

The right flank.

Rules have been changed to speed up the dice draw to make it more of a classic IGOUGO. The way it was implemented seemed to favour the defenders in their ambush positions.

Heading off the beach

Rather than advance straight ahead the cover of the trees on either side was utilised to get closer to the bunkers (being represented by the trenches - they were covered bunkers). The mortars also laid down some smoke for the first few turns.

Bogged down in the middle

Nothing much happened in the middle all game. There was a success on the left flank as a drawn-out duel between light tanks helped the Americans move up to the first defensive line and engage with the rearmost Japanese defenses.

Americans take the bunker (briefly)

The mortars cleared the middle of the bunkers holding up the advance on the right, but the rightmost had to be stormed to clear it out. This was successful but a return 'Banzai' charge, after some artillery to soften it up, soon cleared it out.

Tank loses the gunnery duel.

The tank had moved out of its 'hull down' position to try and help out but got taken out by a three-inch gun. This was the last of the effective units on this part of the wave. Both sides depleted ready for the next wave of incoming Americans.

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Tripod Terror

Time to wheel out the Martians for a couple of games of Tripods and Triplanes at the club as I teach the rules to some first-time players.

Mark the Martian versus Matt and Jim the Aviators.

Martians have Landed

Finally, after much delay, the Tripods and Triplanes Kickstarter has landed. This is a fun add-on for Wings of Glory (Wings of War as was). Unfortunately, a series of events kept delaying the release from Ares games, but it turned up on my doorstep last week (in the pouring rain as the despatch driver didn't put it in the 'safe place' I'd specified. Thankfully it was extremely well packaged inside so avoided rain damage.)

The base game, despite its name, does not actually include a Triplane but instead is a 1 on 1, Mk.1 Tripod vs Rocket-armed Nieuport N16, which was previously available years ago as part of the Balloon Buster set and which was at the time too pricey for me.

Battlegroup Torbruk

A game of Battlegroup Tobruk

The first time most of us have played a game from this rules family.
British vs Italians, but with the British constrained in the amount of ammo they had to wrestle the objective off the initially weak Italians.

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The most effective anti-tank weapon proved to be the artillery which was brought up from their original positions on the ridge. The Italian tankettes did provide some opposition, as did their heavier armour on the opposing ridge line. concentrating their fire on the artillery positions prior to their destruction as the British Matildas moved slowly forward.

The British were rapidly running out of ammo but managed to suppress all the remaining Italian armour, so effectively they would (with decent dice rolling) get a free turn to move closer, and greatly improving their chances in what would have been a final round of fire. The game got called prior to this as the Italians conceded.

The infantry didn't get to play much of a roll in this game, with only the Italian unit holding the objective being active.

The game was quick paced despite being a bit table heavy, with favourable comparisons being made by the participants to both Bolt Action and Rapid Fire.
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Heroes on the Table

A couple of games of Heroes of Normandie, only the second time it has been played at the club.

I pre-selected two 200 point forces of Americans and Germans, and Dave M and Mark set about wandering the bocage.

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Despite both being new to the system they picked up the rules quickly and I was surprised how quickly the first game ended given that 200pts is a decent size for a game.

The Germans were given a more 'veteran' feel; more mobile, plenty of MG's, tanks busters and a sniper. The Americans had better armour (if you could describe an M8 Greyhound as armour), a mortar for indirect fire, and more troops, plus Clint as a Hero.

Mortar fire was decisive in the first game, with three consecutive rounds landing without scatter. Mark also learnt that light woods, while better than no cover, is no match for a hedge as he came out worse in a firefight. So a decisive victory for the Americans.

Dave M kept forgetting to activate Clint, with his autonomous hero action. Mark forgot to use his sniper as well and didn't use his 'veteran' rerolls effectively.

The second game, with adjusted board layout, was much closer. The Germans used their transports to capture the Victory Point locations early in the game. The Americans caused more damage to the Germans and used their armour to take out the transports, the Germans just failing to take out the armour with a panzerfaust that scraped the paintwork. The Mortar was nowhere near as accurate this time.

On the final turn, I tried to encourage Dave M to do or die with Clint to capture the middle Victory Point location. He had the opportunity to soften the target up with suppressive fire from either his 50cal or vehicle MG but chose to fire for effect with no luck. So Clint heroicly defended his shrubbery instead.

The Germans clung on for victory, the additional location counteracting the points for lost troops.
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