Hammered Scots!

Played Hammer of the Scots today and got HAMMERED as the Scots!  This is a Columbia Block Game on the Scottish wars with the English.

Setup for the scenario, Blue is Scots and Red are English.  That big blob at the top left are not actually in play.

End of turn 2 (1298).  The big blob of blocks in England (top right) have special rules to enter but when they do they can do some serious damage!

End of turn 3 (1299).  We were both working out how the game plays, the way to win is to have the majority of Scottish nobled supporting your side.  You do this by having control of their area at the end of each year or defeat them in battle.  In either case they will instantly defect to your side.

End of Turn 4 (1300).  Don't remember much of this turn but from the blocks left on the board at the end it was not a good year for my Scots!

End of turn 5 (1301).  A better year for the Scots.  I thought I was going to go from this position and start routing the English!  How WRONG I was!

End of Turn 6 (1302).  The English King finally ends up in the English reinforcement draw.  He and his troops proceeded to annihilate Scottish resistance in the south.

End of Turn 7 (1303).  The king trounced some more of the Hapless Scots but Mornay managed to run and hide, and so Ross was forced to convert to the Scottish cause since Monray was sitting in his area at the end of turn (Ross' area is the very bottom with two blocks in it).  The King has to leave the board at the end of the turn and goes back into the draw pile.  Probably missing his tarts, English swine!

End of turn 8 (1304).  Things are going from bad to worse to rock bottom.  The King was drawn as a reinforcement and then sea moved to the middle of the map with a knight.  The Scots had to scramble to stay out of the way, in the process Ross switched sides once again.

End of game.  The English moved first and caught the Scots.  Edward and his Knights made their attack and scored enough hits to kill off the Scots (Edward rolls 4 dice and hits on a 4 or less, Deadly!, and the other hits on a 3 or less).

A very fun and quick playing game.  I am looking forward to playing it again.  I have some ideas on how to put in a better game next time around and look forward to putting those ideas to use.  First is using a speed bump unit to slow up King Edward.  This game I tried to stop his big stack with a stack of my own - I ended up losing badly.  Second is to buy lots of units at the end of each year rather then building up nobles.  This allows holding territory that has been taken while allowing a unit to stay behind to hold MY territory as well.  If you can force a noble to defect at year end you get them at whatever strength they are currently at while defeating them in battle will leave them at strength 1.  Plus more blocks in play means more speed bumps for the king...

Cold Wars 2015

Went to Cold Wars in Lancaster PA on Saturday and took some pics and a couple lousy videos.

My quick review - it seemed like lite attendance (been saying that for years, probably fine but the weather might have held a couple people back).  About 25% of the tables in the main room seemed empty most of the day and I missed a couple of my favorite dealers this time out.  I did buy a wargame, some products from Paper Terrain (love them!), some decals from I95, and some flock and river sections from Wally's Basement.

For the most part I was not really impressed with the games with the exception of the SciFi table setup in front of the Distelfink.  Sadly a SciFi game was the most impressive at a historical con.  Maybe I'm just jaded or cranky from all the snow lately, hard to say.  On the other hand the Host seemed fine, clean bathrooms and it seemed in rather good shape in the ballroom areas.

On the plus side (for me) was the Eureka was right off the steps in the vendor hall and they had Lardy products on prominent display.

Without further ado here are my limited number of pics and videos...

Sorry that was sideways, I can not get the thing to rotate!

My son participated in a Fireball Forward game.  The UK eventually won after a couple of Banzai charges went badly.

OK, this one looked very nice!

And this one.

Going to borrow this terrain idea.

From the game above.

Borrowing this terrain idea as well.

Lardy products at the Eureka booth.

Two types of fabric glued together it looks like.  Rug pieces perhaps.

Nice Game

the SciFi table

AP3 A Breezeless Day

Played ASL scenario AP3 "A Breezeless Day" on the 21st of February with Tycho.  Now sit back and let me tell you my tale of woe...

First the Setup.  The allies are onboard and the Germans come in from the right side.  LOTS of vehicles including two JagdTigers!  (losing with Jagdtigers is almost as much fun as winning without them).

End of Axis turn 1.  Nothing exciting yet.  The guy in the foxhole down at the bottom revealed himself...

The Stug fires at the US infantry getting out of the foxhole in the movement phase and rolls snakes!  Then rolls the US sniper number for the effects DR.  This kills the US squad but the sniper takes aim and fires...

One German Sniper is Down!  (I looked at it as soaking up a US sniper 1 check...)

End of Allies half of turn 1.

German stack fires on the Open Topped M36 and stuns it!

And then it starts going all wrong from there.  First the brainless German player (hi there!) moves his Stug where he KNOWS a baz could take a shot at it.  Said Baz fires and kills said Stug...

Then I move my FT armed Stug where it could be shot at (and there was a mine there, the mine missed but the tank rolled Snakes on the to-hit...)

Proper burning stug model courtesy of History Channel...

this is also worthy of another.

There was no need to move the FT stug there, I just wanted to burn shi...

I would later get fixated on that darn building when I could easily have gone around.  Getting 3 squads and the 9-1 leader locked in a melee with the US squad carrying the Baz.  I lost a squad and the leader and the Squad did not die!  That is good for one more...

Especially since that fixation on the building cost me the game.  Lancelot in "Excalibur" said it best.  "You would fight to the death for a building you could easily go around" - or something like that.

Back to the game.  The interesting luck keeps on churning along.  The tank that flamed my stug fired at another stug and missed (he had rate from the earlier snake eyes) and then intensive fired at another stug and rolled an 11.

Down at the bottom of the map my infantry look for fausts (the first squad fumbled and stubbed their toes) the second squad to look finds one and flames the stunned M36, just one of them left to go.

And another tank breaks the MA.  I was not even doing an IF shot (that I am known for, held off on them in this game since the need is not so great with a couple Jagdtigers on board)

End of Axis Turn 2

End of Allied Turn 2

Partway through Axis turn 3.  The Germans sent squads south to draw PB fire from the red circled squad.  The red circled squad was then fired upon by the 8-0 leader stack.  DMs all around.  The Jagdtiger in the center claimed his first kill (love that 28tk value).  The M36 up top blasted a Stug.  My reckless use of vehicles was coming to haunt me.  I was getting close to not having enough CVP to get off board.  Oh and during all of this I rolled the Allies Sniper...

And the Axis sniper says farewell...  (SAN reduced to 0).  The allies would not get another Sniper attack the rest of the game, so good job Germans Snipers!  Best sniper sponges money can buy.

End of Allied portion of turn 3.  Jagdtiger gets another kill and the M36 makes a run for it.

Next turn that M36 sneaks back and takes out another Stug.   I also appear to have my screenshots out of order - the US 60mm mortar OBA also immobilized ANOTHER stug...

End of Game.  The M36 WAS in LOS of the Jagdtiger (we both thought it would not be but when it was strung up there it was).  This meant the Jagdtiger would get an easy shot on the M36 and as expected it was killed.  The OBA took out another stug (killed this time) and we called the game there.  There was JUST enough German CVP left to get 70 off the board but to do that and hold the 10 building locations would have been impossible.  Also note that the melee in the building is still going on...

A very fun scenario and tougher on the Germans then it looks.  The German player HAS to keep his mind on the VC and ignore the US infantry as much as possible.  Getting as much armor offboard is the most important aspect of the scenario.  Lots of fun.  I recommend everyone play this at least once.