The US Civil War turns 4 through seven

Played TUSCW turns 4 through 7 yesterday.  The CSA has managed to put a halt to the depredations of the northern aggressors...

First off the situation at the start of turn 4.  The CANV under Joseph Johnston has run away from the north and is just Northwest of Staunton.  In addition another force that attacked DC last turn was chased north when attacked by Pope upon the failure of the DC assault.

In the West AS Johnston is holding with very depleted forces (sent East for the most part) and in the TM the Union has captured Little Rock.

End of Turn 4.  The USA has 14 VPs, 5 ahead of the Progress of War (POW) chart.  If they keep up this pace it will be all over by Christmas of 62...

In the East all the forces north of Richmond are destroyed (see the leaders up there in the "dead" pile).  Although Staunton is held by Militia.

In the West Grant captures Memphis and destroys the fort and industry there, he then skeedadles back up the river when Johnston threatens to move into Indiana.

In the TM Jackson and some helpful cavalry destroy the Yankee threat and retake Springfield.

End of turn 5.  The USA is now at 15 VP with a schedule of 12, the CSA is starting to swing the war to their favor.

In the East Lee replaces Johnston (who in this reality died around Staunton) and Jackson is recalled to the East.  General Grant is also brought to the East to prop things up.  After a number of back and forth battles Lee retreats to Petersburg while Grant takes Richmond (second time it fell this game).

In the West the Union lands at Clarksville while AS Johnston defends Nashville.  The fort at Memphis is rebuilt and now manned to repulse a naval assault.

In the TM things come to a stop for now.  The CSA sent it's commander East and did not reinforce the area.  The USA was busy with other matters this turn.

End of turn 6.  Hard to see but the US VP track is at 12 while the benchmark is at 15, the USA is now 3 VP behind schedule.  Lincoln is getting upset and the voters are getting ugly.  Jeff Davis is being talked of in glowing terms after nearly a year of invective being thrown his way.

In the East Lee and Grant chase each other back and forth (both can intercept or avoid battle on a 5 or higher on 2 dice which makes it hard to pin them down).  Lee's fearsome reputation lets him chase away the other USA forces as well.  Part of this is due to Richmond having fallen - Lee is not tied down to defending the capitol for fear of losing the VP points there since most are gone for good.

In the West Bragg Replaces AS Johnston, while not as good as Johnston by any stretch he is good enough.  Longstreet moves to Memphis to add to the defense of the fort.

Still no action in the TM.

End of turn 7.  US VP at 13 and standard is 18, they are now 5 behind schedule.

In the East the CANV moves north and entrenches after more dancing around northern Virginia.  They are on a supply line so will be able to take in reinforcements if the USA increases their forces in the area.

In the West Bragg is caught between two sizable forces.  He has been fighting with Buell but has only gotten about even results.  He is tied down to Nashville - he can not leave it with enough force to beat Buell without leaving Nashville under threat from Hooker (of the pain, the pain...).  He is also in a position to receive reinforcement and while he can not leave Nashville uncovered the Union can not leave Clarksville uncovered since they need the landing there for supply.  CSA cavalry general Morgan makes a dash for Columbus and grabs it from Union control.  For now...

The USA moves out in the TM, retaking Springfield and destroying the CSA forces in the area.  The question now is when and where to push them back again?  The troops are going to be needed in the East and the West.

Both my opponent and I really like this game.  It has a good feel to it, the North is able to push the South and stretch them but they have to worry about supply and Lee is a slippery little bugger, nearly impossible to pin down without a large blocking force (you need one as large as the army you are trying to block in order to keep them from Avoiding combat).  Grant is Lee's equal in the this regard so both forces are dancing back and forth to a good position or trying to attack and use a campaign card for a bonus.  In the West Bragg is currently tied to Nashville to keep the VPs of that space (3 of them) out of Union hands but if he does not win a battle he will eventually have to withdraw are be defeated and forced to surrender after losing a battle and being surrounded.

Second game of The US Civil War turns one through three.

Lawrence and I started our second game of The US Civil War today and managed to complete 3 full turns.  Only a couple of times checking the rules and play flowed more smoothly than our last game.

The situation at the start of the game.  Pretty standard...

End of turn 1

In the east Little Mac takes a good hunk of West Virginia.  Near DC McDowell chases off Beuregard(?) but is then chased back to DC by the combined remnants of Beuragard's forces when J Johnston counter attacks.

Things are quite in the West while in the far West Lyon is a Lion and kicks the Rebs out of Missouri.

End of turn 2.

In the East J Johnston with the help of Jeb Stuart's cavalry take Harrisburg.  McDowell makes a dash out of DC to take Richmond and McClellan cuts supply for the CANV.  At one point during the turn I think Little Mac got the Rebs to withrdraw from next to DC - so he crowed about that as a great victory.

Who needs Lyon?  Custis whips Price in the far West.

End of Turn 3.  The USA is ahead of schedule by 3 points, capturing 10 VP and with 1 Confederate VP left from left turn, the glory is fading fast...

J Johnstone proves a near master of retreat, falling back time and again from US forces, but he misses a roll and suffers a loss in battle.  The once powerful CANV is down to 3sp.  The south gathers forces in Petersburg and chases the Yankee devils back to DC,  he then attacks DC and both players roll a 6, TIE!  Forces then come in from the West (not from DC as my picture shows) and whip him yet again.  He is forced to retreat North!  Not looking good for next turn.

In the far West Custis continues his assault.  Price retreats (the south made great retreat rolls throughout the game, lousy combat rolls most of the time).  Battle is joined in Little Rock and Price is forced to retreat yet again.

Things are looking quite bad for my Confederates this time, a major change from last game.  The south has lost almost all of the battles this game - but on the plus side has managed to retreat masterfully, only missing one of those that I can remember and without that the CANV would have been totally destroyed.  Next turn is winter of 1862 so Kentucky is now US controlled and there are no reinforcements.  The US is going to have to do something about Kirby Smith so he may be able to escape if the Confederates go first (most likely not) while J Johnston and friends are very good at avoiding battle and are on friendly soil.  In the West the south (me) has the advantage of seeing where the North will start move forces for the upcoming campaign - we are outnumbered but may be able to hold the North.  Finally in the Far West, things are looking grim but Morgan's cavalry will need to be dealt with and Custis will only be able to get one more sp to him (then again that is all he has needed up till now anyway).  So for the winter it is holding off the North till reinforcements arrive.  For the North it is choosing where to assault next.

ASL Scenario BFP-27 Chapei Roadblock

Played this scenario yesterday over vasl, despite some glitches with VASL itself and Skype the game went very quickly.

In this scenario the Japanese have to take 5 victory buildings in 8 turns.  The Japanese get 18 squads, 4 leaders, 4lmg, 2 mmg, and 6 tanks.  Unlike my last game I treated the tanks as nothing more than extras for this scenario - the infantry were going to carry the fight!

The Chinese get 12 squads at start, 2 leaders, 2 HMG, 2 LMG, and 2 75 arty pieces.  In addition they have 2 roadblocks and 6 trenches (that link to buildings like in RB but with no basements).

On turn 5 they get reinforcements of 5 squads, a leader, an lmg, and 2 tanks.

The board at start.  (I accidently setup incorrectly so technically I lost the first game after all my units failed to enter, ahem...)  Circles are the VC buildings.

Off to the Races!  No LOS means run like crazy!

The fighting commences, Tycho loses a dummy stack and moves his troops to counter the threat.

BONSAI!  (once again, no Banzai by SSR)

Unlike my last game where I played my Japanese like other nationalities this time I press the attack hard (I'm a naturally aggressive player to begin with and the Japanese are a dream come true!).  I also get lucky, the gun at the top right fires and misses, my tank enters its hex and then a follow on couple squads fire and DM the crew.  A Chinese squad broke while firing at my guys (FPF and 6 morale don't mix) and was eliminated by massacre.  Another squad is eliminated in CC.

The tank that entered the Gun's location forgot to roll for bog and it ends up bogging on an 11, followed by a nice low roll firing at the DM crew - which eliminates them...  A Japanese Sniper then DMs a Chinese squad crossing the street.

BONSAI!  (yes, again!)

Image at end of Japanese Afph of turn 2).  My Japanese are not going to slow down to cross a street.  2 squads gunned down in the street but the rest make it adjacent to the enemy.  An HS also gets nailed but no resid since shooter rolled snakes and it disappeared in a puff of Cowering (Tycho would do that a LOT!).  He also rolled lousy against the Japanese entering the building, lots of nines, tens, and elevens.  For the guys entering the street he rolled better but with lower fire values.

The CC phase crushes the Chinese resistance (how do you stop the Japanese?)  Highlight of the phase is Tycho rolling an Ambush and then rolling boxcars.  Japanese HS finished off the poor bugger with ease.

The Chinese try to make a new line of defense.

Japanese portion of Turn 4.  The tanks swarm around the rear and the squads move in.  Chinese resistance cracks again.  At this point Tycho called it - although he had a gun in X6 that might have done some real damage the Chinese now had equal numbers (once their reinforcements came on next turn) and the Japanese would almost certainly have taken all the VC buildings by then - forcing the Chinese to take at least one back in order to win.

With both agree that this scenario seems to be unbalanced in favor of the Japanese but I just realized that the Chinese never made mention of Bore Sighted locations.  With the MGs and the Guns that might have made a difference.  Even with that I would recommend this package to anyone wanting to play PTO - the programmed instruction nature of it and the incredible boards and articles in the Blood and Jungle pack are well worth the money.

Skirmish Outbreak played at Nerdvana on Thursday the 14th.

Joseph Johnson run a game of Skirmish Outbreak at Nerdvana Games and Comics on Thursday night, a good solid game and lovely terrain and miniatures...

First a Pic of the Rulebook.  I think he said it is on kickstarter at the moment.  (Oh, same people that do Skirmish Sangin?  I needs to get me a copy of both games)

A shot of the city terrain and a zombie.

Ed, Edd, and Eddy prepare to battle the Zombie hoard.  Three other guys are on the other side, whoever gets off the left side of the board with the most stuff wins!

Brains.....

The other team checks out an ambulance.

Ed finds a Zombie while searching the building!

Ed and Eddy go out in the street to clear a path.

Poor Eddy, he got bit by a zombie and infected, Ed waited for him to turn and blasted him and the zombie that bit him for 50 Points!  (shotguns are fun!)

Zombies come out of hiding to the sound of the guns, the Shotgun blast had 10 of them come out at once...

The "dead" pile (in more ways than one).

Standing room only as the bodies start stacking up!

More zombies = more points!

The other team in a bit of a fix as one of their members gets infected too.

Piling up the body count...

The other team runs out the side of the board Ed, Edd, and Eddy went through (shotgun cleared em out - Assault Rifles should probably be rated more highly in the game)

Team 2 wins by a single Zombie kill (that is their dead pile) after getting more points from supplies found - one car had 10 zombies worth of supplies and 3 zombies to their total.

A fun little game, not too rules heavy and works well.  Although I would tweak the ammo rules for shotguns vs Rifles and pistols.  Shotguns do more damage to groups and don't run out of ammo requiring a reload any quicker.

We are planning on an every other week game on Thursday nights so far, up next I'm running a WW2 game with 6mm miniatures.  Here is what they look like up close, each guy is roughly 1/4 inch tall...

The US Civil War Turn 6

Played turn 6 of The US Civil War by GMT games today.  For some reason this single turn took us 4 hours of game time to play out.  Being the Summer of 1862 it makes sense that it would take longer to play these turns but those four hours flew by.

The Situation at the end of turn 5.  In the East The Army of Northern Virginia is near the north end of the Valley.  In the West both sides have beaten each other up pretty well.  In the Trans(far west)  the union forces are beating up the confederates in the area.

Now on to the results of Turn 6

First in the West.  The blue lines are the campaign of 3 Star General Grant.  He first moves south down the Mississippi to take the confederate fort (bottom star - other one was an oops).  He lost the first battle and had to give it a second try where victory was his.  Bad rolls for my opponent.  This opens up the Mississippi to Northern Aggression and gives him 3 Victory Points.  Grant then moves East (I was afraid he would go south and take Memphis and the 4 juicy VPs there but he was worried about what Bragg would do.  (coming to that last).  In the Far West Curtis goes from Victory to Victory (or at least one draw but no losses).  In the process moving onward to Little Rock - but he runs out of time).   Finally Confederate General Bragg, starting from Nashville he attacks and destroys Sherman's forces Northwest of him then continues on to Bowling Green and destroys the Militia defending there.  He then had a choice to send cavalry up north to take some Union Victory spaces (they were open, no defenders nearby but they would have needed to cross the river - doable but the Union might have been able to ship reinforcements in to take the spaces back).  Bragg then moves south to block Grant and gets stomped in a battle and falls back to just outside Decatur.

 

Next up in the deep south.  The strategy of holding the ports is not working so Jeff Davis asks Lee to send Jackson down to take care of the problem, along with 30 thousand troops (railed in from outposts through the south, a couple from Richmond's newly raised troops and one poached from the far west).  Beast Butler is the first to feel Jackson's wrath when he is attacked and routed (2 losses to 1 for Jackson - leaving Butler with only 1sp left).  Since the battle started at 2 to 1 Jackson continues on and finished Butler's force off.  Next Jackson goes after the garrison at Charleston easily destroying it.  He then starts a march down to Florida to deal with the Northern Aggressors there - time will run out before he gets there.

Finally we come to the North where the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia scares McClellan into total immobility.  First Activation goes to the North who attack a CSA outpost just outside of DC (battle not shown, just southwest of the one shown outside DC).  This ends up a draw but satisfies Lincoln's On to Richmond call.  Robert E Lee then moves the CANV out, heading north in the valley to engage a union force there (battle marker forgotten), after destroying them he moves to Baltimore and attacks - routing the Union forces there as well.  General Stuart moves cavalry from Richmond up to just outside DC (using a special action card to allow him to get there).  Nobody reacted to stop him so he was able to act as a supply source for the CANV in Baltimore.  Next activation the CANV takes Annapolis and moves toward Wilmington to defeat the remains of the Baltimore force that retreated earlier.  The Next Activation Lee takes Wilmington and parks the army in Lancaster.  The DC forces move to retake Baltimore and Annapolis then skedaddle back to DC.  Final activation roll, TIE - so both sides get a special action card, then the US rolls a 6 and the CSA a 1 On To Richmond and 5 activations but the south gets to go last...  The USA takes out Stuart's cavalry (Stuart failed to retreat, tis sad but oh well), the other activations were used for Grant, a naval move and an attack on New Orleans.  The CANV then gets to move.  First a single SP is activated and moves to Philadelphia, Lee then sends Grouchy old Longstreet to Dover and then finally moves the rest of the CANV to Baltimore and then Annapolis (using the Special Action East card the CSA drew from the previous Tie).  Little Mac tried to intercept twice - needing a seven or higher on 2d6 each time but failed both times.  Being out of supply the SPs on their own have to roll for forage and all three make it (anything but a 6).  This give the CSA 12 VPs for holding the 6 vp hexes in the north at turn end and thus a sudden death victory - the victory point mark for turn 6 is 15, the USA had 14 VPs from other spots they had taken, minus the 12 the CSA gets it leaves them with 2vp and they needed at least 4 in order to avoid the Sudden Death Victory).  Abe Lincoln is forced to Sue for peace with the CSA.

Both Lawrence and I like this game a lot.  Despite the blowout at the end of the turn it would have gone much differently if the tie had not occurred (giving Lee the Special Action card that allowed the run to Annapolis), the US had LOST initiative (and thus would have gone last and been able to respond to Lee's VP grab run) or the CSA had rolled a 6 for any of the units that could have died for being OOS.  The Union has to start attacking from the start by amphibious assault and driving down the Mississippi while defending DC.  The CSA has to threaten DC and the cities around it and keep the US from taking other spots in the meantime.  A real balancing act - quite different from For The People where it is pretty much ALL about DC till Grant arrives.

We like it enough that we are going to start it right up again, perhaps playing with the advanced Naval rules or maybe using the basic rules but allowing naval assaults on regular actions playing the basic game.