Painting Update - FIW

I haven't been doing much hobbywise for the past month or so thanks to vacation and work, but I did manage to finish more units for my French and Indian War project. 

These miniatures are from AW Miniatures that I got in as a kickstarter reward. They work perfectly for British and French Regulars. Each nation has an officer and two units of eight regulars each.

There's a decent amount of detail on the figures and they painted up fairly quickly.

I've got some Compagnies Franches de la Marine to add to the French, but I'll work on them at some later date.

Lights Out! - Battletech AAR

I was back up in the old neighborhood this past weekend, and was looking to game with the guys. Battletech has been generating some interest lately, with the new starter sets and the explosively popular Clan Invasion kickstarter (which I'm a backer of at the Star Captain level - I've got my eyes on a pretty nasty Trinary to bring some pain to the Inner Sphere), and all the guys have played some amount of Battletech in the past. 

So we decided to set up a fight between a couple of Light Lances to get a feeling for the rules without potentially bogging down with Heavy or Assault class mechs. Gary and Russ teamed up to form a Lance, while I had Chris for an ally. 

The battlefield was a sparsely wooded area of flat land on the left side and a mountainous region with a river running through it on the right. 

For our Lance, I was fielding a Wasp (WSP-1A) and a Stinger (STG-3R), while Chris had a Commando (CMD-2D) and a Locust (LCT-1V). 

Gary and Russ decided to double up on the same mechs. Gary was running a pair of Locusts (LCT-1E and -1V) while Russ was going Commando (CMD-2D for both). 

Gary was my main opponent for the start of the fight, and both of his Locusts came screaming across the battlefield. My own mechs walked forward into the nearby patch of woods to get cover. With the various to-hit modifiers, most of the laser, MG, and SRM fire missed, but Gary managed to score several hits on my Stinger.

On the other side of the field, Chris and Russ were more cautious in their approach.

Gary and I continued to mix it up in the woods. I was able to use my mechs' jump jets (and the initiative) to maneuver behind Gary's machine, but the dice weren't on my side and I couldn't deal much damage.

Unfortunately, Russ scored an lucky hit again Chris' Commando, which took several SRM rounds to the face. This killed the Mechwarrior and toppled the machine. Chris' remaining mech kicked up a cloud of dust as it sped away, with Russ following.

The fighting moved over to my corner of the table, with Russ' mechs following Chris into the ongoing skirmish. The mechs ended up in a line that curved around the terrain. My Stinger took more of a beating, but Chris and I weren't able to do much in return.

In a desperate act of bravado (or stupidity), I launched my Stinger towards Gary's Locust with a Death from Above attack, only needing to roll an 8 on 2d6 - pretty good odds for such a risk!

So of course I ended up rolling snake eyes, and the stinger landed on its back in front of the enemy mech.

Chris' Locust sped away from the scrum, with its counterpart under Gary's command in hot pursuit.

The Stinger was quickly turned into scrap metal, armor slagging off and melting onto the ground. Then my Wasp was knocked over and beaten up like a school yard nerd, while Russ moved a Commando to support Gary's chase.

At that point we decided to call the game. With a 4-1 advantage, Chris' Locust wasn't going to last much longer.

Gary, Chris and Russ are all longtime fans of Battletech, with on-again, off-again relationships with the game. Chris even had old folders from high school! I ended up getting the new 8 mech starter box to paint up and hopefully get some games in back down in Cape May.

Wood Nymphs Don't Surf - Warlord of Erehwon AAR

I had my first chance to play Warlords of Erehwon last weekend. Erewhon (and I need to check my spelling every time I write that) is one of of Warlord Games' newest rulesets, taking their sci-fi Antares rules and molding them into a fantasy skirmish game. 

With limited data, I'd say they were fairly successful. 

We were playtesting a scenario for this month's SJGA meeting.

The scenario saw a force of invading Olympians entering the forest from the top left road. On the opposite side of the board was a giant mushroom - the Olympian's goal. They had to move across the table and cut down the mushroom.

Meanwhile, a smaller force of Wood Nymphs (dressed up Elves) awaited the Olympians. Each terrain feature was assigned a number and, as the Wood Nymph commander, I had to choose which units occupied those terrain pieces before the game began.

In the first turn, Sam would bring on his units at his choosing, and then I could react with my hidden ambushing units. From the second turn on, we'd used Warlord's patented "draw Order Dice from a bag" mechanics.

The Olympians came on by the main road. With the infantry clogging the way, the cavalry was forced into the light woods on either side, lowing them down. A unit of Wood Nymph Archers appeared and fired at the Olympian Centaurs, but scored no wounds.

More Olympians poured onto the table, with their commanders calling out for order. Meanwhile, a Wood Nymph Champion and a unit of Guardians appeared in the woods closest to the enemy, where they had been waiting for the Olympians to exhaust their turn's actions. The attack was rebuffed, however, with the sylvan Nymphs taking the worst of it. The Champion, not realizing how tough the Cyclops was, was quickly overwhelmed and pushed back.

The Olympians continued to struggle to move through the terrain, and the appearance of enemies on their flanks meant their slow march screeched to a halt. The Wood Nymphs in range felt the full brunt of the Olympians' frustration. Their Champions slew his Wood Nymph opposite, and the Guardians continued to be whittled down by ranged fire. The Wood Nymphs did manage to slay the last of the centaurs, but could only watch from the safety of the woods as their sisters were slaughtered.

In the third and last turn (the game progressed somewhat slowly since we were busy reviewing the rules as we played), much blood was shed upon the forest floor. Sam's unit of hoplites had swung up in a shieldwall to chase the Archers out of the woods. The Olympians were taken by surprise when what they had assumed where trees turned out be be Dryads, allied to the Wood Nymphs' defense of the woods.

The tree spirits launched an assault into the hoplites, and after a couple rounds of combats, broke the enemy unit. However, the Dryads were in turn wrecked by the Cyclops's hurled rock. The same monster then chucked another rock into the Wood Nymph Archers, who had just knocked most of the Olympian Harpies out of the sky. The celebrating forest spirits were crushed under the improvised artillery. Then a few more arrows from a unit of Amazon Archers caused more casualties. The Wood Nymphs were barely able to hold on, though their Haughty Disdain meant they ignored the result of their first failed Break Test.

We called the game there. Both sides had been bloodied, and it wasn't clear who the winner might have been if we continued. The Olympians definitely had more units on the board, but they still had to move all the way to the opposite edge of the table while being harassed by the Wood Nymphs. But the Wood Nymphs only had a couple units left that could threaten the Olympians.

Sam decided he would adjust his list to reflect something more focused towards raiding enemy territory (more light troops and cavalry, most likely). John agreed that a hard time limit (6-7 turns) would both put impetus on the attackers to get a move on and not get stuck in combat and give the defenders a chance to win if they managed to delay the attackers for long enough.

It's a shame I won't be able to make it to this month's meeting to see how the game goes, but I'm sure Sam and John will post about in on the forum.

As for Erehwon, I found it to be a decent attempt at adapting the Antares rules to a fantasy warband skirmish game. The game moves along quick enough once you get a feel for the rules. It doesn't do anything to really invoke a fantasy flavor, apart from the spells, but it's fun to play.

Sushi for Two - Carnevale AAR

While up in Pennsylvania, earlier this month, Carl and I met up for some gaming. After playing Muskets & Tomahawks, we then set up a table for Carnevale. 

Having seen my previous blog posts about Carnevale, Carl was curious and wanted to try the game himself. So I used the forces from the "War" scenario from the introductory booklet included in the two player set and we had another simple bash-up in the streets of Venice under the strange lights of the Rent in the Sky. 

I let Carl use the Guild, since I was familiar with them, and I took the Rashaar.

Guild
Capedocina
Fisherman (Harpoon Gun)
Fisherman (Pole Spear)
Gondolier
4 Citizens

Rashaar
Magi-Rashaar (Wild Magic - Cantrip of Justice, Healing, Groundsnap, Sunder Armor)
Raadru
2 Lesser Ugdru
3 Slaves

With almost twice as many Command Points as me, Carl won the initiative roll. He used his Gondolier and Harpoon Gun armed Fisherman as a mobile gunboat, rowing up and unloading on one of my Lesser Ugdru. The beast had to eat a Slave to heal its lost hit points. Meanwhile the Raadru and the other Ugdru swam through the canals to reach the Gondola.

While my Raadru was able to take out the Harpoon Gun Fisherman, it was then surrounded by members of the Guild. Between the damage that had already been done, the Capodecina, and the other Fisherman, the Raadru was skewered and left floating in the canal. The Ugdru's engaged where they could as the Magi-Rashaar slung spells left and right.

Meanwhile, a number of Guild Citizens climbed to the top of the nearby building, right behind the Magi-Rashaar and accompanying Slaves.

By the end of the third round, the fight wasn't going well for the Church of Dagon. They lost one of the Ugdru to the Capodecine (who hadn't even been hurt yet) and a Slave to the Citizens' surprise dive-bombs. While the other Ugdru had managed to drag the Gondolier of his boat, I decided to call the game at this point. The Magi-Rashaar was out of Will to cast spells, and the Capodecina was more than enough to handle anyone left on the table. So the Dagonites beat a retreat to their watery lairs, hopefully to venture out again when such formidable opponents weren't around (and maybe when they're painted!).

 I do regret not taking different spells, or maybe another Discipline altogether! Blood Rites may have helped me do some more damage at range with my Magi-Rashaar.

Carl had a great time with the rules and was able to pick them up fairly quickly. He even got the hang of using Will to boost dice pools when rolling for damage or protection (something Kevyn and I still forget to do). Carnevale still provides a good looking, and fun playing, game.

Backwoods Brawl - Muskets & Tomahawks AAR

This past weekend I was back up in Pennsylvania and met up with Carl for a couple of games at 7th Dimension. I had finally finished painting up two 400 point forces for Muskets & Tomahawks, and Carl was interested in trying out Carnevale. 

So we set up a table for a French-Indian War bash. The scenario was fairly simple - two small scouting forces encounter each others by a local settlement. The goal was to reduce the enemy force to half its original number, which would then cause the enemy to flee. 

The French and British forces were nearly identical: 2 officers, 2 units of regular infantry, 2 units of irregular infantry, and 2 units of Indian allies. The British irregulars were Rangers with the Marksman skill (making them better shots), while the French irregulars were Coureurs De Bois, which gave them the Native skill (making them harder to hit).

The area surrounding the buildings was clear terrain, while most of the rest of the table was light cover. The larger trees denoted areas of dense cover. 

Most of the fighting in the woods was between the British Rangers and the French Coureurs De Bois and Indians. The Rangers got lucky with their card draws, and were able to fire and reload at the right moment to force the enemy to retreat to cover before the tomahawks and knife blades came out.

In the settlement, one of the British-allied native units was harried by French Irregulars, until they were charged in close combat. In some serious dice rolling, the natives were able to slaughters the irregulars, leaving a single man in the unit left to flee the battle.

Meanwhile, the British regulars advanced and exchanged volleys with their French counterparts.

The undergrowth was sticky with blood as the British and French fought in close combat. It seemed like the Rangers might be able to hold out against overwhelming numbers...

But Carl was able to prevail, with only a single Ranger left in the melee.

And then, disaster! It had seemed like the British had a good grasp of victory even with the mounting casualties. But Carl had positioned his French Regulars to fire two volleys into a unit of British regulars, with ghoulish results. While the first round of shots only killed two men, the second round killed two more. This meant the resulting Reaction Test had so many negative modifiers, the remaining British infantry routed!

With that, it only took Carl a couple more casualties to force the British to their breaking point, and the Redcoats turned tail and fled into the woods.

We had a great time. Our only regrets were missing that 400 point games were played on a 6'x4' table, which may have offered a little more maneuvering during the battles, and forgetting to bring cotton swabs to mark which units had fired for visual effect.

Hopefully I can get M&T to the table more often now that I've got painted forces, which will also let Carl and I use more of the advanced rules that we skipped in this game - random scenarios, Officer traits, blinds and dummy markers.