Planetstrike arrives!

My copy of Planet strike has arrived. I shall now read it cover to cover and then plan a game soon.

Club Night 26th June

This week Luke and I tried out a new set of rules. Impetus is by Italian company Dadi and Piombo. One of our club members mentioned it last week, I googled it and found the Basic Impetus free rules. As Luke is just putting together some 10mm Gauls and Romans we thought we would try them out with the rules. Although meant for 80mm wide bases we figures our 60mm Vis Bellica bases would fit close enough.

In the first game I took the Romans and Luke the Gauls. I started as the defender so set up the terrain and deployed my legion centrally with cavalry, auxillia and vellites on my flanks. He overran my flanking units and left my legion trying to form a square in the middle of the table. He finally got a flank and frontal charge on one of my bases and killed it, breaking my army.

The next game saw us swap sides, but I again ended up defending so filled the table with woods. Although I fought the skirmished and cavalry away, although his light cavalry killed mine with a rear charge, his legion refused to advance, forcing me to charge out of the woods into his formed lines. I very nearly broke them, but it was not close enough, and he broke my army again

We had time for a final game so diced to see which side we played, Luke took the Romans again, but this time he was defending, so set up just a road and a hill line. He then deployed the legion across the hill line, this was going to be difficult. The legion was not going to come off the hill so I had little choice to attack. And again after a viscous fight I almost broke the Romans, but again only almost, he narrowly broke me first.

We rally enjoyed the Basic Impetus rules and have booked a game for a few weeks time to try out the full rules, they seemed very easy to play and had a great feel to them. i think they might have real potential to be the rules we use for next years show game.

And on the subject of the show game, once I finished working today I spent the afternoon continuing to assembling the figures for it, All the Poles and Lithuanians are assembled, just the Teutons to go, then texture the bases. I am off work in a couple of weeks time and hope to have them all primed and ready to do some serious painting that week before I get distracted by Planet strike, which I have now advanced ordered and am really looking forward to.

Club Night 19th June

Last club night saw Ken and I continue our ongoing WH40K rivalry. This time I took my Biel Tan Eldar against Kens Grey Knights in a 1,500 point Cities of Death game. As Kens army is primarily foot, they where a real potential threat, but I did have the advantage I know what troops he could have and had plenty of figures to pick from.

After deployment I could see Ken had stuck with his usual forces, a Captain and his Terminator retinue, a couple of Grey Knight Purgation squads, and 6 8 man storm trooper squads armed with a mix of flamers, grenade launchers, melta guns and plasma guns. It also meant there was an orbital bombardment just waiting to land on me! All I needed now was a plan to take the high ground in the centre of the board.

I deployed my Striking Scorpions and their exarch out to my right, infiltrating forward with the Stalker skill and using the Infiltrator strategm. Continuing with my infiltrators, next I deployed two 5 man Ranger units. Upgrading them to pathfinders, and with the master snipers strategm, they received a 2+ Cover save, their shots are AP1 on a 5+ and no cover saves where permitted against them, and if they had to move, they ignored the difficult terrain that made up most of the table. These should be my Elite units and hope they return the investment I have made in them.

Next up was a unit of Howling Banshees, with Jain Zar and the Avatar adding to their punch. I planned to throw this unit into combat as quick as possible, ideally against some Grey Knights and delay their advance on the centre of the table. Backing them up were 10 Storm Guardians with a flamer and a Warlock with enhance. I hoped, combined with the command post strategm I had placed on the objective, they should be able to hold off any units that broke through and tried to steal the objective.

On my left I placed Dire Avengers with an Exarch, ready to Bladestorm anyone who came too close. Behind them were 3 Wraithguard with a Spiritseer and a Wraithlord. In reserve where some Jetbikes and some Warp Spiders with surprise assault, both planning on turning the enemies flank.

Before we could even start the Grey Knights used a preliminary bombardment strategy to bring down a building in my deployment zone, killing 2 Banshees, and half the storm guardians. Not an auspicious beginning.

The Daemon hunters forces begun to advance across the board, in a wide formation, aiming to stretch my lines and breakthrough to the objective, with a couple of Stormtrooper squads on my left flank firing at, and killing 2 of the Scorpions. I retaliated with my master snipers and bought down 6 Grey Knights, with the remaining two scampering for cover, while my two flanking units moved out.

Turn 2 saw the Grey Knight advance continue, and the orbital bombardment commence, crashing down around the objective building, but inflicting no casualties. The Stormtroopers in the building opposite began to fire at the Dire Avengers, killing two and forcing the others to withdraw. On the opposite flank one unit if Rangers came under concentrated fire and lost 2 of their number and also fell back, and another Scorpion fell to Hell gun fire. In retaliation the other unit of Rangers felled some Stormtroopers, but it was a drop in the ocean. The Avengers railed and returned to their defensive position and unleashed a Blade storm at the Grey Knight, but failed to bring down a single Power Armoured Knight. Meanwhile the surviving scorpions assaulted a unit of Stormtroopers and wiped out all but one, who was caught when he tried to fall back.

Unfortunately this left the Scorpions facing a wall of fire they would now have to survive. The Stormtroopers unleashed las, melta and plasma fire into the Scorpions and only the Exarch survived the fusillade. On my right flank the Grey Knights assaulted the Dire Avengers, and predictably wiped them out. In the centre the Stormtroopers poured volleys into the Howling Banshees, wiping them out, leaving just the Avatar and Jain Zar to take the fight to the Imperials.

The exarch charged into the unit that had laid low its fellow Scorpions, Jain Zar and the Avatar assaulted another Stormtrooper squad. The Ranger covered these assault by pinning down the one of the unengaged squads to prevent them being able to react to the outcomes. On my right the remaining Wraithguard and the Warlock charged the Grey Knight who had broken through my line, with the Storm Guardians assaulting them from the other side. The Wraithlord rampaged into the Grey Knight terminators. The Scorpion Exarch was bough down by weight of numbers, while Jain Zar and the Avatar easily dispatched the elite guardsmen. Most surprisingly of all though was the Storm Guardians who managed to bring down 5 of the 6 Grey knights before they could even respond. In the following round of melee they managed to bring the surviving justicar down too. Jain Zar was not so fortunate though, with 3 Stormtrooper squads firing at her, even she could not avoid all that fire and fell.

In turn 5 the Avatr stormed into to help the Wraithlord, the Storm Guardians reoccupied the objective after their brief sortie and the Wraithguard tried to engage the surviving Grey Knights. Unfortunately for the Avatar, for the first time in all the games we have played, the Terminator Captain decided that as he was fighting the only Daemon on the table he ought to prove himself and dispatched him with contemptuous ease. But this opening gave the Wraithlord the chance to get himself together and start to crush one of the Terminators in his monstrous hands.

By the end of turn 5 the Grey Knight terminators where dead, as where my Wraithguard, and it was all poised to see if we played turn 6.

And we did, and it started with a bang.The objective building had been sown with demolition charges by the Grey Knights and exploded and came crashing down to be a pile of rubble, killing the Storm Guardians holding it, and leaving the survivors to fall back. With the building they had deployed behind gone the Jetbikes were blown from the sky, and a Squad of Stormtroopers charged forward onto the remains of the objective to try and hold it through my final turn and claim victory for the Imperium.

The Eldar redeployed as rapidly as possible, the Warp Spiders jumping into to try and eliminate as many Stormtroopers as possible, with the Wraithlord unleashing flamer and Star Cannon fire as well. When the fire cleared there was just the Sergeant standing, as my Rangers ran on to the objective. But it was not over yet, the battered Rangers squad had still to fire. They took careful aim, and picked off the Sergeant, leaving the objective in the hands of the Rangers and victory to the Eldar.

This was yet again a very close game between me and Ken. With his lack of long range fire-power, but numerous bodies on the ground, his Daemon hunters performed very well in the runs of the city. He also had the honour of finally bringing down the Avatar. As the only Daemon he usually gets to fight, this should be a more regular occurrence, but his Terminators almost always get into combat with it and then proceed to fight like kittens and be wiped out, but this time they did what the Emperor expects and actually dispatched the abomination. However I still managed to claim victory with my ranger, using the infiltrate and master sniper strategms and being upgraded to pathfinder completely repayed my faith (and the points) I placed in them and won the game for me, I suspect if I use them again like this, they may come under some very heavy fire!! A rematch beckons!

Club Night 12th July

This week Rick ran a WW2 skirmish in 28mm using Corner of Hell rules which I always enjoy. Steve K and Ian took the plucky British Commandos, Rick the beachfront defenders, and I took the Ost front veterans on R&R and the Gestapo.

As the Commandos surprisingly tried frontal assaults on the bunkers rather than coming round the flanks and attacking the sides and rears the Germans were alerted nice and early. Despite this the weight of firepower from all the automatic weapons carried by the Commandos quickly began to tell, and the defences in the bunkers started to keep their heads down.

Meanwhile I decided the Gestapo should stay in their HQ and be ready to deal with all the prisoners we were inevitably going to take, while my veterans assembled in an organised manner and then set off to defend the bridges and ensure the 'volunteers' of the coastal defences did not contemplate retreat!

Unfortunately while I was busy deploying (other called it faffing!) the commando finally overran the coastal defences and set about destroying anything important and capturing plenty of Intel.

While Rick claimed I had not supported him quick enough, as he is now KIA, I will of course report to higher command how his force must have surrendered to a small enemy force almost instantly as I immediately deployed when firing was heard and by the time I arrived, it was all over. And as no one is left to contradict my story I will obviously immediately be promoted and posted to the south of France!
This was a great game and I was really pleased everyone liked the Corner of Hell rules and wants to use them again. I look forward to the next game when the Marquis will be terrorising the Jerries.

Mighty Empires Border Patrol

Sunday saw a group of us combine a quick Border Patrol tourney with a Mighty empires campaign to make it a bit more fun. I ran a Mighty Empires about a year ago so it was already to go, we set up a map, put down 5 capitals and picked 500 point Border Patrol armies.

The Mighty Empires part followed the 'guidelines' in the box, with a few additions, mostly the addition of some Might Empire cards I made, which are inspired by a number of sources, but can give bonuses on the battlefield, campaign map, or hamper others. The target was to get 10 territories or remove someone's last flag from the map. AS there was 5 of us, we agreed we would randomly pair off, and then rotate around so we all played each other and then repeat. As one person would always not be playing that player automatically got 2 empire points.

Rik put down an Empire forces, Chris a High Elf force (we let Chris have 2 specials rather than 1 due to the change in the High Elf lists since the original Border patrol rules came out), Ryan took Khornate Daemons, Joe took Dark Elves and I took Slaanesh Daemons.

I sat out the first round, in the second I took on Joe and everything went very nearly according to plan for a change and I got a massacre result. Having played an 'All or Nothing' empire card this enabled me to capture huge swathes of territory and take an early lead.

Next up was the Empire, using my speed I picked my fights and was aided by Rik's inability to pass a fear or break test, I quickly cleared them away for another massacre. With Ryan chalking up his third massacre, it was looking like a battle between the two of us.

With Ryan sitting out this round, I had a great chance to take a lead, but had to come up against Chris, who I have only ever beaten once, at that was at 40k. And is still the case. He laughed off my fear causing, and peppered me with arrows, helped by my inability to make ward save.

Ryan's Daemons came up next. While I reinforced my army with some more Daemonettes, he added a beast of Nurgle as we lined up for the Chaotic showdown. And it was pretty even until right at the death, where he gained the upper hand in the struggle between his herald and Bloodletters and my Deamonettes, and the ability to regenerate kept his Beast going long enough to wear down the Masque. With all my army wiped out, adding General, tale quarters and standards to Ryan's tally, he scored a massacre, but I was pretty pleased with my performance.

Consulting the campaign map, Ryan now had 10 territories, while I was second with 8. All Ryan needed to be doing was till holding them after the next round of battle sand map moves. Ryan took on Chris and his High Elves, while I faced off against the Empire again. Worryingly the Khornate Daemons finished off the High Elves quickly while I was making hard work of the Empire. I had to push the Empire right off their base line to finally wipe them out, but it was much harder than the first meeting. So Ryan and I both scored massacres and now needed to consult the map. Although I was able to push into Ryan's territories , he expanded the opposite side from me and had 12at the end, while I only clocked in at 9. The Empire under Rik and Joe's Dark Elves came in joint 3rd, and the High Elves bought up the rear, suffering from being caught between the two Daemon territories and get pushed in from both sides.

A great fun weekend, that has almost inspired me to get my Deamons finished, only almost because the horse arrived from Essex today, so I am preparing this new mounts for the Oddzial Osmy figures and will then be painting Poles Teutons and Lithuanians.

Club Night 5th June

Last night I played a Flames of War with Mike. Not sure about the basic scenario, feels a bit contrived and not very period, but the more I play the rules (this was the third time) the more I like them. Simple, fun and they have a nice feel to them.

I took Panzergrenadiers against Americans and it was quite evenly matched, with the casualties my rockets were inflicting on the US infantry giving em the edge while the US artillery could not find the range.

The Shermans, especially with the 76mm seem a bit overstated, but otherwise a very fun game, and look forward to doing some more and trying some of the other scenarios. The game also generated a lot of interest from the others at the club, so this could be the start of 15mm WW2 at CWC.

Club Night 2nd June

Last night was just a little affair with just me and Luke attending. We played Blood and Bridges board game from Lock and Loads World at War series, a hex based board games set during WW3 in 1985. We played two scenarios, the first was a quick recon clash to remind ourselves of the rules, which although I inflicted heavy casualties on Luke's British and got some Russians off the table, I narrowly lost due to a sudden downpour slowing my troops down (from the great new battlefield chaos counter and table) and the loss of both my valuable T-80s not balancing the casualties I had inflicted.

The second game was a more substantial affair with a force of Royal Dragoons and 3rd Queens regiment counter attacking dug in Russian. Again a fun and close game but one that lead us to question the victory points system, as under the normal victory conditions, it was a draw which we felt was fair, with me probably in the weaker position, as although we held two objectives each, I didn't have much to stop Luke taking the rest, but he had not taken them in the time allowed. However VPs gave it as a crushing NATO victory, which didn't seem right to us. Luke had not fulfilled his primary objective and his force was very battered. A Victory for the British, yes, but a crushing one, no. Still we still had fun and the post game debriefing is always half the fun!

Find out more about World at War series here.