Normailty (my version) returns...........I hope

After a very loooooong week or so of Night Shifts (my first stint in 15+ years !!) due to G8 madness here in NI (and complete lack of gaming time) I have returned to normal so hope to get a bit onto blog in due course.

Blame firmly lies with this bunch of n'er do wells

Thankfully it all went off peacefully


Did manage a few Vassal turns with the Thirty Years War game heating up nicely with arrival of Mr Gustavus into northern Germany

Barbarossa To Berlin addiction continues

Played another game of this with my Dad.
I really like this game so much so I have bought another copy cheap on Ebay and obtained the very nice mounted map board in GMT sale which got is first outing tonight (I dont mind spending extra on games that I actually get on to table regularily) I also obtained the updated card decks.
Some do not care for the 'scripting' included in game system but for me its a great how game generally follows historical path albeit in abstract form and usually not in struct timeline. Another game that generates a 'narrative' style experience in the space between my ears.
Also enjoying the Vassal game I have ongoing despite suffering against Axis thus far.










Couple of older cards (top) and newer replacements

Actually we played one and a bit games as cocked up the first go by forgetting to check Allied hand for the all important Soviet Re-inforcement card which gives Germans using Barbarossa a massive and virtually unbeatable advantage.

Thankfully we had only played couple of turns before we cottoned on and so re-set for another bash.
This went more to form expect that the Nazis suffered pretty horrendous dice rolls (almost constant 1 and 2s) against awesome Ivan rolls (mostly 5 and 6s !!) meaning initial assault impotent and therefore Victory Points accumulated damnably low.
However Dad conversely had great success in North Africa completely annihilating Commonwealth and British forces there with timely use of Banzai card (Japanese Intervention card which caused 2 Commonwealth Corps to dissappear to east) and arrival of Panzer Armee Africa.
This opened up the whole of Eygpt and Persia to a rampant Rommel with several VP locations falling to him to offset lack of VPs in Russia. Only my later use of Torch invasion put paid to his roaming ways as the Italian and German Corps left in North Africa failed to stand and Rommel withered due to lack of supply although he did cause Allies grief (ie minus one card in hand) for taking Oilfields at Baku tempoarily.
However with Rommel dispatched and Africa cleared of Axis forces combined with lack of any progress in Russia (where Ivans were becoming very strong with arrival of Siberians, Tank armies and Mechanized Fronts) by Summer 1943 the game was ended by my play of Casablanca card (which gives Allies VPs for all Neutral VP location ie Sweden and Turkey) which give Allies an Auto Victory by reducing Axis to a big fat Zero victory points total.

Great stuff once more

Combat Commander another two scenarios played

Another session with this excellent game at my Dads.



















We replayed the scenario depicting Canadians vs SS at Authie as I was sure I could better last performance. However this proved a pipe dream in face of the SS and their heavy artillery. I was forced to surrender due to losses in very short order.

We then played a Randomly Generated Scenario using same map which saw a Fallschirmjager Company pitted against a Soviet SMG Company. Ivans defended and fielded 15 Smg squads with 3 more Guards Smg squads and 6 Foxholes bought in addition. They had no long range weapons at all. Also despite having 3 Commanders they are forced to deploy 1 squad per hex so hard to control. The Germans simply chewed through lots of Ivans with a nice run of advance and ambush cards. Again surrender level caused collapse of my blokes.

Great fun once more despite 2 losses.

  

Celtic Cup Second Day (and torpedoing)

Second day of Celtic Cup Field Of Glory competition and another couple of fun games










First up was battle with John Lavery and his Aztec army (with rather nice rope bridge camp). Lots of Drilled Impact Foot  (mix of Average, Superior and Elite) for which he managed to get a decent amount of terrain for in one half of his table side. My Vikings piled in with support of Spearmen who marched onto a hill top. I had to wheel all my Cavalry around on my left.
My Huscarls took out an Aztec unit but my Bondi succumbed beside them. This led to my having to charge the flank of a realigning Aztec unit with my Gascon Light Horse. No real chance of bearing them but did force them to stop and fight and saved my Huscarls getting charged in the rear (ouch !). Meanwhile I charged one of my 6 base Lancers units with my CinC into a area of brush against an Aztec unit and broke them over two turns. This then broke a couple of nearby Light Foot units and after a mess of routing, burstiing through and pursuits I had broken another two units and sacked enemy camp.
Sadly a unit of supporting Medium Cavalry had been shot to bits by Aztec (who throw javelins). As time was called neither side had broken and so I managed a 'winning' draw 12-8. I also claimed moral victory as I killed two (yes two folks) Aztec Generals !!
Great game with lots of learning points for the rules as several new situations encountered.

Rather poor iPhone pics as lighting not great today

Final game was against Daniel Taylor (a young lad) with a very nicely painted Late Republican Roman Army. Terrain fell very nicely for Daniel with room for bulk of his Legionaries (really tough Superior and Elite types) to line in between. He used a piece of impassable terrain which I not encountered before. However he had a unit of Elephants and Cavalry in front of this lot which he ran forward as a sort of 'suicide/expendable' unit hoping to bash my Cavalry. But not wanting to leave his terrain fort he left them unsupported and I was able to surround and kill them both losing only my Gascon Light Horse. As Romans resolutely refused to move forward I took my time lining up my Armoured Cavalry and Vikings to assault his line whilst moving against his right with my Spearmen and Medium Cavalry, Romans had two Elite Legionary units on this flank. I could have simply attacked his left and ingnored his line of foot but where would be the fun in that for either of us (plus I had the Irish team to think about). So I duly charged in everywhere I could. This lead to a veritable bloodbath with Romans passing just about every Cohesian Test I threw at them but failing every Death Roll. This saw three units of Legionaries wiped out (and yet another General !) whilst I lost a Unit of Heavy Cavalry  and the Bondi. My Huscarls were flanked but managed to hang on. On my left my Spearmen were assaulted and both broken by the Elite Legionaries who were then duly charged in rear by my Medium Cavalry.
Game was very much in balance as both one unit from Breaking. Things decided by Huscarls passing a key Test and my recovering a Routing Spear unit from broken with a nice double 6 roll. Next Impact phase I managed to kill another on my right with remaing Heavy Cavalry unit breaking the Romans and giving me a hard fought 17-9 win.
Couple of mistakes in this game 1. I forgot to apply -1 to Cohesion tests to Romans for losing to Lancers and 2. my Huscarls should have suffered -1 POA for fighting in two directions (think we forgot this with Elephants as well). A really hard fought game which I am glad to say young Daniel said was his most enjoyable game of weekend.

So a fairly successful Celtic Cup for me with Field Of Glory. Am now perectly happy to play either FOG or DBMM as both offer different games with same toys. FOG certainly an easier game to play in many ways and possibly one that suits my aggressive style of play more than Dbmm.

Some random shots of gamers(ie geeks) in full flow

 

John Muir in Speilbergian backlit shot with Brian Bull doing 'chicken dance' in background and Tony Bergin eating his figures

 

Gamers best sides on view

 

Dave Taylor and John Muir trying to work out which way lines are facing

 

Stephen Brittain about to get his knuckles rapped by Scots bloke (sorry name escapes me) if he moves incorrectly (fairly good old school way to learn how to play actually)

 

John Lavery trying to force his Aztecs onto horses to try to catch George's 'runa away' Sassanids

As a final aside my volunteering to representing Ireland team in FOG may have had desired effect as the Irish team finished 3rd out of 3 with Scotland 2nd and the glorious N.Ireland team taking 1st :-)
I think George Dick of Scotland won the FOG competition and Mark Gibson of NI the Dbmm version.
Well done to both chaps.

Celtic Cup 2013 First Day on Field Of Glory

First day completed of this years Celtic Cup in Belfast. I decided to try Field Of Glory version 2 this time in lieu of Dbmm. I fielded Early Mediveal French with Viking Allies as these are troops types I struggle to use with anything approaching success in Dbmm. An Undrilled army with nothing really special about it and totalling a modest 11 Battle Groups












Two excellent games today against two gents.

Despite being the most British of Brits I offered to play for (Southern) Irish team (as they only had blokes in Dbmm competition), hopefully my efforts will be aid and not hinderance to their team chances !?




First up was against Selecuids under the command of Scottish gent John Muir (an accomplished FOG exponent it turns out). I had no real answer to his Cataphracts. However I had some really good dice rolls early on with my humble Lancers Cavalry to hold the Cataphracts whilst my Viking Huscarls had nothing short of awesome dice all game (including one turn with 8 hits out of 8 dice thrown) and thereby destroyed two blocks of Pikemen. However my defensive Spearmen did not fare just so well and the heavier armour of the Cataphracts began to tell on my Mounted.
Game ended 21-4 vs in John favour. I learnt quite a few new things about rules which is of course one of best reasons to play against different opponnents. Great fun indeed very much 'a proper wargame'.
We both managed to win a couple of door prizes with John taking prize for first Camp Sacked just after I had taken prize (a nice Osprey on Teutorberger Wald AD9 Campaign) for first General killed.

  

















Second game was against George (whose surname I have forgotten) who fielded a tiny 8 unit Drilled Sassanid army. This is very much an army of manouevre which was evident by George being able to redeploy bulk of his mounted units to his left flank whilst holding bulk of my foot with couple of units. He also had two units of Cavalry Lancers identical to mine. This of course meant I charged them as soon as possible and a regular dice-fest ensued. One of my two six base Cavalry (of course the one lead by Inspired commander) duly broke whilst the other heroically held on despite ending up charged in rear whilst fighting to front. In fact they actually routed both these units !! Alas a third Sassanid unit charged their flank and broke them. The break point for the Sassanids was 8 and I had broken three units requiring just one more to take the game with decent points total. I even managed to cvatch an evading Light Foot unit with a unit of Light Horse but only managed to Fragment them just as time was called. This still gave me a 13-7 win. Huzzah !!
Another fun game.

Couple of pics of general competition area


Tom 'grandad' Worden stands to attention as opponnent moves

 

Stephen Brittain trys to initimdate young Daniel Taylor with vieled threats whilst pretending to smile

More to come tomorrow.......................


And a great game of of footie on TV tonight (partly making up for Ulster Rugby defeat by Leinster)