IPMA Annual Show - Alpha Strike

On the Sunday of the IPMA Annual Show we put on two more games. One group ran a two-table Team Yankee game which featured Soviets and East Germans fighting Americans and west Germans. I believe each table was a separate game, but artillery and air assets could be assigned to either and the games were run simultaneously in terms of turns. 

Meanwhile Caesar and I put on a game of Alpha Strike. This was the game we tried out a week or so ago, with two forces of mechs looking to grab energy pods from a power station in the centre of the table and get them to a summoned drop-ship. Here's the power station:

And the overall table set-up. I can't remember how many points we had on each side, but I had around 14 mechs and vehicles, whilst Caesar had 16.

I didn't record a detailed blow-by-blow account of the game because (i) I was trying to remember how to play and (ii) I was very, very tired. However it was an interesting exercise in sending some mechs to grab the objectives (which would then slow them down and which also prevented them from firing whilst they collected the items) and covering them with fire from other mechs. 

Once again Daren acted as our public face, explaining the game to anyone who took an interest. However Sunday is a quieter day at the show, so he had less to do. He's reading here - not asleep. 

You can see plenty of mechs in play if you look closely. At this stage we were just approaching the power station. 

We had a lot of fun setting up the terrain. The loan of a load of small construction vehicles suggested a construction site should be a feature. 

The power station walls and guard towers suffered from the early firing, although one of my mechs simply jumped past them. You can see that we both made plenty of breaches. 

We advanced into the objective, with larger mechs providing fire support. 

The first casualty - I lost a Locust. Not unexpected. 

My right flank - two decent mechs and a heavy tank. They did a grand job whittling down Caesar's forces on that part of the battlefield. 

Later in the game and you can see the smoke and flames of destruction on several mechs. 

At this stage we worked out that the rules for evacuating the objectives via drop-ships weren't entirely all they should be and lacking the time or energy to create some new ones on the fly we called an end to the proceedings. We'd had a good day's fighting at a relaxed pace and with plenty of time to talk to observers, so the game had achieved its objective of providing something for people to look at. Something I learned a long time ago at a UK show is that a demo/display game just has to look like something's being played. If a game really is being played then that's a bonus. 

For the record, Caesar was probably winning. 

There was a lot of lovely plastic modelling on display at the show, and I contrived to photograph very little of it. 

My favourite was this dinosaur with some accompanying tick-birds. I'm a sucker for a nice bit of paleoart.

I also liked this Minmi diorama.

And who wouldn't be thrilled by a 1/35 scale Soviet T35?

I'm also an Eagle Transporter fanboy - it's the best spaceship to appear in film and TV. The perfect balance between looking cool and looking realistically functional in my opinion. 

Finally, I have no idea what was going on here, but it featured a cat, so I had to take a picture. 

Two of our club members had entries in a couple of categories and did OK - no wins but certainly some commendations.

Once again we had a successful couple of days of gaming, introduced the hobby and our club to a load of people  and had a good, if exhausting, time doing it.

IPMA Annual Show - Fjord Serpents

This weekend was the annual show of the Illawarra Plastic Modellers Association. As with previous years our club was invited to put on some demo game over the two days it ran. This year we embarked on an ambitious project to put on two different games each day

On the Saturday the 'main' game was Fjord Serpents, with a secondary game of A Fistful Of T34s. On Sunday the main game was a huge Team Yankee game spread over two tables, whilst the secondary game was Battletech: Alpha Strike. 

On the Saturday I was involved with the Fjord Serpents game. We had three players - myself, Ralph and Caesar, whilst Darren hung around and chatted about the game and the club to anyone who came to have a look. 

We ran the race scenario we'd been trying out for this show, with each player having a small, nimble karvi and a larger faster snekkja. Here we are at the start. Ralph and Caesar are on the left, whilst I kept my vessels together on the right. 

Oh, I know what you're thinking. "Never mind the ships! What about that amazing terrain?". Darren made all that. The waterfalls are gorgeous. 

Another shot of the ships on the start-line. 

And straight from the off Caesar decided to employ violence, ramming the stern of Ralph's karvi with his snekkja. 

Here they are fiddling with the troops on board as the grapples fly and the boarding action commences. On the left my ships were plodding down the fjord, although I had to engage in a little bit of maneuver in order to stop my fast snekkja running into the back of the slower karvi. 

The boarding action didn't last long. Caesar's initial collision had badly damaged the smaller karvi, and once they were grappled the two ships drifted. This meant that Ralph's karvi ended up on the rocks of an island and was destroyed. Caesar ungrappled and went looking for new prey. 

Caesar's new prey - my snekkja. 

I was rammed, and took a fair bit of damage. Top right you can see my karvi, now forging ahead in grand style. 

Caesar and I got into a boarding action, and I came off worse. At the top left you can see Ralph's snekkja. He's rammed Caesar's karvi in an act of revenge, and started another boarding action. 

Thanks to my ship having a skald on board my inspired crew were able to cut grapples and escape from being slaughtered by Caesar's crew. 

Thar is until he came in again.

A view down the fjord. My fight with Caesar is on the left. On the right you can see my karvi. I put in to shore to pick up a bit of treasure. Near the island at the top is the fight between Ralph's snekkja and Caesar's karvi. It was not going well for the smaller ship. 

My karvi loaded up treasure quickly, backed oars and prepared to round the island and head for the finish line. However my snekkja had once again broken free of Caesar's, and Caesar's vessel had forged ahead, unable to resume the fight. It was hardly worth it anyway - I was down to a skeleton crew and only had one hull hit left. But Caesar's snekkja was now at the top end of the fjord, and I had to get my karvi past him in order to finish the race. 

At this point I managed to miss taking a pile of photos. Somehow I managed to evade Caesar's snekkja - we exchanged some archery as we sped past each other, but that was it. I cut around the island and went for the home straight. Caesar had a chance to cut across the middle and sill intercept me, but he misjudged a turn and ran onto some rocks. 

To the left you can see the result of Ralph's attack on Caesar's karvi - the karvi crew was wiped out, with Ralph taking no loss. He put a small prize crew on board and sped off to intercept my karvi. Meanwhile his snekkja closed in on Caesar's

My karvi heading for the finish. But with it heading into the wind it was slow going. Meanwhile my crippled snekkja had put into shore and grabbed some treasure. It was still sailing, so I decided to keep moving and try and complete the race as best I could. The first problem was escaping destruction at the end of the fjord. When ships turn their sterns swing out, so you have to be very careful turning when close to land. I had to row slowly and cautiously, which all takes time.  

Some serious pointing from Ralph and Caesar as Caesar's snekkja quite frankly got what it deserved. 

Victory for Ralph. 

So now Ralph had two ships (his undamaged snekkja and a captured karvi), whilst I had a badly damaged snekkja and a fairly fresh treasure-filled karvi. Ralph's captured karvi cut across the bow of mine, forcing us to a collision and boarding action. It also delayed me for a few turns.

The boarding action went the way you'd expect - Ralph's skeleton prize-crew was destroyed and I cut grapples ready to run for home again. But Ralph had gone into race mode as well. His snekkja had speedily rounded the island at the end of the fjord, cut my crippled snekkja in half as it did so, and was now in hot pursuit of my karvi. Snekkjas move faster than karvis and Ralph kept the wind on his beam for as long as possible whilst I was forced to beat slowly down the fjord. He was catching me up!

But as he closed the wind veered in my favour and I could sail at full speed. Ralph was still gaining, but with everything moving faster he ran out of turns to catch me in, and I crossed the finish. 

The winner! My one ship collected three treasure from the board and nine for winning the race. 

Runner-up. Ralph's undamaged snekkja picked up six treasure for coming in second. 

The game attracted lots of attention, especially the terrain and the painting of the teeny-tiny crew figures. And the game itself was exciting and full of swings of fortune. I was pleased that my race to win strategy paid off, although it would have been nice to get my snekkja home as well. 

Thanks to Ralph for organising the scenario, Caesar and Ralph for providing ships and especially to Darren for the terrain. My sole contributions were some initiative cards, and my great sailing skill. 

In the next post I will cover the Alpha Strike game on the Sunday, plus a few (very few) pictures of some of my favourite models in the competitions. 

More Gladiators

Caesar and I played 'Blood, Sweat & Cheers' last night. It was Caesar's first time.

He picked a conventional murmillo (Murannus) for his first game. I went with a whip-armed light gladiator (Rodan - he uses the Cestus stats). 

The first game lasted one round. I got a perfect hand and after Caesar warily closed with me, unleashed a whip attack followed through with a knife to Murannus's throat to force a surrender (I had two Glory to do my best attack and a Roar Of The Crows card to boost the difference on my win spending the crowd favour It picked up - I scored a straight kill).

We set them up and played again, and this time the fight lasted longer. At one stage Murannus was knocked down, and it looked to be all over for him, but Rodan couldn't finish him off and the bout continued. 

Murannus was wounded, but as Rodan closed for an attack, he countered with an adrenaline fueled strike and cut down the wily light gladiator for an unexpected win. 

In the next bout Caesar went for Verus the hoplomachus, whilst I used Syphax the crupellarius. Caesar initially struggled to defeat the heavy gladiator's armour, whilst I lumbered into a series of attacks designed to take down Verus before he got a chance to hurl his spear. I survived one spear attack, but Verus recovered it and was then poised for another. As I closed for another attack he threw it again, and Syphax was down and defeated. 

This was actually a pretty close fight, with neither gladiator wounded until right at the end. There was lots of maneuver and bluff going on. 

The final game of the evening saw Caesar take Titan the retiarius, whilst I used Ferox the dimacherius. 

Titan caught Ferox in his net, but Ferox immediately cut free, much to Caesar's annoyance. Ferox then wounded Titan, slowing him down. Titan fought back, wounding Ferox, but as the retiarius readied his net for another throw, Ferox finished him off with a furious series of attacks. 

So we won two bouts each. 

We checked for whether the crowd bayed for blood after each bout and, amazingly, they didn't call for the death of any of the defeated gladiators. 

Thanks to Caesar for being such a good sport. And to Darren for spectating and dealing out cards. 

Tribal Warfare

I had a moment of inspiration yesterday and felt like I'd like to try a game of Palaeo Diet based around some form of ritual tribal warfare. I've played some of the competitive scenarios, where hunters are competing with each other for kills, or fighting each other over a valuable prey animal, and the Fireside Tales scenarios have a couple of biped vs biped actions too. But I wondered if I could set up an interesting straight fight between two groups of warriors, one controlled by the player and the other working like beasts. 

This was my first go. I assumed the fight would be arranged and take place at a ford on a river separating the territory of two tribes. The river is tricky ground, except at the ford.

My Tribe had two bowmen, two spearmen and two axemen. The Others had six figures, and I used the Outfolk Hunters reactions for them (with my own adjustments for how Roar and Pelt reactions work on columns after the 'Hunter Within Medium' one*).

My Tribe sent the spearmen around one flank and the bowmen around the other. The axemen crossed the ford, but one was tardy and one of the Others rushed to engage the lead axeman. 

First blood to one of my bowmen, who wounded one of the Others.

The Others reacted, and at the ford one of them wounded my axeman. A second arrow put the wounded Other out of action. 

The fight at the ford. 

My axeman is put out of action. 

One of my spearmen is wounded. 

The Others close in, scenting victory. 

But my other spearman wounds one, which makes them falter. 

An archer crests the hill and downs another of the Others.

I had decided that once at least four figures were wounded or out of action I'd test at the end of each turn to see if the fight ended. This is, after all, a ritual fight and not one to the death. So on a 3 or less on a D6 the fight would end. It did. 

The two tribes assess what happened. The Others have two men out of action and one wounded, whilst the Tribe had one wound and one out of action. I decided on 2 points for a 'kill' and 1 point for a wound, so I won this tussle 5-3.

I set it up again, having checked the Predate reaction rules to be clear what would happen. I'll make some notes on that below. I tried a different setup with the figures all 1x Long from the river, but centred on the ford. The Others were randomly placed, and mostly ended up on the wrong side of the hill from the ford. 

My warriors crossed out of sight of them, leaving one worried Other shouting for help. But he threw a missile that wounded my lead warrior. 

My archers moved up, and put him out of action as he fled, shocked at his audacity. 

I'd moved my axemen onto the hill to hit the flank of the other Others, but with one figure down the Others were riled, and rushed forward in reaction. 

(Oh yes. The white markers? They just show which of my figures have moved in the turn. It's easy to forget if you get a complex web of reactions.)

A fight on top of the hill saw one of my axemen wounded, but they took out the enemy warrior. So the Others had two out of action and I had two wounded. For this game I made the threshold five figures injured. 

Seeing their fellow Other knocked out on the hill, most of the Others backed off (owing to terrible reaction rolls). One stood his ground, and my unwounded axeman attacked him. He fought back and my axeman was wounded. 

With five figures injured I tested for the end of the fight, and both sides decided they'd had enough. I had three wounded figures so the Others got 3 points. They had two figures out of action, so I scored 4 points. This was a closer fight, and had the Others not fled towards the end it could have gone badly for me. 

So in terms of reactions, I assumed that since nothing was being hunted the Predate reaction for dead models wouldn't apply, since no-one is looking to eat. However the Outfolk would do a predate move towards a wounded figure of either side; they would be looking to protect a friend or take advantage of a wounded enemy. If the Outfolk rolled a Predate reaction and there were no wounded figures to respond to, then I rules that they'd move 1 x Medium towards the ford, since that was the ritual ground of the fight. I had them respond with Predatory Behaviour, moving towards wounded figures if they were in line of sight and if no other reaction applied - I treat Predatory Behaviour as a reaction and have it superseded by other reactions if the apply. 

Otherwise, as mentioned above, you simply fight until a turn ends where there are five figures wounded or out of action (you can adjust this based on how many figures you have in the fight). At the end of any such turn you roll a D6 and on a 3 or less the fight ends. Otherwise it continues. At the end of the fight you score 2 points for each opposing figure out of action and 1 point for each one that is wounded.

I think I'm heading in the right direction in terms of what I'm trying to achieve, but more games are required at present. 

*In any column to the right of Hunter within 1 x Medium, all Pelt reactions become Attack (M), whilst Roar reactions become a new Feint reaction - the figure moves 1 x Short towards the figure causing the reaction then Roars. all figures within 1 x Medium test on 2 reaction dice for fleeing (so it's slightly weaker than a regular Roar). This change is because Pelt and Roar reactions in those columns otherwise have no effect because all possible targets will be greater then 1 x Medium from the reacting figure.