HOTT

I played a couple of games of HOTT with Darren last night. He's new to the game although has played a few games of DBA back in the dim and distant past.

As always I kept the armies relatively simple. Darren used the Ceidonians in his first game, choosing four spears, two blades (one the general), two knights, two shooters and a behemoth. I used my Fishment, with a behemoth, four spears (one the general), two shooters, two warband, a lurker and some artillery. 

Darren defended and I promptly did an appalling setup in response, somehow matching spears against his knights and shooter facing his blades. 

Naturally these were the two points where the fighting took place. The spears survived the knight attack, but my shooters were steadily pushed back and destroyed by the Ceidonian blades. 

As is natural in such games the two behemoths met, with the Ceidonian tank being slowly pushed back by the fearsome sea-troll. 

On my right the spears fell back to give the artillery a clear shot at Darren's knights. It destroyed one of the elements. 

Darren had put his spears in an isolated block out on his right flank. I'd matched them with a couple of warband. After looking at each other for a while Darren charged. I rolled badly and both warband were destroyed. 

So I was now down two shooters and two warband, whilst Darren had lost a shooter and a knight. The behemoths continued to shove each other. 

Darren took a gamble and worked his blades into the rear of my behemoth. He ended up in a position where, if his steam-tank won its next round of combat, my behemoth would recoil over his general. Thus wouldn't have ended the game but would have made life difficult for him for what was left of it. 

Needless to say my troll won the combat and Darren's general survived. 

My general finished off the second Ceidonian shooter. 

However Darren's general could now make a proper rear contact, leaving my troll vulnerable to destruction. I responded by hitting the flank of the steam tank with some spears. Loss of my troll would lose me the battle, whilst loss of the steam-tank would put Darren close to defeat. 

I won the fight and the steam-tank was destroyed. 

I picked up the victory on my next bound when my artillery managed to destroy the other knight element. 

This was a 12-8 win for the Fishmen, but could have very easily gone the other way. 

For the second game Darren switched to some Dwarves, whilst I used The Spawn Of Tiamat. Darren fielded artillery, a lurker, a behemoth (another steam tank), three knights and five blades, one of which was the general. I had a magician general, a hero, four hordes, three beasts and three knights. 

The Dwarf line. 

Naturally I set up badly again and spent my early moves trying to bring my knights around in front of a wood so I could face the Dwarven knights. One of them was destroyed by artillery It was a bad day to be a knight facing artillery yesterday. 

Meanwhile my beasts and the hero charged the Dwarf blades, and a beast was quickly destroyed. 

My outnumbered knights put up a decent fight but were soon pushed back.

One ended up in the wood and Darren got to use his lurker. That saw the end of my knight. 

My hordes hadn't really got into the fight and I was 6AP down. However over on the right Tiamat herself destroyed the Dwarf steam-tank in a fight photographed so badly I wouldn't dream of posting it here. 

This gave me an open flank to play with. My surviving beasts, and the hero, charged. And Tiamat came in on the flank. That cost Darren a blade. The loss of the blade meant that my serpent beasts could slither into the rear of the Dwarf line, blocking recoils. First to fail was the Dwarf king. That evened up the losses. 

Then my giant frogs forced another blade to recoil, and it couldn't. That was enough to push the Dwarves to 10AP lost to my 8AP, and with the Dwarf general dead that was another win for me. 

Thanks to Darren for two very close games though. 

Get Yer Gothas Out!

After my Handley-Page bomber game from last week I had a request to get the Gothas out again. I'm always happy to het my big bombers out for an appreciative audience, so yesterday I ran the same scenario but with two Gothas bombing London (probably).

I used randomised defending aircraft as outlined HERE. The RFC would get three planes. 

I'm still tweaking VPs for this scenario. In addition I added a -2 spotting modifier because it's night. However when resolving anti-aircraft fire, if any dice score a 5 or 6 then the target plane is considered to be illuminated and the -2 modifier does not apply. 

There was something else I tried out as well, but I'll come to that later. 

Here's the Gothas heading across the darkened south of England, heading for London. 

The first RFC defender came into view - a Sopwith Pup. The two side spotted each other fairly quickly, but the Pup seemed to be a bit reluctant to close with the bombers. Poor manouvre rolls meant that it took ages to turn into the action. 

The bombers approached the first target, but one took a near direct hit from anti-aircraft fire and was very badly damaged. It kept on though. 

A second British plane was in play now though - an Armstrong-Whitworth FK8. It slowly got onto the tail of the bombers. 

The bombers attacked the first target as the first serious exchanges of fire took place. Both sides took light damage. 

One bomber got its bombs on target. I was playing around with VPs for hitting the target but also 1VP per target for the first time a bomber attempted a bombing run on it. This would encourage attacking both targets in order to to accumulate points. 

The bombers are quite close together and I think I may need to make some slightly larger circular target zones rather than these square ones. 

The bombers turned towards the second target as a Sopwith 1 1/2 Strutter joined the fight. 

The British defence seemed reluctant to close throughout the game. The Sopwith made the first truly aggressive attack, damaging the already damaged bomber. However return fire from the Gotha's rear-gunner killed the observer on the Sopwith two-seater. 

Both bombers missed the second target. But they got a point for trying. All of the British planes were now closing in though. Unfortunately this was the moment the Pup's guns jammed. The pilot couldn't fix the problem, so turned for home.

I wanted to try out a method of preventing the defenders harrying the attackers all the way to their home edge, as it's not an interesting phase of the game. I assumed that once teh bombers were heading home they'd be left to other interception units and that the on-table defenders would be more concerned with other bombers not depicted. 

What I did was allow the bombers to declare that their mission was over. From that point on they couldn't voluntarily move or remain within 6" of the targets, and couldn't drop bombs. They'd just head home. At the start of each turn each British plane would roll a D6. On a 5-6 it would be removed, having flown off elsewhere. 

Anyway, the Pup just headed home on its own initiative with a jammed gun. And the Sopwith two-seater went off in search of other prey. Only the FK8 chose to harass teh bombers on their run home. And now it was pressing them closely. 

The damaged Gotha couldn't take the sustained fire and fell apart. 

The FK8 closed in on the other bomber and its guns raked the fuselage. The front and rear gunners on te Gotha were both mortally wounded, but their last return bursts finished off the already damaged FK8 (it had taken a few flak hits).

The Gotha headed home with just a pilot. 

I gave 1VP for the first bombing attack on a target, plus 1VP for each bomb load that lands on target, up to a maximum of 2VP. So you can score a maximum of 3VP per target. In addition the Germans got 1VP for each British plane shot down (encouraging the defenders to possibly head for home when damaged). Meanwhile I gave the British 3VP for shooting down a bomber.  So in this scenario the Germans got 2VP for bombing attempts and 1VP for bombs on target. They also got 1VP for the FK8, for a total of 4VP. The British got 3VP for the downed bomber. So a marginal German win. 

The British breakoff didn't quite work for me, so I'm going to try something else. 

Memoir '44 In The Desert

We had a WW2 evening at the Wollongong Wargamers on Thursday. There was a small game of Bolt Action, and a larger game of Clash of Steel, which covered a tank action on the right flank of the battle of Bir Hakeim  (May 27th 1942). However I opted to play Memoir '44 with Geoff. And to get into the theme of the evening we played a scenario covering the flanking action at Bir Hakeim. So two games covering elements of the same extended action.

The Memoir '44 scenario sees the Axis with 21st Panzer and the Italian Ariete Division attacking the end of the Allied line. Facing them are the 1st Free French Brigade, solidly entrenched behind mines and wire, and the 3rd Indian Motorised Brigade, who are less well- defended. 

Geoff took the defenders in the first game. Whilst the Allied defensive line is fairly strong, it has a weakness on its left flank, and that's where I attacked. I was able to keep up a constant pressure there owing to some excellent cards, and when my forces started to suffer I was able to bring across Italian elements to assist. You can just see them moving across in the centre of this photo.

Anyway, ignoring the Free French in their entrenchments entirely the whole German attack hit the Indian Motorised Brigade. And they were crushed.

I won 5-2.

It's a tough fight for the Allies. They have good defences, but that also makes them somewhat static. The Free French are stuck behind wire and minefield, so not well positioned to move across as reserves. So  unless the Axis opt to lead with the Italians (and I can see that with a particular run of cards you might have to) the Indians in their entrenchments are doing all of the fighting for the Allies. And they have a vulnerable flank. 

Because scenarios in this game are often unbalanced we swapped sides to get an aggregate score. Geoff adopted the same plan as me, throwing the Germans at the Indians. 

The Free French and the Italians sat the whole battle out.

The end result was much the same, but this time the Allies put up more of a fight, and the Germans only managed a 5-4 victory - they came within a turn of possibly losing altogether. So I got a 9-7 victory overall. In both games the Commonwealth 'Stiff Upper Lip' rules played a big role; a couple of German attacks nearly came  unstuck because of the Allied counterattacks this allows. But they weren't quite enough. 

Meanwhile on the other table the panzers overcame the Grants to give the Germans another win. The next scenario in the Memoir '44 book is the same action, and I played it out a couple of times the day after. The Germans won both times.

A Bloody Paralyser Of An Aircraft

I realised the other day that although I have two Tumbling Dice 1/600th scale Handley-Page O/100 bombers, I'd never actually used them in a game. Since I have been pondering how best to do bombing scenarios for the game I thought that this afternoon would be a great chance to try them out. |

Here they are, heading off to bomb some German infrastructure. I put two targets towards the end of a 3' long table (which was also 3' wide). Each bomber had two lots of bombs, and the aim was to try and get bobs on both targets if possible. 

Because I haven't used them much I gave the German defenders three Hannover CLIIIs. I'm not sure if they were really used as interceptors, but it looks like two-seaters of some kind may have been, as well as single-seater scouts. Anyway, for this game that's what I was going to use. They'd be interesting because although they lack the twin forward guns of the scouts (just a single one instead), they have an observer in the back with a rear-facing gun, so get more shooting opportunities. 

The defenders would appear in dribs and drabs. At the start of each turn I rolled a D6 and on a 5+ a defending aircraft would appear. If one didn't appear then on subsequent turns the roll would be at +1 until one did. Then the appearance would reset to 5+ for the next defender. I used the clock-face placing method from THIS POST to determine where the aircraft appeared, and set the distance at 2D6 + 1D3. Frankly this didn't work for me so in future games I'll use 2D6+3. 

I used the spotting rules, so even after a defender appeared they had to spot the bombers. 

The first defending plane appeared in front of the bombers at close range.

They flew past each other and the German plane turned to pursue. The bombers opened up with their rear guns. Both sides took some damage. 

A second Hannover appeared, also in front of the bombers and also at close range. 

The Handley Page is actually quite quick; in game terms it has the same speed as the Hannover. With enemy planes in sight they piled on the speed towards the target. The first Hannover was already behind them and kept up, but the second would have to turn and was moving to intercept the bombers after they'd reached the target. 

Within 6" of the target all planes are subject to anti-aircraft fire. German planes are attacked by 1 dice whilst the attackers are hit by 2 dice. A score of  '6' hits and criticals are tested as normal. The rear bomber took a near-direct hit that tore a large hole in the fuselage. The Hannover was lightly damaged. 

Both bombers flew over one of the targets. I set the chance of getting a stick of bombs on target as 4+ on a D6, with a -1 for each of being at a speed greater than 3, not ending your move over the target and not having flown straight with no turns or sideslips. One bomber got a hit. The damaged bomber flew fast, trying to avoid being shot at by the Hannover, and consequently didn't get any bombs on target. 

The second Hannover was moving to intercept, but took some damage from AA fire. 

The Hannovers kept ending up in this position, which is not good for them. The bombers can fire their rear gun, whilst the Hannovers can't shoot into their 2 o'clock or 10 o'clock arcs. Needless to say having maintained a close pursuit of the bombers the first Hannover was not looking good and had suffered some serious damage. At this point its pilot was wounded as well. 

The Germans' reinforcement die rolls had been terrible, and their third plane didn't appear until now. Meanwhile one bomber was lining up on the second target, whilst the other was looking to do a wide swing around it and head for home, having taken so much damage that it couldn't risk another anti-aircraft gun hit. 

All of the planes in action. The damaged bomber kept up a steady fire, damaging the Hannovers.

A stray anti-aircraft burst finished off the damaged Hannover as it tried to head for home.

But the damaged bomber was shot down by the second Hannover. Meanwhile the other bomber managed to bomb the second target. 

It would now be a race to see if the defenders could shoot down the bomber before it could get home. The green Hannover got in a long-range shot, but scored no damage. 

Unable to catch the bomber it broke off and headed for home. 

This left the yellow Hannover to finish off the British plane. It dropped into its rear, keeping up a steady fire. But the rear-gunner on the bomber did a great job, scoring a steady stream of hits back.  

The bomber managed to get the Hannover into the position again. The bomber's rear-gunner kept on firing. 

Damaged, but still flying, the bomber escaped. The Hannover was badly shot up and was lucky to survive. 

I created some provisional Victory Points. I awarded the British 2VP for each of the first two hits by bombs on the targets. In addition they scored 1VP for each plane the Germans lost. The Germans scored 4VP for each bomber shot down. So in this game the British had a narrow win, with 4VP for bombs on target and 1VP for a shot down Hannover against the Germans' 4VP for the downed bomber. I'll need to see how these points pan out in some other games. I feel that maybe the Germans should get a VP for each target the British don't attempt to bomb, to stop the British hitting one target and then just running for home. 

I realised after the game that I'd forgotten to apply the large target modifier to the German shooting, so possibly they would have put the bombers under more pressure. Again, I'll have to play this again and see how it works out. 

Anyway, that's the Handley Page bombers blooded.