Alan Anderchuk - Jul 15, 2004 12:21 am (#105 Total: 109)   
Darkmanat on EBay    
 
2nd Game AAR and questions

Got in my 2nd game, I am really enjoying how this plays. Still not fully
comfortable with play balance, but this time the British pulled out a
victory. A squeaker I might add. 

My opponent (my brother) was the Zulu and started massing for a attack
against the Kral and the storehouse. He left the hospital mostly alone.
We now think that turned out to be a mistake. As he advanced on the
storerooms flank of the compound I was able to withdraw all the VP
casualtys to the safety of the redoubt. With only some random fire
harrasing their escort. I started strong onthe roof of the store house
and got alot out my 8SP up there. But when they were in a position to be
meleed from 3 different zones it got pretty ugly for my brits. He moved
into zone A of the Kraal but stalled there as he saw how strong my
positoin inthe Redoublt must be. The attack on my compound from around
the store house never got off the ground as he realized I was postioned
to volley fire and bayonet charge any move over the wall. He settleed
for a skirmish with my forces left in the hospital and got it burning.
In the end he never pressed me hard in the hospital and much of my SP's
there got away with little problem. Although his day time random fire
was very effective. 

The day turns dragged as he relaized he was not giving a concentrated
attack. He had driven my forces from the roof (zone H) and the fire
drove me out of the hospital, but except for the melee around H and his
excellant daytime random fire I wasn't really being hurt. So just before
night (about 2 turns before) he made the big assault over the wall by
the store house (next to the water cart). Plus he moved from zone A to B
in the Kraal. I was wellset up with both Chard and Bromhead in the
redoubt with 8 SP's. The volley fire into his forces over the wall by
the water cart was devastating. 30 shots with almost 19 points of
casualtys. about 11 more fired from the zone between the redoubt and his
zone (range 1). which got 8 more. The meelee round there got a couple of
me but did about 6 more to him. The real nail biter came as I had both
LT's and Bourne make bayonent charges into his 27 at B (the kraal). His
luck was devastating. Wile I did vanquish his force (and cost him a VP).
of my 12 SP's in the attack I was left with only 4 remaining. After that
it was attrition combat as I kept trying to make good volley fire bases
either from H or the redoubt then bayonent charging to finish him off.
He almost got the water cart but a Bayo charge polished him off. 

We called the game on the last turn as realized his forces were not in
good enough position to inflict enough casualtys. I had even managed to
catch 2 of leaders with only about 12 SP and got them all with a bayo
charge after some good shooting results. In the end I had 18 SP's left.
While his daytime random fire was very good, his nite time was well
below average. It that had been good too I think he would have carried
this game. Also he manuvered too much and let me move in and out of the
hospital too easily. A more forceful attack early on might have really
changed the results. 

Some questions need to be answered though. 

When counting things involving SP's do leaders count? I know they add
one SP in combat (shooting, meelee). But how about for stacking? That is
if Bromhead and Chard both occupy the redoubt do they only allow 6 more
SP's or the full 8 SP's? On the roof of the storehouse (H) can you have
8 SP's plus a leader? Same for Victory Conditions. When they say reduced
to below 10 SP's do they leaders count for that? 

Since the mapboard is not a scale drawing a lot of questions have come
up about LOS. While the not firing diagonaly is understood what if you
count range to the target but dont count it out diagonly? As an example
can Zone I shoot to zone 13? Or G to 1? Tracing LOS for those can all be
done not counting diagonaly. Or through LOS blocking terrain. While the
shot might look odd, if your remember the mapboard is not to scale you
could argue the shots might exist. The big penalty is the range
increases counting out range. What sort of LOS exists from L & M (in the
hospital). Others that came up were E to 9 and C to 9 or 16. 

I think playing with adding Bourne and Dalton as leaders, and giving the
Zulu's 100 SP maximum is working pretty good for us. The only issue I
see is that I don't think the Brits can tolerate bad luck as well as the
Zulu.