David R. Moody - Mar 31, 2008 3:41 pm (#22438 Total: 22481) What has mood to do with it? You fight when the necessity arises--no matter the mood! Mood's a thing for cattle or making love . . . . It's not for fighting. ConQuest Sacramento AAR Part I Saturday morning I hit the road fairly early, before 8 AM. Long drive to Sacramento--I'd forgotten how long, since I haven't been in many years. Actually, it was even further, because I had to go to Rancho Cordova, on the other side of our state capital, and the Marriott Hotel there, venue for the third annual ConQuest SAC. So I took 80 all the way up, then US 50. Bit wistful for me, passing through Vacaville; in the old days we'd stop at the Coffee Tree for breakfast or dinner and the Nut Tree for fun (one of the best aviation bookstores I've ever seen, and once my dad and I drove up there and waited in line two hours to meet Chuck Yeager and his wingman from World War II, Clarence E. "Bud" Anderson, and get their autographs). Both gone now; only acres and acres of outlet stores remain. Progress, I suppose. Anyway, I got there, found ample parking, got my badge, and found my friend Jason Pipes (we were staying there together), who had gotten there the night before, picking up the room key so I could deposit my things (box o' terrain and box o' minis for the Mockern game I was running on Sunday, among other things). A quick cruise of the dealer room later (nothing that I really wanted--no Battlegames mags, or any minis mags in evidence--Decision was there, but nothing I really wanted from them either) I headed into the main ballroom to sign up for the one minis game (other than Jason's) I really wanted to play in: St. Mere Eglise, using I Aint Been Shot Mum! rules I've been interested in those rules for some time, ever since I read an article of a sample game using them in Wargames Illustrated. They seemed fairly quick and fun; that, and the fact I can use minis based for Flames of War was a major selling point. Smallish scenario: D-Day, and the Amis had one platoon of paras, with two bazooka teams, two 57mm AT guns, and two 60mm mortars. They had to hold Neuville and prevent the Germans from clearing them out and advancing on St. Mere Eglise (off map behind them). Two of us took the Amis, with two German players. We decided to deploy the AT guns, with the 1LT (one of the four Big Men we got--leaders with special abilities) behind a hedge to shoot straight down the road at the bridge the Germans had to cross, with one squad, a CPL (another one of the Big Men), and a BAZ team in a nearby orchard, behind another hedge. Second squad was across the road in a building to cover the left, with the SGT and the second BAZ team; third squad was in reserve behind the AT guns and first squad; Mortars with the 2LT back on the high ground by a church. We preregistered them on an orchard just left of the bridge, figuring the Germans would go there and set up a fire base. We also had a sniper, who we placed in a building behind the AT guns. So the Germans rolled forward, three platoons of infantry, and one of StuGs. First two platoons tried to rush our main position, and got slaughtered by the AT guns, mortars, and first squad. Our sniper tried to zero in on the German company commander, but failed; the German leader eventually died alongside his men after we moved our reserves up to support first squad. Second squad tried to move up to flank the Germans, but got caught up in a firefight with the German second platoon and were pinned down. Then the Germans got their StuGs up, and third platoon, plus MGs, went around to the right into the orchards and began laying down heavy fire. We fired furiously at the StuGs, but were unable to penetrate the thick armor; our losses mounted. We called for reinforcements. Second squad along with the SGT and one BAZ team, in danger of being flanked, tried to pull back but was cut to pieces as the German third platoon surged forward. The StuGs knocked out our mortars and one AT gun, killing our 1LT; one squad of third platoon overran and captured the second AT gun. Our third squad and what remained of first squad started to pull back. Then we got our reinforcements--a fresh platoon of paras! Two squads lined a hedge on the high ground and laid down fire that cut up some of the Germans in third platoon while the third occupied a building across the road. Our sniper pulled back to join them as our CPL, seized with heroic ardor, led the remaining BAZ team back. He detracked one StuG and brewed up another with a rear shot! The remaining German platoon tried to outflank us on the ridge, but we refused flank and slaughtered their lead squad as they came up; meanwhile, the immobile StuG got a lucky shot and blew up the building one of our squads had occupied. The remnants of our first platoon (one squad plus some survivors from another) pulled back to the last line of resistance. But by then the battle was over, and we had won, just barely hanging on, fulfilling our objective while wiping out two German platoons, shooting up a third, and mission killing two of their three StuGs (they had orders to preserve their armor). A hard-fought game, and great fun. I'm not sure I like IABSM better than FoW though--at least not enough to spring for the rules yet. And I got a Too Fat Lardies T-shirt, in Large, which doesn't fit me, alas. Chloe, my eight year old, wanted it for a nightshirt, so I let her have it, and she had it for two hours last night before it got ostomy bag leak on it. Have to do laundry tonight anyway . . . David R. Moody - Mar 31, 2008 3:42 pm (#22439 Total: 22481) What has mood to do with it? You fight when the necessity arises--no matter the mood! Mood's a thing for cattle or making love . . . . It's not for fighting. ConQuest Sacramento AAR Part II After St. Mere Eglise on D-Day, it was off to Afghanistan in more or less the present day for Jason's modern skirmish game, using Dogs of War (I think it was). Very very nice setup--he's gotten a lot more stuff since last we played. Only one better that I've seen in person was the Zombietown one a few tables over--they had (among other things) a motel with working neon sign, diner complete with messes on the tables, and an outhouse with stopped up toilet. The situation: we, as the US forces (two Delta Force teams, one Special Forces team, and one Northern Alliance team, with CIA contact) had to capture a target building believed to house a torture chamber, weapons cache/factory, or something else Really Important. Problem was our intelligence was not exact, so there was a good chance the building identified was not the correct one. Also, there were civilians about, and we had to avoid collateral damage. Our Taliban/AQ opponents got to choose their posture (offensive or defensive) which determined the level of civilian prescence as well as insurgency level and when they got to shoot at us. There were three of us on our side. I took one of the Delta Force teams, with a kid (maybe ten?) taking the other and the third player taking the Special Forces/Northern Alliance teams. We decided to send the Special Forces/Northern Alliance teams in on foot to take the objective, while the Delta Force teams landed by chopper on nearby buildings to set up a perimeter and prevent enemy forces from intervening. My team was to take a building overlooking the town marketplace, while the second Delta Force team was to land on another building opposite. Then we saw the deployment, which included what looked like a flak truck near my landing spot. We changed our plan--I would land my team on a building next to our objective; Special Forces/NA would take out the truck; second Delta team would stay with the original plan. So in came the helos, and we landed. Both the Delta teams stacked up to clear the buildings; bullets and RPG rounds sailed over the heads of my men. Then--disaster! A lucky shot by a Taliban fighter on a rooftop capped the leader of the second Delta team in the head! Serious wound. The kid pretty much failed his personal morale check at that point, securing his building and getting his wounded leader downstairs for immediate medical attention, then calling in the medevac choppers. Meanwhile, my team cleared our building and sent our sniper up to the second floor to snipe away (ineffectively, as it turned out) at fuzzies while the rest of my team set up a perimeter and waited for the arrival of Special Forces/local friendly fuzzies. Special Forces got their sniper in a high building and began moving forward, getting into firefights with Taliban guys. Three of my men then stacked up, and went into the objective. Nothing there! We got on the horn back to base, who told us that it probably was the building we had planned to land on originally! DOH! Then all hell broke loose. A suicide bomber burst out of a corrugated shack. Fortunately one of our Special Forces guys capped him before he could detonate the bomb, thus saving at least half a dozen men (and winning him a medal). Then another Taliban fighter down an alleyway tossed a frag grenade at the feet of the Special Forces team leader, killing him instantly and mortally wounding the guy behind him (his comrades dragged them both to the now secure first objective, where we set up an aid station, but he died). We also lost a Northern Alliance fighter badly wounded in the ongoing firefight. So we were in the shit--two leaders down, me senior officer on the field, losses mounting. Still, we had a full Delta team left, so we pushed on, clearing a shack, within sight of the new objective. Then . . . another report from base. Nope, not that one--the one next to the mosque, across the marketplace. Uh oh. We had killed maybe half a dozen Taliban at this point, mostly thanks to our Special Forces sniper, but more were coming, and they had taken up good firing positions to cover any move we made in that direction. Our only real hope now: get the second Delta Force team in position to paint the building with a laser so we could call in a precision strike to take it out. The medevac chopper was on the way, and the kid got his men moving again. Then one of them took a serious leg wound from Taliban fire. That was all she wrote--we decided to bug out. What a clusterfuck. Still great fun, and I could totally see it happening. And at least with the game ending early I could go back to the room to finish labeling my units for Mockern and read the paper before the flea market that night. Oh--the flak truck? Turns out it was a relic from the Soviet era that hadn't worked in years. David R. Moody - Mar 31, 2008 3:44 pm (#22440 Total: 22481) What has mood to do with it? You fight when the necessity arises--no matter the mood! Mood's a thing for cattle or making love . . . . It's not for fighting. ConQuest Sacramento AAR Part III Sunday morning got up and ate a light breakfast of blueberry muffin, then off to the hotel ballroom to set up my Mockern game, using first edition Napoleon's Battles rules. Didn't take as long to set up as I thought, and I think my new felt streams and roads looked better than the old paper ones, though still not quite right. Oh well, functional old-school terrain still works. And I even got four players--two on each side--so I got to watch the battle unfold and GM. Mockern is the northern slice (in the NB first add on scenario book, the northernmost of four tables) of Leipzig. While Boney tried to whup the Army of Bohemia south of town, Blucher and the Army of Silesia arrived to the north, forcing the French VI Corps and assorted other units to stay there and fight for the town of Mockern and the northern approaches to Leipzig. The scenario, as written, starts at 7:30 AM with the French VI Corps getting a few free moves before Blucher and the Russians (Langeron's wing, consisting of the IX and X Corps and I Cavalry Corps) arrive at 9:30. When we did a dry run at Ryan's place we determined that took too much time, so I decided to start the battle at 10 AM, when the Poles (a division of the VIII Corps) arrives, thus letting the French and Russians set up on the field. Even with that, we only got through six turns or so (past noon in game turns) in six hours, so when I run it at KublaCon I might move the start time to 11 AM and let everyone but the lone III Corps division that arrives at 4:30 set up on the field. Anyway, Jason and one other fellow took the Allies (Jason the Russians, the other fellow the Prussians) while one French player took the infantry of VI Corps and the other took the Poles and all the cavalry (a brigade each from III and IV Corps, left behind when those corps marched away to fight elsewhere (or not, in the case of III Corps, which spent 16 October marching about aimlessly), plus two brigades (one French, one Wurtemburger) from VI Corps). So we had at it. VI Corps was roughly covering Mockern--one brigade in it, one refusing flank back to the river, one division extending the line down the road toward Leipzig, and one in reserve. The cavalry covered the right flank of VI Corps, with the other cavalry brigades screening the eastern half of the field (the battlefield was bisected by a small stream) while the Poles (one infantry and one cavalry brigade plus an artillery battery) came up behind. Jason formed his cannon (Russian army, so lots of guns) in a massed battery and moved them up, while he sent his infantry at Mockern. Artillery opened up on both sides, and Russian infantry began to fall. But the Marie-Louises holding Mockern were pounded into Disorder, so Jason sent in two brigades in column to try and clear the town. One of them happened to be one of the units who got steamrollered at Montmirail, so I hope they had a better time this time. The fighting raged fiercely; the Marie-Louises hung on, repulsing the bigger of the two Russian brigades. The smaller one (the Montmirail veterans) pushed the Marie-Louises to the edge--one more loss, and they would have routed out of town. But incredible die rolling by the French player saved the day, and the Russians routed back, leaving the battered Marie-Louises in Mockern. The VI Corps commander pulled them out to regroup, sending in a unit of veteran legere, as the artillery duel intensified. Meanwhile, the cavalry of both sides engaged in a massive back and forth fight off to the east, with the French getting the worst of it. The dragoons from IV Corps and lancers (in their first battle) from III Corps overran and captured a luckless Russian horse battery, but were in turn routed back with heavy losses by Russian hussars and 'Guard' cossacks (so called because of the day they had, routing two French units and getting a bounce on a third before dispersing). Didn't go much better once the Wurtemburgers got into the fray. I was very proud of that unit, one I painted recently, with their bright yellow flag from Cotton Jim. They charged in, and got routed by those cossacks. Routed. By. COSSACKS. Hairy smelly guys from the steppes with big pointy sticks. In their FIRST ever combat. The cossacks got so full of themselves they went Uncontrolled recall and slammed into a chasseur unit (which has been in every Boney's Bats game I've ever run or played since I started getting my own minis), getting a Bounce result even despite being penalized for being Disordered and fording a stream. Wow. Anyway, the Russians tried again at Mockern, battering the light infantry and sending in two more units, including jaegers (one of the units I got from Tim). This time the legere got one hit away from dispersal before the jaegers routed back, once again saving the French line. I thought Jason was going to throw the dice across the room. Man he had bad luck with the dice, while his opponent got the rolls he needed. But losses were mounting among the French, as the weight of Russian lead was beginning to tell. Despite silencing two Russian heavy batteries, there were plenty more where that came from. Out came the legere from Mockern; in went more Marie-Louises. The Russian infantry was pretty much spent, but the Prussians were coming up--lots of pretty good units, and their cavalry was coming up to support the Russians. The lancers fell back behind the Poles, who moved to cover the eastern side of the field while the remaining French cavalry regrouped. The Wurtemburgers redeemed themselves by charging and routing the Cossacks, then controlled recalling into them, dispersing them (they'd had their fun) then uncontrolled recalling into my newly painted Prussian dragoons. The Wurtemburgers hit their dispersal number and so left the field, after a hard fought first battle, but they caused the dragoons to go uncontrolled, charging across the stream at the Poles. The reformed French dragoons hit them, routing them back with losses, went controlled and overran two Prussian horse batteries (one of which was newly painted--not a good day for the recently painted), then hit THEIR dispersal number. Behind all this, the infantry of the advanced guard of the Prussian I Corps (one grenadier unit, one landwehr unit) formed to cover the flank while the rest of the Prussian cavalry went it. The landwehr cavalry (the first unit I ever painted for Napoleon's Battles, and in their first battle as a unit--one base had seen action at Montimiral, attached to the uhlans) charged the Polish infantry (newly painted/first battle) who had formed square, and were routed back by artillery fire from Polish and French guns; the uhlans charged the Polish lancers and routed back. By then it was around 4 PM, one of the Allied players had left already, Jason had to go too (and wasn't too sanguine about his chances after the Russians and Prussian cavalry had been shot up), so we called it. It would have been interesting to see what would have happened when the Prussian infantry had gotten into action; VI Corps, already hard pressed, would have been even more so. The arrival of the one division of III Corps would have proved decisive. As it was, minor French victory. Great to see the lads in action. So I packed up, got dinner at In 'n' Out, and drove home to see my girls, weary but covered in glory. Awesome weekend all around. I even sold $35 worth of games and traded for a copy of Imperium Romanum (West End) and a General mag featuring Napoleon at Bay.