Rumble in the Jungle

Over the last 2 weeks, we have played a couple of games set in WWII Burma. Virtual Lard IV took place yesterday and my friend Pierre-Yves was presenting a Chain of Command game with his recently painted Chindit and Japanese platoons. P-Y created an amazing jungle terrain over 2-3 weeks and we needed to play test his scenario and the terrain. We played 2 games, alternating sides. I will not go into the details of either game but suffice to say the Japanese won both times. In the first game the win was hard fought, in the 2nd game maybe less so. We used the regular Chindit and Japanese Platoons with minimal support. The Chindits had a 2"mortar and a Boy AT Rifle, while the Japanese had a Type 94 TeKe tank, a lorry as well as a Flame-thrower Team. 

We also played our first game using Jitsi, another addition to the growing list of video-conferencing programmes. Also we also tested P-Y's new CoC Patrol playing ap, he certainly is a mother of invention.

Jitsi Close up

Jitsi Overview

Standard Zoom from 2nd game

All our gaming is with old iPhones that have been cannibalised for gaming, I believe the oldest we use is an iPhone 4 but P-Y has one iPhone 11 in use. I am using several iPhone 5's as well as an iPhone 8. The Jitsi delivers a superb image but we did find quite a bit of lag, we also found more difficulty managing the settings on the older iPhones. From looking at the above photos, I believe the benefit is marginal and I think I will stick to Zoom for now. 

The most interesting new development was P-Y Patrol Phase ap for CoC. When we first started playing CoC on line at the beginning of the lockdown, we found it important to have a direct overhead camera as moving the Patrol Markers really requires an aerial view. I felt P-Y's overhead camera always delivered a good picture, maybe mine a little less so. It was interesting to note that we would almost play the whole game just looking at the Overhead view rather then the 2 tangential flank cameras we had both set-up. As you can see above in the last photo a high oblique camera delivers a similarly useful view of the terrain but I think I find it a much better view. It is also much easier to manage! But back to the PP ap, which makes it unnecessary to have a ceiling mounted camera.

Now how is that for cool. From what I understand P-Y takes a photo of the terrain and the ap converts the photo to an orthographically correct view. You then move the Patrol Markers (large circles), the ap automatically restricts movement to 12" maintaining the daisy chain of 12". Automatic locking occurs, and as you can see it automatically generates the arcs to place the JOP's. It is adjustable to allow for varying movement, the Japanese can move 14" while the Finns can move 12" but are not limited by the daisy chain of 12". I felt it worked quite well.

Anyway that is enough for now, what follows is some photos in no particular order of P-Y terrific terrain and figures.

Game 1

Game 2