Dracula's America-Swamp Ambush

 

Last Sunday, myself and my friend Luis started our much anticipated campaign for Dracula's America. Luis has been playing DA for a while and I have had 3 previous games, so we felt we were all set. We are taking the campaign from the main rulebook but with added rules and characters from Forbidden Powers source book. We pretty well stuck to the RAW, although we did add some restrictions that I will discuss at the end of this post.

We decided on the basic posse construction with 1 veteran and 5 novices, with a $30 purse each, I went with my Nephilim and Luis's Cultists. We played the Swamp Ambush scenario from the Forbidden Powers book.

Nephilim (Twilight Order)

Astaroth-Veteran (Archanist, Heavy Pistol)

Bartleby-Novice (Nerves of Steel, Sixgun, Silver Bullets, Boilerplate)

Loki-Novice (Nerves of Steel, Sixgun, Silver Bullets, Boilerplate)

Azrael-Novice (Rifle)

Metatron-Novice (Pistol)

Uzza-Novice (Pistol)

Red Cultists (Crossroads Cult)

The Magister-Veteran (Archanist, Resistance, pistol)

The Harbinger -Novice (Flying, Summon Arcane Power, pistol)

Mister S-Novice (carbine)

Mister B-Novice (pistol)

Mister W-Novice (repeater)

Mister L-Novice (2 pistols)

On to some game photos:

Excellent terrain as usual by Luis

Some great cards made for me by Luis

Close up

I do not remember the details but, I won the game by a point but a big part of the game is the post game advancement. I believe Luis won this as you can see below. To summarise, I was able to kill 3 of the swamp creatures and 2 of Luis's characters. Luis killed once creature and two of my characters. Luis though scored a real victory in the post game as he had an event where he joined in a Swamp Ritual and ended up gaining a EXP point for each of his characters. We were able to revive all our characters but Luis was also able to advance a character to veteran. Two of my novices gained skills which was good. The below rosters refer to our post game states, before we expend funds before our next game.

Anyway I can say I had a great time with the game, Luis laid out an excellent terrain and I am quite looking forward to our next game.

Games Day WWII Theme

We had our third Club Games Day last Saturday. We ran 5 tables, 4 by the founders and 1 by a member. We decided to go with a themed day and selected WWII. All slots were full and things went well. We had 3 Chain of Command games and 2 Bolt Action games. We had hoped to also have a Battlegroup but we had to cancel the game.

Some photos.....

I believe everyone had a lot of fun and all are looking forward to our next game.

Chindits vs the IJA-CoC Test Game

I got together with my friend Pierre-Yves, this past Tuesday to have a game of Chain of Command. We had not played since November due to a couple of unfortunate cancellations. We were testing both the scenario for our club's Gamesday on February 17 that PY is putting on and some new jungle movement rules that Truscott Trotter put together.

We played the delaying action scenario, with myself playing the defending Chindits and PY playing the Attacking IJA. The lists are taken from the 2014 TFL Summer Special.  Supports were fixed. 

Chindits

First Expedition Platoon

2 SL's with 2 riflemen

Four Sections of 2 teams with a JL

Boys ATR team

2" Mortar

Two entrenchments

IJA

2 SL's

Three Rifle sections with 2 teams and JL

Knee Mortar section with 3 teams and JL

Flamethrower Team

Type 94 Lorry

Type 94 Te Ke Tankette

We both started with a FM of 9, with PY having the first phase. 

The game was not only a test for the scenario but also for the some Hidden Movement Rules for jungles, they were as follows.

They still need some work but we are getting there.

 

Caesar's Camp: La Ferme de Caubert-Redux

Last Thursday myself and Graham got together for our 5th turn in our Caesar's Camp campaign. The Scots got driven back in the first attack on "La Ferme de Caubert" which was going to be the jump-off point for the final assault on the objective of the campaign and victory. This was going to be a tough one as the Germans already have 2 barbwires, 2 minefields and an entrenchment on the terrain and may add further fixed defences.  The Scots will be dicing their FM with a -2. We both went with the same platoons from our first go on this table. Both of us were essentially missing one team from our platoons.

 German Defenders-217th Infanterie Regiment (FM10)

2nd Wave Infantry Platoon #3

2 SL's

3 squads of 10 men, lead by a JL's, one squad with a MG08/15-missing 5 men

Supports 12

2 barbed wire

3 Entrenchments

Infantry Squad

MMG Team

Scottish Attackers-The Cameron Highlanders (FM8)

British EW Infantry Platoon (D Company)

2 Senior Leaders

2" Mortar Team

3 sections of 11 men, lead by Junior Leaders-missing 6 men

Supports 18

Vickers MMG

2" Mortar Team

Infantry Section

Char B1 bis

Hotchkiss H39

Scenario

This is the Attack and Defend scenario from the main rulebook.  The victory conditions were going to be difficult with the Scots having to capture 2 of the buildings in the German position or reduce their FM to 0. Clearly the latter was going to be easier and I should note that if I brought in AFV's they would be restricted to the road.

Game

A fairly equitable result in the Patrol Phase

I was able to get a JOP on the dirt road allowing me to deploy beyond the minefields. This gave me some better options in the line of my attack, which was now going to take place on my left flank.

My two tanks were stuck on the road but as you can see had LOS to the farm, thus limiting German deployment.

Lots of smoke as usual.

This was a weird game, I thought both of us played quite well. There were few double phases but both sides accumulated CoC pips rapidly. There were times in the game when we both had 3-4 fully cocked CoC dice each. This resulted in a situation that if one player made a move he was interrupted or an ambush appeared. I kept both a mortar team and a MMG team off the table to ambush until quite late in the game. Graham had kept a full section off the board that could be deployed entrenched if I left myself in the open. Fortunately I was so concerned that he had a Flame Thrower team that I was quite careful to not expose myself. After almost 3 hours Graham withdrew, his FM was 5 and mine was 6. I think it became obvious that as a defender a double phase was not going to be of an advantage but a double phase would be more useful to me especially in the setting of us both having expended all our CoC dice. Certainly the game was interesting but was a little slow. On to table 5.

The Butcher's Bill

Germans Platoon #3 (9 dead, 2 missing next game)

6 figures lost

CO -1

MO -5 (-1FM)

Outlook Content

The Camerons Platoon #1/D Company (3 dead, 0 missing next game)

0 figures lost

CO -1

MO-3 (-1FM)

Outlook Sad

More Training

We had another CoC training session after the campaign game as it was out club's game night at the Abyss. We had Dan again as well as David for his second game of CoC. We also had a new player Julian, who had his first game of CoC. We used the same terrain as above with the Canadiens attacking a farm held by a platoon of Italians. 

This was really quite a good game, we probably got almost 3 hours of play in, and for new players everyone caught on to the rules exceptionally quickly. In our training games I really focus on stressing tactics rather than mechanics and this seems to be working. I am hoping everyone enjoyed themselves.

WWII Games Day, Saturday 17 February

 

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