2011 Battlefront Mid War Doubles G.T.– Day 1

Day one complete, and I’ve doubled the number of games of FoW that I’ve played. So after 3 games today I knackered.  I’m still learning things as I go, but  I really enjoyed the day. The tables were all really well laid out, and full of terrain. I took lots of photos, I won’t pretend to know what half of the models are, I’ll just put them up.

So at the end of day 1, we have 12 points…mainly thanks to Will and his rules knowledge.

Game 1 vs Chris and Dan - Win 6 –1

Game 2 vs Steve Hill and Russell  Pemberton -  Lost 2 –5

Game 3 vs Gavin and Steve - Win 4 - 3

2011 Battlefront Mid War Doubles G.T.

Today I’m off to my first ever tournament, not only is it my first tournament, but it’s playing Flames of War. The game system I know the least about of all the games I play. Thankfully it’s a doubles tournament and my partner in crime is a Veteran at the game. It should be a blast and I’m luging in my camera and macro lens to take lots of photos as we play. Below is Will’s army list and info for our entry. Lot’s of photo’s to come… XXIII Battaglione Bersaglieri, 12° Reggimento Bersaglieri (part of Divisione Corazzata "Littorio", XXo Corpo d’Armata) with support from I Panzer Abteilung, 8. Panzer Regiment, 15th Panzer Division These form part of the Deutsch-Italienische Panzerarmee at the second battle of El Alamein on the 23rd/24th/25th October 1942 An army list for the 2011 Battlefront Mid War Doubles G.T. prepared by Will & Rob 1st Army is an “Italian Bersaglieri Battalion” prepared using “North Africa” fielded by Will. Battalion HQ 30 Combat Platoons Bersaglieri Company - 3 Bersaglieri Groups 320 - Passaglia Bombs 15 Bersaglieri Company - 3 Bersaglieri Groups 320 - Passaglia Bombs 15 Bersaglieri Mortar Platoon - 3 Mortar Sections 100 Support Platoons Battaglione Carri 3 “Lancieri di Novara” - Light Tank Platoon 120 - 4 L6/40 TOTAL 920 Number of platoons for deployment/morale: 4 2nd Army is a “Panzerkompanie” prepared using “North Africa” fielded by Rob. HQ 2 Panzer III J (early) 180 - 1 upgraded to Panzer III J (late) 15 - 1 upgraded to Panzer IV F1 10 Combat Platoons 1 Zug 4 Panzer III J (early) 360 - 2 upgraded to Panzer III J (late) 30 - 2 upgraded to Panzer III L 50 2 Zug 3 Panzer III J (early) 270 - 3 upgraded to Panzer IV F2 165 TOTAL 1080 Number of platoons for deployment/morale: 2 Total Combined Force Points: 2000 Name Mobility Front Side Top Notes Weapon Range ROF AT FP   Panzer III J (late) Fully Tracked 5 3 1 Co-ax MG, Hull MG, Protected Ammo 5cm KwK39 gun 24" 3 9 4+   Panzer III L Fully Tracked 6 3 1 Co-ax MG, Hull MG, Protected Ammo 5cm KwK39 gun 24" 3 9 4+   Panzer IV F1 Fully Tracked 5 3 1 Co-ax MG, Hull MG, Protected Ammo 7.5cm KwK37 gun 24" 2 9 3+ Smoke firing bombardments 48" - 2 6   Panzer IV F2 Fully Tracked 5 3 1 Co-ax MG, Hull MG, Protected Ammo 7.5cm KwK40 gun 32" 2 11 3+   L6/40 Half Tracked 2 1 1 Co-ax MG 20/65 gun 16" 2 5 5+   47/32 Gun 24" 3 7 4+ Man-packed 81/14 Mortar 48" - 2 6 Smoke, Man-packed 133. Armored Divison Littorio was formed in 1939 from the Infantry Division Littorio that fought in the Spanish Civil War in the Corpo di Truppa Volontaria. It was a reserve unit during the invasion of France when it attacked through the Piccolo San Bernardo Pass. Later it took part in the invasion of Yugoslavia, fighting at Mostar and Trebinje. It was sent to North Africa in the spring of 1942 were it fought until it was destroyed at El Alamein in November 1942. At the start of the 2nd battle of El Alamein, Littorio counterattacked with the 15th Panzer Division and both divisions took heavy losses. The skeleton division that remained of Littorio was pulled back and what was left was assembled into part of the Brigade Imperiali, but the Littorio division effectively ceased to exist at this point in time. 15. Panzer-Division was formed in November 1940 from 33. Infanterie-Division. It was sent to Libya Feb 1941 and took part in the fighting in North Africa. At the beginning of July the Eighth Army had reached their final defensive position before Alexandria at El Alamein. The DAK was understrength from its recent battles, but Rommel attempted an attack along Ruweisat with the 15th Panzer and the remainder of the DAK. Only minor progress was made, British counterattacks and mounting German losses caused Rommel to call off the attack on July 22. Another attack was attempted on August 30, with Rommel's armoured forces attacking the southern flank. The 15th Panzer Division reached as far as the Alam Halfa ridge on September 1, but failed to break through the British defences. At this point Rommel went on the defensive and began to build a comprehensive position with deep minefields. The 15th Panzer Division formed the reserve in the northern part of the front. As with Littorio, 15th Panzer formed part of the initial Axis counterattacks at the start of the battle of El Alamein, but these failed to halt the advance; by November 4 British tanks had achieved a breakout. Now began a period of steady British advance to the west, combined with the Allied landings as part of Operation Torch on September 8. The remains of the 15th Panzer Division and the remainder of the Axis forces, were continually forced to withdraw. XXX Corps reached and out-flanked the line at El Agheila on December 17, then took Tripoli on January 23, 1943. By February 18 XXX Corps reached the defensive line at Mareth in Tunisia and were forced to halt. The 21st Panzer Division was drawn away to the Kasserine Pass operation on February 22, so 15th Panzer held the Mareth Line with the remaining Italian forces. It surrendered in Tunisia 13 May 1943 with the rest of the Axis forces in Africa. Links used: http://www.axishistory.com/index.php?id=4301 http://niehorster.orbat.com/019_italy/42-10-23/div_cor_littorio.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Battle_of_El_Alamein Books used: Osprey “Men at Arms” – Rommel’s Desert Army Osprey “Battle Order” – Rommel’s Afrika Korps

WIP: Making Roads

After several hours of looking around on the net and finding very little in the way of templates for roads. I did find a couple that you could buy, but I’d rather spend my money on more figures. I started making up my own in Photoshop, So far I’ve got several straights and some basic intersection. I’ve just printed them out on photo paper and cut a few out. I like the look so far, but they are impractical for gaming as they slide around on the table top to easily. I’ll need to mount them on something, then do some testing with spraying them with a matt varnish to seal and remove the gloss finish. The real test will be working out how to make corners in Photoshop.

WIP: Battletech

Started on a couple more Mech’s for House Steiner.

I didn’t get a lot done today, trying to fight off a cold. But I did play around with some decals on my Thor. They came out really nicely, even the extremely small one on the chest which suppressed me. I got them from http://www.fightingpirannhagraphics.com . Not the easiest web site to order from, but well worth it.

Also added some more bit’s into my spread sheet, it’s starting to work quite well. I still need to add the Force Value balance into it.

House of Marik

I finished up my first lance from the BT Starter Box set today. I split the Mech’s up into a bunch of lances with a similar Battle Value. I started with the House of Marik.

I went with a purple base colour using a Vallejo Purple Ink which I have only resonantly acquired. The ink worked really well and didn’t separate at all even with watering it down.

Also managed to get a bit more done on my spread sheet, just added in a reset button to clear all the data back to blank., I’ve now just got to sort out the Gun and Pilot adjustments.

Battletech–WIP

Today is my first day of my week off, having worked an insane amount of hours in the last three weeks, I needed a brake as I was burning out big time. So after an awesome day gaming on Saturday, I got stuck in to some painting today. I’ve split up all my Mech’s from the Starter Box set into Lances of about the same Battle value, give or take 200 points. I’ve got them all on the hex bases along with Polly filler and spent the morning spraying on the base colours on. I went with a camo scheme for the House Davion Mech’s which I’ll also be able to use with my Clan Jade Falcon as stand in until I build up some more Clan Mesh's.

I also spent several hours working a spread sheet to present and calculate Lance Battle Values nicely and easily. I just used the data from http://www.fortunecity.com/ and then spent hours and hours working out how to do things in excel. Thankfully my wife is an excel expert and helped out with some of the hard bits last night. It’s still a work in progress, I haven't added in the Gun and Pilot calculations yet, but slowly getting there.

I’ve also go sheets with the various types of Mech’s and units so you can sort my Type, year, weight etc and get an overview of what you may want.

Review: Battletech –Total Warfare

Title:            Battletech -  Total Warfare

Publisher:                           Catalyst Game Labs
ISBN:-10                             0-9792047-0-4

First Look:

With getting back into Battletech using the Starter box, I was well versed in what to expect from the Total Warfare book. I opened the shipping packaging and went WOW!.. now this is a rule book….the weight and thickness, all 312 pages (you could easily kill someone with it , or just bludgeon an annoying opponent into seeing things your way)  A seriously solid book

Cover Art:
I really like this cover,  gives a good sense of the game I thought,  from infantry up to the Mech’s and Aerospace.  And I love the new Classic Battletech logo at the top, nice and crisp and clean looking. The Mech warrior model  on the back cover  is nice and fits with cover art. Being truly critical the fighter  on the back cover however nicely painted, should have had a better photo taken of it.

Book Binding:
This is a hard cover book, with a good solid binding that will last the distance of many hours of thumb through rules in the heat of battle.

The Blurb: Back Cover
Short and to the point, I really like the info about the intended audience. It’s consistent with the Start Box set and also the web site, so pretty hard to mistake what the book is about and who it’s aimed at.( I’ve seen a few other reviews criticize the book for not being able to learn the game from it.…dogh.. they obviously didn’t they back cover) And in saying that I think you could learn the game from this book without to much difficultly if you have experienced other table top war games.

Content & Index Pages:
For a rule book the contents and index pages are the life blood of the book. Nothing worse than half way though a game you come across a scenario that requires you go fishing though a rule book and 15 minutes later your still looking. So far I’ve been able to find everything quickly and easily. After playing a game yesterday and actually having to lookup a couple of rules it was evident that this is by far the best contents page I’ve every had the pleasure of using.(Several of the other lad’s also commented on the same thing)

Page Layout
One of the new things appearing in a lot of book these days is the Chapter labels down the right hand page border. I love this, makes browsing the book nice and quick, especially once your an old hand at the game,  knowing where the rules pages are by section. makes it quick to use. Combine this with the awesome contents page just makes it even better.

The font and text is easily read, the diagrams and photos through out the book are inspiring, shots of well painted Mech’s and all manor of troops, ships and terrain.

The Meat
25 Year of game development and knowledge really shows. The page layout and contents alone stamp this book a step up from most rule books. After 20 years of not playing the game it was easy to pickup and jump back in. With all the info on the base game put into one book, you can’t go wrong getting it.  There is fluff throughout the book that I haven't got to read yet but at a quick glance it looks top notch as you would expect.

Conclusion
This is a great book and well worth the money if your getting into Battletech, This is the best Rulebook I own, of the many and varied game systems I have and still play. Not only does it look fantastic, but it’s practical and useable as a rule book. Having had the book only a week I still give it a 10/10. It’s that good.

A great review with lots more in-depth info go to:

http://wargameguru.weebly.com/in-focus-review---battletech-total-warfare-core-rulebook.html

Clan Jade Falcon vs Kurita

Today we piled into Mark’s new and improved garage. He’s spent an insane amount of time doing up his garage, with wall cabinets all along one side to house all his toy’s and terrain. A couch and good size coffee table on the other side. It’s now a gamers paradise.The only thing missing at the moment is the beer fridge, which I’m sure will eventually turn up :-).

We ran our first game using Battle Values, After a little bit of messing around we ended up  with Mark and Paul running a lance each of 4 Mech’s versus my 4 Clan Mech’s. It wasn’t until I added the points up as I was writing this that I saw I was running over 1000 points more.

The table setup was a large city with a river running across one end and a forest on the far side of that. At the other end of the table were two power plants, which were my objectives to destroy. (Mark’s Blog with a good overview pic of the table)

The deployment was the Jade Falcons coming into the city from the forest edge while House Kurita took the Power Plant edge.

Clan Jade Falcon     8272
Loki Prime                       2196
Loki A                                1651
Thor Prime                     2306
Thor A                              2119             

Kurita                       7196
Trebuchet                          864
Dervish                                868
Catapult                              1165
Whitworth                           771

Vindicator                         900
Panther                               664
Dragon                                952
Quickdraw                       1012

The first round I came in from the forest edge over the bridge so I could get into the city for some cover. The other guys moved up, jumping onto buildings and manoeuvring into positions to take me in there crossfire. I then split my Lance to two, one Loki and one Thor to go for the each objective. 

After a massive exchange of fire power between one of my Thor’s that jumped onto a building and Pauls Catapult which was already sitting on top of a building. Both Mech’s fell over. Unfortunately for me I fell forward off the building which resulted in the destruction of both of my Gyro's, end’s that Mech’s game

On the other side of the board I had also jumped onto the rooftop with my other Thor, and the following exchange was a whole lot of nothing as we were to close for all our big guns. Then  after losing initiative, I got completely surrounded when I jumped back to the ground.

After my Thor fell to it’s doom, I moved my lone Loki into some cover from the Kurita Mech’s on the roof and unloaded everything I had to try and reduce at least one Mech to rubble. Unfortunately the following barrage of missiles and my already hot Mech meant I had to use my Anti-Missile system to try and avoid total destruction, but  totally overheated. My Mech shutdown on me and I was a sitting duck. Which didn’t take long before my ammo case was hit and I vaporised.

With two Mech’s out of the game I changed tactics and went for a run at the power plants ignoring everything and just tried to get some cover while blasting away at the power plants. This worked for the first power plant although as I took alot of damage on the Thor in the process, then the Loki with it’s LRM20 came in to finish off the first power plant. (80 Building points later)

After that it was a running game to get into position to blast away at the final power plant. With no armour left on the Thor and taking critical hits all over the place I got the final shot off to destroy the objective and win the game.

Overall a really smooth game, as we have got the basics down pat, and starting to bring in some of the more complex rules. Along with Mark’s awesome table setup it made for an awesome game.

Battletech–Evening up the odds

After playing a couple of games now and getting the taste for Battletech again, I’ve gone and got the Total Warfare and Tech Manual. (I’m going to do a review on the books in the near future) I started to look into battle values, so we can even up the odd’s in the games. As I’m building a Clan force (Jade Falcon) which out gun’s the same tonnage Mech’s and if we get into a campaign game we need to make it much more balanced. Using the battle value mechanic will even out our next games alot. I found this cool site with the Battle Values of all the base Mechs, which made it nice and easy for me to create some labels.

http://www.fortunecity.com/rivendell/troll/584/btip/btukbv.htm

I’ve made up some small labels that  I’ll past on the bottom of every Mech’s base to make it nice and easy to know what Mech is what and their battle values.

Here’s a base, it’s a 35mm Hex base from Gale Force Nine, they are laser cut so nice and sharp looking and best of all they are cheap. It’s actually a little large (about 2 mm) than the hex’s on the Battletech boards that come with the starter box set. I bit of a mistake by me, but since we don’t use the hex boards it’s not a problem anyway.

Photo Challenge : Part II

Well I got busy and have been playing some more, my first attempt a mussel flash, not great and I can do better. Still a good start I think.  Used another YouTube video to do this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qx0AJYimURA

Photo Challenge

After seeing some very cool photos of mini’s that had some Photoshop work done on them to bring them  alive, I’ve decided to have ago myself and see what I can come up with. I found lots of how to’s and tutorials online. So I snapped off this pic of my unfinished Hunchback and gave him a laser beam…yes, yes, I know it’s an auto cannon. But hey, not bad for my first go at this type of stuff in Photoshop.

Soviet T34/85’s

With the weekend coming up and having to work through, I managed to get a couple of hours off today. So I started on my FoW tanks, a whole bunch of T34/85’s I swapped with Mark (from http://kiwi-colour-studio.blogspot.com/).  With me being a complete nube at FoW, I thought I’d keep the paint scheme simple and go with something similar to the Flames of War web site.  A little boring I know, but start out simple and go for the more complex once I get the hang of these little tanks. I am so glad I bought my airbrush back at Christmas. It’s been the greatest  investment, painting these entirely by hand would send me insane.

Picture below from - http://www.flamesofwar.com/hobby.aspx?art_id=373

Rules Overload

Talk about a brain overload on rules. On Saturday we rolled out another game of Battletech, followed by a game of FoG, then a game of Malifux. Then to finish off the day with another round of FoG. So the brain is a little blurred with rules. But it was a lot of fun, getting in 4 good games and mixing them up made for a great day, although a little brain bending.

The Battletech game went off really well, with the stat sheets for the Mechs all laminated now, it made for a much nicer and quicker game with less time spent running the paperwork. It was a three way game between Mark, Chris and I. The initiative roll really played it part in this game, and I was on the end of it on countless times. We slugged it out for the first few rounds, with all of us doing a little bit of run and hide jockeying for the best position. I got shot to bits in the back after losing the initiative and tried to get into some cover, but Chris had his revenge and hit my internal ammo three times, completely obliterating the Mech . Then Mark and Chris slugged it out for another few rounds before Chris took down Marks Mech.

The two FoG games I rolled out my New Kingdom Egyptians up against Chris's Chinese Jin. I managed to completely botch my deployment on the first game leavening two battle groups basically stranded for the game. I was severally beaten in that game. In the second game my deployment was much better but my dice rolling was ludicrously bad, and against Chris’s hand of God rolling 5’s and 6’s at will, I had no chance. I don’t think I even managed to get 1 point off him in that game. ….back to the drawing board, I really need to work out how to use the light chariots better.

Here’s a few pictures of the FoG battle.. or should I say FoG rout.. my Egyptians got mashed in both games. They are looking rather unpainted at this stage, and none of my Chariots, are actually on the bases yet. But I just couldn’t resist playing them in a few games.