Tomorrow's War Battle report

So, over the Easter weekend, myself, Lead Legion and one of our friends Andy P decided to have a game. I fancied trying Tomorrow's War out, as while I have the rules, they seem to me the kind of rules that you sit down and read and just make a confused face at, whereas if you play them, they make more sense. Also I intend on buying some 15mm stuff for it at Salute, and wanted to see if I was actually going to get use out my investment.

So Lead Legion kindly supplied some figures and scenery, I supplied a board and gaming space, and our friend supplied Irn Bru and hob nobs. All in all I feel everybody contributed equally.

The scenario was modified from the Tomorrow's War book. Lead Legion would control the evil aliens, in this case from Pendraken miniatures I believe?. I would take on the role of corporate marines, who had been sent in to clear out the "accidental" release of corporate bio-weapons on this colony, represented by GZG New Israelis, while Andy P would be using Lead Legions Khurasan Neo-Sovs as the local constabulary.

I effectly had two 4 man fire-teams at tech level 2 and heavy armour, Andy P had three 4 man fire-teams at tech level 2 with light armour. Space Demons were considered tech level 2 and had fearless and light armour. If I'm wrong no doubt LL will jump in and tell me.

Our objective was to rescue colonists, Lead Legions was to eat them. For every colonist or trooper he killed, he got one 1 vp, whereas for every colonist we escorted off a board edge, we got 1 vp. Also we would be competing against each other, to see who could rescue more colonists between the marines and the local cops.

Colonists would move randomly, unless they could see either marines or police, then they would move towards them. If they were attacked by aliens, they would react by trying to move away from them.

Aliens would spawn randomly. 1d6 4 man (alien??) squads would appear every turn, with 5 locations randomly determined. On a 6 they didn't turn up (or turned up at the wrong settlement or something).

The Set-up

The board with myself deployed at the near edge, Andy P sitting in blue with his cops, and most of Lead Legion looking on with an evil grin (that you can't see).

So we set up along the board edges. Colonists in the middle, with the aliens having 5 squads deployed. One in the centre, one in the large wooden temple thing, one amongst the brown tanks, one in the grey bunker and one in the toxic pool. Our forces were deployed at the board edge.

Turn 1:

I got initiative so my marines decided to move up. Of course this got them seen by the aliens in the wooden temple, so they reacted by moving towards them. I had forgotten to declare I was going to shoot them. I then failed to kill any, and they got into close combat. I wasn't particuarly looking forward to this as I thought I was about to get killed. However his guys were d6 and mine were d8. So after a couple of rounds of combat, it turned out that marine boot beats alien quite nicely.

Dead aliens

Andy P then moved his troops up, again drawing the attention of some aliens. After some shooting and close combat, his cops faired pretty well, taking one casualty who would be rolled for at the start of next turn to see if he was actually dead.

Seen off with the help of anti-alien truncheons.

Aliens then began moving, chasing after the colonist in the centre as well. Most of them managed to get away, however one group didn't react fast enough. We didn't realise that the colonists shouldn't fight in combat. And then after finding out they couldn't, we decided to allow them too anyways. Especially as it resulted in the amusement that followed. For unfortunately the aliens didn't realise they'd picked on the colony's Kung Fu class.

Four dead aliens lie at the feet of some rather put out colonists.

Turn 2:

Lead Legion got 2 more groups of aliens. They spawned at the closest point to me. Sigh. Andy P's cop recovered with a light wound, which basically meant he couldn't advance move without a quality check. Andy P also got initiative.

The table at the start of turn 2

His cops moved up to move towards the colonists in the centre. This meant they were now in site of some of the colonists, who would now begin moving towards them on their turn. They also moved up to shoot some aliens who were chasing colonists

The colonists run towards the local constables, while they shoot some aliens, which can be seen just at the side of the white bus.

My marines on the other hand were bogged down, as they now had a whole load of new aliens in front of them. Thankfully I remembered to shoot at them this turn, killing some, but they still reacted and moved into close combat. After several rounds of this, all the aliens lay dead, with one marine casualty.

A whole load of dead aliens

By this point I think Lead Legion had one lonely alien left, all the other having been shot up or stomped on. So he doggedly chased some colonists, which just got it shot by the local cops.

Turn 3:

The situation at the start of turn 3.

Lead Legion spawned his aliens, only another two groups, and thankfully they were far away from me, meaning I could try and make up some lost ground. They spawned in the cess pool, and in amongst the brown tanks. My trooper recovered, though had a serious injury, so was basically useless, and as I had a bit of a chase I decided I'd spend this turn escorting him to the rear.

The colonists now flocked to Andy P's cops. It was at this point we discussed could I try and steal the colonists, convincing them to come with me. It was decided that yes, if I got close enough, I could try and opposed test to convince the colonists, that clearly I was the safer choice. So the chase began.

The horde of colonists, with some freshly spawned aliens

Not a lot happened this turn. Andy P started to move his troops and colonists back, while managing to kill all the aliens in the cess pit, while the others began chasing his colonists. My guys fired up the Benny Hill music and started chasing after them.

Turn 4:

In which we forgot to take a beginning of turn photo. D'oh. Lead Legion managed to get more aliens this turn, and in slightly useful positions.

Andy P's colonists were on the large hill with his troops, while his other troops and remaining colonists were on the left handside and leaving the board. My troops had just made it to the hill

Hey you guys wouldn't you rather come with us??

 Unfortunately they couldn't quite get close enough. Then of course pesky aliens arrived.

Effectively I had to turn round and save my competitor. Rubbish

So yeah I had to turn my troops round, so that my opponent could get the colonists to safety. I like to think of it as self sacrificing and all that for the greater good yadda yadda. Eventually after some shooting and some close combat the aliens were defeated with no casualties. My other group of three also encountered a group of aliens as well, close to my original board edge.

Take that.

Thankfully these ones didn't even get into close combat, managing to shoot them all, and then fire again as they tried to charge into close combat. Take some space guns nasty aliens.

Andy P's police also encountered some more aliens, while protecting the last group of of colonists.

All lined up

In which he managed to kill them all. through a combination of shooting and close combat, all the aliens were seen off with only one casualty. All the aliens were also kind enough to slide down the hill into a nice neat row after a rather ferocious round of close combat.

At this point we decided to call it. It was pretty clear that Andy P would get the colonists off, and there was nothing I could do about it. So basically he managed to get 16vp for rescuing every single colonist. Lead Legion got 1vp for killing a cop. And me, I got none. Swines.

Still an enjoyable game, so definitely think I'll be investing in some 15mm stuff to play this with. They'll also double up as space troops in various RPGs and what not.

As always thanks for looking, comments more than welcome.

Heavy Gear battle report

Well horribly late is better than not at all right?

Anyways, last Tuesday, the forces of North and South joined up against the evil tyrannical grasp of Earth and the Colonial Expeditionary Force (CEF). Or what this means is myself and my friend LeadLegion teamed up against another mutual friend for a game of Heavy Gear. I'll say right now this took a while, as not only is it on a club night, so there's a bit of chat with people you only see once a week, there's also the fact that neither myself or the other player (the regulars of the game technically) get many games in, so it was a bit of "how do you do that again?". Also it was LeadLegion's first game. Still he'd read the rules and that helped.

Anyways force composition comprised the following.

North:
1 Fire support squad, comprising 2 Grizzlys, 2 Hunters and 1 Jaguar.
1 Strike Squad, comprising 3 Jaguars and 2 Hunters
1 Mammoth Strider

South:
1 General Purpose squad, comprising 3 Jaegars and 1 Black Mamba (they were the honour guard)
1 General Purpose squad, comprising 3 Jaegars and 1 Command Jaegar
1 Fire support squad, comprising 3 Spitting Cobras and 1 Jaegar
1 Infantry Squad

CEF:
1 GREL Platoon in HPC-64s (Hover APCs basically)
1 Light tank squadron comprising 2 LHT-71s
1 Heavy Tank squadron comprising 1 HT-68 and 2 HT-72s

Now, I had found out our opponents army list in the day (as we'd all worked them out in advance, so we started chatting during the day), and was suitably terrified of the fact he had 3 Heavy tanks. Still, we decided to sacrifice our lives dearly in service to Terra Nova, and began set up, after choosing objectives and support.

The set up.

The initial set-up, the guy on the right is the CEF player. 

The Terra Novan forces set up on the right hand side in the above picture, while the CEF were on the left. The Heavy Tanks were set up in the middle, with the HT-68 off to the left of his side (up in the top left in the picture). His light tanks were also deployed in the centre, while his HPC-64s were deployed behind the large hill in the bottom left. His GRELs were already out.

Our forces were deployed, with the Northern strike squad in the right hand side (top right of the picture), the fire support squad infiltrating into the woods (bottom of the picture) and the mammoth taking up position in the small town in the centre. And yes none of my stuff is painted. LeadLegion pretty much had all his painted just to show off. Swine

Southern forces had the two general purpose squads deployed on the right hand side (top right) while the fire support squad were just the other side of the river from the town. The infantry were deployed in the town. Then battle commenced.

Turn 1:
We got the initiative, and instantly began pouring fire into his heavy tanks as much as possible. LeadLegions fire support squad opened up on the HT-68, and managed to damage it, removing it's sturdy box (basically ablative armour). So would begin the long process of wittling the tanks down. His tanks moved up, and began opening fire, heavy particle cannons blazing trails, and managed to cause damage to the southern fire support team. Meanwhile eventually his HPC-64s started moving towards the town, round the hill. My fire support squad emerged from the woods, and began laying down rocket pod fire on them, damaging one and destroying another. My Mammoth also joined in pouring fire into the HT-68, lightly damaging it.

The most important part of this turn when both sides decided to call in a lot of support, intending to try and cause massive damage. We locked two heavy artillery bombardments onto the position of his HT-72, as they'd managed to log jam themselves between the bridge and the buildings. A medium bombardment was called in against the HPC-64s, while the CEF player called in a heavy bombardment against my Mammoth.

And it was a result. Another one of the HPC-64s went up in a ball of flame. The 2 HT-72s suffered damaged, though not enough to adversely affect them greatly, one of them losing its sturdy box, and the other suffering light damage.

My Mammoth managed to lose it's 2 sturdy boxes, and suffer light damage, so took quite a beating, but thankfully kept going.

Turn 2:

Cunningly I decided to take the photo from the other table end, so it's all reversed now.

Our opponent got the initiative, and started moving his heavy tanks again. Reaction fire from my strike squad, and LeadLegions fire support squad, managed to finally destroy the damaged HT-68, which ditched in the middle field, while his HT-72s took to the river and began doleing out punishment, reducing the southern fire support squad to 1 Jaegar.

My fire support squad, emerged further from the woods and pounded the HPC-64s with further rocket fire, destroying not only the whole squadron, but the army commander with it (this is important, as it means he no longer has access to command points for re-rolls and activating things out of sequence etc). Cheered by this victory we began the slow march forward.

His LHT-71s had advanced up the river and began scanning the bridge (one of his objectives). They then nipped behind our lines and began dishing out punishment. However, we weren't without return fire, with my Mammoth opening fire on them, while both of LeadLegions general purpose squad moved to allow his rocket pods to get shots in, which eventually destroyed one, and damaged the other.

Unfortunately we had to call it a night at that. It had taken a long time to set up, with deciding objectives, support points etc, so I think next time we play we're going to sort it out by e-mail prior to the game to save us time. Also we weren't clued up on the rules which didn't help.

Technically the Terra Novan forces won, as we had completed more of our objectives, that of certain key gear squadrons surviving. However had we played longer the CEF player would've garnered points by having his LHT-71s leave the table with the recon data.

Still, it was a great game. There's talk of getting a game over the Easter weekend were we can take more time over it, and play it out. And next time I'll take more photos. Promise. I seem to have landed the role, as LeadLegion isn't allowed to handle his wife's camera, due to him perpetually dropping things.

Apologies for the slight sketchiness of the details. I'll maybe try and take brief notes, though it's difficult to do, and get a game in during the say 3 to 3.5 hours we get in a club night, depending on how long it takes to eat and chat.

Thanks for looking.