31 August, 2013

Tecala Rescue

Call in the search parties - I'm still alive! A long summer hiatus, set in motion by a hectic period in work and then kept going by holidays and the like. Anyway, hopefully things are back to normal and you'll be hearing from me at my more usual rate.

You may recall this scenario from before the summer - based on the climatic rescue scene from Proof of Life. I ran it twice at Hobocon, a local Dublin games convention last weekend. 

Terry Thorne, a Kidnapping and Ransom specialist and former member of the Australian Special Air Service Regiment is assigned to negotiate the return of building engineer Peter Bowman. While overseeing the construction of a dam in a Tecala, Bowman was kidnapped by the country's left-wing insurgency, the ELT.


Through connections with the oil company Thorne has arranged for the army to make a push across the river and draw out the main force (about 100 fighters) of the ELT, while he and a small hand-picked team (Dino’s Panama crew) mount a snatch and grab mission to rescue Bowman and another hostage, Calitri.

The ELT camp
Downtown 2 & 3 overlook the barracks and Peter's house. They'll move down to rescue him, while Terry is on overwatch
Most of the rebels are engrossed in a game of football on the parade ground, they're completely unsuspecting of the attack
It takes then some time to organised themselves once fire breaks out. The ELT group by the barracks spotted Downtown moving off the hill and opened fire, putting both of them to ground. Terry will have to proffer medical aid while rescuing Peter himself.
As the camp erupts, Uptown open fire on the groups pouring off the parade ground. They can't stick around for long, and move towards the farmhouse where Calitri is located
Dino goes down under fire from the two guards, but Uptown shoots them down and gets Dino back into the fight quickly
The football players move into towards the farmhouse, hoping to overwhelm Uptown and prevent any escape
Terry's return fire does have a positive effect - the ammo dump behind the rebels blows up, taking out one of them and driving them back to cover - he's out of the fight however - it's all down to Uptown now.
Uptown rescue Calitri, keeping the rebels nearby under fire - they can see no sign of Downtown and have got to make it to the landing zone soon
11-8 to the ELT, Downtown's initial surge was ill-conceived but ultimately just plain unlucky. We set it up and tried with some different players later that day

07 June, 2013

Sittangbad - Scenario

This is an old school scenario refitted for modern times and for use with Force on Force.


A major Taliban offensive in Helmand has been thwarted by British forces and the resulting counter-offensive has the group running for the hills. The local leader is unwilling to loss his most valuable supplies and has set up a rear-guard operation in advance of the main bridge across the Sittang to give him time to evacuate his headquarters.

Download the full scenario
You can view an earlier report of the action at Sittangbad.

Off tomorrow for a short campaign of epic Commands & Colours: Napoleonics taking on a joint British-Russian expedition to free the Batavian Republic from the French grasp!

24 May, 2013

Lead Painters' League continues


Apologies for the prolonged hiatus, it's been a busy few weeks at work and at home (including an outbreak of Chicken Pox!).


Season 7 of the Lead Painters' League continues with Round 6. An especially wide variety of subjects this time I feel (though I inadvertently seem to have picked out a seam of Dark Ages entries!). As before I'm not picking out my favourite pieces, but I'm hoping to highlight a few match-ups which are (or ought to be) very close.

Chindit Support Weapons vs. Darkenwald Scouts













Here We Make Our Stand vs. Dystopian Legions Britanian Infantry













Named Men vs. Citizens, We Must Feed the Revolution 










Head on over to vote for your favourites!.
I had been preparing a summary post showing highlights of Salute from other people's blogs (like this one from 2011); if anyone really wants to see it, let me know...

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