Nothing is Sirte-an...

No Bloody Picnic try out on Friday night; entirely my fault as my brain broke over the week and I couldn't assimilate the rules.  Sorry, Dillon!

As such, I ran a game of Peter Pig's Squarebashing (of which there may be a new version in the future) for four of the chaps, set in August 1914, each pair sharing a division apiece; continuing the confessionals, the Hun forces were barely undercoated, let alone base coated.

There appears to be an oasis ahead, sir...

As a result of German pre-game decisions and some significantly worse-than-average German dice rolling, a distinctly under-strength German division was to fend off a full-strength British Division's advance.  The British gained a clear victory, driving through to the enemy baseline.  Whilst this was not necessarily a foregone conclusion, a major factor was the German decision to split their limited force between the flanks of the deployment zone, leaving the centre entirely clear.  This caught most of us by surprise, including myself, and I'm not the sharpest tool in the box.  Even then, the British still ensured that their assaults were well supported, as opposed to the penny-packet attacks of the Germans.  

The German players didn't mind losing too much (after all, it's what eventually happened in 1918).  The British were quite pleased- they were up against a game countdown, and managed to sneak in under both that and real-time constraints.  Given the fact it was an early war game, and at divisional level, it was felt the level of abstraction found in Squarebashing was appropriate- the difference made to assaults by rear and flank support was also noted in particular.  

There was more gaming today as it was Club Sunday.  This time we had an excellent trio of linked Force On Force scenarios set in Libya, based around the search for a recently deceased North African leader's son...our referee having created a very topical day for us!  It's been the first time in a long while where I've had to number crunch modifiers, and the noggin is still hurting, but it was well worth the effort.  I 'got' the idea that different die types represent different levels of training, morale etc, and we also quite liked the Stress mechanism that was used across the three scenarios.  As for the results, our NTC forces managed to whizz along a dried wadi to reach our destination with the loss of one technical (scenario 1),  eliminated an urban enemy HQ en-route (scenario 2) but fell at the last hurdle!  Whilst a fog of war card meant that our target was inadvertantly revealed due to some media types interviewing him, NTC forces were unable to get into the compound or eliminate the attached squads of bodyguards.  To compound this, a friendly special forces team that might have snatched our target was blown out of the sky by an AA missile.  Curses.  As a result, our victory point ratio dropped from 5:1 to 3:1.  Nevertheless, an excellent day's gaming.

Next Friday sees a return to the 7TV campaign , as various shows- Spyforce UK and The Man From S.P.A.C.E., for example- vie for audience ratings, and Saturday should see a visit to the Warfare show in Reading...

Playing by the rules...

Given that Friday is the 93rd anniversary of the end of WWI, the offer of a WWI game for that night's Abingdon Wargames Club meeting seemed appropriate.  It would also be a chance to try out a new ruleset for that period, A Bloody Picnic, using a meeting enagagement basic scenario included with the rules.

However, an understanding of these rules seems to be elusive at the moment.  Hopefully, they will click into place once play commences on Friday night.  If not, Squarebashing by Peter Pig may be employed (whilst a start has been made on forces for Through The Mud & Blood, they are nowhere near ready).  

This does raise the question of how set some of us might be when it comes to trying out new/innovative/'different' rule sets.  Even before playing, I've taken on board various Peter Pig rules like Patrols In The Sudan and Squarebashing, lapped up Too Fat Lardies rules aerial and terrestrial alike and had an inside-view of 7TV's development, so why hasn't A Bloody Picnic clicked?  

Clearly a prescription of regular gaming with these rules is required, to be repeated as necessary.

Paint! Paint like the wind, my friend!

Sunday 30th November: "By normal standards, it'll have been a productive week if 3 sections get completed!" 

Crikey.  An entire company of Peter Pig early WWII British painted, along with support weapons in the form of 2" and 3" mortars, Boyes Rifles and even some ATGs with associated crew.

Painted in a week no less.  That's a miracle for a painter of my habits. 

Clearly the Lard works in mysterious ways, and I Ain't Been Shot Mum is still inspiring painting in these parts...

Of course, they still all now need to be based, and a better camera than the one on an iPhone might be useful.

From one extreme to another...

Here at Abingdon Wargames Club, we try to have a campaign or two run over the winter months to get club members into something a bit different and playing against folks they might not normally meet over the gaming table.   There's a Warhammer Fantasy battle campaign this season, and I'm helping to run a 7TV campaign.  

Tonight therefore saw some of the 7TV participants draw up their casts.  So far we have "The S.P.A.C.E. Man" and two from as-yet-untitled series, one a 1960s pastiche of Torchwood and the other based around a bunch of London coppers.  A couple of other players unable to make tonight just need to get up speed, and then the first games will take place on Friday 18th November. 

We then got in two games of Pandemic (failing to halt the advance of the diseases both times) and finished with a quick and very amusing game of Worm Up.  All dice-free.

I swear I've got withdrawal symptoms already.

Charlie Don't Surf: Bowman's Last Stand

In which Captain Bowman goes on one last mission, only to be transferred to a mobile latrine unit at the end of the night.  After various playthroughs of the Combat Engineer mission from Surf's Up (a scenario pack for Charlie Don't Surf), the time came for Captain Bowman to have a crack at this mission as part of his ongoing tour of duty last Friday (28th October).  As two of the four players had experience of this scenario from both sides, a couple of changes were made to keep things fresh.  More of which later.

The US deployed and prepared to advance but already the VC were on the move to their far right!  This was the first surprise for those who knew the scenario; namely the deployment and destination of the VC was 'flipped', and it was an apparent joy for the VC player to see the alarm the sudden appearance of several blinds caused the US players.  Particualrly when Captain Bowman muttered "I wasn't expecting VC there"...

Lieutenant Kallachek's platoon prepared to enter the jungle whilst the Rome Plow and mine detector squad began to check the road ahead for mines and booby traps.  To their rear in this picture are Captain Bowman and a medic.  

Now, I'm well aware that the above photo does not show a Rome Plow, but a WWII era British armoured bulldozer.  If anyone knows where I can source one of these in 1/100 scale or compatible with 15mm miniatures, please shout out, as my Google-fu has failed me!

It's also worth pointing out the second change made to the scenario here.  In previous runs, the US engineers had studiously examined the road and clear ground either side once they had  left their deployment zone.  This was a perfectly reasonable course of action given their briefing.  This time though, I offered the VC the option of having mines already lying in the road (thanks to the earlier efforts of their peers) in return for limiting some of their initial equipment and potential military victory points at the end of the game.  The VC happily leapt upon this option! 

To the left of the road, the platoon commanded by Lieutenant Monterey Jack also begin to file into the jungle, where Charlie has apparently begun some timber felling...

The VC CO has clearly been paying attention to the nuggets of Blinds-based wisdom I've been relaying from the Too Fat Lardies Yahoo group.  To the south of the road, Lieutenant Kallachek's platoon spent most of the game clambering though dense jungle in pursuit of a rather insouciant blind that eventually revealed itself to be a just a couple of VC chaps having a dekko, rather than a unit of any significant size.  At the same time, the VC rather boldly had two units out in the open mine-laying.  By now, my players are well aware that lingering in the open like this (a Great shot, in TFL parlance) will greatly increase the chances of being mashed!  However, the long range nature of US fire and careful use of VC Big Men to remove Shock saw the VC scurry into the jungle north of the road in surprisingly/relatively good order.

By this point, the US had finally requested- and received- mortar support, and an otherwise hesistant Captain Bowman began to walk the fall of shot in hot pursuit of the VC, who now seemed hell-bent on scarpering.  Having halted their advance to take pot-shots at the VC sappers, the US renewed their advance across the board; sadly, whilst they actually traveled the furthest that any US force has in this scenario (my players are highly cautious),  they still; had a third of the board to cover.

And they still weren't quite far enough to contact the numerous mines scattered in their way.

Is It A Bird?  Is It A 'Plane?  Yes!  It's Jetcam!

Post-game discussion hinged on the degree to which the US could achieve their objective of clearing the road.  The consensus reached by US and VC players alike was that perhaps the US are too easily distracted by the VC!  It was suggested that the Rome Plow and mine detector squad should methodically advance along the road with the remaining platoons covering their flanks, rather than trying to scalp VC, so to speak.  The mantra of "Keep It Simple, Stupid" was invoked when considering what would be an appropriate plan.  The wisdom of wiser heads than our's would be gratefully received!

As stated at the start, this sadly saw the end of Captain L. Bowman's combat career in Vietnam. Despite showing himself to be an increasingly astute political animal over the course of several scenarios, Ol' Cappy Bowman sadly was out of his depth militarily (mind you, Lieutenant McColl didn't help in one infamous previous encounter!), and was transferred away from his unit.

It appears that he was assigned to a mobile latrine unit for the remainder of his tour, whereupon he then returned to the United States. Bowman had difficulty finding work until someone invented "Health & Safety", at which point his experience of talking his "specialist subject" stood him in good stead. He is are now much in demand from corporations and government departments who really don't care but need to cover their backsides. It was either that or politics...!

As to our real-life Luke Bowman: well-played, Sir! You were clearly getting to grips with how to field your platoons, and definitely understood the importance of getting your Big Men to do their jobs properly. Bad luck too that you were up against the wiliest of wiley opponents, Mr. Smallridge- curse his inscrutable plans and dummy blinds!

Thanks must also go to Doc Neodynium; in the absence of a game on Friday, he kindly took on Dennis Hopper duties and took a few shots of this game and others running at the club.  Getting a visual record of games is something I'm terrible at, so it was extremely useful for the Doc to share his!

Slowly but surely...

Amidst prepping for work next week and making like Agent Orange to clear up the garden (fortified against the cold and rain by some rather nice cabbage and bacon), a little bit more work was done on the lead pile today, with continuing inspiration coming from IABSM.  

The Peter Pig Early WWII Brits have now been inked and blacked, ready for the detailing going on.  To be precise, twelve sections, four ATR teams, three 2" mortar teams, two 3" mortar teams and four ATGs (with some crew) are in line for the detailing.  By normal standards, it'll have been a productive week if 3 sections get completed!

Fuelled by a lava-like flow of tea, I even began to black some of the PP Late WWI Germans.  Slowly but surely indeed.

In other news,  Doc Neodynium has passed on some snapshots he took of Friday's Charlie Don't Surf game at our local club, Abingdon Wargames Club.  Sadly, the Combat Engineer mission marked the end of Captain Bowman's tour of duty...all will be revealed once the pictures have been cleared by the censor!

It's Aliiiiiiiive....

..clearly the weekend before Hallowe'en is an auspicious time for digital Necromancy.

Glossing over the extended hiatus in a few words in no particular order (domestic building project, China, technical gubbins and work), it might be asked why the Tao of Lard has revived now?

Here's the answer:

The tenth anniversary edition of I Ain't Been Shot Mum! I first bought IABSM about six years ago, even though there wasn't any WWII kit in the lead pile, and browbeat various club ne'er-do-wells into letting me use their kit to try out IABSM.  The rules were/are thoroughly enjoyable, and (to my limited mind) are positioned perfectly to marry historical simulation with entertaining games (even if there are some who treat those concepts as mutually exclusive; Yesthatphil and toofatlardies amongst others challenge the "It's only a game" mentality in this TMP discussion).

This was my introduction to the world of Lard, and since then Charlie Don't Surf, They Don't Like It Up 'Em, Algy (currently being revised) and Bag The Hun have been bought and- most importantly- played.  To be fair, other Lardy goodness has also been bought but only read.  So far. 

Too Fat Lardies have gone for broke with this release, providing all one could need to play IABSM (assuming you already own the necessary toy soldiers) in a variety of bundles.  Here's what was in the preorder bundle, alongside the softback rulebook and a PDF copy of said rules:

At the back of this poor quality photo you can see three examples of the IABSM card deck available (104 cards, enough to field two infantry companies, five armour platoons, eight Big Men, three off-table support units for the Allies and again for the Axis, as well as all the bonus characteristic cards).  In the foreground are the IABSM tokens also now available.  From left to right:

• Low ammo marker
• Artillery aiming point marker (which came in handy for the Free World in last night's game of Charlie Don't Surf)
• Pinned marker (likewise for these; two on a squad indicate that it is suppressed)
• Reduced Actions marker (you might be able to make out the wee 1 on it)
• Lieutenant Hugh Jarce! (Limited edition figure; not sure if he's still available from TFL.  He'll probably end up in my 7TV games as a "Mad Mitch" sort of chap)
• AFV Reduced Movement/Immobilised markers (the green and red spanners respectively)
• AFV Main Weapon Damaged/Out Of Action markers (the green and red targeting pieces respectively)

I've already begun hawking the rules around to try and persuade others that they really want to give IABSM a try, but without solely relying on their kit.  I'm sure they'll come round to my way of thinking after they play a few games, not just one.  By now, the Lead Pile contains some 15mm Early WWII British from Peter Pig, so I've begun to have a crack at them.

Of course, whether I continue to make progress is another thing, particularly when I've also got these chaps vying for attention at the other end of the desk...

A rather large quantity of Peter Pig's Late WWI Germans (luckily all the British are done).  Even before the arrival of IABSM, I'd been poring over my copy of Through The Mud & The Blood, also from TFL.   I'd been lucky enough to spend some time around Albert and Arras in France recently, helping my folks with their ongoing family history project, and spending a few days retracing my great grandfather's steps during the Battle of the Somme and ultimately his death in 1917 at the Battle of Arras rekindled my interest in WWI, and my thoughts turned to the various TFL WWI rules like Mud & Blood, If The Lord Spares Us, as well as others to be found in various Lard Winter ans Summer Specials.    

However, IABSM arrived and my train of thought was redirected...

It's like I've never been away.