Brothers In Arms: War Journal

[127th Angry Angels]

FRIDAY
The weather in Southern England is superb. The sun is out and the city of Southampton seems alive and awake. My thoughts of course are pre-occupied with the prospect of War... BF:Evo that is. I pack my army (all of it- you never know what someone else might forget) and ensure i've some crisp notes for the mongoose shop. After enjoying some wine and a picnic on the common with the missus (quality time to smooth things over) i head down to the train station and meet Rick. Rick won't be playing but he fancies coming along as an observor. It'll be a laugh.

The train takes 1 hour and 40 mins to get from Soton to Bristol (home to one Mr Evil) and in true style Rick and I are forced to stand for most of it. We meet Mr Evil at the station and head back to his. We talk abit and Mr Evil lays on a good feed. Then the grand tour of models starts. It's awesome, i know it's all on the site in various posts but to see it all in the flesh is something else. I won't go into too much detail as i don't want to steal any thunder but it's impressive. We then (naturally) head to the village pub where too much alcohol is consumed. On the walk back it occurs to us that we havn't sorted our army lists out. This leads to a council of war. We're discussing how annoyed we are that we can't get a warrior, command, Chally, and all the infantry we want into my list by 10 pts when Mr Evil has a brain wave. "What if you take 3 warriors?"

It took a full five seconds for me to reply. I hesitated as it seemed madness to not go with the best tank in the game. I (and everyone it seemed) ALWAYS take a Chally. After looking at the cards it just made sense. The shadows would hammer the tanks and the warriors would mop up. It was a simple plan but hell, i'm a simple guy. At 2 am we figured we'd best bed down.

SATURDAY
6 am!!! It felt like 5 mins sleep, i just couldn't switch my brain off. After a cup of tea (did I mention we're all Brits) we set out for Swindon and the pre tourney breakfast cafe. Now i've yet to get an answer as to whether Mr Evil was taught to drive by the A team or the Dukes of Hazard but most of the trip is a blur....and i had to get him to pull over so i could hurl....twice. The sat nav went wrong and we had to make up time. Needless to say, i passed on breakfast .

When we arrived at Mongoose the shop was set out and i quickly snagged 2 more warriors to give me the three i would use in the list. I met the other guys and everyone was great. Matt welcomed us and showed us the tables. Mexico was a desert table with rock formations and a village complex in the middle. Kreplakistan (?!?) was the urban city you see alot in S&P lots of buildings to hide in and a nice square in the middle with ornamental planters. Then we had Kent, lot's of trees and some ruins.

We prepared for our first game with LBH and Low Roller....

To be continued.....

 

[cordas]

Sounds good so far... but stop teasing and get to the meat!!!! 8)

 

[127th Angry Angels]

Game 1 Vs LBH and Low Roller, Mexico

Our opponents deployed with a Chally on each flank and infantry in positions to take the small collection of village buildings in the middle. Mr Evil spread his shadows between the rock formations on each flank and the middle. My Warriors lay in cover on the right flank with one in the middle ready to commit to either side should it be needed. Infantry wise Mr Evil’s 5 marines were stood behind the large large rock on the left flank ready to move into it’s cave and stay safe for the game. My 4 man infantry team had much the same plan behind a hill on the right flank.

LBH and Low roller had the first turn (if memory serves) and LR’s Chally made it count. It rolled forward and then drew perfect line of sight on the 5 Marines! Mr Evil and I exchanged a worried look as Low Roller defied his forum name and killed all but one of the Marines. The lone survivor reacted into the cave and stayed there for the rest of the game. The marines were there to help tie down the shatter point, we had a basic plan that our infantry would remain hidden and contribute to war effort with it’s model count. With Mr Evil’s marines reduced to one man and a red stain things were already coming apart. On the left flank LBH’s Challenger rolled forward and took cover in the middle of a ring of rocks leaving only the back of the vehicle exposed. The infantry moved up and secured the buildings. Then came our turn.
Mr Evil’s shadows opened up with a vengeance and destroyed LR’s Chally.. They also moved to flank LBH’s armour trying to get a good angle on that often invincible armour. Mr Evil rolled those D10’s, 7 or 8 shadows worth….when the smoke cleared it was still there….and angry. On the left flank my Brits settled in for the turn. The Warrior was my most expensive unit and as such had a Victory point on it’s head. I wasn’t about to try and sneak 3 light tanks past LBH’s commanding position in the rocks. He’d have picked off a warrior instead of the shadows just for the VP. My boys boiled up a brew and sat tight.

The next few turns became a duel between the shadows and the Chally 2. The shadows moved quickly from cover to cover and adopted a surround and pound tactic. LBH’s Chally began to take hits, slowly but surely but it also began to chip away at the shadows. It was tense watching it play out, the shadows are very deadly but have nothing like the survivability of the Chally. Eventually the shadows worked their way behind the chally and despite some interference from the Brit infantry in the buildings finally brought down the Challenger 2. It had survived a sustained CKEM attack for about 3 turns and shot up a few shadows to boot. This was the signal my armour had been waiting for the Warriors rolled out. As they moved into position a flanking Warrior caught one of LR’s infantry sections in the open and brought down 3 members of the patrol it reacted heading for a building when they passed into another warrior’s field of fire, the handful of survivors holed up in a building. With the Chally’s both gone the Warriors were practically invincible and drove to the building to fire into the buildings. Unfortunately for LBH and Low Roller the buildings really were tiny and the size of vehicles we were using allowed us to fire 40mm cannon, MG’s and CKEM’s into them and this eventually drove them to shatter point.

This was a great game. I’d met LBH and Low Roller very briefly before but we’d never really spoken. We had a great game with no rules arguments or issues and everyone seemed to have a good laugh. The poor cowering US marine was particularly amusing. The funniest thing about that was that Mr Evil forgot him in the scramble to change tables and we had to go back to Mexico to retrieve him J Where’s my parade!!

Come on Brothers in arms, share your war stories!!

 

[JayRaider]

An enjoyable read

 

[cordas]

Sounds like a good fight, but given the number of shadows, I didn't really think there was ever any question over who was going to win.....

The question is what happened once Mr E got his bloke back....