Tabletop Thursdays

Last night I stopped by Adler hobby for their 'Tabletop Thursday' game night. I don't usually make the long drive on a work night, but I had some items to give to one of the Thursday regulars so I made the trip. Adam and I tried to play an 850-point North Africa FOW game. I used my British armor, Adam used a German armor force with attached Fallschirmjägers on motorcycles.  I was suspicious of using any scenario other than 'Free for All' with such a low point total, but we gave it a go. We rolled 'Cauldron' . With three platoons in my force two started off board and one started in ambush. That gave me a single platoon and my HQ to protect the center of the board from all sides. Adam had four platoons thanks to some creative kamphgrouping which gave him two platoons on board to start.

In my first turn I failed to get reserves, and with an 88 and a platoon of infantry on board I decided to smoke the 88 with my HQ tanks and assault the infantry. I managed to kill the only stand I could reach in my assault. In Adam's turn he received reinforcements, used the platoon of newly arrived tanks and his HQ to kill my two HQ tanks. Game over. I had nothing that could reach the objectives to contest them after Adam would capture them the next turn. Lesson learned: trying to roll for scenarios for 850 points will give you some unplayable games. Play free for all or pick a scenario both players can agree upon. I don't think either Adam or myself would have picked cauldron with such small forces.

After that I dropped into a game of  Wings of War that was being played. Since the two players were learning the rules they were doing a mission against some observation balloons and some 'Archie'. I rolled in with a Spad XIII to try to spoil their raid. I was able to shoot down one Albatros D.Va before getting gunned down by a Halberstadt CII's tail gunner. I think maybe Wings of War has the tail gunners a bit over powered for my tastes, but still a fun game. Maybe if there is a two seater on each side it will balance things out a bit more.

Meanwhile while we were dog fighting over the trenches of WWI, Adam and Chris were playing another game of FOW. Chris brought his newly painted Matilda company. I took a few photos of Chris' Matildas which were beautifully painted with full Caunter cammo scheme and hand-enscribed tank names using a technical pen. Awesome stuff.