AAR: Normandy Firefight: British vs. Germans

 

        Kalissa and I decided to play another home game, since we had the time to for a change. Besides, I tend to like to play on commission mats before they leave. In this case, we decided to play a game of Normandy Firefight. As usual, I have five of my pesky Germans versus my wife's British men. I had my leader with a St44, one man with an MP40, and the last three with KAR98 rifles. The British had two men with Sten Guns and three with rifles. Like most of the Normandy Firefight games, they also seem one sided games when getting into the action. I am not sure why, but it seems that the first person shot/killed on a side turns into a terrible day. In this game, it was not my side. In fact, I escaped with no one injured and three kills. One of my men with the MP40 ran around and shot one poor Brit in the back at point blank. Other deaths were caused from great rifle shots. Of course, Kalissa had a lot of fun, despite her demise, because she felt that gaming was very relaxing. That was almost a direct quote. Either way, I am sure I will have a bad game of German deaths in the future as usual. Until that time, here are photos of our game. Enjoy!

Yeah, I went the cheap way by just dropping sand on the matt for play purposes. This is a commission, so I could not add roads. 

AAR: Aliens Board Game: I Not Saying It Was Aliens, But It Was Aliens!

 

      Well, we are back to playing another Aliens board game. Kalissa and I have the older Prodos Aliens Vs. Predator game, but that seems to have had a bunch of issues with that game. At one point, we were playtesters to the Second Addition to that game, but that version was thrown out. I wished they would have continued that route. There were going to be a bunch of new characters involved to make it interesting. However, someone else who was also a playtester ruined it by posting the details online on some forum. It is stupid people that tend to ruin it for the rest of us.

    However, we still had not gave up on the whole Aliens games. When we found out that Gale Force Nine was going to release an Aliens game, we decided to pre-order it. This game is based off of the movie. Of course, my only real complaint when we got this game is that the figures are all plastic. I know, I know! But I am a metal figure kind of guy. It was not terrible to put the figures together. If left unpainted, the Aliens were in black plastic and the marines were in green.

   Kalissa and I played the first mission a month ago where we managed to save Newt with everyone  surviving, but Frost. We were going to play a rescue mission to get Frost, but it turns out we both needed to reread the rules. We did not play the game exactly right. So this game is a revisit to the first mission to rescue Newt from the Aliens.........with painted figures!

    As a recap of this game, Kalissa was playing as Lt. Riley. I decided to play Hicks. The rest of the crew we could both control. Now, I was under the impression that this we going to harder mission than our first time playing. For one, we are now dealing with painted figures. They also seem to died quicker! Two, this game requires some luck, since it has cards involved and spawn points. Think of the game like the game Zombicide. First thing we did wrong was have Riley move first. We miss read that she would not be able to go first, but decided to play it out. Immediately, an Alien spawns in front of Riley and attacks her! Kalissa rolled two tens on a D10, killing Riley out right! It was luck I had a card to re-roll her defense die to save her. Nevermind the whole fear that Riley had in the movie, such as, her night terrors. Nope, I just advance first with no back up! Now, we understand why Riley's character moves last out of the group of characters you play. Now, Newt will only run towards Riley, but away from the Marines. Also, Riley is the only one who can calm Newt down so she can decide to follow the group to safety. In this mission, Newt is one of four locations on the board. At the same time after turn four, Aliens start popping everywhere each turn. I am not sure how many Aliens we killed, but there were 43 Aliens chasing us on the way out of the board. The luck we had in this game was when, at one moment, Hudson was confronted by 7 Aliens at once. He took them out with a lucky shot using a Pulse Rifle Grenade. If that did not work, our exit would have been cut off. At least everyone escape on this run!

Terrain Goodies: Into the Woods

 

      Since I have been getting my free time back, I have doing such silly things like making terrain. Naturally, as a Terrainiac, I like to experiment on new types of terrain options. Some things I decided to tackle were making more scatter terrain for woods. I have a couple of tables we have to set up that really need some woodland areas. Plus, I need some woods with trees that will survive better in the gaming world. A lot of my trees have been dying from the constant warfare they endure. And I have future games that need them, such as, Muskets & Tomahawks.

    Now, I did not photo any of my process that made these or the extra amount of hedges. However, I am sure this will happen as a list of things to do. Besides, I need enough to cover roughly three board rather densely. Yes, that is going to be a lot of trees. When they say to "Go Green", I took to the level of plant more trees and bushes on the table. Anyway, these are pictures of the ones I made as my test runs. 

AAR: Bolt Action: Polish AK Army versus Soviet Forces.

 

   From another weekend, Kalissa and I got to actually venture out to the gaming world over at a local hobby shop, Hit Point Hobbies. With non-stop working between the two of us, it was nice to have a gaming day amongst friends. Work seems to be slowing down a little bit giving me more free time for future games and commission work. I have a lot of fun things to paint/build. 

    Anyway, we went to the store where most of the players were there to finish the tale end of the local Bolt Action Escalation League. I was suppose to take part in the League. That was the main reason for making my Polish Army. Instead, I am just going to have to force myself to make a convention game out of my army. However, while we were there, I threw in for a game against some Soviets. Now, I found that I may have broke some wargaming courtesies, since I did not bring my army list, so there was some guess work involving what I played. I told Michael, who was my opponent, that I had roughly a 1750 point list of my Polish. It turns out that this was nowhere near being true. I found out when I got home, I was running 1244 point list. I needed three more full strength inexperienced militia squads to make it there. So this is the second game for them for the second time being out matched. I mentioned this, because my Polish were very good in this game. Actually, I will go as far as "Stellar!" I lost a total of eight people after killing a T-34/85 Flame tank, two AT Teams, one Regular squad and a truck. Both of my inexperienced militia squads rolled a six after the first casualty upgrading to Regular troops, and they performed both assaults. The only addition to my list that I did not believe was true was the rule on Partizans were they get booby traps for free. It is not the rule that is the problem, but as I told them, I did not believe my AK Army counts as a Partizan list. Only one trap went off killing and AT Team. Again, at home, I found that what I was saying was true. My list would not have had them. However, this was a friendly game, so I am sure I will be forgiven.  I hope.