AAR: Bolt Action; Night Fighting.

    For the final conclusion of Labor Day weekend, my wife and I decided to try out some special Bolt Action rules involving "Night Rules." We had played them before for testing purposes for our convention game at Historicon. The first game had heavy rain making it hard to see. The "Night Rules" seemed to address this problem, even if  the rain stayed heavy for just a turn. So in the sense of an actual fight at night, we had not done one until now.
   Now, we could have played and basic game with the rules implied, but if you are going to have a game room to do cool stuff: why not do them? Early, this afternoon, we picked up a clip on desk lamp with blue light bulbs. I used to have different color bulbs in my lamp in college to reflect my mood and the music I was playing. However, there was going to be no Howlin' Wolf or Jimmy Reed playing with this blue light. The light just made a nice feel for moonlight. s
    In this game, Kalissa was playing her normal force of American Airborne with some Sherman tanks. I answer in kind with my German paras and some Pak40 guns and a Stug III. This was going to be a interesting game, because my wife's vision is not that good normally. Despite this, she was able to see what she was doing rather well. If there were any issues, we had a flashlight. We only used it once during an infantry assault that she won. There were many cases of troops not seeing each in combat based on dice rolls. The only true line of sight given was based off of fires and burning wrecks. A Sherman tank bit an AT round at the very first turn, so there was some good illumination in the middle of a field. Fire light was given a 12" range. If you were within the 12", you could be seen.
    For a game, we run through it fairly quick, which surprised both of us. It still was rather bloody on both sides, but the game scored as a "Draw." I am thinking of making a rule with flares in the next night game. Either way, the photos below were our game.

Germans setting up defense.

The Germans move into town.

It's quiet! Too quiet!

American Airborne moves in with tank support.

A medium mortar sets up.

Lurking through the shadows, a Sherman moves into town.

A German mortar fires hitting a squad of Americans after being illuminated by a burning Sherman.

First Strike! A Stug III plugs a Sherman in the open.

Germans try to sneak up on an unsuspecting Sherman tank.

A German squad sneaks through the dark around a farm.

The same idea for the Americans.

American Paratroopers use this person's stonewalled backyard as a fort.

Another Sherman tank crew looks on at the first burning tank.

Using cover.

German mortar are very accurate! Small arms fires also erupts against this American squad.

This squad of Germans was quick enough to avoid this HE shot from the tank, but not the machine gun fire!

This squad is down to two members.

The Circle turns out to be a dangerous place.

The Fort!

Charge!

This Sherman is disabled by a PaK40.

The gun's view!

The other Sherman erupts in flames!

The Circle is cleared of Germans.

The mortar takes out the rest of this Airborne squad.

The Final good photo.