AAR: Bolt Action: Dueling Wives.

       It was another beautiful Saturday as usual at our house for wargaming. We tend to have few people over to play games and such. Sometimes, this is just a reason to socialize. That is the joy of this hobby is that you have to interact with people in person. And we had a few people come over that we rarely see. In this case, our friend, Hugh brought his wife, Beth. Now at this point, Kalissa and I had met Beth once. The first time was at our local Hobbytown, U.S.A. After thirty minutes of discussing all of the interesting games that our lovely hobby has to offer, she seemed quite interested. After all, it is not she does not have an excellent painter to build her an army of her choosing. So Hugh and Beth left and that was the last time we saw her for about seven months. This seemed to bring up all sorts of nifty theories mostly concluding with evil wife plans in miniature warfare. Muahahaha!!... so to speak!
       Now, to our surprise, Beth was back and at our house, since Bill and Hugh had a game set for Chain of Command. My wife has made no secret that she does not like the Chain of Command rules. In a sense, she likes her game fast and bloody. As it turned out, Beth also found no interested in their game either, but was not playing any game. That is when the idea came up that Beth and Kalissa could play a game against each other in Bolt Action.
       As a side note, I would like to talk about first impressions and games that speak you people. Since Kalissa and I have been wargaming, we have noticed how people react to different games. Everyone is a little different about wargaming first impressions, but it is roughly the same: it has to look fun. There has been a trend for smaller skirmish games with quick action rules coming out, and I believe it is there to attract new gamers who have never played tactical game or a wargame, in general. I also believe that some games just speak to people! This might of happened on this day with Beth.
      Since I already had a desert table set up, I set up forces for both ladies as they got lunch. It turns out that Beth ended up running Kalissa's British, and Kalissa had my German DAK. There were quite a few firsts this day. It was the first time Beth played a wargame. It was the first time Kalissa played as German, since day one of wargaming. It was the first time I have seen to ladies play against each other. It was the first time I saw Kalissa not be able to assault in a game. And it was the first wife fight that was happy and friendly that did not involve pulling hair and slapping!
     The game they had had both of the them talking about future gaming and how much fun they had. Even though, my wife lost horribly; it was the best game she had in months. She talked about it a good two hours after the game. To me, it was good to see Beth play and enjoy herself. I hope she plays more in the future. Anyway, below were the game shots.

The Board in the beginning.

British artillery strike takes a toll on the Germans.

Germans are pinned everywhere!

These poor bastards keep getting hit in the open.

German tank is disabled.

Craters from German mortar rounds.

Not looking good for the Germans.