Weird War I action

Tuesday evening is game night with Arthur's friend Oliver and his dad Tyler.  This week, Arthur came up with a novel setting - somewhere on the Western Front in WWI, nefarious cultists are trying to complete some mystic rites to summon strange creatures from beyond the veil.  Arthur took the scenario from the Fistful of Lead supplement Tales of Horror but changed the setting to the Western Front.  

Arthur set up three factions.  First up, army troopers including a chaplain with special abilities to counter the summoned creatures.

Four cultists - a leader and three guards.

And a selection of creatures that can be summoned.  The spiders need one successful test to summon, the apparition needs two successes and the big beastie needs three consective successes across multiple turns.

The guards line up in the trenches as their leader begins summoning at the altar.

The guards get into a firefight with the advancing soldiers.  Puffs of smoke signify shock.  The officer uses the abandoned artillery piece as cover, but is still wounded.

The cultists summon giant spiders, which wound one of the soldiers.

Despite his wound, the officer moves up to rescue his wounded trooper.

Fierce fighting in the trenches as the cultist guards hold off the soldiers, allowing time for their leader to summon a greater monster.

After three consecutive successes over three turns, the greater beast is summoned!  I was able to use cards that allow rerolls to help get those successes!

The beastie instantly turns on the cultist that summoned him!

He tries to defend himself, but is quickly defeated and is soon monster food.

The soldiers pour fire onto the monster as the chaplain works to undo the summoning.

After some tense conflict, with the monster distracted by gunfire, the chaplain successfully banishes the beastie back to its home dimension.  The Earth is safe, for for how much longer?

Battle for Husiatyn - WWI Eastern Front

 Lisa, Arthur and I played scenario 6 from the historical campaign she's preparing based on the service of the Royal Navy's Armoured Car Expeditionary Force on the Eastern Front in 1917.  Today's game is based on action at Husiatyn in Galicia.  The Russians and their British allies want to stop the Germans from crossing the bridge and capturing the town.

We used Fistful of Lead Bigger Battles for this game, same as with the others in this series.

Russians and Brits start on the road across the top of the photo, and the Germans on the lower side of the photo.  Germans want to cross the river, which can be done at the bridge at regular speed or they can wade the river, treating it as difficult terrain. The airplane represents an observation balloon, which the Germans can use to call off-board artillery strikes.  The observer called in shots turn after turn until late in the game, when the Pierce-Arrow armoured car finally knocked it out of the sky.

The day was a foggy one, so every turn a die is rolled to see if the fog settles in, restricting vision to half range.  If it is already foggy, then a test is made to see if the fog lifts.  The fog came in early in the game, which allowed the forces to advance unhindered by their opponent's actions.

Here the German MG has crossed the bridge, but had to deploy quickly, without taking cover, to respond to the Lanchester AC that appeared through the mist.

Other German forces attempted to wade through the river. The two-man sniper team was eliminated by Russian and British fire before it was able to get into position.

In a rare occurrence, the German flamethrower team was able to fire its weapon, at its extreme range.  They only had minimal effect, adding a single point of shock onto the Lanchester. The car immediately returned fire and wiped out the flamethrower.

A firefight developed, between the MG, infantry and two British cars.

My photography was a bit off here - the Russian cavalry charged and eliminated a German infantry unit, and were then driven off by rifle fire from another unit. 

As the Russian cavalry regroups, an infantry unit moves to keep the pressure on the Germans.

After the Germans wading across the river were defeated, the focus turned to the remaining forces at the end of the bridge.  The smoke puff represent shock.

Russian infantry quite sensibly use the Rolls Royce as cover,

Only to be dismayed as the car is taken out by an off-board artillery strike!

Meanwhile the Russian cavalry regrouped, then charged and wiped out an infantry unit and the MG that was adjacent to it.

Glamour shot of the Russian infantry.

Victorious Russian cavalry!

RNAS Pierce-Arrow Armoured Lorry.  This was quite a beast, porting around a 3" QF field gun.

Thanks, Lisa, for writing a great scenario pack.  Looking forward to playtesting the final scenario soon!

WWI Eastern Front - Between Kuropatniki and Taurow, Galicia 1917

Today, Lisa and I playtested another of her scenarios featuring Locker-Lampson's armoured cars on the eastern front in 1917.  In this one, the Austro-Hungarian troops (again proxied by my WWI Germans) must cross the table (bottom to top in the image below) as Locker-Lampson's cars try to stop them.

KuK troops - officer, three teams of 10 riflemen and a 2-man flamethrower team.

The armoured cars.  Ford Model T armoured car, which can only fire to the rear, plus the Rolls Royce and the Lanchester, all three armed with machine guns.

Lanchester AC advances on the table.

KuK move up, working up the nerve to cross the open ground.

KuK take advantage of the cover provided by the woods.

Infantry unnerved by the approaching cars open fire, and disable the Ford.

The Lanchester focussed its fire on the flamethrower team.  The flamerthrower was disabled before they had a chance to fire, so unfortunately we didn't get to see how devastating it could have been!

The infantry laid down fire on the Lanchester, imposing shock and forcing it to fall back.  They then attempted to dash across the open ground, thinking that the car was too suppressed to act.  Turns out they were wrong!  The crew made all their saves, and opened fire on the infantry when they were in the open.

Things went a bit better on the other side of the table had more success.  Heavy rifle fire managed to disable the Roller.

The Lanchester saw that the first group of infantry were making a break for the table edge.  It rushed forward to fire on them, but its fire was not enough, and the KuK got their first team off the table.

The last squad of infantry managed to disable the Lanchester.

Final result was that two teams of infantry plus the officer cleared the table in the time available, for three victory points.  The last rifle team would also have cleared the table as well, but not within the time limit.  The RNAS only eliminated one team, so final points count was 3:1 in favour of the KuK.  The scenario was tense, a near-run thing, and most importantly, fun!  We have two more scenarios yet to play, so there will be more reports before too long.

More Eastern Front WWI - The Road to Monasterzyska

Lisa stopped by this afternoon for a playtest of the next scenario in the adventures of the RNAS armoured car squadron on the eastern front in WWI.  In this scenario, the Russian army is in retreat, and the armoured cars are assisting Russian infantry and Finland Dragoons in escorting ambulances on the road to the town of Monasterzyska in Galicia (now part of Western Ukraine, but in 1917 this was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire).  As usual, my WWI Germans proxy in for the Austro-Hungarian KuK forces.

We rolled for leader traits before starting the game.  Amusingly, we ended up with negative or neutral traits for almost every unit.  Unfortunately for Arthur, the veteran Finland Dragoons ended up being led by a shirker, so these guys were prevented from charging anyone who hadn't already attacked them!  One of the KuK infantry units had the same trait, so there was a built-in resistance to action right from the very start.

Here is the table.  The Russian ambulances enter on the left and must exit by one of the two roads on the right.  The telegraph poles have no effect on the game, and are likely anachronistic for this part of the old A-H empire.

KuK infantry move up to cover the fork in the road.

Russians and RNAS move on to the table.

Finland Dragoons threaten the KuK infantry.

but then they decide to screen the ambulances from the other side of the road (as their leader unconvincingly tries to explain why he isn't attacking the enemy).  Meanwhile, their more enthusiastic infantry tovarischi engage in a firefight, inflicting shock as noted by the puff of smoke.

The ambulances move forward screened by the infantry and dragoons.  The tan truck is a proxy for the second ambulance.

The Austro-Hungarian artillery don't recognise the proxy ambulance and destroy it!  Meanwhile the KuK infantry in the crater are suppressed by the Russians and the armoured cars.

The field gun turns its deadly power on the RNAS Lanchester, destroying it.  The Rolls Royce uses the destroyed ambulance as cover.

The field gun plays an ace, a wild card, as a 6 which allows a free reload, and it destroys the Roller!

The game ended up a draw.  One of the two ambulances escaped.  The Anglo-Russian force lost both armoured cars, one of the ambulances and the dragoons but were able to destroy two of the KuK infantry teams and the A-H officer.  We'll be playtesting another of the scenarios next week.