The Fest - 2016

The Fest... a gathering of nerds, a wretched hive of scum and villainy, a chance to fit in more games in 18 hours than most people play in a year.  This is the 24th iteration of this private, friends-only event, and it was excellent.

First up: X-Wing.  Got in two solid games (capitol ships just for show) of x-wing, playing Imperials.

Brian's extensive collection is shown below.  He had a program which created three semi-random 100point lists that we could chose between.  Saved a LOT of time.

Game 1:

Game 2:

The final shot for game 2:  All four of my fighters crammed into the enemy's blindspot. Very one-sided battle!

Also played "Passcode" which I would say "pass" on, but then we moved on to "Secret Hitler".  Our host, Brian, was in on the kickstarter and had a beautifully produced special edition of the game (sorry, no pics).  It was LOTs of fun, highly recommended, but it is basically Avalon with better production value and Nazis.

Then, probably my favorite game of the evening, "Captain Sonar".  Two teams, each representing a submarine, hunting each other in real time (not turn based!), with each player taking on either the Captain, 1st Mate, Engineering and Sonar positions.  It's all about team work and communication and was crazy fun, and relatively quick playing.  Well, two of the games we played of it lasted 15-20 mins, but one epic game lasted about 40 somehow. If you have opportunities to game with 6-8 players, I very highly recommend this game.

Hats are of course optional (that's my opposing Captain and host, Brian).

Pick-up game of Chain of Command: SCW

Taking a break from Battletech this to bring you back to a time before Battlemechs, before A-bombs, before it stopped being cool to be a Communist... the Spanish Civil War.  Via Chain of Command of course.

Fritz and I wanted a solid but somewhat random game. We rolled off sides (I'm the Nationalists), and rolled off the scenario and to see who was the attacker (attack and defend scenario, me as defender). Then we gave ourselves a fair amount of support (12 points for him, 6 for me) and chose our forces. Fritz chose some regular G.I. Joses, a Republican army platoon, and I chose some Moroccan regulares. The imbalance of my choice's quality gave Fritz a total of 20 points of support, although my extra command die more than makes up for all the vehicles he's likely to bring on table.

I was happy with how the patrol phase played out.  The attackers were forced to come in from 1/4 of the table. Bottom left below is their territory, and at least one of the JoPs ended up on the table edge due to lack of cover.

All is quiet now, except for the mooing of war.

My JoPs:

Started deploying right away into the large complex close to the opposing table edge, moving the section into the tower to overlook the enemy jump off point.

Well, I can be sure of one direction the enemy won't be attacking from.

The communists bring on both of their armored cars and their mortar section. Damn, two armored cars...

With the enemy ignoring the exposed JoP, the Nationalists send a squad to capture it. The Moroccans can move fast and stealthy, using all available cover as they go. Taking full advantage of this here.

The Nationalist armor arrives.

And the squad advances... as a communist T-26 arrives on the scene!

With 20 points of support, I was pretty sure I'd be facing some armor, so thankfully I took a Pak AT gun, which I position with a clear shot of the road.  Those armored cars will have to pass through their field of fire to advance towards my infantry. They also have a clear shot on the Russian tank.

A hit, but no damage. Still, it halt's the tank's advance and gets it off the infantry's back for a while.

Meanwhile the armored car advances cautiously...

Machine gun fire from the car takes a toll on the gun team, but they fight on.

Turning the gun slightly, they fire on the armored car, and it's plate is far thinner than the T-26's. The hit causes it to explode spectacularly.

The second car emerges carefully out of the smoke...

And is able to wipe out the gun team entirely!

The squad of infantry, after managing to capture the jump off point, makes a hasty retreat under fire.

Meanwhile, the rest of the platoon deploys and begins to move up, hoping for an opening to attack the enemy mortar section, still hiding out of sight.

Fearing the support of my Panzer, the communists bring out their field gun.

The panzer (wisely) beats a hasty retreat out of the mountain gun's sights.

Abandoning their tower, the rest of the first section pours out and makes a crazy rush for the tank. The Moroccans are renowned for their ability to take out tanks at close range, eager for the monetary bounty Franco placed on them.  The tank crew hits the reverse, trying to keep away from them.

The second section opens fire on the field gun, at this point the only enemy soft target exposed. The rest of the enemy infantry is taking cover inside a building, away from the windows.

The Moroccans chase down the T-26 and shove a grenade into the viewport, killing the crew!

Supported by the panzer, they then take up a firing line and advance tactically towards the enemy cowering in their hovels.

Although suffering for shooting more or less in the open, the second section has decimated the AT gun's crew.

Finally, only the enemy platoon's leader remains behind the gun, and he wisely abandons it, fleeing the battlefield and leaving his men behind, their shelter quickly surrounded.  Fritz and I agreed that they were probably all captured and sent to one of Franco's "happy camps".

A final shot of the battlefield - the enemy infantry are all in the building at the bottom left - two full sections! A very fun game - I just love me some CoC!