First up will be a training montage of the three or so battles I fought to get ready for the Flames of War and Warhammer tournaments I played in there. First up, you will see my German infantry take on some Americans and the Commie swine, and then selected images from the first half of a Warhammer game in which my Skaven beat up the Empire of Amazons. Finally, I will give a quick summary of what I remember of TactiCon 2013, along with selected (Read: 2) pictures.
There were some amusing quotes, most notably "Bazooka man from Bazookastan" and "quadruple-decker halftrack."
I can't remember my list exactly, showing that I really should post more often, but it was an infantry company with a customizable platoon, Marders, Panzer IIIs, MGs, and Mortars. My father used a great variety of things. I was Surrounded, defending two objectives in the middle from and attack from both sides. Then, we played a Hasty Assault.
The Training Ground
Infantry set up to defend the objective.
Motor rifle set up to TAKE the objective.
The Marders were in a wood in the side of the table to counter my father's tanks.
More motor rifle on the other side.
An overview of my position.
This showcases a phenomenon I know as "triple-decker halftracks."
My father's armor-- in front of the Marders pictured earlier.
The halftracks rush at my position and cause light casualties.
My tanks show up to kill some halftracks, at least one driven by a bazooka man from Bazookastan.
On the other flank, many things die.
I feel a lot better about my defenses on that flank now.
My tanks all got killed by his darned Ambushing tank destroyers.
A picture from the other side, which I always like to take.
The Sherman killed my Marder. It was supposed to be the other way around.
I had nothing better to do and no pressing reason to go to ground, so I decided to pound this one gun into smithereens. These are the hits.
The predicted result.
A big assault took the other objective. Things look grim.
How am I going to get out of this one?
I send most of the other infantry platoon rushing over, but not quite fast enough to contest the objective.
My Marders do it, though.
This does, however, only solve the immediate problem. I still have a lot of things to kill.
My Marders got killed. This was expected but it still sucks. We called the game at this point.
The beginning of the next game. My infantry defends the right flank against T-34s.
My other infantry on the other flank does some hits to the Soviets.
Tanks close fast!
So do mine.
Dave's infantry close rapidly.
My Germans are outnumbered like always.
The Soviets dig in. My MGs are too much for them.
It's a tank brawl.
Until the infantry, who are Pioneers, clean up the T-34s.
My other infantry platoon along with Dave's KVs shows up.
We agree that the game has reached a stalemate by this point. Eventually his tanks will shoot me off the objective, but that would be no fun to play or to report on.
Now I show selected images from a Warhammer game. This shows a very effective Scorch spell killing 13 models.
Skaven advance.
My Hell Pit "Abomination." Ain't he just so abominable?
My plague monks take the hill.
One of only two pictures I remembered to take at the con. A Soviet "infantry" battalion with more tanks than infantry held me off, but with another turn I would have won.
Four teams are all that remain of his infantry, and he was running very low on tanks as well.
Summary of the Con:
Friday night, I played in a game of Dust Warfare run by somebody from the local club. This is a hypothetical game with World War II extending several more years. It has things like walkers, futuristic armaments, and battle zombies. I was the Germans, defending a command post from the Americans. It was a fun game, and I ended up buying a basic set of the game on Sunday.On Saturday morning, I played in a homebrewed 15mm Vietnam game. I was the Vietnamese army attacking a French fortification. It was a very nice looking game, but sadly the rules did not live up to the same expectations. They were slow as heck and poorly presented. The scenario was very one-sided as well. He was running it as a campaign, but none of us cared, so we just went balls to the wall to overrun the French, doing so with ease.
Saturday afternoon and evening, I played in a Flames of War tournament. I fared very poorly, with three losses. This was because our first game was slow getting started, so I didn't have time to win, losing 4-3. This gave me an opponent who steamrolled me 6-1. The third game, I played a better opponent who had slightly better luck. Oh, well. I deserved this 6-1 loss. I also lost the tournament.
On Sunday, I played Warhammer. I won, demonstrating very effective use of Skaven weaponry and beating the Dark Elves, my first game. I then lost my second game against the Empire. My third game was against the fabled Chaos troll army, which also kicked my butt. At least I didn't lose this tournament.
All in all, a good con, with me going 3 and 5 and probably deserving 4 and 4. I played in some fun games, bought some cool stuff, and now know what games not to try next time.
Until next time, at least once in November!
