From: Tom B <kaladorn@g...>
Date: Mon, 27 Feb 2012 05:46:47 -0500
Subject: [GZG ECC XV AAR]
textfilter: chose text/plain from a multipart/alternative TEAM: Doug Schavo, Kevin Fox, Thomas Barclay INSERTION: US BORDER BREACHED 1230 HRS 24 FEB 2012, ALL PRESENT AND ACCOUNTED FOR EXTRACTION: CANADIAN BORDER BREACHED 1815 HRS 26 FEB 2012, ALL PRESENT AND ACCOUNTED FOR 1900 24 FEB 2012 Battle of Cormorant Moon (GM: J. Davis) [FT in a minor star trek retheming] (TomB, Doug, Kevin, Aaron N, Barosi the Younger, Johnson the Younger, Barosi the Elder, Tom McCarthy and allegedly John Lerchey) 6 Fed CAs fight 6 Klingon D7s around Cormorant Moon (with the last bar in the known universe). Feds attempt a strategy to bring defeat in detail to the Klingons and instead bring it home for themselves. Officially the Klingons won, but one Federation Captain had plotted orders each turn to sleep with one or more of his senior officers (and once, all of the engineering department after great damage control), so the general conclusion was he probably won. Or thought he did. Hope the medical doctor survived.... Fun game, interesting lightweight retheming, and poor Federation tactical execution. I couldn't convince my other commanders to go in reverse at speed 16 firing proximity photon torpedos. I read somewhere this strategy was the key to victory..... [obscure SFB reference... bonus points for anyone who can name the Admiral who came up with the term paper....] Another good Davis' game! I did point out the federation painters were engaging in deception as all cruisers had hull number NCC 1701.... (vanity, thy name is James T. Kirk....) 2300 24 FEB 2012 Two games of Panic Station semi-cooperative card game. One was one by the bugs, one by the humans and their android porters. A game with some treachery as a host appears from among the good guys then quietly tries to infest his fellow players. 0900 25 FEB 2012 Battle for Aldensport (GM: J Davis) [Strike Legion 6mm TOG vs. Renegade Legion] (TomB, Doug, Mark Kinsey, Stuart, TomM, the French Guy) The lawful forces of the TOG attempted to liberate the port of Aldensport from the unkempt and highly unsanitary barbarians of the Renegade Legion. Grav tanks slugged it out having forgotten that infantry are the correct force to employ in urban terrain. Had more in common with attack helicopter engagements than tank warfare given the vertical envelopments and popup attacks. Was quite a bit of fun. Renegades bribed the GM and the GM claimed they won by 1 vehicle. The TOG Inspector General has promised a full inquiry and the Grand Inquisitor has promised swift executions. Jon ran a good game, it was very close, and it had some interesting mechanics (though I think EW's offense/defense swing is too potent). Not a bad ruleset, I'll probably pick up a copy. Scenairo was fun to play as per normal in a Davis' game. 1400 25 FEB 2012 (GM: Brian Phillips) [Stargrunt/FMA Dune themed game] (TomB, Kevin, Mark Kinsey (aka wussy Atreides who needs his Fedakeen to fight for him), and Martin Connell (Gurney 'Tea, Spice Melange, Hot' Halleck) http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-vhH1nIjgK8M/TZHI8M9T3jI/AAAAAAAABi8/kRqfX6UHdZ c/s1600/Dune.png Some mood clips: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYUolurihOQ (It's the slow bad that gets through) The forces loyal to Imperial Duke Baron Harkonnen, led by the heirs Feyd-Rautha and Raban and assisted by the Emperor's own Sardaukar attempt to protect Imperial interests and Harkonnen property from vandals, terrorists, insurgents, and Kyle MacLachlan. The scumba...errr...Fremen and their foaming-at-the-spice Fedakeen nutters decide to blow up the Emperor's harvester, perhaps hoping some Sardaukar will happen by in an ornithopter (aka air vehicle capable of impressive speeds faster than a belly crawl, armoured with thick paper plating, and capable of firing no weapons of its own or of its occupants at anyone while easily drawing fire from any nutter on the board). There are rumours of huge worms but everyone knows about fishing stories. The game sees the Harkonnens try to fight to defend the Imperial property from the ne'er-do-wells. Feyd-Rautha leeds a hapless squad of valiant regulars (actually half a squad) into a blocking attack on an elite squad (at least they claimed so) of Fedakeen commandos led by the Kwizbotch Habberdash, the new-age deity of crystals, vegas showgirls, and men's tailoring. Proving their 'worth', the Fedakeen take most of the game to beat up a roughly equal number of troops two grades inferior and Feyd-Rautha gets Atreides pretty heavily wounded despite his shield. Imagine the fight went like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoPKajvq3gE Just instead imagine it happens in a mountain pass. Oh, and also imagine that the Escapehatch Has-a-rash did no fighting and had his Fedakeen tie up Feyd-Rautha and gang beat him, since apparently the "dustbowl messiah" fights like a hobbit. Anyway, in the long run, the ecologically concerned Fremen blow up the spice harvester's propulsion, lighting all the spice on fire. The truth is that they're just a bunch of sand-crawlin' spice addicts looking for a fix. We could have just thrown out 1 pound packets of spice and they'd have left us alone while they got their 'blue eye' thing going. They didn't need 'wierdo modules' and 'glass knives', they needed a 12-step program and an INTERVENTION! So, Raban got shrapnelled, but he wasn't given credit for his shield (we all missed that) so maybe he should have lived. Or maybe his shield mysteriously malfunctioned. Feyd-Rautha would have moved up with him dead.... if it wasn't for the Fedakeen gang-beating thing. Gurney left the fight wanting to call for Doctor Crusher and wishing this was all a holodeck fantasy. Paul Atreides went back and told his people of his great fighting prowess in defeating the (tied up and helpless) Feyd-Rautha while his Fedakeen all quietly got a raise to keep the secret that he can't fight. Then of course, the 'not-phallic-at-all' roundworm showed up with some sort of hunger for eating Imperial property and elected to consume the harvester. The Sardauker simply landed (for fear their ornithopter might get wet and collapse into a mache pile) and got a few shots off. I think the Emperor got a 'Friend Plan' discount on training for his minions at Imperial Clone Trooper Academy. If Mark hadn't been hiding in the corner of the board, this is how a fight might have looked between the Kwizzler Haddock and the Sardaukar.... (imagine Leto is Paul and the Fedakeen are Sardauker).... Okay, now that I'm done being funny and abusing Mark and Martin (who seriously were good sports and played excellently given their objectives): Brian's Fremen (scratchbuilt from Eldar) and his Harkonens (mostly Imperial Guard) were great and the models for the worm (dryer hose based) and the spice harvester (bowl with tracks) and the ornithopter (two tailed dragonfly?) [PS descriptions don't come close to how good they are....] were amazing. All of us agreed he did a great job. Also, Brian ran the game well, was flexible when we pointed out some odd inconsistencies here and there, and was amenable to suggestions. I think we all highly enjoyed his game and thank him for the effort. Hope to see Brian again at the next con! Those minis need to be shown off! 1730 25 FEB 2012 (GM: Me) [Full Thrust rethemed to Stargate SG-1 universe] HIGH VALUE TARGET (Jerry, Vince, Dave and Scott) Thanks to JP, TomM, Doug and Kevin for helping me playtest and get this much righter for the Convention. This scenario had Lucians and Tauri landing boarding parties on an enemy station to control 8 locales while the fleets battled outside the station. The ships used mixed tech. Tauri had 5 row hulls, regenerating shields(armour that healed), class 1 and 2 K-guns, and classed P-Torps (aka Asgard Beams) and Tauri Missile Arrays (my own system: 360 arc, 30" range, launch declared in fighter and missile attack allocation, no placed marker, 2 missiles per mass, each missile does 1 point) and Asgard Beam Transporters and F-302s (heavy interceptors). The Lucian (Goa'uld design) Ha'taks had lots of Beam 2s, Ring Transporters, Death Gliders (turkey reg fighters), and a good fleet tactician. At the end of each round of ship action, we fought a round of combat in the various locales of the station on a seperate side gameboard using SG2 chits to represent the boarding parties (100 total combat strength in total in the scenario). Cinematic movement. Various rules mods (fighters only useful against unscreened ships, etc). Tactically, the Tauri fleet split around either side of the station, with each wing having an Achilles BB, a Daedelus BC, and an Ares DD. There looked like there would be 2 Ha'tak cruisers on each side of the station, but Vince pulled a fast one with a hard turn and got all 4 onto one side. This was very, very bad for the Tauri - half their fleet lacked a target for 2 rounds and the other half got hit by twice as many enemies. Fighters screened ships until about the second last round. This was wise for the Lucians (so as not to need to convert beam 2s to beam 1s for point defense) and not so useful to the humans (no missiles or fighters to stop). The Tauri probably should have started the fighter clash earlier. Even if it had ended up the draw it looked like it was going to (as per design!), it would have stripped a lot of defense from the Ha'taks versus the Missile Arrays and then the Ha'tak commanders would have had to take the damage or allocate B2s that would not then be shooting at the station or the Tauri. That said, the good tactical moves on behalf of the Lucians were aided by RIDICULOUSLY above average die rolling. I think Vince agreed he'd rolled only one less-than-average roll for damage all night and when it should have been averaging 19 or so for a full 24 beam-die engagement, his shots were something like 27, 25, 23, 28 and 21. The other Ha'tak commander was good (score 15 on a roll that should have been 9) but not as awesome as Vince. That combination made the space battle a bit of a route for the Tauri as the Ha'taks savaged them. By the end, two fleets that should have been somewhat close in CPV ended up with the Ha'taks having 1 threshold and working on another and a human BB and DD gone and one BC savaged (a total of about 9 thresholds). To speed thresholds, I used a threshold chart for each class. Roll 1D6 and I read off a list of systems taken out for threshold level N (1, 2, etc). This made thresholds for the classes I'd finished the charts for very fast. I will probably do this all the time in FT from now on. In the end, the Lucians held 2 sectors in the station, the Tauri 3 including the center and the other 2 were contested. It was a touch and go fight in most of the sectors. However, the Tauri fleet battle was bad enough it pretty much turned a minor victory in the ship fight for the Tauri into a decisive victory for the Tauri. Vince flew well and his dice (both Ha'tak commanders but Vince far moreso) were ludicrous. The Tauri could not match those sorts of out of average rolls so that helped seal their defeat. I had fun, I hope the players did! 0900 26 FEB 2012 Showdown at Tuffley's Gulch (GM: Me) [FMA with some wild west touches] (Kevin, Aaron, and Jerry) Boss Kochte's rancheros from the K-Bar Ranch were headed into town (with the Boss riding them hard) to get the younger useless heir out of jail where the "My Town, My Law" Sherrif "Stewart MacMurray" was holding them for 'shooting, drinking, and spitting on the sidewalk'. Kevin took the beleagured lawmen and scattered them around town. Aaron and Jerry took the K-Bar boys and Boss Kochte and came sauntering (well, mostly Run Like Hell-ing) into town. There was some gunplay in the streets, a few wounds, some bleeding, a head and neck blast from a shotgun, and then a huge gunfight cum melee with at least 7 participants in the Sherrif's front room (and the deputy got shot in the aorta while he lay on the floor waiting to reload). The end result was the weight of numbers (even crappy green ones) on the K-Bar boys spelled the doom of the blue-red-orange mix of smaller numbers of lawmen. This game had some issues. I lifted the pistol ranges from FMAS but the town's main road was about 12" wide (long range is 12"....). Either the map should have been much tighter or I should have scaled up all weapon ranges. A good number of Kevin's guys only had pistols. That I'll clean up before the next game. Also, allowed moving and shooting and it was... abused. I don't blame everyone, but it didn't end up doing what I thought it should. Have to keep thinking about how to fix this one. No solution I've liked yet that wasn't abusable. The wounding rules, in an attempt to not be likely to kill half the shooters by turn 2, were a bit easy on the gunshot victims if they had any kind of cover. Aaron made a valid point that tying the wound severity to attacker die total compared to situation die meant that guys in cover were brutal to score more than a light wound on. Will get that cleaned up before my next game. Still, I hope the guys had some fun. It was fun to watch Aaron play Boss Kochte (whom I described as Ed Asner - hard ass ranch boss with an ego) as I did a bit of NPC improv for his sun in the jail (as Boss Kochte called to the none-too-bright-and-all-too-likely-to-misbehave Jerry-Jon Kochte the heir). "Where's mah boy? Get my boy out of there!" "Pa, the Sherrif's looking at me funny! And the food is awful!" etc. I think with a few flaws tidyed up, I'll have a good enough set of Western FMA-ish rules to use more generally.