[GZG] GZG ECC XII - had a great time

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went home from GZG ECC 12 in a great mood, more enthusiastic about the games
than I'd been in a long time.

Friday night I played in Scott Bishop's sci-fi crossover scenario.
Scattered around the table were Mark Kochte (Tau'Ri), Jerry Han (Klingons),
Aaron Newman (Earth Alliance), myself (Imperial Star Destroyers) and Ken Wang
(2 Battlestars). Jerry and Mark turned towards each other and fought viciously
in one corner, while Aaron, Ken and I accelerated towards them. After two
turns, it was clear Jerry would disappear and Mark would be relatively
unscathed, but drifting off the table edge (and wrapping back at the bottom).
So Ken unleashed fighters and missiles at me, while Aaron completed the pincer
with Starfuries from my right. I was eliminated, and Aaron, Ken and Indy
declared a draw.

After the game, it was time for the board game Pandemic.

Saturday morning I was on the Rebel side of Aaron's scenario, along with JP
Fiset and Carl Scheu. In the aftermath of a successful but punishing strike on
the Imperial forces, a damaged Mon Calamari Cruiser lurked in the asteroids,
repairing itself. But before it was repaired, enemy contacts appeared. JP had
approximately 8 or so fighters (X and A wings primarily) to hold off twice
that number of TIEs of various stripes (flew by John Kovacs and Scott
Bishop?), I had the cruiser and 1 Y and 2
B wings, Carl to my right had the Falcon and 3 X-wing shaped fighters.
Jim Bell was flying in some unidentified elements of scum and villainy
(X-wings and 2 ships of the class Boba Fett flies) with unknown
intentions. Behind the cruiser was an Imperial shuttle and 3 gunboats in one
corner (Steve Barosi), and in the other a Vesudra which proved to
be an Imperial Q-ship carrier (Derek Rogillio (sp?)).  The battle
unfolded fairly neatly. (I digress; the battle's spectacle hinged on the
typical fighter being a plastic WOTC Star Wars collectible, and the rest being
scaled up from that, mostly MicroMachine Titanium series or
plastic snap-togethers, with the cruiser model some 2 or 3 feet long of
carved painted foam). Jim's scum and villainy took four turns to come down the
right side of the board, during which time JP engaged and
slowed the advancing TIEs.  I lost a B-wing destroying the Imperial
shuttle, but flew past the gunboats, which had to face Carl's X-wings by
turn 3 or 4.  The other B-wing braved the intense but incompetent fire
of Derek's fighters while pounding the Vesudra. At turn 4, the game changed as
Jim tried to cripple and capture the Vesudra, Carl dealt with Steve's
gunships, and the I spent my turn marking damage to the cruiser from Scott and
John's TIEs and what remained of Derek's fighters. On turn 6, the game ended
with the cruiser intact and the rebels holding the board. JP had lost very few
fighters, and Carl's losses were light. A Rebel victory.

Saturday afternoon I was in Vince Johnson's game. Carl Scheu and John Kovacs
had FSE factions, and I had a block of NAC. The Imperial Japanese (CJ
Coventry) and ESU (Lisa Johnson) were trying to prevent us from sending 2 BDNs
into the past through a 'time gate'. The dense asteroids limited the board to
an asterisk shape, and the battle started with ES and IJN fleets coming up two
branches towards the middle while John came down the centre towards them and
Carl and I were oriented diagonally through the middle to face the attackers.
The ESU and IJN came in fairly slowly, allowing me to sally forth into the
middle to attack the ESU, then cross the centre and engage the IJN just as
Carl and John's lead elements began to enter the centre. With FSE fighters and
salvo missiles decimating the IJN as my guns came to bear, CJ's fleet was
decimated. The next turn, a fast moving IJN flotilla appeared behind the
evaporating first wave, but by then the FSE was busy stripping away the ESU
escorts using SMs like paint remover all over the hull. As the game came to a
close, the NAC BDN escaped the board, the FSE BDN right behind it, while the
ESU swallowed inordinate amounts of ordnance and the fast moving Japanese,
arriving too late, was also damaged by whatever launchers hadn't been able to
bear on the ESU. A
surprisingly clean and bloodless win for the NAC/FSE alliance.

Saturday evening I switched to FMA, with Steve Barosi and Martin Connell's
game. Through luck of the draw, I felt like I had a target painted on my head.
I was playing the grey aliens, lead by Beeg Het. To my left were the Drantahk
interstellar cops hunting me (Mark Kinsey). Left and ahead were the Men In
Black who were hunting me (Damond Walker). Across the table were the
Intergalactic Women's Defence Force, who wished to expose the existence of
aliens to the world (Jerry Accord) and Jerry decided he could either claim
victory markers, or just hunt
and capture me... To my right was a small squad of anime-inspired deadly
school girl assassins, hired to kill all aliens (such as me and Mark) and
finally to my right and ahead of me were 3 soldiers from an unnamed agency who
owed me money (Mike Hudak). Mark Kinsey's Drantahk advanced cautiously in a
block, driving me to the right. Aaron quickly was tied up in combat with
Mike's gungho rednecks. The MIB swept wide and aggressively advanced, while so
did the IWDF. My close combat specialist failed a morale test when one of the
IWDF tried to engage him in close combat, and he fled into the guns of the
assassins, becoming stressed with each shot that narrowly missed him or
bounced off his forcefield. He would eventually surrender to Jerry. Beeg Het
and his supporters otherwise proved too arrogant to ever drop below
'Confident', but slowly and steadily accumulated wounds (especially in close
combat) and were eventually overwhelmed. They ended the game having failed to
have wounded anyone with any of their shots from their sidearms. Beeg Het
actually died of his wounds (a bleeding torso wound from Jerry's IWDF) while
Mark's Drantahk just couldn't wound the greys fast enough to force a morale
collapse. Damond Walker's chief agent nearly brought it all to a precipitous
end by grappling Beeg Het, but his will was weak, and he wound up dragging
Beeg Het to relative safety (in front of Jerry's guns; ugh!) before going off
to challenge and be captured by a school girl assassin.

Saturday night late was more Pandemic and some Ticket To Ride.

Sunday morning was another Aaron Newman game. We had Martin Connell
(Blackbeard), Carl Scheu (Black Bart), Anne Bonney (Mark Kinsey), Steve
Barosi (Calico Jack) and myself (Navy/Governor's daughter).  Somehow,
this one started off badly for me. The Governor had been kidnapped (presumably
by pirates) and I was to interrogate Anne Bonney or Calico Jack to find out
who took him. Bonney's ship was at the dock, while Calico Jack was nowhere to
be found (his ship had been lost weeks before). Blackbeard and Black Bart were
sailing into the harbor as the game began. Each of us had 6 figures. As the
first turn unfolded, I began to send marines to the dock, while Bonney began
to prepare a dinghy. Calico Jack's figures began to appear around town,
scattered, while the 'blacks' approached. Suddenly, Anne Bonney herself
clambered over the side of the ship, shot my lead marine Ned, in the head,
dead. Then the 'Dancing Turk' followed over the side, and killed the other
marine. And Calico Jack appeared, struck up a conversation with the
Governness, and wooed her to his side. Turn 1 ended with haf my figures dead.
Turn 2 I sent a marine to the cannons and Captain Fancypants and Elizabeth,
the Governor's daughter, the end of the dock. Blackbeard sailed up and killed
Fancypants with a swivel gun. Elizabetha nd Calico Jack's cabin boy engaged
the Turk but he refused to die. Meanwhile, the undead pirates of Black Bart
began to harass Anne Bonney's ship. Craziness ensued. My marine failed
hopelessly shooting at the ships, and when Elizabeth boarded Bonney's ship,
she could hear her father below decks. But Blackbeard swooped aboard and
captured her, only to be gunned down by one of the undead, who fell to a
member of Bonney's crew. Then a second undead scooped up the lass and dropped
her as he swung through the air to his own ship. He wound up in the water,
swimming to escape the shark, while Elizabeth fell into the hands of
Blackbeard's crew. But Calico Jack, the governess, cabin boy and Mary Reilly
were storming the ship to steal it. A mine on the dock finished the cabin boy
and governess, and Mary Reilly's monkey wound be wounded twice before she
herself fell, but Blackbeard's crew was hard pressed, and the undead swung to
the attack, trying to take the virginal prize from them. To my relief,
Elizabeth woke up (doubling my forces), swung to the deck of Bonney's boat,
freed her father, and fled with him to shore, hotly pursued by two undead
pirates. The hapless marine came to their aid, survived the pirate beating
him, then destroyed the buccaneer remnant. Elizabeth ran home, killing the
second pirate in the doorway, and bolted the door. (The town was in deep
trouble at this point. While this went on, Steve's faction recruited two
townspeople, got a treasure map, found a key in the pirate on the gibbet, ran
into zombies coming from the graveyard, and attacked the voudun witch doctor
among the crypts. This had left zombies wandering the town, eating the
blacksmith, priest, farmer, madam, callgirl, waitress, dog, etc.) The game
ended with Blackbeard's mate taking Black Bart's ship, Bonney's mate sailing
away with her ship (and the treasure found in the shark but losing the
governor), and Calico Jack taking Blackbeard's ship and the treasure. The
hapless marine would be promoted and Elizabeth had saved her father.