I have already talked much about my love for Skirmish Sangin, and having played V2 remotely over the last few months, I found my energy for it returned. However, I definitely found a few places where the systems in the Beta rules just didn’t seem to work, missing the point of the game or requiring far too much busy work for my tastes. And so I got to work thinking up some ways to take the game I adore.

This has obviously taken some time – writing rules and working through the basics requires some thought. But, Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 had its campaign released the weekend before this game and I had a good time playing it. More importantly, as I was crossing over a border in pursuit of the villain, I suddenly realised what my next game of Sangin was going to be. Luckily, I also had a game arranged with my former housemate and as a recovering player of Inquisitor and the 40k RPGs, the sight of D100s wouldn’t terrify him fast enough to cause a problem.

So with all this arranged, and with a few custom rule sheets printed out, we return to the Albion/Bazistan border for a new operation.

Cross-border actions by criminals operating in the metro area of Pani (the capital of Al-Bawaaba province, Albion Commonwealth) and Barakat(2nd largest city in Bazi Emirate) have been an increasing issue for the Albion and Bazi Security forces over the last few years. While cross-border negotiations are ongoing to formalise joint efforts, local area commanders often turn a blind eye to operations launched by their counterparts when dealing with certain criminal groups. 

These raids are exceptionally dangerous for the officers involved – after crossing the river, any combatants are technically violating the laws of the other nation and are outside their jurisidcation, leading to the potential for political drama. Local criminals take advantage of this problem, calling in the local police as protection from the outsiders.

For six months, the Special Counter-Drug Squad (SCDS) operating in Barakat has been building a case against an Albion national (codenamed “The Jackal”) operating a crime ring across the border. While the squad was preparing to launch a raid to capture him, inteligence reported he had managed to escape into Al-Bawaaba, taking up residence in a slum close to border. Interceptied phone communications revealed his plan to escape to an estate in the mountains deeper in Al-Bawaaba.

Major Saleem Baraca, head of the Special Division in Barakat, has managed to communicate with his opposite number in the Pani Police Force (PPF) and requested approval to perform a cross-border raid to arrest The Jackal. This has been granted, although due to the situation (it is believed The Jackal has bribed officers of the PPF to provide information), only a limited number of local law enforcement has been alerted to the operation. SCDS has one night to cross the border, capture The Jackal and return back to Barakat.

In this situation, we were following the adventures of Captain Bashim Al-Zuri, leader of Barakat’s Special Counter-Drug Squad (SCDS). Al-Zuri is attempting to arrest The Jackal alongside three other officers (Master Sgt Kaheer, Sgt Baraca and Sgt Jaleel) as well as sniper cover provided by Sgt Amari (safely sat in a hide on top of a building somewhere across the river). All of the team is either Veteran or Elite (the SCDS are well trained and pretty busy dealing with smuggling in the region seeing as the city is the midpoint between drug producers and users) except for Sgt Baraca, the youngest son of Major Saleem who has only recently joined the team after a few months on the street. Based on the agreement with the Pani Police force and to prevent misunderstandings, the squad is crossing the border in full uniform and tactical gear – this is not an undercover raid. Weapons in the squad are a mix of suppressed ARs and SMGs, along with sidearms and two frag grenades each. Each officer also has light raid-style body armour. They deploy outside this fortified area of the old town, the lights of Barakat glittering behind them across the river.

The target compound is in the midst of one of the slums of Pani, in an area under the control of one of the criminal groups. The team is assaulting during the early hours of dawn, the streets mostly empty except for a skeleton crew protecting the Jackal.

The man of the hour was safely hidden upstairs in the only two-storey building in the area alongside two of his protection detail. Interestingly, these two fighters were not in the same civilian-style clothing as the rest, with one acting as an NCO and the other carrying a medium machine gun (along with a rucksack full of ammo). It seems there are some shenanigans at play!

(Because Sarissa’s buildings continue to be incredibly unfriendly to skirmish gaming where people actually go in the buildings and need things like stairs, we counted the area currently unoccupied on the top floor as containing a way up and down floors)

Outside, the other fighters in the area have set up some patrol routes, guarding the area around the target building. On the right, two average fighters and one veteran stand on sentry, the veteran dressed slightly less obviously that he’s an armed member of the group.

Something similar is taking place on the left – a group of average fighters under their commander are getting to work preparing the pickups for transport, all under the careful eye of a veteran.

The SCDS start the game hidden meaning that for the first few activations, I moved the enemy around like they were on simple patrols. The group on the right clearing up the alleyway before taking a smoke break, the group on the left moving to crowd around the pickup truck. In contrast, SCDS worked their way into position.

During this time, Sgt Amari in her sniper perch across the river was spending her AP spotting possible targets, which means it’s a good time to mention my tweaks to the spotting system! Rather than having to set up a matrix of who has spotted who, my changes now track how “spotted” a character is on their character sheet. This is done via a bar on the top of the sheet – aside from two special locations for scenario-specific levels of spotted (Covert/Hidden), the bar goes from Undetected (the enemy has no idea this character exists) up to Confirmed (multiple enemies have spotted this character so more people are aware of them and get bonuses to spot). Every successful spot check on a character increases this bar, every activation of this character outside of enemy LOS reduces it. To shoot a character, I’ve also changed it so that you have to spot a character every time you shoot. However, at higher levels of “spotted-ness”, spotting the target character becomes 0AP for the first attempt at it which, combined with the bonuses and the rule that spotting with no negatives is an automatic pass, means that characters still get to engage the enemy they have spotted.

With Amari having radio’d in the location of the enemy contacts, it didn’t take long for the SCDS to start the party. While Baraca took his suppressed P90 for a flank down the right side and to watch for squirters, the other three setup on the group near the vehicles. Jaleel started the party with a single aimed shot, dropping his target and then confirming with a spot.

Lets talk about the damage system. The HP tracker of the core game is a very RPG-esque system but I definitely find it can feel very gamey, require too much tracking and can often lead you to having a load of people who are functionally useless but still taking up activation time. My tweaks turn it into another tracker, with unharmed at the top, Lightly wounded (-20% on all tests), Heavily wounded (-60% on all tests), Combat Ineffective (no longer activates but is in need of medical support) and KIA (dead so no longer activates). This helps to streamline the effects of injuries.

However, actually causing damage has also changed. Once an attack hits, rather than rolling however many D10s to match the firepower stat, you instead place that many injury tokens on on a character. And that’s it! You know you’ve hit them but rather than immediately knowing their situation, you just know they have come under fire. Instead, when the injured character activates (or if a friend/foe manages to spot them) then you roll an injury test. First of all, you roll to see if body armour has absorbed any of the hits; roll a D10 for each injury token, aiming to roll equal to or under your armour value (for light armour in this game I used 3). Once that’s done, you roll a D10 and compare it to a table, with the result depending on how many injury tokens are left. With the fickleness of combat, 1s always count as no effect (other than having been knocked to the ground and suppressed) while 10s are always KIA, while the other injury values vary between how much fire has been poured into the character before the test. The only exception is if you manage to reduce the number of injury tokens down to 0 – in this case, the effects range from nothing up to Heavily Wounded (by all accounts, cracked ribs from a plate hit still hurt like hell). The system isn’t perfect (there is still some confusion when it comes to what happens with follow-up injuries) but we found it quick to handle and slightly tense when you fired a shot and didn’t have enough AP to make sure the guy was actually dead.

Of course, after Jaleel puts the first shot in one guy, the rest of the squad opens up. Amari and Kabeer soon put rounds into the rest of the group in the group, the sound of suppressed gunfire slightly overwhelmed by the THUMP of a .50cal rifle.

Of course, with gunfire coming in, the Jackal’s men would start reacting. Starting on the left, the injured fighters had activated and were revealed to be Heavily Injured, with both barely able to function other than getting out of the firing line. The veteran that had been with them sought cover in the maze of buildings, going to ground to avoid appearing in the firing line of the sniper. He did however manage to spot the source of the incoming fire.

On the right, the other veteran had managed to make it up to the corner to see what was going on. However, he reached the corner at the same time as one Sgt Baraca did who, while still moving, managed to stop and drop the criminal veteran causing an instant KIA. The other two criminals on that side split up, one hunkering down in cover to protect the street, the other using the alleyways to move up to a flanking position once the SCDS pushed into the compound.

However, the big news was the machine gunner on the top floor. Spending some of the tempo generated by his NCO, the big guy managed to spot Amari’s position aim and unleash a burst of machine gun fire in response to hopefully suppress. Despite an incredibly low chance to hit (being in cover and gone to ground makes things pretty hard) the machine gun hits managed to slam home causing three injury tokens. When Amari next activated, her body armour had absorbed some of the hit, and the result was only a light injury – we imagined the gunfire had managed to rip up the cover she was behind, sending splinters into her rather than any direct hits. However, this burst had knocked her to ground, so it would take some time for her to set back up.

Not that it would save the poor unfortunate militia out in the open. Before one of them had a chance to activate (and while the other had managed to crawl away slightly), my opponent was introduced to the possibility of what frag grenades can do in Sangin. Despite his skills, the throw landed a little short, bouncing off the back of the pickup and rolling along the floor before exploding. The scatter actually meant that the thrower was barely out of the damage zone. However, the two criminals were both within the zone taking shrapnel hits and taking one of them completely out of commission. The other however managed to roll up a 1, leaving him dazed in the aftermath but still barely alive.

As SCDS advanced, they ended up in a close-range gun battle with one of the criminals. This almost ended in disaster when the team leader, while crossing a gap, attempted to spot and then shoot the enemy. However, the spot roll?

Yeah, he rolled a 00.

What this means is it’s time to hit up the fumbles table to see what happens. In this case, he rolled exceptionally well, resulting in the Captain lining up his rifle on the bad guy, pulling the trigger and suffering a stoppage. This forced his final AP to be spent diving for cover rather than pushing on into the fight.

This is something I really like about Skirmish Sangin, these little moments of madness where for one moment the dice take a wrench and throw it in the works, which ends up giving you the moments it’s easy to visualise.

After the stoppage, Captain Al-Zuri decided he didn’t have time to clear it and so swapped to his sidearm to continue the fight. This actually worked out well as, in the following activation, Jaleel called a CQB action and charged in, spending a point of Focus to bring Al-Zuri in with him for the +20% bonus in CQB. This helped him easily take out the insurgent, causing a KIA and removing the enemy from the board.

The CQB action continued as one of the Veteran criminals found himself assaulted as he advanced down the alleyway into contact. This time however, Al-Zuri didn’t finish the job, instead critically wounding the Veteran before pushing forward to advance on the Jackal’s location seeing as time was rolling on.

However, this caused a pretty major problem as the injured Veteran, rather than simply lying there, instead rolled over and (through a haze of pain) sent a burst of SMG fire down the alleyway at Al-Zuri’s back. Luckily (and thanks to having some left over points of focus), Al-Zuri was able to react to the contact and dive into cover. Kaber, bringing up the rear of his long time commander, finished off the criminal before he could cause any more problems.

Sgt Baraca, having delivered a killing blow to the first militia fighter, advanced further down the right side roadway heading to the rear entrance. However, he only got a little way along when suddenly he found himself in a two way shooting range with one of the locals. Both had gone to ground and were in cover (a total of -70% modifer), leading to a suppression war back and forth as the two traded shots.

Until eventually, in his first activation of turn 2, Baraca popped up with a final burst of P90 fire and took his opponent down, causing a Combat Ineffective result. Not bad for a relative rookie – nepotism might be strong in the Emirate but in this case it seems to have worked out well.

While the squad was moving towards the building, and avoiding the advice of his handler, The Jackal decided now was the time to escape out the back door. He actually managed to get pretty far before anyone had realised he was gone. Jaleel however ducked out to the main road, and spotted a figure fleeing the compound. He managed to spot it was an enemy combatant, brought his rifle up and shot the figure down. This led to a rather tense wait for the injury check and at the end…

The Jackal was unharmed. Dusting himself off, he managed to disappear off into the morning mist, vanishing into the slums while the SCDS were too busy finishing clearing the compound.

As we ran out of time before we got to going room by room in the the final building, we ended up talking our way through what might have happened in order to setup the next mission. With the Jackal gone, and with a team of operators about to kick the door in, we decided that the two remaining fighters in camo (having spent most of the game being pinned down by Amari’s fire) decided to surrender… by speaking Bazi.

Turns out these two are actually members of one of the Bazi Army’s many Special Forces teams, hailing from somewhere in the Kingdom itself. For all the talk of the Jackal working with allies on the Albion side of the border, it seems that someone in Bazistan is wanting to support this particular criminal. However, SCDS would have to get answers to this question back across the river as dawn was breaking and their allotted time without local police kicking the door in to arrest them. Bagging as much intel as possible, and cuffing their two new friends, the police officers made a break for the crossing point.

Overall, the game went really well. Both of us had a good time (the most important part) and there was definitely a few dicey moments in the game with some close calls. My former housemate picked up the basics quickly, wrapping his head around the AP system quickly and experience the same frag joy everyone who plays Sangin gets

For the new rules, I think they worked out pretty well with a much faster flow and less confusion (such as who spotted who). They aren’t perfect, with some tweaking needed to help reduce odd behaviour (how best to handle Injury rolls on a character already injured) and the layout needs to be worked on above and beyond what my hasilty printed character sheets can do. But that’s a future problem.

Finally, this is going to be the start of a new campaign. I’ve been wanting a story using the forces in Bazistan as the lead, and these guys should be able to be fitted into a selection of mission types using the terrain I have.

Speaking of, I really have to get my adobe buildings painted up…

Just around a year ago, the first playtest version of Skirmish Sangin V2 was put up on the facebook group to be tested. It has taken me this long to actually sit down and get it ready to play, mostly due to finally getting my mojo back to play some Ultramoderns.

With the first game of my newly planned monthly schedule against the Dastardly Regular Opponent coming up, what better time to jump back into Skirmish Sangin, one of our preferred rulesets for Ultramoderns, especially with the new Version 2 and all it’s changes. This is also the first game in the ChargeReal setting, using my fictional nation of Shyluz.

We begin our mission on the outskirts of Al-Khalas, a small village in the south of Shyluz, close to the border with the Emirate of Bazistan. Last night, PMC operators from TIJ moved into the village and took cover for the night, the civilians fleeing into the hills. This alerted the forces pursuing them, elements from the 1st Airmobile Division of the Republic of Shyluz Army.

After deploying from their transport helicopters (a variant of the Mi-17) at a safe distance from the town, the platoon spread out out over the various hillsides. Our section moved into the main buildings, splitting into the three teams that form a Republic of Shyluz Infantry Squad.

The Scout Team, a pair of Veteran soldiers who had completed the Shyluz Ranger course, were the foremost element. The moved into town, unable to spot any of the hidden defenders.

On the right flank, the Gun group (based around the MG3) moves into an overwatch position to cover the rest of the village.

The main group, including the NCO, radio operator (required due to the outdated comms equipment the squad use), Light AT weapon team and combat lifesaver, started moving down the main road into town. Pictured here taking a pause before the advance.

Against them, the PMC force was comprised of 7 operators (a mix of Elite and Veterans). Four of them were armed with assault rifles, the machine gunner with a PKM and the team leader with a P90 SMG. The final member was an elite sniper, hidden under camo netting. All of them had body armour and several grenades each (which will come into use).

To lay an ambush, a team based around the machine gunner took up a hidden position on a compound roof, while the commander lead a three man team hidden in the marketplace. Overwatching both, the sniper took up position in the main compound. All of them started off as hidden, giving a pretty useful -75% to being spotted by the opposing force. They also had three claymore mines, hidden among six possible locations. These were treated as a hand grenade but only in one direction, set off after a demolitions check.

For the first few phases of the game, the Operators held their fire, waiting for opposition to get closer. The Scout team, despite having Gone Firm (the replacement for being prone) are quickly spotted by their sniper thanks to their impressive Spotting skill. Additionally, the operators are sharing information between each other, helping the others to spot targets.

The main Shyluz force is slow to move off, partially due to being lulled into false sense of security by the lack of contact. Or maybe it’s the squad leader trying to get orders through the limited radio network thats being hampered by the surrounding hills.

On the right, the base of fire team moved into their covering position, blissfully unaware of the possible danger in front of them. Again, the PMC team wait to open fire, instead spotting and reporting positions to the rest of the team.

Despite the NCO and radioman holding position to get orders from command, the rest of the team moved up to the field edge and went to ground.

These crop fields took advantage of the new cover rules – obstacles fall into three categories: Concealment, Cover and Buildings. For these troopers, the fields are concealment – good at blocking line of sight, bad at stopping bullets. A nice simplification that rapidly sped up playing the game.

Meanwhile in the square, the squad leader continued to hide while slowly cranking out Tempo points for the squad, passing out commands and keeping the squad updated as to the attackers movements.

Tempo is a brand new mechanic that both myself and my Dastardly Regular Opponent found REALLY changed how the game played. Tempo points represent a soldier understanding the flow of the battle and being able to push ahead. They can be gained through either command actions (assuming you are a character with that skill) or lucky rolls, and then can be spent to do actions that modify the usual flow of the game, such as interupting enemy actions, reacting to coming under fire in ways other than “hitting the deck” or even adding an additional action point for when you really need to move.

Speaking of which…

The NCO managed to lag behind the rest of the squad, keeping an eye on the village. While sprinting towards cover, the enemy sniper called an interrupt and sent a round downrange. A successful hit (elevated position, target in the open and using two AP to focus easily overcoming the penalty for targeting a moving target) only saved by the NCO’s body armour roll being especially lucky.

As an aside, the body armour and overall damage was perhaps a little bit swingy. Maybe not enough to cause a problem or ruin the game and it’s easy enough to rationalise it (sometimes the hit might be more of splinters or ricochets or maybe it just slams into the armour).

The next stage of the PMC ambush was for the group in the centre to prepare to fire. First up was someone attempting to spot a target when… A Fumble was rolled. Much like in V1, fumbles occur when you roll a “00-0” on the D100 and can lead to some bad things. They have changed since the first version, now giving the possibility of draining your Tempo, losing track of your spotted targets… or making yourself exposed for someone else to spot.

Obviously the movement of the PMC in the town centre drew just the wrong sort of attention. Naturally I selected him to be spotted by the machine gunner in the Base of Fire Team, already set up in a perfect flanking position. However, part of me was aware that I’d have to wait a little bit before actually being able to drop that 2″ burst of MG fire.

At a similar time, just as the fireworks kicked off, I decided to push my scout team up to the buildings. They would not be aware of the enemy forces above them, their spotting being unable to work out what the noise coming from above them was. Behind them, one of the Base of Fire team also attempted to spot but failed.

At this stage I unfortunately had a minor issue – all of the activations coming up were for the PMC force. And worse, my Dastardly Opponent was all ready to use them. First action?

Flipping over the claymore marker and rolling to detonate…

It went off successfully, the mine slinging a torrent of ball bearings at the two soldiers within the blast radius. Not even the protection of the rocks was able to reduce the damage to a manageable level. The Machine Gunner was killed outright, while the loader took enough points to permanently pin him, effectively taking him out of action.

The next thunderous explosion was a PMC operator posting a frag grenade off the room and into the scouts below. This time there was no cover to reduce the damage and again, both operators were severely injured.

This of course was made worse when the next PMC decided to finish the job with another frag grenade. This finished off both scouts, the deadly amount of damage (3d10 inside the kill zone) easily overcoming the armour protection.

Overall, this flank was starting to look like a nightmare. Two thirds of the total number of troops on that side taken out, leaving only the team leader and a rifleman still in action.

However, the fight wasn’t over yet. Despite some small arms injuries from the PMC machine gun, the team leader was able to slide into cover next to his subordinate and hand him a frag granade. The rifleman then activated, winding his arm up to fling the bomb…

And Nailing the guys on the roof with it. One PMC operator was taken out immediately, while the others all took damage and suppression from flying debris.

On the opposing flank, having spotted the gunfire from the elevated positions, the main team decided to attempt to flank around the compounds. Interestingly at this point they were unaware of the group still in them market.

Until they managed to work out a good flank onto the hidden bad guys. Looking through the gap behind the buildings, the pair of riflemen were able to spot the hidden enmies and start putting shots down, although none managed to cause damage.

In response to the advanacing enemies, the sniper fired a final shot down the road at the edge of the field and then relocated to cover the rear. Getting an additional AP via tempo points, the sniper went firm in cover, giving them a little more survivability.

Meanwhile, the Shyluz Infantry started moving up a little closer, working their way around the field to avoid being cut down by the machine gun fire. It should be noted that the NCO of the team lagged behind a touch, using most of his actions to attempt to get more tempo and interrupt some of the enemy movement. However, this was not as successful as the Elite PMC Commander, and much of the dice rolling was unsuccessful.

Unfortunately I managed to miss out on getting a photo of the action but the Infantry ran into a major issue when the PMC operators pulled out frag grenades and lobbed them over the cover. There was less immediate KIAs than on the other flank, but it was definitely spreading the suppression and wounds around.

At this point, the PMC team realised they could slowly start peeling out, having delivered a pretty destructive ambush on the pursuing force. The machine gun team on the building moved first, with one of the riflemen picking up the body of his teammate. The small group left the back door and kept moving.

However, their retreat left an opening on the right flank, meaning the two remaining members of the Base of Fire team could move up. The team leader reached the edge of the wall and fired a few shots at the retreating team in the marketplace, who had managed to disengage behind the thunderous explosions. However, being injured meant most of the shots whistled overhead.

Of course, shooting off the rifle caught the attention of the PMC Machine Gunner who managed to spot and then shoot through the field. The rounds shredded the foliage, removing the Shyluz team leader from play.

With a smoke grenade popped and most of the pursing force pinned down, the only obstacle between them and escaping was the enemy Radio operator, who had managed to find a gap in cover that neither the PMC riflemen or the sniper could engage. It was of course at this stage that the Dastardly Regular Opponent decided to try out the CQB rules. A quick combat move, a very high CQB skill + sidearm and the radio operator was in the dust.

With the entire Shyluz infantry squad in various stages of out of action, the International Janissaries managed to break contact and escape into the wild forest that covers the border between Shyluz and the Emirate of Bazistan. They had taken casualties and injuries but managed to get everyone out and to safety.

Overall, it was a really fun game to sit down and play. The new version of Skirmish Sangin keeps a lot of the stuff I loved from the original, slims down a lots of the bulk in the older systems and then adds some new twists.

In addition to the ingame tweaks I am also a big fan of the new character creation process. By breaking the link between activation order and skill level, you can now have much more varied soldier types at the different levels. Additionally, each character is built from a template, giving you some preset to values to then adjust to give them the specific feel. Building the two sides took a fraction of the time it used to.

In terms of the game, we both had a really good time, quickly getting back into the swing of it. I’m already planning out a new scenario in the setting, looking at some other operations in the ChargeReal. Maybe over the border in Emirate of Bazistan. There are a few little things I think I need to prep before next time – the character sheets have a lot going on on them (wounds, tempo and suppression especially) that need to be tracked during the game. I’m think of using some pins on a backing board so I can move them back and forth. But expect more games soon!

Yes, as previously announced, the next version of Skirmish Sangin is coming. Titled simply Sangin, with an updated subtitle, this product is designed as an evolution of the first game – keeping some of the core concepts while making it play a little more smoothly. To begin the playtesting process, Dishdash Games have put up an alpha version of the rules, letting everyone start playing and take a look. You can find it on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/groups/716296198947496/permalink/762611367649312

To play my part in this testing, I’m going to be putting up a few posts as I work through it, especially once my foray into the North African desert is over and my Regular Opponent is dragged into the uplands of Bazistan for some counter-insurgency patrols.

But before we begin the actual playing, lets talk through some of the major changes. All of these are using screenshots from Playtest Version 1.5.4. As a heads up, I’ll be using Skirmish Sangin and V1 for the original game, and Sangin and V2 for the playtest rules.

New Character Card

This is going to be a brand new post to itself but the classic character sheet is gone. Instead, we have a much leaner, much more active character sheet. Damage is designed to be marked off as it’s taken, there are far fewer percentages to keep track of and the bar at the bottom and top of the sheet are described as best to be used with a pin or paperclip.

Even better, the character card is designed to fit 8 to a standard sized piece of paper so you only need to print out a page for a regular British Army section.

And yes, there are already changes afoot if you look close enough. We’ll get to them in a second.

Updated Force Creation Process

Again this will be a full post by itself (once I’ve read through it more), but force creation has been tweaked to allow for a little bit more structure. There is a cool new mechanic about generating squad points to lets you spend on adding additional bits of kit.

Skills and Classes/Templates

In the original Skirmish Sangin, you picked your character’s rating (now expanded to include civilians), rolled up their body rating, rolled up their skills and then picked from a number of packages to fine-tune your soldiers. You had to break out the calculator to create ALL the skills on the character sheet and even then it was hard to theme soldiers quite as well.

In Sangin, there are now templates. These function to both give you starting values for a soldier and also define costs and skillsets. Certain templates will have additional skills (such as the NCO and the new Command skill) or including skews towards their specialisations, speeding up the creation process.

Additionally, the list of skills covers more than just shooting guns – two I especially find interesting are Interpreter and Combat Medicine. These are not covered in this specific version of the rules but I look forward to their arrival in the next update.

Initiative

Yep, the singular body value is gone, died before it had a chance to activate. Instead, the new Initiative value has come to the table, generated during character creation and affected by body armour. Functionally, it does a very similar task but is separated out from the basic skills. No need to worry about the person activating last being a complete chump.

Tempo

The big new addition is Tempo. Tempo is basically a new resource to represent your characters gaining momentum as they do well, allowing them to push themselves slightly further than most other soldiers. Either by starting the mission with it or by gaining it by rolling well, tempo points can then be spent on doing actions such as Reacting to Contact, Interrupting an opponent’s actions or even gaining an additional AP. It also lets your soldiers interact with each other, helping to clear friendly soldiers of suppression through Leadership or assist them by Mentoring them.

Tempo, I think, is huge. Tempo is going to let your characters become even more unique and even more powerful. You’re going to have a lot more of those dramatic moments, the stories you tell after the game is over – the NCO who rallied his squad-mate to fire the critical shot, the team who, surrounded by MGs, managed to react to contact so well that not a single one of them took a hit. I’m looking forward to taking another look at this mechanic, especially once I get it on the tabletop.

Command

Tied to Tempo is Command. With your NCOs and Leaders, characters with the Command skill can use it to generate Tempo, increasing the effectiveness of the force. This tempo can then be passed out to fellow soldiers nearby, helping to keep up the momentum of your operation.

Combining these two additions together, there is now a greater need for command characters to, rather than simply being a fighter with better morale, do what they should be doing in a combat action – commanding their soldiers!

New Action List

The core of the game is still the 3AP per activation and the list of actions. All our old favourites are here (including a nice speed boost for anyone not wearing body armour) but there have been some tweaks.

• You no longer pick between Crouching and going prone, instead just Going Firm instead.
• All of the actions are now properly detailed, including specifics for tweaks (such as entering/exiting buildings)
• Focus is the new name for the loose rule of “spend extra AP for a 10% boost”. And now it provides +20%!
• Attack and Clear Jam/Reload are now variable cost – some weapons are going to need a bit more time to use effectively and then get back online
• Suppression… I’ll cover this more later.

Shooting

Shooting is mostly the same routine as last time but with a few little tweaks. Spotting is still required but actually taking the shot depends on the weapon used – heavier infantry weapos

Once you start shooting, the new combat modifiers table is much shorter than in V1, with much less maths needed. Cover and elevation has been simplified.

Then when you actually land the shot, the person on the other end now actually gets a chance to react (if they have the tempo) or simply hit the deck, take as much damage as is rolled based on a weapon’s firepower dice and roll for suppression.

Additionally, automatic and explosive weapons have had their rules clarified. Now, both have Templates, using the idea of Kill zone and Damage zone to let you spread out your attacks.

SUPPRESSION

So Suppression/Morale is a key part of wargaming and had a very particular feel in Skirmish Sangin, throwing down markers that stopped you playing properly until you solved them. This worked, but it was definitely an all or nothing approach – you’d have markers or you were fine.

V2 nows moves suppression to a floating value, using the chart on the character card. It still has an effect (-10% to each skill for every level of suppression) but now you can still keep fighting through it. At the same time, suppression is also much more varied – rather than a marker for each shot on you, you instead roll the number of dice from a weapon’s firepower rating and then see how many actually beat your experience modifier. This means that elites have a 50/50 chance of beating a firepower dice, showing their nature. This change also reduce the number of additional dice rolls – instead, as you gain suppression, you hit ratings that force behaviour, going firm and getting pinned.

Luckily, you have ways of recovering from suppression. From spending tempo to motivate another soldier to using an action point to get yourself together there are plenty of positive actions to take to get a trooper back online. However, you also slowly recover a little at the end of an activation. This is where sticking to cover and close to friendlies comes in handy.

Buildings and CQB

There seems to be a lot more details about fighting in and around buildings than I remember in V1. As well as detailing about moving in them and between the sections, there are now lots more details about causing havoc getting in there. Enter and Exit actions can now include adjustments for breaking through locked doors (with or without the correct tools).

There are also rules for stacking up on a CQB situation. Currently this is the only bit of rule that activates multiple soldiers at once and once again uses Tempo, keeping that theme of it giving your force more momentum.

The rest of the CQB rules seem pretty familiar (although the modifiers now give you a reason to use a SMG over an assault rifle) but there is a lot more details to them (helped by various example and edge cases being covered). I need to take another read but I think CQB actions will end up being much more interesting.

Target Reference Points

A neat addition, TRPs add to the mission planning of scenarios. You can mark out key locations where the enemy might be and then prepare your forces for possible contacts in that area by letting shooters ignore the spotting rules for targets in that area. The fact you place it during deployment and tell both sides means that it might actually let you put pressure on your opponent before the game even starts – pushing figures out of key overwatch positions based on careful placement and making key chokepoints even more dangerous.

I will need to take a look at this in several games to see how it works but I like it on first reading.

Fumble Chart

Yep, its still here. Changed to the new rules and if you roll on it you end activation right away as well as the effect. Some of these are pretty nasty – losing all your tempo mid-mission is probably going

The D100 is still here!

Yep, the king of dice is still alive and part of the game. I think it plays a key part in the feel of the system and I’m glad it’s still here.

There are a lot of other smaller changes throughout but these are the big ones I noticed. The main thing is that everything feels a little smoother, a few less random dice rolls in strange places or unneeded maths. It’s definitely got the same tactical feel, but now with a better coat of paint.

I am very excited to get this on the table, and will probably try a few solo games before I put my opponent up against it. I’ll also be continuing this series, covering my findings as I play and detailing other additions as they are added.

Okay, this game was an exercise in improvisation. What was originally planned as an all-out assault on a rebel fortress (cancelled due to lack of painting time) became a massive multi-person game (until we lost some players due to double booking) until finally it was down to a tight, three person game. And what a game it was.

SITUATION:
BAZISTAN

US MARSOC Team Sabre has been separated and immobilised behind enemy lines. Radio communications report their Humvee was damaged in an ambush and the team has sustained casualties.

ISAF-AP forces are directed to recover injured personnel and destroy assets. Local National Forces are available to assist.

Enemy militia forces are on site and moving to the target location. Motives unknown. ISTAR has spotted unknown forces among the Militia units.

Objectives:
ISAF-AP must fulfil the following objectives:
MARSOC Team must be escorted off the board
– MARSOC team cannot move until contacted by friendly troops
MARSOC Humvee must be destroyed by the use of incendiary devices
– This must be placed by hand

The MARSOC team consists of four guys. Well three guys for me to activate. A team leader, a LMG gunner and a final trooper carrying his injured buddy around. This last trooper was unable to run while assisting his buddy and only armed with a pistol (the rest of his kit left behind in the humvee.)

Coming to rescue them was a combined force of US Special Forces and local Bazistan Forces. The four operators had light body armour and were armed with a mix of weapons including assault rifles, combat shotguns and an LMG. The local force were in heavy body armour, 5 soldiers armed with assault rifles and another totting a PKM.

Against them was a sizeable insurgent force. Although lacking body armour they did have an RPG and PKM to help put the fire down, as well as a total of 8 soldiers. Interestingly alongside them was a group of bandana-wearing operators. These guys only had assault rifles and light body armour but were rolling hard with grenades.

Seen from above, you can see the battle zone. ISAF-AP are entering from the the top left, while the insurgents would move on through the fields. In the centre of the map was the construction site where the MARSOC team have dug in, their damaged Humvee outside.

As both teams start to move, two of the operators from the rescue party work their way through the quiet streets.

The lead scout of the Bazi Army squad rushes up to an abandoned vehicle to use for cover.

Meanwhile on the other side of the board, the contractors wait as militia fighters begin to advance.

Thanks to their high body rating, two of the operators bombed forward to get into a position overlooking the damaged humvee.

They aren’t the only one getting into position. Two of the contractors move into a position to rush, one of them popping a smoke grenade to cover their advance.

Concerned by this, the MARSOC LMG gunner started scanning the horizon. After spotting an engaging a militia fighter, he relocated to behind the engine block of the nearby pickup, hoping those fuel drums on the back were empty.

Dodging the machine gun fire, one of the contractors pops smoke to block line of sight and then moves up into the cloud.

Meanwhile, the Bazistan Army were moving up as a squad. The PKM gunner started heading for the roof.

A third smoke grenade filled in the gap, blocking the humvee from any of the US-SF guys. Just in time for one of the contractors to bust up and get close to the intel inside the humvee.

Despite the firing around him, the contractor manages to wrench the door of the Humvee open and recover the data disc. Looks like payday for this merc!

Seeing the enemy getting closer, one operator decides to drop a second smoke in order to build up. However, rolling a 100, the smoke grenade simply rolls out of his hand and goes off directly in front of him.

The nearby insurgents decide to back this hero up, not having seen the fumble that just occured. They also rushed passed one of their comrades who had been hit (the cards hiding his current condition until someone checks on them).

The Bazi Army hold back and hammer rounds down range, except for one brave soldier who rushes forward to make contact with the stranded MARSOC team.

Good news for the ISAF-AP team! The injured Marine and his buddy managed to meet up with one of the US-SF guys. The rest of the MARSOC team were still engaging the agressors, hammering 5.56mm whenever the militia would popup.

But tragedy strikes! A grenade, thrown to take out machine gunner on the roof scattered into the open and bringing the US-SF team leader into it’s blast radius. The armour absorbed some of it but he was still knocked unconscious, sliding down the wall behind him.

After running through a hail of gunfire, the contractor with the data managed to get back to his buddies. This actually started shifting the militia’s objectives. They started falling back, popping off some suppression to make sure the data was secure.

The US Marines still in the fight managed to put fire down, pop smoke and fall back through the building. They were probably happy to see the Bazi Army soldier frantically giving them the Jambo as they ran past.

However every moment of joy for ISAF-AP was tempered by something sour. And oh boy, was this sour.

In one of the last shots of the game, the RPG gunner who had moved to flank managed to get onto the rooftop. With a super low chance to hit, he fired and rolled a critical. With a single super powerful shot, two of the operators were taken out, one KIA and the other critically injured.

The sole remaining US-SF operator, having heard his team go down, rushed after the fleeing merc carrying the data, desperately trying to catch up with him. With the final dice roll, he shot and missed. The Merc kept running, successfully escaping with his prize.

Who knows what shenanigans someone could get up to with that classified material…

At the game’s end, the MARSOC team had been successfully rescued, with the loss of three veteran operators rendered combat ineffective. However, the classified material was now in the wind, possibly setting up a future game.

Overall, it wasn’t the game I originally planned but everyone involved had a good time. There was some comments about getting some more cover to break up the sight lines, so I think it’s time to base up all my scatter. Come back next time for more events in Bazistan.

This week’s battle report takes us back to Bazistan. The last few battles have been pretty Special Forces heavy so this time we’re going to get the regulars on the table. This is also a chance to play some Skirmish Sangin without a giant plane sat across most of the table. Anyway, on with the battle report!

The contested zone between Bazistan and Aden has been the site of several attempts by international agencies in improve local conditions. One attempt in the 2000’s was the establishment of the Bazistan Agricultural College, including a modern educational building in the contested zone. The compound, co-sponsored by the Argo Corporation, would provide technical help to the locals farmers as well as a testbed for new techniques and varieties. Unfortunately, the building was started just before a rise in violence between the local tribes and the governments and so was left abandoned. The local farmers took over the fields around the building shell and continued to till the ground.
Unfortunately, the building, among others in the valley, have been taken over by one of the insurgent groups in region to use as staging positions when moving supplies and personnel into Aden. ISAF-AP have spotted the activity in the region and have ordered elements of the 3rd BCT, 10th Mountain Division to move down the valley. Starting the operation in the early hours of the morning, dawn is approaching by the time the first troops reaches the Bazistan Agricultural College.

BLUFOR

The Americans in this battle were formed up in two groups:

Alpha – Squad Leader and two fireteams with the usual mix of weapons (Two M4s, a M4 with UGL and a M249). One of the riflemen is replaced by a marksman with his M21.

Bravo – Team leader, Combat Lifesaver, grenadier and M240 medium machine gun team. All of these are mounted in a M-ATV with a HMG

The objective for the US Army troops were simple – secure the area, destroy enemy assets and limit friendly casualties. These guys are the forward edge of a search and destroy mission.

OPFOR

The opposing force in this battle was one of the militia groups in Bazistan that has taken advantage of the porous state of the border. Several small groups were scattered around the main buildings with a mix of weapons from assault rifles up to RPGs (including a RPG 29). There were also a set of technicals, with two of them carrying HMGs to add some fire support. Two more acted as objectives.

The insurgents have also setup the area for defence. They have placed some small but potent IEDs in some of the fields (in order to take out people trying to sneak into the area). Additionally, mortars in other strongpoints are available to call in (assuming a forward observation roll is passed).

For this mission, the Insurgents know that the Americans are in the area. They are preparing to fire a rocket barrage from their technical which is a little unreliable. This is also a delaying action, so causing casualties to the oncoming force will give other strong points more time to prepare their defences. Evacuating supplies and fighters is also recommended.

This battle begins just after dawn. The American offensive began before the sun rose, with small units working quickly and quietly to overcome positions at the start of the valley. Just off-board, Alpha dismounted from their MRAP and began their advance on foot, trekking up to the edge of the wadi. On the road, Bravo moved slowly, looking for a good position to support the assault.

Inside the college grounds, the insurgents were preparing the rocket pod pulled from a Bazistan Hind. Although the system for firing had been used before, it was never 100% reliable.

The M-ATV arrives with the gunner swinging to aim at the shell of the Agricultural College.

A better view from above shows Alpha set up near the wadi while Bravo sat in their M-ATV (their presence in the drainage ditch is an illusion).

Eager to get in the fight and keep pushing forward, Bravo’s driver put his foot down and floored it. As they rolled down the road, the gunner shouts “CONTACT” after spotting two of the sentries close to the turning into the compound.

Hearing the news over the radio, Alpha decided to stay in the wadi and put the fire down, rather than the original plan of assaulting the compound. The marksman in the squad quickly found a target on the roof and, in an excellent bit of marksmanship, dropped him with a single shot. This alarmed the RPG wielding fighter behind him, who is suddenly distracted from the oncoming M-ATV to evade bullets.

However, the insurgents closer to the road were all ready to take on the armoured truck rolling towards them. One of the DSHK technicals rolled onto the road while the RPG-29 gunner set himself up ready to fire. At the same time, the M240 team disembarked from the MRAP and began to set up their machine gun.

Before anyone could take their shots, one of the grenadiers in Alpha dropped a 40mm grenade straight onto the technical. This blast ripped the vehicle apart and rendered it combat ineffective. While the crew dived for cover amongst the wheat field, many of the other fighters were disheartened.

However, the RPG gunner on the roof was more on the game and sent an RPG round flying towards the target. Despite the huge size of the vehicle, he missed sending up a plume of smoke next to vehicle. The shot wasn’t entirely ineffective though – the blast rattled the crew inside causing them to be stunned in place.

Two insurgents attempted to outflank the MRAP by moving along the drainage ditch, careful to keep out of the firing arc of the M240. However, Bravo’s grenadier (sat in one of the passenger seats) spotted the oncoming threat. In one swift move he disembarked, spotted the oncoming threat and took out both fighters with a single 40mm grenade.

The two lead sentries, shocked by the arrival of the M-ATV, had gone to ground in the crop field. For a few activations they were hidden away until Alpha spotted them and opened up with the M249.

Back on the road, things were not going well. After seeing the original RPG 29 gunner get cut down, another insurgent rushed to pick up the dropped launcher. Barely pausing, and limited by his skill with heavy weapons, this plucky insurgent sent another round towards the vehicle. Sadly it was ineffective causing nothing more than another nasty fright for the crew in the MRAP. Return fire cut this have-a-go-hero before he could reload.

I haven’t got a huge number of photos of this but throughout the game, Alpha squad were racking up a massive bodycount. Rather than advance, they simply sat back and used their high rifle skills and night vision to spot enemy targets an engage. The photo shows one of the main threats to them, a PKM team in the front building, after it was engaged by multiple LMGs, 40mm grenade rounds and assault rifles.

After an aborted attempt, the rocket pod suddenly sprung to life. With a plume of smoke and a scream of rockets, the insurgents completed one of their objectives by sending its deadly payload into the bulk of the American offensive.

Around the same time, a plucky insurgent armed with an RPG attempted a hit and run on the MRAP. This shot also missed but it did make the M-ATV realise that it maybe should move before one of the rounds actually caused some damage.

Having seen the rocket pod go off, the Americans were desperate to engage and destroy the launcher before it fired again. This lead to a rather hilarious situation where almost two full squads engaged an empty vehicle and managed to do nothing more than add some ventilation holes, wreck the interior and blow big chunks of dirt up.

On the other flank, the green technical had been attracting ineffective fire from Alpha while distracting them from the escaping supply truck. As the rounds got closer, the technical decided to back up.

“What’s that Abdul, there’s Americans around here?”

The M-ATV hammered away with it’s .50cal, turning the vehicle to mincemeat and igniting the ammo.

With only two fighters left, Alpha and Bravo decided to roll forward and begin clearing out the college building. However, tragedy unfolded when the M-ATV decided to cut through one of the crop fields. With a deafening bang, one of the IEDs detonated and ripped through the crew compartment, completely destroying the vehicle. Having not taken a single casualty all game, two soldiers were now dead and an expensive vehicle was now wrecked.

However, the Americans had forced the insurgents from this position and the road was now open for the rest of the offensive to move forward. At the same time, despite massive casualties, the insurgents had fired their rocket barrage, evacuated their supply truck and caused casualties amongst the American forces.

Overall it was a really fun game. BLUFOR managed to get fire superiority and keep it through most of the game. Playing as the insurgents, I think I fixated too much on the M-ATV rather than trying to engage Alpha. It was a real shame that my off-map mortar were not called in – I guess they had an issue (possibly the kicking off for a new scenario perhaps). At the same time, I managed to hit all of my objectives which is new! It’s also really different to play with more Average troops having been running the demo game with Special Forces. There were more missed shots than I was used to (even with one of my opponents using his magic dice) which led to a few outrageous shots.

Having not run a game at the club since January, I really miss the different feel that you get from running demo games. It’s a bit more relaxed despite having less time to play. So expect a game in April – perhaps this one will be run with more than a week’s worth of planning.

If you haven’t checked out the previous posts in the series on Operation Dragon’s Hoard, check out the page I’ve set up for it at https://hntdaab.co.uk/blog/demo-game-operation-dragons-hoard/

Last weekend was Vapnartak. This was a show I’ve been particularly looking forward to; Its one of my “local” shows (thanks to one of my buddies in the wargaming being based in York) and it’s also a massive event spread over three floors (and mezzanines). Its big enough to lure many of the southern companies (such as Empress) up to the frozen north. Getting to run a game has been on my wish list for a while and I was a little disheartened when they initially reported they had ran out of space. However, thanks to the guys at York we managed to squeeze in and we were off to the races.

PRE-GAME TWEAKS

So with the whole uncertainty around if I was running a game, I didn’t manage to do the main task of making the plane look a little less hacksawed by using my new airbrush and dremel. With only two weeks, the idea of having to repair it in the event of dremel related mishaps was too much to take. Instead, the focus shifted to improving the other elements on the table.

First stage was repairing the boards. This was pretty simple – reapply the filler, textured paint and the cover up with lashings of Zandri Dust. The repair work was mostly effective. However afterwards there were one or two places where I don’t think the filler had set properly before I painted it and so it wasn’t quite as hard-wearing as it should have been. However, between these tweaks and changing how I transported the boards (bubble wrap rather than foam spacers) meant there were no massive chunks of surface that had been knocked away.

The next step was to add some more terrain elements. Finishing off another RedVectors buildings gave the OPFOR some height (useful for the marksman) and make the board look a little less empty. As I mentioned in the impressions on them, this one is great but I did have one or two events where the rooftops dropped through the rest of the building. Luckily no figures were lost to the fall damage.

Another element I think that was missing from the board was debris. Even if you ignore the straight edges on the plane wreckage, it’s easy to notice the lack of material that a plane shredding itself in mid-air would eject. This would also add some more detail to the board and provide some difficult ground to cross. Building them was pretty simple – get more plasticard, cut out kidney shapes, add plastic elements from the C130 kit and then cover in filler. Some of the plastic elements were trimmed to be closer to the ground making them look like they have sunk into the sand.

Once assembled, the same process I used on the boards again came into place. The difference this time was that I added a rough spray of grey over the plane elements, oversprayed by the base colour and then finished off with some drybrushing grey and the old faithful, Iraqi Sand. Overall I think they worked out quite well – it helps to make the board look closer to the ideal.. The only issue was again due to the filler. It hadn’t set correctly and so, as you can see above, a few bits chipped off over the weekend. It’s easily fixable but if I had more time it shouldn’t have happened in the first place. Moral of the story – don’t try to rush things at the last-minute.

For a while, I’ve been wanting to upgrade my central objective from “white SUV” to something more suitable to the mission title of “Dragon’s Hoard”. After throwing a few ideas around, the idea of a big chunk of gold was just too tempting. I’d already bought the components I was going to use as part of Bank Accessories pack from TTCombat in 2017 and just hadn’t got round to building the actual objective. With time pressure adding focus, I built the pile of gold you see above. The three stacks were to act as the base, with one of the smaller piles placed on top for detail. The other smaller pile was chopped up into single bricks to be loosely scattered around the base.

After basic construction, the next stage was adding the tarp. This was the classic modelling standby – toilet paper with watered down PVA painted over the top. Once this was dried, painting began. Rather than painting up like terrain, this was closer to a figure – sand on the base, black undercoat, base colours, lashings of agrax and then drybrushing. The tarp was painted dark blue first before going over the top with a layer of light blue. Gold on black is always interesting and it took several coats to get the look I was after. Also Agrax is still my method of choice for fixing any issues with painting.

Something else I needed was smoke cloud, both for the operators to deploy and also to mark when explosions went off. Rather than cotton wool, one of my fellow SESWC members pointed me in the direction of teddy bear stuffing. After a Saturday where I couldn’t find any in Edinburgh I went to Amazon and ordered 1kg of the stuff. Now, I may not have anticipated just how much 1kg of stuffing is. The package was literally straining at the packaging when it arrived. To put it mildly, I don’t think I’ll be buying much more, even if I decided to model shooting lines for a Napoleonic battle.

Once I’d pulled lumps of smoke off the pile, it was painting time. Rather than just dropping lumps on the board, I used some old bases to keep the clumps anchored to the ground. Rather than just using the same colour for all of the smoke, I set up a few schemes. The white smoke had Mechanicus Grey spray for the lower portion with white spray paint for the top half. The black smoke was a little more involved. The bottom was black spray done relatively close to the clump for a dark colour. The next step was black again but further away. Finally, a light dusting of grey for the top of the cloud. For a first attempt, the smoke clouds worked fine – the only change I’d make would be to get a glue gun to stick the smoke to the base.

Some of the final prep was getting some more cards printed out. This was for a few reasons but primarily, it was because I repainted my insurgents. Along with finishing the other insurgents, I had I ended up with a fair number of cards left over to fill. This was a perfect excuse to keep working on the Task Force Operator pile, with a particular focus on some of the cool gear people may want to pick (such as the airburst grenade launcher). I also added the December releases to the list of guys I have on cards so pickup games of Skrimish Sangin will be even easier to arrange. Once again, personalised card creator knocked it out the park in terms of service. Downside: I didn’t do any post processing on the images so you can plainly see which cards are from which packs I made. However, they were once again a hit.

As I mentioned in my last post, the game at Fiasco ran well but it did feel like the operators, once on the objectives, were basically fated to win which is fine but not quite as exciting as it should be. Having managed to use two of the cards in the new pack for some Technicals, I decided that the operators going loud (be that by lots of gunfire or by blowing the cockpit) should prompt the arrival of some insurgents reinforcements. This basically moved the response squad from a building to a much larger threat, as a four man team of veterans were accompanied by two technicals with HMGs. The operators, thanks to the technicals lacking armour and BLUFOR having brought AT weapons, would find it relatively easy to destroy these reinforcements, as long as they react fast enough. This also makes the end game as exciting as the start, forcing the players to change-up the plan rather than getting all the time in the world to work out how best to approach the problem.

DETAILS OF THE DAY

After setting up the boards on Saturday afternoon (thanks to traders and game organisers being let in early), Sunday morning was a quite relaxed affair where we were able to turn up, get the figures out and then get ready for everyone turning up. Once again, we managed to run the mission three times, rotating players and observers each time.

Game 1 was the usual show started in that I get to play against my number 2. As well as making the game look busy while everyone is doing the early morning lap of the show, it’s also a chance to iron out issues and show off exciting gameplay. Game 1 had a nice mix of stealth and violent gunplay with BLUFOR achieving most of their objective before we called time.

Game 2 brought in some of the public to participate. I actually disappeared off for my lunch break during this battle so I didn’t see all of it but there was everything from awesome sniper shots, some clever tactics and a slightly explosive fumble that luckily didn’t cause any harm other than the need for some fresh pants.

The final game of the day showed just how deadly Skirmish Sangin can be. Thanks to the operators picking a lot of explosive weapons (ranging from two AT4s to the multiple grenade launcher and airburst grenade launcher) the game was all action all the time. With both BLUFOR players ignoring stealth in favour of all action all the time, this was one game where the technicals were actually rolled out. The .50cal scared a few people, but the return fire was able to cut

THOUGHTS ON VAPNARTAK

That was the game, how was the show? Well, apart from two evacuations after someone set the smoke alarm off twice, it was a fantastic show. Vapnartak does really well thanks to its timing at the start of the year, dragging in everyone looking to pickup new projects for a new year. The range of sellers is always great, and I was very excited to see both Spectre and Empress there. The combination of these two (plus people like Pig Iron Productions and Crooked Dice) is perfect for any ultramodern gamers.

Speaking of gamers, thanks to the size of York it’s perfect for meeting up with people you’ve only talked to online. Putting voices to names is always exciting and getting to talk about the hobby is one of my favourite things.

PLANS FOR NEXT TIME

So what’s next?

• Work on the plane – change the edges of the cut to look less uniform, curl some of the panels, add some interior details (dangling wires and cargo nets) and then tweak the paint job
• General repair work – make sure there are no chipped edges
• Get the new buildings from Supreme Littleness Designs ready for action – I’m really excited to get these buildings into action. As I want to build and paint them up myself, there is going to be a little bit time to put aside to get these things built up but they should improve the look of the board and provide a nice tactical challenge for the players.
• Tweak the battle – We’re almost there. The final gameplay tweak is going to be adding another two-man patrol to the OPFOR start. However, this patrol will be further back – they are not designed to be sentries, instead they will be backup once the action starts.

Something else I’m thinking about is future games. In the projects post for this year I’d mentioned my plan to do a second demo game, with its first run at Fiasco. As fun as this would be, one of the things I realised is that I kind of missed going to Vapa as a customer rather than as someone demoing. Chatting to the figure makers was limited to during a few small breaks. I also didn’t get to do as much browsing as I would like. Combining this with possible work schedules and I think I’ll be having a year off. Game 2 will be bumped back, giving me some more time to work on what exactly I want to do.

CONCLUSION

I’m so glad that we managed to show off at York. I’m even more glad that people really seemed to enjoy it. I had lots of great feedback from people (as always, a downed C130 draws the eye) and was really happy that lots of people totting cameras stopped to take proper photos. Seeing as the planned items is also much smaller, I think we are almost there with this game. Fingers crossed, the version shown at Hammerhead will be the definitive version, perfect for its final planned showing. So keep your eyes open for the final part of Operation Dragon’s Hoard at Hammerhead in March.

If you haven’t checked out the previous posts in the series on Operation Dragon’s Hoard, check out the page I’ve set up for it at https://hntdaab.co.uk/blog/demo-game-operation-dragons-hoard/

Operation Dragon’s Hoard had its first public showing last weekend. This was a pretty major turning point for this project – as well as having the game running, it also needed to actually attract people to it from the horde walking past.

Pre-Game Tweaks

Remember the massive list of things at the end of the last post? Unfortunately due to a couple of reasons (mainly the potent cocktail of other releases, work and finishing a book off), I didn’t manage to get any of the physical tweaks to the board done. I really don’t want get into adding more damage without having the correct tools and material for the job so I pushed back those changes to the long gap between Fiasco and Vapa.

One thing I did decide to do was adjust some positions of bits of terrain in order to change-up the dynamics. BLUFOR now approached the board from a full edge rather than just a corner piece. They also approached the plane side on rather than head on, meaning that the detached wing became less of a trench line. The other two points were shifting the buildings around, and moving the technicals from parked locations to more dispersed. As well as improving the look of the board, it helped to make things a little bit more natural looking.

The final decision was to adjust the number of characters on both sides. BLUFOR was reduced to two fireteams (8 in total) while OPFOR was maintained at 16. The aim with this was to keep a relatively quick pace of play (allowing for a quick turn around) while also providing a challenge. BLUFOR should still have a slight advantage but there should still be a little more balance that what was seen in the original run.

Details Of The Day

Part of the reason for choosing Fiasco as the first run was it’s on my home turf. Needing only to drive 30 minutes into Leeds to get to the Armouries meant I had a pretty relaxing morning. As I wasn’t a trader I could only use the back entrance for drop off. Luckily, there is a cheap nearby car park to leave the car in. In addition, being in Yorkshire meant I could grab my usual York based gaming buddy Peeb to help out.

Setup was relatively painless – the tables were already placed out in the hall and just need a quick swap round to create a more level surface. A quick look around the hall also made me realise I need to a bring a tablecloth next time to cover up the table underneath.

As it was pretty quiet at the start of the day (everyone more focused on seeing what was available rather than wanting to sit down to a game), I decided to jump into a quick game against my buddy in order to give the table some activity. To make it easier to stop and reset once someone became interested, we went for a tiny team of operators (just four) against the rebels. This first game was pretty relaxed so it ended up being a testbed/photo gathering chance. I also got to see Mr REDVector himself, and show off his buildings being put to good use.

Peeb decided to go loud in a rather spectacular way by shredding a patrol with a 40mm grenade and causing enough suppression to worry the elite reaction team hiding in the building.

The game also saw one of the OPFOR team manage to sneak behind the BLUFOR operators. Rushing up the wing and standing on the engine, he was interrupted by the operator snap firing. This shot managed to hit the OPFOR, dropping him. Nice try, but no one out sneaks Wyse.

At the end of the game, which ended with the BLUFOR operators with two figures down and the other two suppressed, we decided to do a few tweaks. Bringing the rest of the BLUFOR team on the field, we also moved the OPFOR DMR nest to tweak its field of fire. Rather than seeing across the entire board, the rear DMR now just had a good shot into the gap between the two plane sections.

As you might be able to guess from the lack of photos of Game 2, it was full on. Both myself and Peeb took control of the OPFOR forces to go up against three players (split up with 4 – 2 – 2 in terms of figures). Overall it was a bloodbath, with BLUFOR using its explosive advantages and reasonable skills while snapfiring to reduce the OPFOR team down to only three survivors before calling it.

After another gap (during which I ran round the floor grabbing some purchases while Peeb watched the table) and then we had time for one final game. Three kids took command of six operators and in perhaps a shocking display of the impetuous of youth, managed to achieve the most objectives of any games during the day. Highlights include an early maneuver that saw two operators pile on to a single militiaman and (I quote) “shank him”.

After the game was done it was time to pack up. Everyone we talked to seemed to like the board (especially the centerpiece) and many of those who got to play came away with saying how much they had enjoyed it. I also really liked how many people said how they had seen Skirmish Sangin before but were tempted to get back into it after seeing it being played.

Thoughts on Fiasco

As for Fiasco 2017 what did I think about it? It’s very definitely on the smaller side of shows, with a focus more on local clubs and retailers. As such, it got really quiet by the start of the afternoon and I think many people were there to simply get in, buy and then get out. The other thing is the hall is a little dark. Black curtains and roof worked okay but it did lead to lots of slightly overshadowed photos.

The location is great, relatively central to Leeds and only a short walk to the station. Car parking is expensive if you want to park right next door to the event but a short walk away is £3 all day – one of the joys of being on a Sunday.

Overall as an exhibitor doing something for the first time and with free accommodation in the city, it worked out great. I’m also tempted to come back next year with a new demo game but we will have to see.

Plans For Next Time

The next event is going to be Vapnartak in February at York Racecourse. This is the first Big show of the year I’ll be going to and as such I want to improve the board even more. So there are a few points to look at.

Fix the broken edges on the boards 

I really like the boards and they seem to have held up pretty well to models and dice bouncing off it. However, the edges have been suffering and so I need to do some emergency repairs. Luckily it should be relatively easy to repair. The bigger issue is how best to prevent this damage from happening too often.

Detail the plane

Yeah okay, I know I mentioned this one last time. Same plan however I should be getting the necessary tools (dremel and airbrush) and material (wire and aluminium foil) at Christmas

Improve the central objective

Still trying to decide between gold transport and mysterious box – either way this should be more interesting than the objective to “look through car”.

Tweak the balance

So we’re still not 100% on the balance. I think that 6 BLUFOR seemed to be the best number to balance speed and the giving the players enough toys to play with. On the OPFOR side, I want to tweak the composition. Primarily, I want to adjust the elite reinforcements so they don’t just roll out of building.

To make the game a little more exciting, I’m tempted to get some cards made for vehicles and have the OPFOR backup arrive in a pickup and backed up by a .50cal truck. This would force BLUFOR to get into a good location rather than letting them sit back and plink. It also helps with the action movie esque flow.

Build more explosion markers

I’ve learnt the ways from a friend at SESWC, but I think I need more. Especially if the Operators get more explosive weapons.

Make more cards

It’s safe to say the cards are a hit, with lots of comments and questions about them. With some upcoming releases and the possibility of swapping some figures out, more cards are needed!

Conclusion

So overall I’m calling Fiasco 2017 a success, which is a strange thing to say based on that name. The game worked, people enjoyed it and I didn’t destroy the terrain in transit. I should be doing an update post just before Vapa in the new year so keep your eyes open for that!

It was the last club night before Halloween – something slightly spooky was required. With freshly finished scenario in one hand, and freshly painted werewolves in the other, we sat down to play… Home of the Wolf!

The scenario saw 8 UKSF soldiers and a SIS agent going up against 3 werewolves. Thanks to the design of the scenario, I managed to fit two games of it in.

The board ready to play, with an abandoned compound in the middle of a forested valley. I think this was the most trees I’ve used in any of my wargames.

First game saw me taking control of the werewolves. The SAS setup throughout the central compound, in particular taking the high ground.

Slightly blurry shot, but it isn’t a werewolf film without a shot of one howling to the moon. I went for a scatter approach, probing for a thin point and then using my superior speed to mass suddenly at that position.

The start of the game didn’t exactly go my way. Werewolf number 3 was shot before he even activated, having been spotted early on and shot down by the combined gun fire of two Operators (including the SIS agent).

Werewolf number 2 ran straight into the two-man combination of shotgun/LMG trooper, leapt on top of the gunner and ripped him to pieces sending morale markers everywhere. Werewolf kills generate additional morale effects so even the elite and veterans were suffering morale failures.

Meanwhile the Alpha bounded over the wall and engaged one of the operators covering the front. Luckily for the trooper, he managed to parry the werewolf’s furious strikes.

I must have missed the photo but the two-man killing team that took out Werewolf 3 slewed round and finished off the alpha as well. About 4 phases in and I was down to 1/3 of my force.

Back on the rooftop, the shotgun trooper now stared down the last werewolf. Before it could leap forward he took aim and pulled the trigger. And….

Rolled a misfire. The shotgun jammed and now required 3AP to clear it.

The last wolf leapt off the roof and went running for some concealment. Maybe another ambush would help it get its prey.

After having watched the operators move to regroup, the wolf jumped in to take out another operator but got hit by the mother of all snapfires. Everyone in the arc opened up. However, the wolf managed to take the storm of bullets before slashing it’s target down and then sprinting away into the darkness.

As the wolf player, I was running out of options. So I went for a hail mary – moving round the compound, leaping over the wall and then trying to get some stealth kills by sneaking up behind

Alas, it was not to be. The wolf’s attacks were parried and in the next turn, he was dogpiled by the remaining SAS troopers.

Final result – all wolves dead, two SAS trooper critically incapacitated. Looks like the boys at Porton Down are about to have some new things to investigate.

I took a different approach when I jumped in as the SAS. Rather than sitting in the compound, I decided to make a break for the separate building and look for a spot where I could take advantage of massed firepower without being ambushed (also to avoid wolves jumping over the walls). To this end, I setup at the south gate ready for a sprint.

The downside of this blob approach was the fact the wolves could get much closer and very soon one had jumped over the wall to get at a straggler. However, snapfire inflicted some serious damage, dropping him to half health and his attempts at combat were parried.

This wolf then attempted to flee but Cunningham the SIS agent was having none of it. Upon activating she turned, sighted the fleeing wolf and dropped it with a burst before it could regenerate

The SAS attempted to make a break for it but upon exiting the compound got slammed by the other wolf.

After some bouncing around (including a good few hits on the wolf that regeneration didn’t get round to fix) one of the wolves managed to cause a wound on one of the rear guard. This caused a bubble of morale markers but the Operators were not being put down by a few oversized dogs.

At this point, the Alpha really got to strut its stuff. First it disemboweled the shotgunner (the snapfire shot missed by rolling equal to the target value) before killing the LAW gunner outright.

Raging at this kill, three of the SAS bum rushed the Alpha and with a flurry of blows (helped by the fact the wolves can’t parry).

The other wolf, seeing the Alpha taken down, promptly failed its morale test and made a run for the hills, followed by a chorus of jeers from the surviving troopers.

And with that, another victory for the SAS. Two men dead (minced by the Alpha) and one injured but the werewolves had been fought off.

One point we thought up while playing – the pounce move mentioned in the PDF which knocks the enemies prone is designed to cause a problem in close quarters. For this reason, we changed its effects to match up to the “Trip Up” combat action – a nasty way for the wolves to avoid enemies parrying them. Similarly, if you find the wolves a little too squishy, some light armour would help.

Overall a fun, dumb scenario – perfect for Halloween. Don’t worry, we’ll return to your regular scheduled Ultramodern content next week.

SHOWING NOW ON A WARGAME TABLE NEAR YOU…. 

Halloween is always a great time to put some stranger things on your wargames table. Rather than the usual zombies, and after watching a film or two, I instead pitched Colin on werewolves. Nasty, agile, ambush predators werewolves that are dead hard to kill. The scenario includes the special rules for the werewolves and a small scale action showing the SAS going up against a pack.

This free scenario (as well as some more serious ones) can be found on the Skirmish Sangin site at the download page http://www.skirmishsangin.com/downloads/

Tune in on Friday for this week’s battle report which will be this scenario. Good thing someone finished off some figures for it…

All the posts so far have been leading up to this: the first play through of the game. The original plan had been to go in at the deep end and running the first attempt at a proper show. After that fell through, running the trial at a smaller event made a little more sense. 100 Years of War is an anual event run by the Falkirk Wargames Club

After spending the Saturday typing up a play sheet, Sunday saw me waking up at 8:30 to drive over to Falkirk (about 45 minutes from my flat). The weather was a bit grim but it wouldn’t really matter much. The venue is a community hall, very easy to get to by car and with plenty of parking nearby. Its also really bright, great to see in a wargames club venue. In addition to my game, there were quite a few other being setup, including a huge Indo-Pakistani air war game next to mine and a ridiculously large Boxer rebellion game further up, complete with the walls of Peking. Overall, it was a great event – a very relaxed time that I am looking forward to next year.

So, lets take a look at the first game. The picture below shows the layout (although the gunner on the technical was removed before play began). Three players each took a fireteam (created by choosing four operators from the decks I’d made) while I took the OPFOR. My force was randomly generated, based on a dice roll for number of characters and then draw from the pack. Although this was fun to do, I think it may have made the game too easy.

There were four objectives for BLUFOR to achieve

1. Destroy the flight deck with thermite
2. Secure the black box
3. Search the white SUV for important documents
4. Destroy OPFOR technicals 

As the game begun, the players headed off for their objective. Fireteam A headed for the broken wing section in order to dominate the flank and then advance onto the white SUV. Fireteam B started close to the nose section and so they set off to place the charge. Finally, Fireteam C moved to grab the black box, as well as setting up to hit the various vehicles. All groups started infiltrating (using the stealth rules from the new book).

As they crept closer, one of the militia marksmen managed to spot an operator from Fireteam A. With no suppressed weapons, this basically meant they would have a limited time before they were rumbled.

With a ridiculously high shooting skill, Fireteam A’s marksman was easily able to shoot down his target and incapacitating him. Fighters nearby were unnerved by the sound of this first attack and started locking them in place with morale tests. Fireteam B used this distraction to get into the cockpit and placed the thermite device.

On the other side, Fireteam C got to work. The first shot sent a UGL round flying across the board and into a technical. The resulting explosion set off the fuel being stored there, destroying the asset and taking down two insurgents in the blast. The anti-material gunner 

Fireteam B and C also opened up, engaging the group near the white SUV. The first shot took down the middle of the group with the morale effect pinning the rest of the squad in place.

Fireteam C saw the fight starting and decided to use this distraction to sneak up on the black box. The fireteam leader sprinted to the box before kneeling next it.

Unfortunately, this move exposed him to the waiting sniper. Swinging the anti-material rifle around, a quick shot hit and inflicted massive damage, immediately killing him.

As the next phase started there was a sudden blast as the thermite detonated, immolating the sensitive equipment and achieving one of the objectives.

After being pinned down in the open, one of the militia sprinted to seek cover in the back of the plane. However, this move exposed him to gun fire and he was taken out by the dead eye marksman from Fireteam A. Also note the two operators in cover behind the wing, easily able to pin down anyone trying to move up on them.

Covered by their team mates, more operators started to move up on the white SUV, seeking to quickly snatch the intel. 

Having reloaded his grenade launcher, Fireteam C’s grenadier sighted the red technical and sent a round flying towards it. Another hit, another asset destroyed.

I must have forgotten to grab a picture but I should mention what happened to the machine gunner on the roof. Fireteam B’s SMG character, still standing close to the nose section, managed to thread a difficult shot through the plane and land an incapacitating hit on him.

Moving round both sides of the plane, the operator catch the last few enemies in a cross fire allowing easy access to the SUV. Both Fireteam A and B took full advantage of the cover provided by the wreckage, including crawling under the wing.

One final bit of excitement – as one operator was search the vehicle a militia man spotted him with the intel and opened up. He didn’t cause any damage and in the next turn, his target rallied and took him down.

As the game ended, nearly all of the OPFOR lay dead or incapacitated. BLUFOR took one casualty and managed to achieve all their objectives. Scratch one for the good guys. All three players had a good time which was great to hear.

After a short break for lunch (including a trip to Subways located 2 minutes from the hall), game two began with three new players picking three new fireteams. I also changed up the enemy team and the objectives, the black box now on the other side of the board. I also set up my OPFOR a little differently

Rather than jumping straight into the shooting, BLUFOR this time managed to actually be a little more sneaky.

While Fireteam A setup at the nose, Fireteam B and C can be seen above moving up on the central part of the plane.

Of course you can’t stealth forever. Fireteam A held off detonating the charge as long as possible letting element of Fireteam B sneak into position next to the engine. The insurgents didn’t spot him but did notice the marksman rushing forward.

As we learnt in the first game though, spotting marksmen never ends well. Before the alarm could be set off, the LMG gunner from the sentry team was taken down by a well-aimed shot, momentarily pausing the sentries as they have to handle the sudden appearance of BLUFOR.

Hearing the sound of gunfire one of the militiamen ran to the back of the SUV and opened up on a prone operator. His shots hit home but the body armour absorbed it all.

Before the shooter could get away, a BLUFOR SMG operator managed to get behind him, drop him with a quick burst and then begin grabbing the intel from the SUV.

Back on the wing, Fireteam A and B moved up. Fighters from Fireteam A, who had blown the cockpit, now moved to join the fight, including one who rushed up to the wing. An insurgent way back on the edge of the board (just out of shot) started shooting but was swiftly silenced by the combined efforts of an entire fireteam.

Meanwhile on the other side of the board, Fireteam C was causing havoc. Having taken out a technical and the marksman, the subsequent morale tests (and their many failures) had pushed lots of troops around and into less advantageous positions.

Seizing the opportunity, two operators moved up and started what was the strangest fight. As the shotgun wielding breacher turned the corner, the closest enemy managed to avoid all the shots fired at him, pass a morale test, drop prone and get into cover. Before the breacher could even act, the insurgent leader came screaming in from out of nowhere and engaged him in close combat. Luckily the leader manged to fluff two turns of close combat before the breacher threw him to the floor. The machine gunner eventually engaged the man under the car, forcing him to surrender.

Start of the final phase and the only effective fighter left on the board was the lone RPG gunner still frantically trying to reload his RPG. As the Operators closed in, two players almost caused a friendly fire incident. As a LMG gunner crept into position behind the tail, his AT gunner compatriot tossed a frag at the last insurgent alive. It didn’t land exact but luckily scattered enough that the plane’s tail absorbed all the shrapnel while still vaporizing the hapless goon. With the operator’s ears ringing we called the game.

Again, BLUFOR wiped OPFOR from the table (even managing to capture two of them) and got all the objectives. BLUFOR did end up losing one character to a PKM burst (this was the team leader in Fireteam A). Once again, everyone left the table having really enjoyed it.

So after getting back and having some time to think back over the events, there are a few things that I think worked and a few that need improving.

What worked well:

• The baseboards: I am really happy with how the baseboards look and work. They look great, didn’t chip too badly despite having dice and terrain on them all day and I was easily able to carry them around by hand from car to table.
• Terrain: The whole “crashed plane on board” idea worked. Despite not using a huge amount of terrain, it managed to successfully break the lines of sight and present something interesting to play around. It was also successful at grabbing people’s attention, with lots of people walking past stopping to take a look at it.
• Cards: Everyone who played (and many people who walked past) commented on the cards. Having the stats plus picture in a handy format really made it much easier for player to get to, rather than having to check bases or look at descriptions.
• Basic play sheets: The basic playsheet/quick reference I wrote up reduce the QRF down to four pages. People seemed to find them very handy and by the end of both games players were working out the modifiers.
• Everyone enjoyed it: The most important part of running the game. Talking to everyone after the game, all of them said how much they had enjoyed playing and liked the system.

What Didn’t work well:

• It was too easy: Both games saw the BLUFOR operators walk away having ripped OPFOR a new one and with minimal casualties. This is way to easy – the ideal is that the players should be able to do all the objectives but it would be a close thing.
• The demo board gaps: The tables I was using had metal rims on the edges of them. This lead to there being a slightly higher point in the centre, leading to some gaps appearing. I think I should bring something to help level it out but I’m unsure what. Something to think about.
• Transporting the boards: Moving the boards in my car was a bit of an experience – while driving back a sudden brake caused them to come sliding forward. Ideally, I need something that will both protect them and stop them shifting around.
• Standing up all day: I really need to get used to being on my feet all day. By the end of it my legs were aching. Basically I need to stretch more.

So before the next showing, what am I going to do?

• Detail the plane: As mentioned previously, I need to make the plane look more like it crashed and less like someone took a hacksaw to it. The plane is to add some structural elements to the joins, paint on some different textures (smoke and oil). Additionally, the board needs more clutter from bits of wreck that were ripped off, like panels of the fuselage or bits of cargo.
• Better objective: Speaking of cargo, the middle objective needs to be improved. The white SUV was a good placeholder but it needs to be something more exciting for the main release. I’m still deciding what it should be but whatever it is it needs to be very important.
• Rework the balance: The game is too easy. My solution is two-fold – increase the number of OPFOR and make the objectives take longer to succeed at. I think my time/AP estimates were off when it comes to placing a demolition device or checking for documents
• Tweak the layout: The core idea is there but I think the buildings should be adjusted to make them more than just show off where the enemy are staying. I also want to add some elements to make it look like the insurgents are working on a recovery operation. Finally, the technicals need to be a little more spread out
• (maybe) Paint up more operators: I really like the start of the game where people would pick their operators from the deck presented to them. If I go ahead with my plan to add some permadeath to the event (operators lost in the morning will not be available later in the day), I need more specialists (MG, UGLs and DMRs primarily) to prevent later teams from being screwed.
• Tweak the timing: I’m tempted to drop the teams down to only two fireteams vs equivalent insurgents to speed up play and allow for more playthroughs of the scenario. It would be nice if this was a quick game that players could jump into. However, I’m not decided on this just yet.
• Other things: I have some other ideas to help get the players in the mood for the game. However, these are secondary to getting the main game fixed so I’m not stressing too much about them yet.

That’s all the update for now. The next update will be after Fiasco but keep your eyes on the Wargaming Week posts for WIP photos as I work on my tweaks.

The extra post is for one reason – Plausible Deniability (The new book for Skirmish Sangin I’ve been working on for about a year) has gone to the printers. We don’t want to put an exact date on it but it’s on the final approach to being available to the general public.

I’ll be very vocal when it comes out, but it may be worth looking at the Skirmish Sangin blog and facebook pages for updates. I’m incredibly excited to see it become a physical object and available for everyone to buy and start playing with.

So there has been quite a gap since my last update (back in May) and since then a lot has changed. The game went from pie in the sky idea to actual game that is about to run in the next few days. I am both excited and terrified.

THE PLAN

So in the last plan I fired off a big long list of what is going on with the demo game. However, a few things changed

• I didn’t make it to Claymore in August – ran out of time to get ready for it. On the other hand, not worrying about it did mean I really enjoyed the Spectre Weekend
• I’m not 100% sure on Salute in 2018 – there is a lot of logistics to sort out around it (being up in Edinburgh obviously makes travel a huge issue)

However, the cool thing is I can now update that the game is confirmed for two shows! I can confirm I’ll be at the following shows running games

• October 2017 – Fiasco, Royal Armouries in Leeds, 29th of October
• March 2018 – Hammerhead, Newark Showground, 3rd of March

I should also be at York in February but we are still working on confirming it.

Of course, there is another event I’m going to this week…

THE SCENARIO

Scenario is ready. I decided that I wanted to a co-op mission – focus more on the players working together with their small fire-teams while I run the bad guys. The character sheets are all on cards makes this even easier so I can hand over a selection of troops and let the players parcel them out as required. I mentioned on Monday about the cards and I’m really happy with how they have turned out.

As for the objectives, I’ve decided on four that should force the players to push deep into the map rather than just sitting back and having a long range fire fight. These objectives are:

1. Recover the flight recorder.
2. Destroy the flight deck in the nose compartment (every operator has thermite grenades for this task).
3. Check main compartment for sensitive information.
4. Destroy OPFOR assets.

For the flight recorder, I looked up some example online, realised that the core of one looks like a fire extinguisher piece for the C130 and decided that that would be the objective. Quick, easy and simple to paint.

I’ll probably tweak them once I’ve done the first run but the multiple locations should lead to each

In addition, I’m also starting the game using the stealth rules I wrote as part of Plausible Deniability, letting the operators sneak onto the board without being pinned down out in the open areas. It also helps me to show off the new features of the book.

To finish, this is the description I’ve been sending to people and should be appearing in the various programs for each show:

Operation Dragon’s Hoard

A Special Forces team has been dispatched to investigate activity around a crashed transport plane somewhere in the Arabian Peninsula. A co-operative game using Radio Dishdash’s Skirmish Sangin.

THE BASE

The base boards are all done! These are obviously the foundation of the demo game so getting them finished was pretty important.

Last time you saw them they looked like this. The wooden portions had been assembled, the foam was added and then the polyfilla was placed on top. We eventually switched to using plaster as it was easier to buy in bulk. On top of that, I painted on a layer of thinned down PVA and sprinkled on sand to create some variations in texture. Then painting happened with spray can after spray can. First up was some textured paint (requiring 4 cans for 5 boards) then a spray of Zandri Dust for the base colour.

The final stage was a scruffy drybrush of Iraqi sand to break up the brown colour. I’m pretty happy with the final result but the real test will be how well they stand up to the process of driving to and from Falkirk as well as a whole days play on them.

THE CENTRE PIECE

As mentioned last time, the centre piece of the board is a downed C130. Having bought the kit. I then had to build it (as seen here covering my desk). The build was fun, although I was a little slapdash (hence some of the seams you can spot in the photos).

And then this happened after using a razor saw on it

After cutting it up, each part was then placed onto plasticard bases. Left over foam from filling the interiors of the baseboard was then added to fill gaps or add some decoration, topped off with a skim of polyfilla. Then the same process used on the boards was used – sand, textured spray paint, Zandri Dust spray on the top.

The next stage is to some addition damage and details. I’m actually planning to hold off on this for my first game – my hobby fund ran a little short for this month. However, they will be ready for the game in October. I intend to add some plasticard struts and wires dangling, as well as cutting some more of the panels away from the airframe.

This shows the wing and drop tank basically finished with the final drybrush layer. I think they do a pretty good job of showing off “aircraft that has been downed and left in a sandstorm for a while”.

I just about managed to get the entire plane finished before finishing this post. The final touches is just more sprays of dust and a big brush for drybrushing. The final effect looks dusty which is exactly what I was aiming for.

To add – I’m not finished with decorating this plane. I still intend to add some more damage to it but I just ran out of time and bits to be able to do it and guarantee to have something ready for Sunday.

THE SCENERY

My plan last time to go minimal on additional terrain was actually implemented. For the first run, I’ve decided to go with two adobe buildings from REDvector, five rough ground patches made from foam to provide half and full height cover and a collection of technicals (already painted) to be objective targets/cover.

The rough ground is made a similar way to all other terrain on the board – plasticard base, foam offcuts on the top, layer of polyfilla and then desert paint. The end result almost blends into the surface which I’m not 100% on. This is one element I might revisit.

It’s not a great photo but this also shows the buildings finished. Textured paint, spray paint, wet drybrush across most of it and then some brown paint on the beams. The brown helps to break up the scheme, prevent it from turning into just a sea of dust.

The terrain is one place I might tweak, either adding another building or more areas to break up line of sight. However, all this depends on the first run.

THE GAME

So with all these things at the correct stage, the biggest piece of news is what’s happening on Sunday. I am taking this game out for its first two runs on the 24th at 100 Years of War. This is an event that Falkirk Wargames club is running, bringing players along to take part in a whole series of games themed around 20th Century warfare. For me, it’s the perfect place to run a trial run – everyone going has some wargaming experience and it’s not a huge event.

Its really exciting to see how I’ve managed to actually get the game ready to go. Everything on it has been painted by me and its quite satisfying to see it laid out – this is my first terrain project and I’m amazed I even got it finished. The next step is to make sure the game side of it goes well Expect a full report next week as to how the battles went and to see the whole thing laid out on the table.

Radio Dishdash has just announced the next Skirmish Sangin book entitled Plausible Deniability. Focusing on Special Operations, this book will have all sorts of stuff in it to expand Skirmish Sangin.

In addition some preview images are now available.

As you might have guessed from all of the Wargaming Weeks where the gaming portion read “writing stuff” this is the book I’ve been working on. I’m super excited to see it as it progresses and now we’re getting close.

The book’s release date is currently TBA. If you want more info, the best places to look are the Skirmish Sangin forum and the Radio Dishdash blog. More news coming soon but I’m super excited that I can now talk just a little bit about this project.

The start of this week saw the release of the film Free Fire on Blu-Ray and DVD in the UK. Set in the 1970’s, it’s an incredibly tense film all set in one location as an arms deal goes incredibly wrong. The film is packed full of twists and turns and well worth a watch. Incidentally, it was also filmed just round the corner from where I used to get my car serviced when I was in Brighton.

When I first saw the film, I started writing a wargames scenario (scribbling down ideas on the way back from the cinema) but then that whole “lets write a book” happened and it fell by the way side. But seeing as the film has just come out for everyone to watch it, I thought it would be a good time to finish it off.

The scenario is going to spoil a few things from the film so go watch it before coming back. Everyone past the double horizontal lines should be considered spoilers.

Seriously, don’t read further unless you don’t mind being spoiled on a really good film.

This scenario should be considered Alpha – it hasn’t been tested and will probably need one or two tweaks before I’d put it into prime time. Due to the setup, it’s also quite special rules heavy (although not as heavy as it could have been). In the case of anything not working, I recommend players feel free to tweak the scenario to their heart’s content before playing. I would love to hear the tweaks people come up with. Also this will be in a slightly different tone to many of the usual scenarios I show off. It’s a little bit of fun inspired by a film I like.

I’m going to run through a generic version of the scenario on the blog, covering the sides, layout, victory conditions and special rules. This version is designed so anyone can look at it and make it match their chosen set of rules.  However, there are two PDFs available giving the exact details for Skirmish Sangin and Spectre Operations.

If you want the scenario for Skirmish Sangin, Click Here.

If you want the scenario for Spectre Operations, Click Here.

Two parties meet to sell each other some guns. The deal is almost done, despite some issues along the way, when something goes horribly wrong. It begins with an argument but escalates when someone gets shot. Now we have a gun battle. Worse, a third-party is already on site and about to join the show

Forces:

The Buyers:

The Leader (1): Trained with Pistol **

The Bodyguard (2): Trained with Pistol *

The Cousin (3): Novice with Pistol *

The Help (4): Novice with Pistol

The Contact (5): Trained with Pistol **

The Full Back: Trained with Pistol

The Sellers:

The Prodigy (6): Novice with Pistol *

The Right Hand Man (7): Trained with Pistol *

The Operator (8): Trained with Pistol **

The Loudmouth (9): Novice with Pistol *

The Realist (10): Novice with Pistol

The Third Party:

Gunman, Enter Stage Left: Trained with Battle Rifle

Gunman, Enter Stage Right: Novice with Carbine

The Third Party will also take control of two other characters during the scenario (see the special rules)

Map Layout:

(The Creative Review post on the making of Free Fire was a huge help in getting the basic layout of the warehouse)

The number on each the circles link back to the list of characters further up the page.

To represent the small-scale of this gun battle, I recommend playing on small board (2’x 2′ or less). I’ve shown some areas of cover but it needs to be densely packed with plenty of half height and full height cover spread throughout the warehouse floor.

Starting positions

The map above show all the starting positions for those characters that begin on the board.

The two gunmen enter the board using the positions marked. They can choose which elevation they start (ground floor or first floor).

The Full Back moves on using the door marked on the plans.

Victory Conditions:

All three parties have the same goals. The game ideally ends when only one team is left. However, if you need to work out the winner when you run out of time, here are the victory points

• The Money: This is a moveable objective any character can pickup and move. To be in control of it, the team must have . It’s worth 200 points
• The Guns and Ammo: These are stationary objectives shown on the map. To be in control of each one, the team must be the only figures within 3″ of it as the game ends. The guns are worth 150 victory points, the ammo is worth 100 points
• Last Team Standing: If only one team is left standing, that team automatically wins.

Special Rules:

It Kicks Off: As the game starts, the action is just kicking off. As such, the characters are desperate to get behind some hard cover. In the first turn of the game, no character can shoot – they are too busy rushing for cover/to grab a gun/to get the money.

Delayed Reinforcements: The Full Back is on his way to assist with moving the guns after the deal is over. As such, he’ll be joining the party a little later than everyone else. The Full Back arrives on the board part way into the game (the exact time has a chance to vary and appears from the doorway marked on the map.

Who are these guys?: To begin with, the Third Party starts with no one on the battlefield. The Third Party player can, at any point in the game, choose to deploy the two gunmen. They appear from the positions on the map.

Not what they seem: One character from each side is not who they appear to be. At any point during the game, the Third Party player can take control of the Contact and the Right Hand Man. I recommend not telling the other two players that this may happen – instead they should take advantage of the surprise. Note, The Contact and the Right Hand Man will not shoot at each other. If one is about to engage the other, the Third Party player has to taken control of the one about to shoot.

Arming Up: The assault rifles, the whole purpose of this meeting, are currently sitting in their boxes. If a figure moves into contact with one, they can pick up an assault rifle and start using it.

Additionally, once the two gunmen have been taken out of action, the weapons they are using can be picked up by any of the other figures on the board

Limited Ammo: Although the new assault rifles are freely accessible, they only have a limited amount of ammo with each of them. Every time one of the collected assault rifle is fired, roll a D6.

• On a roll of 6, the rifle goes click. No shot takes places and the figure can no longer use the assault rifle.
• On a roll of 1 or 2, the burst finishes and then goes click. Resolve the shooting as usual. However, the assault rifle is no longer useable until the figure has picked up more ammo

The Van: Good news, there is more ammo for the assault rifles. Bad news, it’s all in the van. As the game begins the van is locked and inaccessible. To unlock it, someone has to grab the keys that are in the middle of the arena and then bring them into contact with the van. The Limited Ammo rule for a character can then be removed by moving an assault rifle wielding figure into contact with the van.

(Optional) Luck of the Devil: It’s amazing how around some people even a point-blank shot can miss. Some of the characters above have a number of asterisks after their names. This represents how many luck tokens they have to use over the course of the game. Luck tokens can burnt anytime a character is hit. Burning a token ignores the physical effect of that shot (they still take morale or suppression damage from it). 

Now you’ve read through it, here are the links to get the version specifically designed for the two main games I play. I look forward to hearing what happens when you play. Enjoy!

If you want the scenario for Skirmish Sangin, Click Here.

If you want the scenario for Spectre Operations, Click Here.

Spectre have released their Razor model and alongside it brought out some rather cool rules to include it in their Spectre Operations game.

The Razor has a few key characteristics that separate it from other vehicles. These are

1. High speed even over rough terrain
2. Small size, light weight and lacking in armour
3. Carrying capacity
4. Weapon carrying

Using this set of ideas as a starting point, I donned the writing helmet and delved into my pile of rules (covered in great detail here). The first issue that came up was OSC and Danger Close. Both these rule sets currently lack rules for vehicles (although OSC is getting its rules in the next update). In those games, a Razor would be sited just off the board to act as a resupply or MG position and provide support. This left three rulesets to take a look at. Spectre’s rules does include the Razor 4 variant, different to the model that is released, but for now we will focus on the smaller Razor 2.

These rules are in their very early stages and so may be slightly unbalanced. If in doubt, talk them through with your opponents and tweak if needed. Think of these as guidelines.

Black Ops

Black Ops is a cool system that is super easy to get into and great fun to play. It’s rare that you will bring your own vehicles to the party (relying on stealth and all that) but for the Razor we can make an exception.

Razor 2 Stats

Name	Front	Side	Rear	Card	Equipment	Crew (Passengers)	Points
Razor 2	0	0	0	King	LMG (commander's)	Driver, Commander (2)	6

Rules

• Razors count as man-sized targets when shooting at them (like bikes). When hit, they use the car row in the hit location table.
• The Razor, as you can see in the stats, has no armour. You’ll want to drive very quickly.
• Razors are fast: Cautious Move is 7″, Advance is 14″ and Run is 22″
• The front machine gun always counts as stationary (so you always gain the additional shot)
• The Razor has a quiet engine. It does not immediately raise the alarm, instead it generates a noise counter every turn it moves. This is increased to two noise counters if it Advances or three if it Runs

Options

• The commander LMG can be upgraded to a GPMG for 1pt or a minigun for 4pts
• The roof slot can be fitted with a heavy weapon. This turns one of the passengers into a gunner. The weapons available are: LMG 2pts, GPMG 3pts, HMG 4pts, AGL 5pts
• The vehicle can carry two additional weapons (bought from those available to its faction) that can be used by character. Additionally, including a Razor allows the squad to take an additional squad upgrade for the usual points cost.

Force on Force

So Force on Force isn’t my favourite game and I haven’t used a ton of vehicles in it. However, looking around, it seems like many of the stat lines are standardised and anything on the small side will look pretty similar. I’m basing this off the Chenworth DPV with a few small tweaks. I was tempted by Deathtrap as an attribute but I think it would be a negative too far. Instead Technical makes it a less effective gun platform.

For weapon stats, check the rulebook.

Name	Class	Type	Firepower	Gun Rating	MGs	Front	Side	Rear	Deck	Crew	Attributes
Razor 2	S	W	(Optional) M2HB or Mk19 or M240	(optional)	M240 (3D)	1d6	1d6	1d6	1d6	2+2	Technical

Skirmish Sangin

Skirmish Sangin provides me with a problem as there are two ways to implement the Razor – treat it as a vehicle or use something similar to the motorcycle rules covered in Dispatches 2. I prefer the second option due to its increased detail but in case you don’t have a copy of Dispatches 2 I’ll present both options.

The Vehicle Option

The Razor 2 in Skirmish Sangin is generated the standard way depending on the crew experience level. The important information is the following:

Vehicle	Armour	IED Protection	Primary Weapon	Secondary Weapon	Crew	Cost	Morale Mod	Capacity
Razor 2	0	0	None (Can be replaced with MMG, HMG, GMG)	MMG (can be replaced with LMG)	2 + 2 (3+1 if primary weapon is bought)	100 (not including weapons)	0	4

The Razor can be used to carry additional gear. Players before the game can pay points values to store weapons and hand grenades in the vehicle. It takes 2AP to collect an item from the vehicle. I recommend limiting it to a small number of grenades and between 2 and 4 long arms. Mention your loadout to your opponent before the game starts and keep track of which character has which weapon by using a token. 

THE BIKE-ISH OPTION

The other way of showing off the Razor is to treat it like the motorbikes in Dispatches 2 (page 61) but with some minor tweaks due to it being a slightly larger and more stable platform. I’d use the following changes:

• A Razor is bought as a vehicle using the profile above but without crew. It is instead crewed by four other figures bought as normal. These use their Drive skill. As ISAF troops would be more used to driving motorised vehicles, they get the skill for free. It is generated the same way – BODY x experience level.
• A Razor has 4 crew positions – Driver, Commander and two rear passengers.
  • The Driver’s Drive skill is used for all tests involving the vehicle moving.
  • The Commander uses the commander seat’s weapon (their own weapon has been stashed away) and using their heavy weapon skill. The firing arc is from the forward position to the 4 o’clock position
  • The rear passengers can only shoot backwards and use their own weapons. They can only fire pistols, SMGs, Assault Rifles, Shotguns, grenade launchers, LMGs or MMGs while in that seat and only in the rear arc.
  • If a heavy weapon has been purchased it is mounted on the roll bars. One of the rear passengers is now the gunner. They can only fire in a forward arc, must use their heavy weapon skill and only shoot when the vehicle is stationary.
• If a Razor collides with a character, it does not inflict damage on the crew. However, it does force a morale test.
• If the Razor crashes, the crew take 1D10 damage. However, the vehicle can then move on after the crew members take a morale test.
• If you attempt to ram a vehicle with the Razor, the other vehicle takes 1D10 damage. The crew of the Razor take 2D10 and must then take a morale test.
• The team on board operates as a fireteam, with all crew members using the driver’s activation phases. They each get 3AP to use on the table on page 61 of Dispatches 2 but act in a random order.
• When shooting, the crew take the modifier for shooting on the move. The driver does not shoot – his hands are on the wheel.
• The Razor moves the full distance of 40 metres no matter how many crew it is carrying.
• If a crewman is hit, they do not need to take a drive test to remain in the vehicle. However if the driver is hit while moving, the vehicle will move forward half its move distance in the next turn. If it impacts difficult terrain, it crashes.
• The Razor provides light cover to anyone on foot behind it.
• When disembarked, the Razor’s commander weapon can be used by a model standing close to it. It takes 1AP to begin using the weapon and 1AP to disengage from it. The firing arc is from the front of the vehicle to the rear of the vehicle as long as it does not clip through the Razor’s body.
• The Razor can still carry gear using the rule mentioned above in the vehicle section.

That’s it for now. I hope more people will take a look at these cool vehicles and see that can be used everywhere, providing a new set of capabilities in any fire fight. Try out the rules, see what works and I look forward to your feedback!

Part 3 of Weekend Warfare steps away from the adventures of CGS (don’t worry, more reports are coming soon following those lunatics). Instead we look at a side story, based on events that took place in Bazistan before Commando Global Solutions arrived. These stories are based off Intel requested by officers in the company

Argo Corporation maintains several depots in Bazistan. These depots will often contain Argo made products getting ready for local distribution but can also act as storehouses for Argo Black Ops in the region.

6 months ago, -REDACTED- discovered Argo was stockpiling gear and preparing to move contractors in country. -REDACTED- hired a team of freelance operators to break into a depot and document the hardware that was in place.

The freelance operators chose to break in before the contractors arrived, when the only personnel at the site were an overnight crew not expecting trouble.

The freelance operators comprised of four characters

• “Hawthorne” – Elite with SMG
• “Compton” – Elite with silenced SMG
• “Alameda” – Veteran with assault rifle
• “Hollywood” – Average with assault rifle

There are two interesting points about these guys – the first is the range of experience. Two are elites ready to roll but the others are less well-trained. I presume they found Hollywood in a bar somewhere. The other thing is the lack of gear. None of the guys are wearing body armour and only one of them is using a silenced weapon. In other words, they are not in the best state for the mission they have signed up for – the plan is to rely on not getting spotted.

Against them are 8 guards. The four with M16s are all fully trained (rated Average) and start off duty in the sight office. The four armed with pistols are renta-cops (either Novices or Average) and begin wandering set paths inside the warehouse.

The goal of the game is for the Operatives to place trackers inside 5 ammo boxes spread throughout the warehouse. Depending on how many are tagged will determine if the Operative succeed in their mission, each tracker placed improves the final roll by 20%. If they need to set off the alarm off to do this task, it doesn’t matter. However, due to a lack of numbers and armour, it would be best to be avoided

As the game begins, all is quiet with the guards continuing their patrol routes. Hawthorne and Hollywood are the first to enter, sneaking up to the shelving and coming to a halt. Hawthrone, keeping his eyes open for movement ahead of him, finds the first of the ammo cases and cracks it open. Placing a tracker inside, the first part of the objectives are achieved.

Compton, the second in command of this little group, then enters the warehouse. Walking through the half-light of a dark interior, he spots movement and a flashing torch ahead of him on the ground floor. However, his attempts to spot the exact source fail. In contrast, one of the guards (Waters) peers over the gantry and spots someone who doesn’t seem to be wearing a security guard’s uniform. A flash of a torch and Compton has been spotted. All it would take is a radio call and suddenly the rest of the guards would come rushing in.

Sensing his hastily planned mission is about to go awry, Hawthorne now decides time is of the essence. He sprint up the board and runs head long into Jones, another guard. Hawthorne throws his weight and slams Jones backwards. However, Jones isn’t knocked unconscious (instead running back behind a shelf) and the noise of the scuffle sets alarm bells ringing. With the rest of the guards now getting into combat positions, Hollywood finishes placing a tracker, pulls his gun and starts to rock and roll. Spotting Waters up on the gantry, he raises his assault rifle and sends a burst flying down between the shelves. It misses but forces him to duck for cover. This movement attracts Compton’s attention and he also hammers a burst of 9mm rounds up towards the gantry. These rounds hit and cause a lot of damage, knocking Waters unconscious with a Critical wound. One guard is now out of action.

More worryingly, the reaction team begin to enter the warehouse, sprinting for cover (one of them even flips a table over thanks to too many action films) or rushing up onto the gantry. However Alameda, the final operative has also entered the proceedings and rushes to cover near his boss and long time friend.

The guards start attempting to spot the intruders and for a little while the battle turns into a two-way shooting range with both sides trading fire for not much result after everyone dived for cover. There are some close calls (including a shot missing by 1%). The main result is the slow progress of the operatives up the board, with a third tracker placed by Alameda.

On the guards side, one memorable moment is when Baptist (one of the reaction guards) draws a bead on Hawthrone. He spots, aims and shoots. Its unsure what happens next but probably inspired by the action film they had been watching in the hut and maybe related to an unauthorised modification to a trigger sear, but Baptist proceeded to mag dump all 30 rounds into the wall. Even worse, he seemed to have misplaced all his spare magazines and would have to go grab one from one of this buddies (translated: he rolled a 100 which is a fumble in Skirmish Sangin).

Compton rushed up to cover and almost barged into Jones, still recovering from that first melee attack. Compton however quickly responds putting two shots into Jones chest before a final shot to his head to finish him off. However, exposing himself to get there draws the attention of the guards and a hail of fire flies over his head, almost pinning him in place.

Other guards continue to hammer fire at the rest of the operatives. One, by the name of Brown, pulls up his pistol and scores a hit on Hawthorne. It’s only a graze, a light wound. In return, Hawthorne swings around and puts a burst of accurate fire at Brown. The hits pummel Brown and falls unconscious from the shock. This sudden violence shocked many of the other guards letting up the fire slightly.

Hawthorne, watching the clock, realises that it might be time to cut their losses and flee before the rest of the reaction force turns up. Giving clipped orders, the operatives start to peel away with Hollywood taking the lead. Alameda followed, popping off a shot to pin down any pursuit. Compton even managed to brave the fire and begin his own withdrawal. However, before Hawthrone could join them, one of the guards popped out from behind his table and dropped the leader of the operatives with a short burst (the hit was a massive 17 damage on 2D10).

Despite this last act of defiance, the Operatives had managed to fulfil at least part of their objectives and escaped into the night leaving only one of their number behind. Now they just had to hope the trackers were working….

So final count:

• 3 Guards knocked out of commission
• 1 Operative KIA and left in the warehouse
• 3/5 trackers placed giving a 60% chance of the trackers actually working as intended. Rolling the dice I got a 25, meaning that the mission was overall a success and -REDACTED- now know where the Argo mercs are heading. Starting point for a future mission maybe?

Overall it was a fun game. The testing of stealth rules was rumbled by a valid detection and instead it turned into the test of fighting through the TTCombat Warehouse. There were a few places where I was struggling to fit my chunky gamer hands but it’s a great place for just a simple battle through it if you don’t fancy laying out an entire board. The multiple levels and bays, as well as the shelves you get in the kit. The only downside is that there are limited chances to flank without exposing yourself. Having smoke grenades or adding a small outside area would help solve the issue.

Additionally, the lack of people with body armour led to much more cautious play, sticking to cover and using suppression. However, when someone got hit they normally dropped down hard. A 1D10 pistol becomes a lot more horrifying when there isn’t body armour to block it.

I also really like Skirmish Sangin for such a small game – each character feels like a separate person with their own skill level. For example, Hollywood’s rifle skill in this was almost as good as Alameda but Hollywood did suffer from a lower morale due to being Average rather than Veteran meaning he was more likely. In your mind’s eye, Hollywood becomes the skilled new guy who may be more likely to run away than the seasoned old-timer Alameda.

I’m coming to the end of a few things, and hopefully with have my terrain boards back so expect more Weekend Warfare soon!

CGS S01E02 – 1 Hour Earlier

1 hour before CGS Team 1 go into action in Bazi City, the camera zooms in to a warehouse complex on the outskirts of town. Zooming out to the front gate, it pans over old and worn adobe building before directing towards four dirt lumps huddled on the roof. There is a pause and then a shuffle as weapons are drawn and placed into position.

Team 2’s mission was to infiltrate this warehouse facility (codenamed Site Bravo) and perform two tasks:

1. Hit the comms tower and grab a data dump that will contain information on transfers around the site
2. Investigate the interior of the warehouse, in particular a shipping container from the last shipment to arrive at the warehouse

Team 2 was comprised of four soldiers split into 2 elements:

1. Sniper team with Tinkler (Sniper Rifle) and Richards (DMR)
2. Assault Team with Ward (M4 w/ UGL and Suppressed Pistol) and Harrison (M4 and Suppressed Pistol)

Arrayed against them?  The initial Intel put a set of 4 security guards (Smith, Wright, Brown and Creighton) patrolling round the site or in static positions. On site observation in the days before the raid showed an 8 man from Argo’s Direct Action team – armed with assault rifles, SMGs and a light machine gun. Four operators began off site in an SUV (Dvořák, Pownall, Baum and Leusink), two were sleeping in the building next to the portaloo (Chichigov and Séguin) while the other two were guarding the warehouse (Montanez and Šnajdr).

Due to the imminent start of the operation in Bazi City, it was decided to bring the action part of the operation forward. With the SUV away from the site, Ward and Harrison chose this opportunity to sneak inside and begin the intel gathering.

Turn 1

To begin with Tinkler and Richards stayed quiet, using their shooting position to spot the various guards that were in the line of site. Wright and Brown continue on their patrol paths while Smith stayed inside the front gate shelter, looking back into the facility. This distraction gave Ward and Harrison plenty of time to sprint towards the dense on the south side of the facilty, moving past the jersey barriers via the gap. They then paused to climb the fence.

Inside the warhouse, the two mercs eventually stopped their conversation and returned to guard duty. Worse, the two sleeping mercs woke up and move outside to get some fresh air. Luckily, Richards and Tinkler were able to pass on their locations allowing the assault team to pick the right moment to climb the fence and then sneak past the front security gate. Unfortunately, just as they were about to clear the guard hut, Smith finally stopped staring off into the distance, turned, noticed a man (Harrison) wearing a bush walking past and started reaching for his radio.

Before he could thumb the radio, it was time for Ward to activate. Walking forward, he pumped two suppressed pistol rounds through the open window dropping Smith to the ground, heavily wounded and unconscious. Brushing this off, the assault team crept in. Creighton, having swapped roles with Brown, walked out of the site office and strolled right past the front gate. Obviously thinking too much about the warm chair he just left, Creighton managed to miss both the pair of bushes and the strangely quiet gate post.

Turn 2

This lack of awareness would be his downfall. As the second turn started, Harrison activated and crept up behind Creighton. Rolling well, Harrison dropped the guard to the floor by causing 13 points of damage, an instant kill. Bounding past, Ward rushed to the the main hub building to get to the data tower and begin the download. Working his way through the building he reached the roof, placed the hacking device and started the transfer. Harrison moved into position on the floor below, ready to provide cover or escape should it be required.

It was at this point that an SUV started pulling up to the entrance of the facility. The four remaining members of the mercenary team had returned.

Tinkler and Richards, sat in overwatch watched the vehicle slowly turn in and halt at the barrier. Realising that the odds were stacked well and truly against them with the arrival of the relief team, and that the objective wasn’t yet complete, Tinkler decided now was the time to go active. Also affecting the decision was the sounds of dismay coming from two of the security guards – they had spotted Creighton’s body in the open and were about to raise the alarm.

Just as Baum stepped from the vehicle (planning to investigate why the barrier hadn’t been raised), a round from Tinkler came flying right past him, hitting the front of the vehicle and smashing through the engine block. The SUV was no longer functional, causing the rest of the mercs to dive out of the vehicle in disarray. Richards then attempted to send a round into Baum but he missed. The rest of the mercs outside the base then moved into their own cover points either by choice or by failing morale tests and retiring.

Inside the compound, the rest of mercs started appearing out of their various hiding places and started moving towards the front gate. Montanez headed up to the first floor of the warehouse to gain an advantage while the others (and the remaining security guards) moved into various pieces of cover to regroup.

This gap in the firefight was advantageous as Ward was quickly able to finish grabbing the download. At this point, CGS had fulfilled one of two objectives. After consulting with the CGS off-site commander (one of my wargaming buddies down in York), they decided not to risk entering the warehouse as they were unsure how many enemy troops were hidden away and the current situation was one they could more easily escape from. As part of this getaway, Harrison rushed down the stairs, vaulted through the window of the front gate’s hut and then hit the deck. Ward, data disc in hand, only made it to the top floor of the office.

Back at the extraction point, Richards was able to spot Pownall and bring an aimed shot to bear. It hit, dropping the unfortunate soldier with a single shot. However, this fire was starting to attract attention. Leuinksi, having pulled himself together managed to spot Tinkler after a few attempts. The rest of the mercs inside the compound started to engage the Assault team. Montanez sprinted up the stairs ready to breach and enter. The rest focused on Harrison, shredding the outer wall of the hut but doing nothing more than causing some morale markers. Chingov, looking for a new angle, moved behind the site office.

Turn 3

Baum and Tinkler have the same body and would activate at the same time so a roll off took place. Tinkler won it and responded by spotting Baum in the open and hammering a shot into him. The sniper round caused more than fatal damage and another merc was down. Success was also on CGS’s side inside the compound as Harrison climbed out the window and barely made a close range shot. It also caused a low amount of damage, doing not much more than putting Brown on the ground for a bit. Ward also caused some damage, spotting Montanez through the door and putting a burst into him. Montanez was in a bad way but still conscious. This shooting had a knock on effect as both Wright and Brown became pinned in place.

The next activation saw lots of things happen very quickly. Tinkler tried to shoot the LMG gunner but fumbled, causing a misfire that would need to be cleared. Spotting the shot, Lesunki popped up out of cover and put a burst of fire down on Tinkler to shut him up. It didn’t cause any damage but it did draw Richard’s attention. After a successful spot, a shot landed and caused a medium wound knocking Lesunki unconcious.

The mercs still in the fight spotted Ward and started putting rounds down. With the luck of the devil, Ward managed to evade all this fire, pass his morale checks and keep running. Both he and Harrison reached the exfil zone and were about to move off board when Dvorak, the Argo team leader, popped up and sent a few aimed shot towards Ward. The shots missed and the CGS team disappeared off into the desert.

Post Game

With all four team members intact and with the data disc in hand, CGS Team 2 had managed to fufil part of their objective. However, they had not investigated the warehouse and so are unaware of what exactly Argo are distributing in the region. Due to the lack of injuries, Team 2 will also be able to assist Team 1 in the next mission, either as heliborne snipers or by dropping into the city.

The rules I was testing was working well, and although there are a few tweaks needed it’s heading in the right direction. The other stand out part of this was playing over the excellent MDF terrain. Sarrissa’s factory is without compare and it’s a shame more of a firefight didn’t happen in there. Its also making me think about using the factory as one element of my demo board. Maybe CGS will be returning to Site Bravo? I also really need to get the boards assembled and the scenery painted – bare MDF is a little boring to look at.

Next game will be delayed a while (the next few weeks are very busy) but when we return it will be time for Team 1 to try and get out of Bazi City with a VIP in tow. Hopefully the arrival of Team 2 should help them out a little bit. On the other hand, there are a lot of cops and militia on their tail.

Team 2 sits in the back of extraction chopper, ghille suits stowed and weapons hung on the racks. The usual post mission feel is interrupted when the helo suddenly changes direction. The loadmaster breaks open the supply boxes and begins handing out ammo and weapons. Ward stands up, turns to his team and asks “You guys ready to pull Davison’s ass from the fire again?”

• Emails have been sent out to get the ball rolling on actually booking space to run the game at two shows. It might be a little early for some but better early than late.
• Continued working on the scenario and forces. Looking at three way brawl, going to have to test/practise the scenario a few times.
• Sat looking at Italeri C130s and mentally preparing to spend that much money on something I’ll be cutting to pieces. Plan is to cut into three (nose, centre of body + wings, tail + bit of fuselage) and then build up the broken support structs using plasticard.
• Built my first two buildings to go on the board. Originally I just thought about only filling the board with shacks but a few larger buildings will set the scene better and a change in elevation will be more interesting to play over.

The buildings are from Knights of Dice (delivered by Shiny Games in the UK). I picked up Desert Compound 2 and Desert Residence 1.  The buildings went together super well, just had to pop them out of MDF frame (assisted by the MDF crowbar that came in one set), pop out any inner bits and then assemble together. A few of the guys on the Spectre Operations group came up with some nice advice about building them. The dry run went together really well so next step is gluing everything together and then break the primer/textured paint out.

I’m also going to look into getting some detail items to set the scene. Thinking fencing, tv aerials and air conditioning units to be attached permanently with some more situational stuff (like sandbags) to be left loose and added when needed.

In a few day’s I’ll be grabbing the bits I need for the board (as well as maybe a little extra) and finally pushing the button on the most expensive item that makes up this build.

Coming back to Skirmish Sangin after a short break where I’ve spent most of my time writing scenarios rather than playing them, I decided to go all out. Big table, vehicles and everything. After dispensing with my original idea, I instead decided to send us off looking for a downed pilot. After lots of comments about “That’s a big board” (useful seeing as vehicles move rather quickly), we set down and started playing

The SAS begun in the village, getting ready for moving into the rest of the search area. In the fields, the rebel band was milling around next to an old watch tower, climbing aboard their technicals or setting up their machine gun to overwatch the area. One of the fighters moved north to scan through the crops but found nothing of use.

Across the board, the SAS drove north heading to the abandoned mosque. Coming to a stop nearby, the team leader disembarked and looked inside. With a whisper of a codeword, the pilot revealed himself. He was swiftly bundled into the SUV but the sight of potential pursuers caused the SAS to pause in place.

Seeing the cloud of dust from a high speed vehicle, the rebel leader shouted for his band to roll out. Streaming across the desert, the two vehicles separated while the guard team (sat in the tower) started trying to accurately spot the target vehicle.

However, the SAS had easily drawn a bead on the pickup trucks. A second trooper disembarked, dropped to a knee and opened up on one of the approaching vehicles. A burst of fire ripped the vehicle to pieces blowing it up and immolating all the passengers except the rebel leader. This cunning veteran had dived out the vehicle just before and was now lying prone on the desert floor.

The other vehicle tried to spot the source of the gunfire but the gun crew were distracted watching the burning wreck of their comrade’s ride. This distraction was deadly – a second burst of fire (this time from the squad’s LMG gunner) shot up the crew compartment wrecking the vehicle and stopping it from functioning. The passengers bailed out, going to ground around it.

However, it wasn’t going all the SAS’s way. The guard team in its tower was putting fire down on the SUV, with the combined PKM and assault rifle pinning the troops inside down. In an attempt to respond, the JTAC in the squad started trying to call down a hellfire from an orbiting drone. Despite the visible threat, the drone operators were in a no go situation, requiring more details from the operators. The JTAC was happy to give them, in addition to a few choice words.

The rebel leader was, to bit it mildly, a little annoyed. He had been robbed of his prize to parade on TV, two expensive weapon platforms were destroyed and several soldiers were either dead or injured. Angry, the battle-worn fighter levelled his AK at the figure behind the bonnet of the SUV, took aim and fired a shot. He saw the target drop behind the vehicle but before his eyes the injured man crawled out of sight.

With an injured squad leader (mostly alive due to his body armour) and still under MG fire, the team was now all in cover behind the vehicle and trading shots with rebels. The UGL punched out a grenade that took two more rebels down, leaving 3 of the attacking force still alive. The second squad leader didn’t want to become stuck out in the wasteland so he and his buddy sprinted off towards the village in the hope of finding cover and a better angle.

Also around this time, another white SUV was seen off in the distance. This was the second team in the SAS element, having been alerted to the ongoing fight. The offroader bounced across the plains, pulling to a stop near the edge of the crops in the centre of the play area. The second team then started to disembark, providing a distraction to the guard team in the tower. The PKM swivelled to face the new threat.

The let up of incoming fire allowed the JTAC to do his job more easily. Transmitting the target co-ordinates to the help flying aboce,  nothing initially seemed to happen. Nothing that is, until a titanic explosion ripped the tower apart as a hellfire missile found it’s mark. With the gunfire slackening off, the SAS started to prepare to leave.

The rebels were shaken but not yet out the game. The force’s leader became pinned down in a crossfire, lost his nerve and then left the field of conflict. However, the other squad leader sprinted up some stairs to a rooftop. Using this advantage, he and his partner in crime riddled SAS team 1’s SUV, causing the pilot to bail out and potentially giving them a long walk home. However, before they could finish the job, Team 2 landed a 40mm round on their position putting them out of action.

The AO now clear of enemies, the SAS were victorious. Now they just have to fix their holey vehicle and get out the hinterlands and back to civilisation. I’m sure this is one story the pilot will be telling for a while.

Overall we both had a fun time. It was great to get back into playing Sangin after a break and it’s still my favourite system to play.

Learning Points

• Vehicles look tough but actually technicals and humvees (whose profile the SUVs were using) are still vulnerable to small arms fire.
• JTACs and UCAVs are very fun to use as a player, even if they take up a massive points value.
• Scenario still needs a little balancing. If I had all my vehicles painted, the insurgents would have received a third technical as well as a team to go with it as reinforcement for the OPFOR.