Terry Haney Games Day - A Retrospective

Wow, it was a fantastic day on Saturday. I made it to Gigabytes around 10:30. Already there were a number of folks there. Games were being set up and soon dice were rolling. There were so many games going on in the store, I could not keep track of them. On the tables immediately surrounding me, there was a near future skirmish game (home brewed rules), a Napoleonic Naval game that was very beautifully done and a Check Your Six Jet Age game that I got to play in.

I only had a few pictures of each of the games. The above were all taken from Mark Luther's camera.

I did get some pictures of the setup of the future war game.

I managed to get several shots of the Napoleonic Naval game as it just looked very nice.

The CY6 game was great fun. I commanded two migs over Korea. I managed to get two good shots in on one of Mark's aircraft. The one that hit failed to do damage and ran my ace out of ammo. My ace then turned and headed for home. My other aircraft circled for a bit looking for a shot. After not getting one, he too turned and headed for home. Both of my aircraft survived the skirmish. My understanding is that none of the other aircraft had a decent shot before the game was called. I left early in order to set up my game.

Here are my couple of pictures for the game.

I then set up my Chain of Command game. It was the Cabbages and Wells scenario from my In the Name of Roma book. The Italians had a lower overall force morale as we used the determination of morale from the Chain of Command book instead of the suggested method from the scenario. Both the Italians and Soviets had a morale of 9. The Soviets selected a light mortar as their support from List 2 while the Italians selected a Breda Machinegun as their support.

Brian and Bob played the Italians and Rob played the Soviets. The Patrol phase was conducted with the Soviets having one jump off point right on the edge of the farm. The others were back on the table edge. The Soviet player first deployed a light mortar and the squad with the flamables on the table edge jump off points. The Italians deployed in the woods. I was too busy to take notes and enough pictures. The Soviets were roughly handled and lost two of their three squads. Their force morale was dangerously low when the Soviets managed to turn the tables. They successfully burned one of the farm buildings and conducted a suicidal charge on one of the Italian squads that destroyed an Italian junior leader. The Italians took over all light casualties but they had lost two junior leaders that eventually broke their morale at the same time the Soviet Morale was also broken. The Soviets retained a single junior leader, a light mortar team and a couple of soldiers. As a result, only the Soviets had achieved any of their objectives giving them the win.

Above is the Italian command: Bob and Brian.

The only picture I managed of Rob, the Soviet commander. Not the best shot. Sorry about that.

It was an interesting experience to umpire the game. I am looking forward to playing again. Next time I will work on the armor rules and include some in my next game.

While my game was going on, James ran a game of his Coastal Patrol rules. I really wanted to play in that game but the timing did not work out.

Mark again is responsible for the pictures above. What I heard was the game was great fun but a bit lopsided.

Next up was Mark's game of Terrible Sharp Sword. Steve and I played the Confederate Commanders and Rob and Bob played the Union commanders.

Again more pictures from Mark.

I commanded the Confederate Cavalry and Artillery. By the time I had to leave, my troops were still on blinds and had only begun to move. Most of the Confederate infantry was deployed but remained bogged down near the woods edge. The Union troops did not really achieve much but did not get moved from the town either. The game ended before anything concrete developed.

Lastly are some more pictures of people. As we learned in prepping for the Games Day, I need to take pictures of not only the games but also of people. We had a tough time finding pictures of Terry but had plenty of the games we played with him.

Here is a picture of Mark and James discussing.... something.

Another picture of James and someone else. (Help anyone).

All in all, it was a great day and I hope we can do this again.

New Toys

I have been looking for some boxes and barrels to use for jump off points. I found some boxes on the Rebel Minis site. I placed an order in the beginning of the week and they arrived today. Since I just could not resist, I ordered one pack of their Roman Command as well. Well, I am happy with the pack. The Cornicen and the Signifer are outstanding figures. I really like them. The two "officer" types are less than stellar. The way they both grip their swords just looks awkward to my mind. The helmetless fellow seems better to me than the one with the odd helmet.

Here is a blurry pic from my phone. I am willing to give another of their packs a try. These will go towards my Germanic Limes project. They will go to the back of the painting table for the moment.

Prep Work

I was able to reclaim the dining room table for my own to run through my Chain of Command scenario for tomorrow.

Here is the table. I am borrowing Mark's winter trees for tomorrows game so it won't look quite as odd. I began the patrol phase with the Italians entering from the left hand side of the table and the Soviets from the right. My first mistake was forcing the Soviets to use the ford with their patrol markers. This funneled them through a narrow gap that left them poor starting positions. The Soviet end of the board was horribly open. This placed all of their jump off points on the table edge. The Italians had much more options with thier jump off points.

This is one of the jump off points I made after I ran out of imagination.

The Italians were quick to enter the farm and took one of the farm houses to use as a strong point. They brought the Russians under fire as they crossed the river. My dice rolling was odd. The first squad to cross the stream took 4 casualties before getting to cover. The second squad was absolutely mauled. Taking very little shock the squad was killed nearly to a man. Only one soldier, the squad leader and the platoon leader were left. They were pinned just on the Italian side of the stream. The third squad with the cart was stacked up waiting for its turn across the stream.

I will replay again later today using the patrol markers correctly. We will see how big a difference that makes.