Fracas 2015 army

With Fracas fast approaching (next weekend) I thought I better get my list together and submitted. Fracas this year is going to be a 750pts late war tankfest so with lots of armor about why not take the best armor out there the King Tiger. so I took 2 of them.
I went with a list out of the Bridge at Remagen book and went with the German Schwere Panzer (510. Schwere Panzer Abteilung) company. I choose the Reluctant trained list as most things that hit a Tiger 2 wont do much anyway so Im not to worried about the ratings of the. The one down side of this though is that they don't get Tiger ace skills or the Kampfgruppe rule but each tank is only 215pts which is a steal. This list is a always defend list so knowing with the missions will be is key and for this event they have told us just that. We will be playing 5 games two of them are hasty attack one is cauldron and two fair fights. So knowing this I decided to add in 2 platoons of volkssturm which always start on table regardless and always start dug in. And with the remaining points I got 2 Panzer 4's. So any missions that have reserves all I do is keep the 2 panzer 4's off table.

Schwere Panzerkompanie HQ - CinC Konigstiger (Henschel) (215 pts)

Schwere Panzer Platoon - Command Konigstiger (Henschel) (215 pts)

Ersatz SS-Panzer Platoon - Command Panzer III L or M, Panzer III L or M (100 pts)
- Replace Panzer III L or M with Panzer IV G or H (15 pts)
- Replace Panzer III L or M with Panzer IV G or H (15 pts)
- 2x Equip Panzer with Schurzen (10 pts)

Volkssturm Platoon - Command Panzerfaust Rifle, 8x Panzerfaust Rifle (105 pts)
- Replace one Panzerfaust Rifle with MG08/15 LMG (-5 pts)

Volkssturm Platoon - Command Panzerfaust Rifle, 6x Panzerfaust Rifle (85 pts)
- Replace one Panzerfaust Rifle with MG08/15 LMG (-5 pts)

750 Points, 4 Platoons

The Readied troops

The company Comander

The Duo of Panzer 4's

My 2 platoons of Volkssturm each with an MG team.

So the plan is to have the Volkssturm sit on each objective and not move and let the tanks do the heavy lifting as the Volkssturm and reluctant conscripts so I wont be charging across the battlefield with them. They are there as a deterrent as they are loaded with panzerfausts.
Ive done quite well in the past at this event so I have some confidence going into this event but at the end of the day it comes down to dice. So you can only do what you can.

Hope to see you there.

Wellington X-Wing Regional event

On Saturday I attended the Wellington X-Wing Regional event held at the Wellington Bridge club. There was 27 players entered there would be five round rounds then the top four going into elimination rounds.

I went with me trusty Rebels I went with a 3 ship build.
- Jan Ors in a HWK-290 with a blaster turret, Kyle Katarn crew, Moldy Crow title and swarm tactics.
- Blue squadron pilot with a Heavy laser cannon and fire control system.
- Blue squadron pilot with a Heavy laser cannon and fire control system.

Game 1 vs Alister Setters
Alister was running a Rebel list with a falcon and E-wing for my first up match so my play was to let the B-wings concentrate on the Falcon and leave the E-wing till last.

I set up on the left Alister set up on my right I was hoping to draw the large ship into the asteroid field.

We both close to engage each other. My first volley from the B-wing does some decent damage to the Falcon.

While the B-wing's did their job the I decided the HWK-290 would tie up the E-wing to give the B-wing's the best chance.

After 4 rounds of combat the falcon goes down but both B-wing's a quite damaged by now.

Some silly piloting by me saw my HWK leave the field of play. I must say that's the first time Ive done that. Mean while Alister downs a B-wing.

Some very close flying and one final round of combat and I finish off the E-wing. Winning with 1 Hit point to spare

So a first round win was more then I was expecting but more then happy with. onto the next round.
Points killed - 100pts
Points lost - 69pts

Game 2 vs Ian Lenny
My next game was vs yet another Rebel list I thinks there was only 4 or 5 there so it looks like another blue on blue fight. Ian was running an E-wing and 2 A-wing's. This would be a hard fight with 3 very maneuverable craft vs 3 very un-maneuverable craft.

The setup I was hoping to get in shots as long range with my secondary weapons to try and negate his agility some what.

But that didn't last long. So the melee ensued.

My HWK was the first to die while I managed to inflict some damage. But the B-wing's were taking a lot of damage from the A-wing's missiles.

I managed to get Ian's E-wing but in the final round of combat both my ships died.

This game highlighted my biggest weakness my lack of maneuverability vs an agile foe. But was still a good fight and would play Ian again anytime.
Points Killed - 42pts
Points lost - 100pts

Game 3 vs Andrew Shepard
Andrew is a fellow war gamer I have known for a while as we both play flames of war. Andrew is still fairly new to X-wing but I expected a good fight none the less as he was fielding 2 Decimators and a Tie fighter.

My plan was to concentrate on 1 Decimator and a time and leave the Tie fighter till last.

I moved up the side of the table while Andrew came strait up the middle. So I did a U-turn and open fired.

Andrew shot down a B-wing but not before I did a lot of damage to him.

With 1 Decimator down onto the next one while my HWK started on the Tie fighter as it was annoying me.

My B-wing moved in for the final volley to finish of Andrew's last ship. As you can see the moldy crow card I have on my HWK is keeping me supplied with lost of focus tokens. Couldn't use them quick enough.

I was glad to come away with a win from this match as this sort of list is what my ships where equipped to deal with.
Points killed - 100pts
Points lost - 31pts

Game 4 vs Jordan Setters
Jordan was running a Tie swarm consisting of 4 Tie fighters and a Tie Interceptor. I wasn't to sure how my heavy hitters would deal with lots of light targets that would most likely overwhelm me.

This was the first battle where some one had a ship with lower pilot skill them my B-wings. So we set up right across from each other and went at it.

In the first combat round I some how knocked out his interceptor and a tie fighter for little in return. This round I did some damage and setup for the final kill.

The final round I lost a B-wing but managed to get the last 2 Tie fighters in quick secession.

This game was over before it really got going but some times that's just what happens in games that rely on a dice result to get what you need to do things.
Points killed - 100pts
Points lost - 31pts

Game 5 vs Blair Grey
This was a Game I wasn't sure about as I know Blair is a very skilled person at this game. He has won a few events I know of so I knew it would be a very hard fight. He was running a Decimator with Darth Vader on board with a Tie interceptor escorting it.

We both moved down opposite flanks sizing each other up. I knew I needed to knock out that Decimater quick.

I just 2 rounds of combat I was down to my last ship Vader was literally killing me. After each attack he could cause 2 damage to himself and inflict a critical damage to me. And with gunner on his ship he was able to do this twice a turn.

Well the last game was a real wake up call on card combo's that work well. He may not of had the firepower I had but he could nullify it quite quickly. I was quite simply schooled in this game although Blair did say when he saw 2 B-wing's he was worried as they have done well in most lists in tournaments that they appear in.
Points killed - 0
Points lost - 100pts

Well over all for my first X-wing regional event I felt I did ok getting 3 wins out of 5 was more then I expected. Out of 27 people I think I finished about 14th and for my efforts I got a scum and villainy promo Boba fett card and 10 acrylic shield tokens. My next event is a Flames of war event in Wanganui called Fracas 750pts Tank fest.
Hope to see you there.

Panzershrek 2015 Armies on Parade.

Here is most of the forces In action from the weekend. while I didn't get all the armies I managed to get a list of the nations together and there were quite a few soviet armies around for the weekend which you don't normally see.

Nations

German - 10 teams

Soviet - 6 teams

U.S - 1 team

British - 2 teams

Minor Axis - 1 team

Tony Bates Jagdtigers.

Russel Briant's Germans

Ken Camel's Germans

Damien Reid's Tigers

Paul Waeehter's Soviet masses

Chris Otton's British forces

Simon McBeth's Kiwi infantry

Scott Bowman and Bryan Thomson's Germans

Gavin Van Rossum and Daniel Linder's Germans

Andrew Shepard's soviet mass of guns and tanks

Joe Kelly and Cameron Wansborough's Americans

Nick Garden and Tim Ward's British tank division.

Mike and Andrew Haught's Horde with lots of IS-2's

Victor Pesch and Wayne Turner's Soviets.

Andrew Stanton's German train set

Marks Stanton's Germans with2 Sturm tigers

Andre Jacobs Soviets.

Mike Haycock's soviet army

Sophia Chambers and Simon Smith's Soviets.

Alex McEwen and Scott Avery army. Fins I think.

My next event will be Fracas and being a late war 750pts tank feast who knows what to take but you will see me there wouldn't mind using my Purshing's but i know they will come up agents Tiger 2 tanks and the like so dont know if that is a good idea.

See you around.

Panzerschreck 2015 Day 2 Report

After a good nights board gaming and good nights sleep Warren and I were set to go for the final days push to grab a good position on the table after our good first day. Before the first game of the day kicked off everyone had their armies out to show them off for everyone to vote on the best painted army. That will follow in the next post to many to put in with this one.

Game 4 Free for all
Team - Fist full of special rules.
Players
- Russel Briant (Panzer Ausbildungs Verband)
- Tony Bates (Schwere panzerjagerkompanie)

I forgot to take one of deployment but on this flank all our spearheading infantry would attack in one massive blob. While we kept the Jagdtiger under smoke to keep the StuH42's safe so they could cover the infantry's advance.

The other flank we would just defend with the Jagdpanthers and a couple of platoons of infantry. I forgot how ever that the Jagdtigher has a breakthrough gun and with otto carius negating any sort of cover men started falling quite quickly. and my Jagdpanthers where powerless to stop it for now.

As we got closer to the coming assault we started taking a few casualties and some of my reluctant men were starting to not un-pin.

As Russel's Panzer's and infantry moved up i was losing more men each turn and powerless to stop it. All was could hope for is that we could hold on long enough for our men on the other flank to win it before it was too late.

With my men gone Warren has to move in to hold the objective from the advancing forces.

With everything we tried on this flank wearing us down it wasn't looking good. Victory was so close but yet so far.

My Jagdpanthers move up to help with the panzer's I get 2 in the end. While Warren flames a fem men.

This flank's attack had stalled and Russel killing my 2 Jagdpanthers that forces a company morale check which i failed. We threw everything at this game and come up short. Handing Russel and Tony a 6-1 win.

Game 5 Surrounded
Team - Minuteski Komrade
Players
- Simon Smith (Sredniy Samokhodno-Artillyeriyskiy Polk)
- Sophia Chambers (Hero Motostrelkovy Batalon)

Again I forgot to take some photo's for this game so. But as we were attacking we used our night rule to advance under darkness. We pull everything of our force at one end of the table but the 3 man recon platoon which we to the other end of the table. after 3 turns we managed to kill the T-34 platoon and about half of the big strelkovy platoon.

My recon started to harass the heavy mortars and the rocket mortar trucks. So Sophia sent a squad of spetsnaz after them.

With the SU-100 having no Mg for defensive fire Warren saw an opportunity to assault and kill these tank killers. His assault would bail most of them out but he would be forced back and they would survive.

The Spetsnaz close in to kill my recon platoon before I had the chance to get the rocket mortar trucks losing this platoon sent my company morale over the edge as I had lost my CO already. So a good defense by Sophia and Simon earning them a 5-2 win for the final game.

Well with 2 losses it wasn't the end to the weekend we where looking for but we enjoyed ourselves and weren't to unhappy with our armies performance. And with slight tweak I think it could be made better.

And to the results. we were a little suppried at where we came but all in all we had a good weekend. It is going to be early war doubles next year which will be fun. You know Russia and Germany where allies for a while aye now there's an army idea.

1st Andrew & Mike Haught
2nd Russel Briant & Tony Bates
3rd Nick Garden & Tim Ward
4th Andrew & Mark Stanton
5th Bryan Thompson & Scott Bowman (Best Generals)
6th Victor Pesch & Wayne Turner (Victor won best painted army)
7th Andrew Shepherd & Damien Tyson
8th Cameron Wansborough & Joe Kelly
9th Chris Otton & Simon McBeth
10th Simon Smith & Sophia Chambers
11th Dan Linder & Gavin Van Rossum
12th Brett & Rhys Mudgeway
13th Damien Reid & Ken Camel
14th Andre Jacobs & Mike Haycock
15th Derek Forrester & Mike Clements
16th Chris Townley & Phil Yates
17th Paul Waechter & Ste Haran
18th Bob Pearce & Greg Lockton
19th John Fletcher & Warren Hart
20th Alex McEwan & Scott Avery