Earlier this month, I attended Fall In!, one of the Historical Miniature Gaming Society East's annual shows, held in nearby Lancaster, PA. While I always enjoy going to these shows, I was especially excited because one of the guys from my new gaming group (who is totally new to miniature gaming) was tagging along on Friday.
In addition to making several trips through the vendor area and flea market, Chris and I were able to play in two participation games on Friday. The first was a spirited round of Chain of Command that was part of the Two Fat Lardies Day(s) run throughout the weekend. I'm still waiting on my British Infantry and SS Panzergrendiers (my painter's had a lot going on outside of the hobby...but they're coming), so haven't gotten to play CoC at home yet, but I thought the convention would be great way to show Chris the ropes so he could help me teach the others in the club.
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| The field of battle |
The scenario was set shortly after the D-Day landings as a group of British Commandos, having captured some German entrenchments outside a small village, now must hold onto their dearly-won real estate against a counterattack by a platoon of Heer grenadiers with some captured R-35 tanks and an infantry gun in support.
The first few phases were pretty uneventful as I got both my commando rifle sections, Vickers team, and sniper team deployed in cover and on overwatch by phase three, while Chris's Germans began trickling in and working their way to favorable positions from which to lay down some fire before their assault.
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| One of my sections deploys along a hedgerow... |
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| ...while the other, along with the platoon sergeant and a Vickers team occupy the captured trench. |
The Germans opened up with some rifle fire on my section behind the hedgerow and inflicted some shock, but it wasn't until the German infantry gun deployed and started firing that the men started to worry. Two were killed in quick succession and the shock began to pile up.
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| The pesky German IG with a friendly tank rolling up in support |
At this point in the game, the dice gods began to smile on Chris, as he got a couple of back-to-back phases which allowed him to bring up more units and lay down some heavy fire, while I kept rolling lots of 4s (which didn't do much to help the solitary senior leader I had on the table) and several waves of multiple 5s, which certainly help me earn some Chain of Command dice, did not allow me to do much retaliation. Thankfully, our GM had decided to include a random event deck to be used when phase rolls produced at least triple 5's or 6's. One of the cards returned one of my killed Commandos to the ranks, for which I was rather fortunate.
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| A German rifle squad trying to whittle down the enemy, while the R35 contributes some (ineffective) fire |
Eventually the dice began to level out and my section's corporal/junior leader did a great job at whittling away the shock his section had accumulated. The section began returning fire against their tormentors across the hedges, but only got a few points of shock. Thankfully (for me), the German fire gradually grew less effective - especially from the R35, which couldn't hit the broadside of a barndoor.
It was about this time that Chris began making the boldest move of the game, as a German squad began advancing through an orchard on my left, gunning straight toward the entrenchments. Thankfully, I had deployed a sizable portion of my force in their wake by this time and quickly began overpowering them with fire from a rifle section, Vickers, sniper team, and a 2" mortar which shot its allotted 3 rounds of HE in quick succession, but caused considerable casualties. Though the Germans were able to lay day fire as they advanced through the cover, things began to look bad fast (admittedly, this was first due to a mis-measurement on my part). The squad's junior leader was wounded early on, which certainly did not help them keep their shock total low.
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| A German squad catching all kinds of lead during an advance |
Hoping to stabilize the the assault, Chris rushed a flamethrower team forward to attack the trench on their own. While I sent a few rounds their way, but sensing the vulnerability of the rifle section, put most of my attention on them. Finally, the amount of shock doubled the remaining number of figures, causing the squad to break. I then used one of my CoC dice to end the turn, causing the squad to be removed from the field. The next phase, I piled more fire onto the fast-approaching flamethrower team and incapacitated them quickly.
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| The German flamethrower team beginning to attract a lot of enemy fire |
By this point, Chris had not rolled so well on the "Bad Stuff Happens" table and his force morale had dropped to 4, while mine was a 10. We had been playing for a few hours (there was a small break for a flea market visit) and Chris had gotten a good handle on the rules, so we decided to call it. A hard-won victory by my Commandos! Getting the upper hand on elite troops in heavy cover can be a real challenge!
More on the rest of the show later...
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