What was the last ruleset you played 2017?

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

1) What ruleset do you use in your last game? - was meant to be Warband, but he went on a date with his wife instead! So I played the Battlestar Galactica Boardgame.
2) What armies were confronted? - humans vs cylons
3) Did you feel comfortable with the ruleset? - after an hour or so, yes
4) and... was this the first time you used this ruleset? - yes
5) How many players were in the game? - four

Wow, what a good game! We were two jumps from home, in a very poor state, with the Cylons breathing down our necks when we had to end.
I played Lee Adama, and by a twist of fate (and The President being a Cylon) I ended up being the Admiral, the Vice President and the President all at the same time. As soon as I took office, morale, population and food went up too! Born for this job!
Such a paranoid game, it's brilliant!
Oh, and I killed four Cylon Raiders in a turn! Starbuck killed three and a base star though!!!

[Luddite]

Haven't played it yet Lemmy, but i plan to.  Currently very much enjoying Firefly.

[kustenjaeger]

Greetings

1) What ruleset do you use in your last game? - Bloody Big Battles
2) What armies were confronted? - French  and German 1870
3) Did you feel comfortable with the ruleset? - Yes
4) and... was this the first time you used this ruleset? - Yes
5) How many players were in the game? - 4

In fact two games back to back (Mars le Tour and Gravelotte) at the BBB Big Bash Day just outside Oxford.

Results were historical in that the French lost!

I had owned the rules for a while but this was the first time I had used them. Quick to get to grips with and exciting games.  Good fellow players helped too! 

The games I played were in 6mm but the next door game was 10mm.  I reckon I have enough unpainted Pendraken figures to do the Spicheren scenario available on the BBB Yahoo group.

Regards

Edward

[Hwiccee]

1) What ruleset do you use in your last game? - Sedgemoor to Staket (variant set covering late 17th/early 18th)
2) What armies were confronted? - French vs Alllies, 1693
3) Did you feel comfortable with the ruleset? - Yes
4) and... was this the first time you used this ruleset? - no
5) How many players were in the game? - 4

We played what will probably be the last play test of a 'Western' battle with these variant rules. The game went well and so it is now time to look at the GNW, the Ottomans and others. hopefully we will start playtesting these soon.

In the game the two sides were fairly even with the French having the advantage in cavalry and the Allies the advantage in infantry. The Allies managed to neutralise the French advantage by blocking one cavalry wing with a cunning defensive position and tempting the units on the other flank to attack individually and each get destroyed in turn. Meanwhile the French infantry attempted to storm parts of the Alllied line. They achieved some success but the attack stalled which allowed the Allies to bring their infantry superiority to bear.

[Chris Pringle]

Quick to get to grips with and exciting games.  Good fellow players helped too! 

That's what we like to hear. Thanks, Edward!

Chris

Bloody Big BATTLES!
https://uk.groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/BBB_wargames/info
http://bloodybigbattles.blogspot.co.uk/

[Nosher]

1. Bolt Action 2
2. German v US - Normandy 1944
3. Yes
4. No
5. Solo

This was a game I've had in the back of my mind for a while but simply haven't had the chance to set it up.

It was based on an action fought by the British at Dickie's Bridge on 31st July, but seeing as my British are far from ready for battle, I used American forces instead.

American recce troops had secured a bridge across the Soulevre finding it much to their surprise completely undefended. In the days following the battle it appeared that the bridge (known nowadays at Le Pont du Taureau) was slap bang in the middle of two separate German Corps boundary lines, both of whom believed the other had responsibility for securing it....

Two American armoured cars (an M8 and an M20) are all that stand between elements of the 21st Panzer Division who attempting to use the bridge stumble into the Americans....

The 21st advance along two roads unaware the bridge is held.

The 21st included two sections of PzGren in 251's, a Puma, a STuG and a 251/9 Stummel led by an experienced German Officer in his 251/10.

At the bridge are solitary recce elements of an M8 and an M20. US Infantry with minimal armoured support (a solitary M4) are heading to the bridge in support of the recce troops.

In a nutshell the 21st were fairly easily repulsed having taken a cautious approach rather than speeding for the bridge. US support arrived very quickly and set up a robust defensive line which made relatively short work of the German armoured cars and carriers once the STuG had been knocked out. Some fairly jammy dice rolling saw both the 251/10 command vehicle and a Stummel taken out by HMG fire - 6's followed by 6's followed by 4+ to knock them out! To add insult to injury, the Puma was taken out by a bazooka at long range ending any hope the German's had of forcing the bridge.

[toxicpixie]

1) What ruleset do you use in your last game? - Spearhead WW2 by Arty Conliffe
2) What armies were confronted? - US Infantry Regt. versus German Panzer Brigade
3) Did you feel comfortable with the ruleset? - Yes
4) and... was this the first time you used this ruleset? - no
5) How many players were in the game? - 4

Whilst I say we were comfortable, it's actually been too damn long since we played and we had a lot of "umm'ing and ahh'ing" as stuff kept creeping around from other games!

An American infantry regiment (reinforced by the Divisional Tank Destroyer battalion - one company M10's, two companies 76mm ATG's - and a company of Shermans from the Tank Battalion, with two arty battalions of 105's off table) holding a set of Normandy wooded ridgelines and fields anchored on a couple of villages and a river, against a set of German Kampfgruppes drawn from a Panzer Division (Panzer Grenadiers and Panthers, with a 105mm & 150mm battalion of off table guns). Set up using the Spearhead Scenario System, we actually outnumbered the Germans by about 3:2, with more on table guns, almost as many tanks (although not Panthers...) and as much (if not so heavy) arty support - AND an Air-Ground Controller with three flights of Jabo's on call.

Our plan as the Yanks was to refuse the right flank & defend the river and ridge line and ambush the infantry as they came in, then follow up with air support and the TD's against the Panthers as they tried to throw us off. It might have been sound, if our radios hadn't almost always failed, and Oddball having been in charge of our ammo supplies and replaced all our AP shells with paint rounds. Vicious hand to hand fighting cleared one village on our left (including the Panthers, very dangerous but the defending company of Doughboys put up such a fight it basically sucked the entire mixed battlaion in. We failed to manage to support it (arty was hopeless, ATGs fired paint, then we all fell on our bayonets after a very heroic first defense!), the German flank march came in right into what should have been a killing ground covered by TDs, screened by Shermans and in plain view of the AGC with his radio primed to call in the Jabos. An hour later, we'd failed to call in any air, suppressed one platoon of Panthers, seen the remaining two Panther platoons brew up both companies of our armour and got all the infantry killed failing once more to keep the Grenadiers out of a valubale village sector.

In the centre the first German kampfgruppe moved out from the rown along the axis of the ridgeline, where we engaged once more in vicious close range fighting with heavy casualties all round but mostly for us as we got ground back, and the final kibosh wa sput in as the third lurking German kampfgruppe infiltrated forwards enough to panel our 3rd Battalion with the attached 150mm guns, which broke the whole lot in rapid order! Three turns of fire from three guns plus a solitary stonk from the 120mm mortars killed seven platoons of entrenched infantry, one after another.

It was actually a pretty tense game at every stage, with every stage in question, but each time we lost out, sometimes narrowly, but for all the vital bits horrendously. Need some counterbattery arty to blat the German arty with, and new radios for the AGC. Their plan was better, and better executed, and we were always on the back foot trying to recover from failure every turn!

1) What ruleset do you use in your last game? - BBB by Chris Pringle
2) What armies were confronted? - Crimean Russian versus French & British Allies in the fog at Inkerman
3) Did you feel comfortable with the ruleset? - Yes
4) and... was this the first time you used this ruleset? - no
5) How many players were in the game? - 4

Second game of the weekend, using my new printed PVC terrain - made set up amazingly quick, and zero "discussions" about who was up/down what slope or in redoubts or out of LoS etc.

Great game, very hard fought to a final turn draw. Gorcukov in the south (me) tried very hard to persuade the Allies the main thrust was coming there, but hellish musket fire and point blank cannister stopped me cold, whilst the north was a scene of carnage as brave Russian infantry kept rushing the British muskets and redoubts to no avail. Fortunately they got a little cocky and opened up a gap to get some nasty flanking fire going just as our reinforcements managed to squeeze in. I'd taken over the attack on Home Ridge with Paulov's troops, and threw them forwards (guns included!) through the fog to keep the pressure up whilst driving my reinforcements towards Lancaster Battery (getting a crushing flank charge on Bullers troops who'd rolled forwards to flank our frontal attack) drew far too much attention over my way and allowed Soimenov to get the critical mass needed together for one last, final desperate assault up and over Gordons Battery on the last turn to secure us a glorious, crushing, absolute draw

We were very happy to manage that

Played well, easily picked up, got seven full turns in about two hours with plenty of idiocy & fun all round. The Russians are really truly awful though - hard to get moving, and they suffer horrendously against the aggressive, veteren muzzle loading rifle armed British with skirmishers - tactically inept and lacking skirmishers gives a two column shift when fired at, so even very small numbers of bases shooting is lethal. Never mind smooth bore artillery at point blank range. My most glorious moment was the French cavalry sneaking past Gorkuchovs infantry to deliver a flank charge into my artillery support, at which point they impaled themselves on the limbers and we all went back to the box

[Chris Pringle]

Great that you had such fun with Inkerman! Our group has some new recruits who haven't played the BBB Crimea scenarios, so they are starting the whole 5-scenario mini-campaign on Monday.

Chris

Bloody Big BATTLES!
https://uk.groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/BBB_wargames/info
http://bloodybigbattles.blogspot.co.uk/

[toxicpixie]

We jumped past Kurudere I'm afraid - our Crimea enthusiast didn't want to paint/have painted a gazillion Turkish cavalry he'd use once!

Inkerman was good - interestingly, we're now at one win and one draw for the "worst" army (the Russians), with the Allies expecting a comfortable win each time.

I'm hoping I can run it my club as well, starting with the Alma again - although as my personal collection is in 2mm adding forces for Kurudere wouldn't be hard, I just don't want to do another map/terrain mainly

[JeffNNN]

1) Rise of the Battleships.
2) Russians vs Japanese 1904. Just 3 battleships and 2 armoured cruisers per side
3 +4) First time I tried them so a bit slow and I know I missed one feature at least.
5) Playing as a solo game.

Started probably too close together and then threw a lot of +95% damage hits. Meant that pretty quickly 2 Japanese sunk, 2 immobilised and one staggering await to try and repair damage, meanwhile the Russians lost 1 battleship sunk, one a/c sunk, one a/c immobilised and the remaining two hard hit.

Will have a few more goes with these, introducing more ships. I've got substantial fleets and  naval in this period makes for a good solo game.

These will do until my friend Tony does the final update to his rules.

[Steve J]

1) What ruleset do you use in your last game? - Bloody Big Battles
2) What armies were confronted? - Prussians vs British at Dorking 1871
3) Did you feel comfortable with the ruleset? - Very
4) and... was this the first time you used this ruleset? - No
5) How many players were in the game? - 2

AAR to follow...

[Roy]

1) What ruleset do you use in your last game? - Some't belonging to Bodvoc. [WW2 Iron Cross]

2) What armies were confronted? - German Heer vs Soviet ... bods?

3) Did you feel comfortable with the ruleset? - Aye, it wasn't bad for a first game. Certainly worth another outing.

4) and... was this the first time you used this ruleset? - Yes.

5) How many players were in the game? - 4. How many knew what they were doing; 0? 1 at most 

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

1) What ruleset do you use in your last game? - Star Wars Armada
2) What armies were confronted? - Imperials vs Rebels.
3) Did you feel comfortable with the ruleset? - yes
4) and... was this the first time you used this ruleset? - this year, yes
5) How many players were in the game? - 4.

The Imperials (us) took a mullering! All our big ships (4) taken down by a swarm of lighter Rebels (7). Our fighters won, but it's a long walk home with no hyperdrive! We had killed two Re el ships and mauled three men there,  it to no joy

[Luddite]

2) What armies were confronted? - Prussians vs British at Dorking 1871


AAR to follow...

Chesney's masterpiece?

I did that a while back  Enormous fun!

http://luddite1811.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Dorking

Really looking forwards to your AAR!   

[DFlynSqrl]

1) What ruleset do you use in your last game? Warband
2) What armies were confronted? Hill Dwarves vs. Undead
3) Did you feel comfortable with the ruleset? Getting there
4) and... was this the first time you used this ruleset? Yes
5) How many players were in the game? Solo test run

First couple of turns went a little slow as I kept double-checking rules stuff.  Then it flew right along.  The Undead took a pretty bad beating.  They never won a single initiative and the Dwarves had an exceptional general who had max CPs for two turns.  Also learned that bad placement of artillery can really limit their targets once troops start moving.  Looking forward to my first game with one of my gaming buddies here in the next week or two.

[Leman]

1. Flames of War

2. Soviets v Germans

3. Yes

4. No, about the third

5. I took part in three out of the five participation games that we (LWA) put on at Overlord in Abingdon on Sunday. One company of SS were holding a rather messed up section of a town against two companies of Soviet infantry and half a dozen T34s. Punters take on the role of the Soviets. Needless to say I got my head kicked in three times.

Overlord was a very good show, with about 30 traders there, so I managed to pick up some extra cavalry for Marlborough's army, a fighting Welsh princess for Saga, some Marlburian flags, a very nice pack of Ainsty gabions and the original Osprey on Marlborough's army from David Lanchester, at a much fairer price than Amazon are charging. Advice - when in Abingdon stick to the pubs near the Premier Inn side of town. 

[Steve J]

1) What ruleset do you use in your last game? - Bloody Big Battles
2) What armies were confronted? - Danes vs Schleswig-Holsteiners at Istedt 1850 during the 1st Schleswig-Holstein War
3) Did you feel comfortable with the ruleset? - Very
4) and... was this the first time you used this ruleset? - No
5) How many players were in the game? - 2

A simply cracking game that was full of action from the off. Probably our best game so far with these rules. Am in process of writing up an AAR, but trying to capture all that went on will be tricky. At least their are plenty pf pics

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

1) What ruleset do you use in your last game? - Star Wars Armada
2) What armies were confronted? - Rebels (my 12 year old daughter) vs Imperial Bullies (me)
3) Did you feel comfortable with the ruleset? - yes
4) and... was this the first time you used this ruleset? - it was Imi's
5) How many players were in the game? - 2, and the cat!

Rule 1 when playing a twelve year old, you will lose! I did! 45 minutes! Only used the three starting ships, but she chewed me to pieces! Her dice were rolling critical after critical, I kept missing! 
She enjoyed it! 

[Leman]

1. FoG

2. Alexandrian Imperial v. Porus' Indians

3. No

4. No, but still utterly bewildered

5. 5 - I had to admit that my understanding of the rules was only slightly better than my understanding of  Mandarin. Consequently next week we start Forlorn Hope.

[paulr]

Rule 1 when playing a twelve year old, you will lose! I did! 45 minutes! Only used the three starting ships, but she chewed me to pieces! Her dice were rolling critical after critical, I kept missing! 
She enjoyed it! 

We all used up our good rolls decades ago
And that is the point