Break-Out Mission

o/

SURPRISE!

Here is the latest battle report from my most recent game. No, this is not the Frenemies 2.0 follow up mission as that was more or less a slaughter in terms of victory points rather than casualties. Nick brought the speed and I really wasn't able to counter it. I believe the VP total in the end was something like 17-2, ouch! Anyways, onto this battle: 

The Scenario:

Allied forces have been holed up in a dense urban area and have been under segie, unable to break out and retreat. Your objective as the attacker is to break through enemy lines and escort your trapped forces to safety. As the defender your objective is to prevent the enemy breakout and if that fails, to prevent their retreat off of their home board edge. Two separate forces were needed, 3K & 5K, Late Succession war/Renaissance era forces. 

Here is how it went: 

The Battlefield.

My 3K force was a tank lance and a UM-R60L in the city. Here my missile carrier deploys with an excellent lane (literally) of fire. 

Nick's 5K break-through force advancing on my defenders. I had deployed the catapult up on the hill, but with 3 medium/heavy mechs on approach, i jumped it down into cover. I was more interested in it surviving past turn 1 than going down in an immediate blaze of glory. 

Another angle of the above. My Raven at the top of the image would take several hits, all to the same leg taking it out 1 turn! I was not off to a good start...

My urban defenders moving into close quarters with the enemy with the misssile carrier hanging back on overwatch. 

Down a medium laser and a little beat up after a skirmish with one of my Bulldogs, the Spider races down into point blank range of my missile carrier. It is at this point that I revealed that my SRM carrier would stay put! Hilarity ensued and the Spider's pilot punched out when it's 2nd laser was lost. Aww, I wasn't even half way thru my damage rolls. 

Nick's Locust made it to the city and the enemy moved to flee. It was difficult to pursue as my two Bulldogs and Vedette had all suffered motive crits, rendering them as slow, if not slower than the Urbie (which was only remodeling buildings instead of mechs with it's AC20). 

But here comes the SRM carrier! I would spend the rest of the game moving at flank speed, serving as an area denial weapon desperate to get into range. Following the Spider's demise, it never got to fire another shot. 

Hiding in a copse of trees, my Catapult had long since revealed itself to be the unique Butterbee model and it was pummeling an LRM Scorpion tank (that had been NARC'ed earlier on) with impunity. Sadly, the woeful lack of double heat sinks in this mech was severely limiting it's rate of fire. Seriously, why the fuck was that never remedied after they became availible?!? 

Speaking of being NARC'ed, my 2nd Raven died here. 

The Cataphract was outgunned and outnumbered, yet fought on valiantly...

The Scorpion succumbs to the inevitable. 

The Butterbee, camped in the trees simply reversed it's arm launchers to engage the oncoming horde. 

The Cataphract, after a protacted scrum takes a hit to it's remaining AC10 ammo and goes BOOM!

The Butterbee takes a headshot that knocks my pilot unconcious and we called it there. My defending force in the middle was down to the snoozing Catapult and my pursuing force from the city was being lead by an SRM carrier and it's blinding 3/5 speed curve. 

This was a fun one and we will play it again in the future with roles reversed. We collectively took a lot more pics than are posted here, but it gets hard when looking at the thumbnail pics to sort them out into a coherent order as the time stamps differ between phones. 

Complicating matters further, I can tell that the order in which Nick sends over his pics (no doubt sent in the order they were taken), clearly doesn't match the order in which they are recieved, making a further mess of the time stamps. Going thru 30+ pics, reordering them chronologically while deleting dud/redundant pics is kinda laborious. 

A Thunder Run with our 'Frenemies'!

lol, almost looks like it's been attacked by a salad!

A battalion of the 2nd Chisholm's Raiders are deployed to McComb to serve as a ready reserve for the 1st Chisholm Raiders' operation on nearby Marduk. Just as they settle into their FOB, HPG transmissions arrive telling of the burgeoning FedCom civil war which is rapidly devolving into violence. While ultimately siding with the Archon, at this stage the Raiders like so many units are a mix of troops with varied political affiliations. 

The battalion splits in half along political lines, and while both sides are sorting themselves out, one faction seizes the initiative and captures the nearby spaceport. Unfortunately, the Raider's jumpship is no longer in orbit and both sides are stuck planetside. Having not yet come to blows, trading only insults with their new found frenemies over inter-unit comms, the commanders of both camps are left wrestling with the twin threats of tension and boredom amongst their troops. 

Tired of being on the backfoot, and just sleeping in the mud with the bugs, the Raiders bivouaced at the FOB outside the spaceport decide to make a 'Thunder Run' into to mix things up a bit, and perhaps opening yet another front in the civil war...

The Mission:

6,000 point BV, 3060s era, Fedcom faction availability only. The 'attackers' will enter from one short board edge and need to reach the Dropship's landing pad before turning back to exit via their board edge. Initially caught unawares, the defenders will be deployed midway between the opposite board edge and the landing pad.

 The attackers get the first turn, with the attackers/defenders determined by a die roll. 

Attacker (ground) units get 1 VP for reaching the spaceport, and 1 more for evacing back off their board edge (if not under forced withdrawal). 1 additional VP is scored for each defending frenemy unit destroyed or placed into forced withdraw towards their board edge (standard rules for forced withdrawal apply see page 258 in Total Warfare). Likewise the defenders recieve 1 VP for every unit they prevent from reaching the landing pad, 1 VP for any unit forced to withdraw, and 2 additional VPs if said unit is destroyed thereafter. Otherwise they get 2 VPs for killing a unit outright. 

Note:  Chisholm's Raiders were chosen because they lack a cohesive color scheme and conveniently, the 2nd Raiders were known for their mobility. However unlike the 1st regiment on Marduk, the 2nd's whereabouts during the Civil War are unknown.

Here is how the game went:

Starting with the backrow and going left to right, my force consisted of a Javelin JVN-11A, Whitworth WTH-2, Shadow Hawk SHD-2D2, Griffin GRF-1DS, a standard Vedette tank (which was carrying the) squad of Cavalier SRM battle armor, and lastly a standard Rommel tank. 

Nick's force consisted of an Axman AXM-1N, Nighstar NSR-9FC, Vindicator VIND-5L and a Bushwhacker BSW-X1

The initial set up with just my terrain  which yes, includes Baxter. 

the Thunder Run begins with my forces charging in from the right, while Nick's mechs moved in towards the launch pad for the most part. 

I believe everything that I had that was elligible to shoot in my first turn needed boxcars to hit. Which is to say, everything missed. 

Nick's to-hit numbers weren't much better and the first round of shooting was largely bloodless. 

The Bushwhacker tries to flank me and draws a fair bit of fire in return for it's efforts. 

My Shadow Hawk & Griffin make it to the objective first, scoring me 2 VPs. Knowing that the Shadow Hawk is the weaker link, Nick concentrated fire on it knocking it to the ground (where the Axman delivered a savage chop to it). Damage sustained put it into the forced withdraw category giving Nick his first VP. 

My Javelin zips around into rear, point blank range and startles Nick when it opens up with all 7 MLs! Naturally only 2 hit and Vindi's rear armor was not penetrated. Typical. 

Neeka was pissed that we were using her lounge table for a game and wanted it back! Most of the time, the table is covered with a quilt & kitty cushions where they can lounge in front of the windows all day. She is the most hostile towards gaming member of my household.

The tanks reach the launch pad and the Vedette drops off the Battle Armor, netting me 3 more VPs and an early big lead! I was starting to rethink the scenario...

As my first wave retreats from the pad, the Whitworth which had been hanging back with supporting fire was finally on approach. 

I got lucky here in that the Axman's AC20 & ax both missed the Griffin. Both of our pulse lasers hit though I believe my punch missed as well. The Griffin 1DS is over-sinked which allowed me to jump and alphastrike every turn with impunity. I could do so even with an engine hit had I suffered one! As such, I quite like this variant.

But then the Shadowhawk went down to a trio of engine hits, followed by the Vedette which was obliterated by the Nightstar in just 1 volley! The Vindi which was taking heavy fire, overheated itself by 25 points(!?!) and shut down, falling to the ground. It would not rise again as I kept shooting at it and destroyed the smoldering mech while it lay helpless on the ground.

The battle armor swarmed the Nightstar in the prior turn. I had to look the rules up and in the Total Warfare book, where it explains how the enemy's infantry can also swarm the same mech to fight my troops on said mech before bothering to explain what damage I could actually do with a swarming attack. Well done game designers, well done! It was a mostly superfluous 2 page read to find what I was actually looking for.

The Whitworth, having left the landing pad, waddles away as fast as it can while the Nightstar ignores my battle armor and destroyes the oh so dangerous Rommel. Barely mobile by that point, the tank was stunned in the prior round and unable to defend itself. My lead was quickly dwindling as the casualties were racking up!

In the backfield, despite a last ditch effort to stop it, my Griffin escaped on one side whilst my unopposed Javelin did the same on the other, netting me two more VPs. The battle armor were doing their best to annoy the Nightstar, though as heavily armored as it is, only the 1 head shot got it's attention. Undeterred, the Nightstar ignored the battle armor and obliterated the fleeing Whitworth instead. 

At that point all I had left on the table was the battle armor, and being too slow to escape the overwhelming firepower remaining in Nick's force, I conceeded that they would be casualties. Adding up all of our VPs we ended up with an even tie!

Well that was fun! This scenario is loosely based on an old X-Wing scenario that we used to play called Wolfy's Hit & Run. I was concerned early on when I pulled ahead with an early big lead, but once my casualties started to mount, Nick closed the distance quickly! 

It was kinda hard to make a list not knowing who would play what. Speed is needed primarily as the attacker, but so is the need to put down mechs quickly if defending. Next week we will try this again with roles reversed as we often do. Nick was lamenting about what he ought to take as most of his mechs are on the slower end. I'll try not to tailor my force too much, now that I know that I will be defending on the next go round. 

Capturing more bridges...

 o/ 

One hellova fight in progress!

As promised previously, Nick & I played this scenario again with our roles reversed. This time I was playing the defenders and he the attackers. Oddly, I was playing Capellans and Nick Mercenaries, so we also switched factions. 9300 BV this time as Nick's force was a little off again, 3050s era although Nick would end up fielding no upgraded tech. 

Here's how it all went, or as best I can recall as there were a lot of mechs and tanks on the board. 

My Capellan Homeguard force which I called the Jedburg Militia (Jedburg is a town not far from here, with the most redneck sounding name that I have ever heard of). I had a Heavy Mountain Platoon, 3055 LRM carrier, (2) standard Bulldogs, a Liao Vedette, a UM-60, UM-R63, (2) UM-R60Ls (both with 3/5 pilots), an RVN-3L, RVN-4X, CTF-1X and a CPLT-C4C with a 3/5 pilot and serving as my commander. 

The battlefield during our opening maneuvers.

A better view of the same...

I did not get a group photo of Nick's forces, but you can see them pretty good here. In green were The Swamp Foxes fielding a Highlander, Marauder, Quickdraw & Valkyrie, and in blue with the lightning trim were Haim's Hebrew Hammers (yes really), fielding a Battlemaster, Phoenix Hawk, Warhammer and Wasp. All of his mechs were base models & pilots I believe.

Turn two and both sides finally got a good bead on one another with the Vedette leading the charge down the center.

In my backfield, the Infantry platoon was camped atop a building and calling out targets for the hidden LRM carrier's indirect fire. These two units would neither move nor suffer any damage all game. Firing with impunity, they would connect with a fair few missiles on Nick's forces. 

The suddenly, all hell breaks loose! The Cataphract would put an AC-10 into the head of the Highlander deleting it's life support systems (luckily not needed on this world). The Cataphract would suffer heavily for that, but remained standing. In the backfield, Nick would complain that my RVN-4X was tying up an entire lance though in truth that was not so. 

I love this photo. On the left you can see that if any of Nick's mechs were to hop over my Raven and the building behind it, then they would be squarely in cross hairs of a trio of Urbies as well as an immobilized Bulldog (not quite, but the driver was bleeding out...), which were instead sniping at limited targets and doing so at long range. 

With my Catapult, and all of my forces across the 2nd river providing fire support, my Raven-3L, Cataphract and 2nd Bulldog run straight into a hornet's nest! The Raven whiffed other than to plant a Narc beacon onto the Battlemaster, the Cataphract & Bulldog put in a few hits into the Warhammer, which along with the indirect LRM fire, brought that mech to the ground. In return the Cataphract got mauled with it's autocannon being taken out of action, as well as a rear facing ML. The Bulldog was hit as well I think, but nothing major.

The Catapult meanwhile dumped into the Highlander, hitting with both LRM 20s & large laser for a collective 40 points of damage! 

Just another angle of the brawl on the boulevard.

Behind all of this, the first bridge was heating up as well...

Successfully having run the inital gauntlet, the Vedette moved to secure the first bridge. My RVN-4X and Nick's Valk & Quickdraw all jumped onto the bridge as well (luckily it was sturdy). They traded fire but no major damage was suffered as the movement mods were pretty high all around. 

Meanwhile one of my UM-R60Ls held the 2nd bridge, daring something to come around the corner. With so many models firing, the non-firing R60Ls went unnoticed in the chaos. We don't declare mech variants beforehand, so Nick probably assumed that the Urbie on the bridge was another standard one. That said, with 4 Urbies on the table, he commented while we were deploying that there was likely an AC-20 Urbie hiding in there somewhere. 

You're about to find out why Nick really doesn't like this Catapult variant...

Things got rather ugly when Nick's Mercenaries made a late push on the 2nd bridge! The Cataphract backed up to a building to dump its now useless AC ammo (which had little armor by this point to hide behind). The Catapult took a punishing volley of fire that knocked it from it's feet, but not before it put it's large laser into the Highlander's head, vaporizing the mechwarrior within! The Phoenix Hawk & Wasp jump onto the Bridge and the Urbie damned near takes the Phoenix Hawk's leg off with an AC-20 slug! Knocking the mech to the ground. 

The Brawl from the first bridge moves on up the street following the rest of the mechs, while the vedette stayed behind, successfully securing that objective. The Narc'ed Battlemaster ran into some heavy trees to (successfully) avoid any incoming fire and damaging the 3L Raven which whiffed it's shooting at the wasp aside from plunking a Narc beacon onto the back of that mech's head.

My backline continued to fire at whatever was in range all game, the 2nd UM-R60L took a pot shot on this last turn, cratering a building and scaring the be Jesus out of the Battlemaster, but doing little more. Nick was not pleased by the realization that there were two AC-20 Urbies were on the table. Aside from the Bulldog in the trees, none of my units in this last pic suffered any damage in this game. 

By this point in time it was 9:45pm on a weeknight and Nick ran up the white flag. I held 1 bridge, the 2nd was contested with my R60L staring down a Phoenix Hawk and Wasp, both of which had one leg into structure. The Highlander was down, the Warhammer not far from it, and...well everything on that road leading to bridge #2 was moderately to severely damaged in one way or another. 

I still had a pristine LRM carrier, spotter platoon and trio of Urbies in the backfield, The Urbie on Bridge 2 took a ML hit I think. While not mobile by any means, were there still time to play this one out, he wasn't sure his battered forces could weather this untouched force, while still having to deal with my first wave units. 

Once again this was a fun scenario, and again a close one with 1 bridge held and the 2nd contested. After the first game, I was fearing Nick would arrive with his Demolisher tanks, to do to me what I had previously done to him. Likewise while the infantry spotters and 3055 LRM carrier preformed admirably, all it would have taken was 1 VTOL to zip into the backfield and wreck my day. I don't think he did anything wrong tactically, rather I just got really lucky with his traditionally built force. It allowed my static backline and sheer numbers carry the day.