Damn Colonials

Hi Guys

Ed came to the elegant abode the other evening for a game, his turn to pick our rules, so he chose Dystopian Wars. He used his Australian fleet, picking the rebels to try out the energy turret version, I used my American FSA. I have a basic boxed set fleet so we played at approx 800 points. I threw a few islands out to block line of sight and a little coral island in the centre to block movement but not line of sight or firing. We deployed a squadron at a time and started right away. We did not do a blow by blow write up, but took a few pictures as we went.

The FSA fleet deployed

The Oz fleet amid viennese whirl crumbs...

Some of the Australian heavier units

Collision alert- two Oz units come close as they move around an island.

First blood, an Australian frigate gones down

The FSA battleship with air support, 3 cruisers in the foreground.

A long shot of the board with coral island in the centre

The battleship carrying a lot of damage under attack by boarders.

My right flank struggling to land a blow

The FSA cruisers and bombers.

A failed attempt at dive bombing, as Ed gets lucky with AA

We had a good game and plenty of laughs but my luck was appalingly bad, I may as well have been rolling D4s for all the 6's I saw. I scored a few hits but sunk nothing bigger than a frigate. I conceeded the game as all my heavy units were either crippled or settling on the sea bed and my dive bombers were pretending to be submarines....

Next game should be in a week or so, Rome vs Pyrrhus. Hopefully the dice Gods will smile...

Magazine rack

Hi guys

Here are a few pics of a recent game of Dystopian wars between Ed and myself. I took the FSA American fleet and Ed tried out his new Australian fleet. The Aussie fleet is a change from the normal Dystopian wars box sets. Usually a naval box set for DW contains 1 battleship, 3 cruisers, 9 frigates, 2 bombers and 10 fighter stands. Instead the Australian fleet is 2 pocket battleships, 4 gunboats (heavy cruisers), 9 frigates and 2 minisub tenders with 8 minisub stands, and no aerial forces at all. The minisubs are purely for boarding and have no ranged weapons. Most of the boxed sets are of roughly equal pointage and thats what we usually play for an evening game. It was only after the game we checked the points on the Aussies and realised I was seriously out-gunned..... I had roughly 700 points against over 1000 points on Eds' side. The Australian models are superb, incredibly detailed and crisp. They have a choice of turrets as there are two Aussie factions, one using energy turrets, the other using conventional guns. The larger ships have shields, with can be used to protect just the ship the shields are on, or extended to cover nearby vessels but at the expense of making the shielded ship more vulnerable. This is shown on the model by a sliding hatch over the shield generator, the hatch closed means the ship is protecting just itself, open means the shield are extended and the ship more vulnerable.

FSA cruisers

The FSA fleet

The Aussie fleet

 The Australians deploy their first squadron and then we each deploy one squadron in turn until everything is on the table. The Aussies take the initiative and their pocket battleships open up on a single American frigate, but miss the small target. There is a general advance on both sides. The FSA cruisers open up on an enemy Gunboat with long range rocket fire and scores a critical. American bombers then launch torpedoes at the same target and sink it.

 

Turn 2, the FSA win the initiative and their battleship opens up with everything on an enemy pocket battleship and scores a crit. Things are looking good for the Americans at this point. This is about to change. The surviving Aussie Gunboat opens up on the battleship with its monster gun. Is scores 27 hits (!) and two crits. The first crit isnt too exciting, the second roll is double 1, the first but not last Magazine explosion of the game. The resulting explosion, and it is a big one, takes out 3 nearby frigates and the smile from my face. Ed however is grinning like a medicated politician. My cruisers score a single point of damage on the gunboat. There is an exchange between frigate squadrons , sending an American ship to the bottom. The pocket battleships fire, presumably using special anti-rudder ammunition as they score stering lock crits on two cruisers and a bomber. An American frigate squadron fires to no effect. A gunboat opens up on the centre of the 3 FSA cruisers, again scoring a Magazine explosion crit and the blast scores a point of damage on both his squadron mates.

 Turn 3, Fsa wins the initiative and sends a flight of dive bombers in to attack a pocket battleship. They score a crit and get chaos and disarray, weakening its defences. A gunboat fires on the damaged FSA cruiser, scoring two crits and sinking her. A second flight of American dive bombers crit a gunboat . Americam bombers torpedo a submarine tender but only score 1 point of damage, while taking heavy damage from AA fire in the process. The last surviving FSA cruiser fiers at a Gunboat and scores the third ammo explosion crit of the game. This time the explosion takes out a nearby American frigate, the crippled American bomber and 7 Aussie minisubs. The last FSA cruiser is then mobbed by Australian frigates, takes 2 more crits and sinks, clearing the board of American units...

So America rules the sea floor, the Aussies own the top part. Then we added up the points. I was robbed !

From Prussia with love.

Hi Guys

My usual opponent, Ed, and I have a good game of Dystopian Wars last night. He wanted to try out his new Russian fleet and I used my Prussians. This was my first time playing against the Russians and the learning curve was rather steep, practically vertical .... In Dystopian wars (DW), the Prussian fleet is faster than most of its counterparts, very good at close range gunnery and boarding attacks but weak at long range. They are very well balanced opponents for the British fleet, Eds' usual force for DW. The Russians are slower than the Prussians, have very little long range capability, but are very dangerous at close range. They also have ablative armour, which makes it very difficult to damage them. Once you score a point of damage, the armour is cracked and the advantage lost. It means that the first hit on them can only cause a single point of damage, where everyone else can take catastrophic damage in one strike. My usual tactic against the British is to charge through their long range fire, closing to close gunnery range and then launching boarding attacks as soon as possible. This would be suicide against the Russians as you would be just running onto their bigger guns.

We  went with the basic starter fleet, each having 1 battleship, 3 cruisers, 9 frigates, 2 bombers and 10 tiny flyers ( you have a choice of fighters, dive dombers, torpedoe bombers or spotters. We each choose 10 fighters.) When we deployed, I accidentally used 3 Battlecruiser models but used the stat profile for normal cruisers, so no cheating occured.

The Prussian fleet deploys



The evil Russian fleet deploys







  In turn 1 Ed won the initiative, and activated a squadron first ( in DW each player activates a single unit/squadron and it alternates back and forth so you are both involved, but getting the first punch in can be a big advantage. We both advanced toward each other at full speed. This was a bit dumb on my behalf but I wanted to see what the Russians could do, I just learned the hard way. There was very little firing in the first round, due to both of us having little long range firepower. The exception was my two bombers each have a forward tesla coil with a limited long range attack. I took pot shots at Eds bombers, both at the edge of effective range. My first attack was a lucky one, I scored a critical on a bomber, rolled on the crit table and got magazine explosion. It destroyed that model and damaged its companion, and sunk a nearby frigate, much to the dishumour of Ed.

Kerblamo !

Ed seeing the crit result

Turn 2, I took the initiative. We both advance, the Russian cruisers destroy a Prussian frigate, the frigates close on the cruisers but score no damage.  My bombers tesla his cruisers and crit one of them, and halving his speed with engine damage. The Russian frigates close on my frigates on the left flank, destroying one. The Prussian cruisers advance on their opposite numbers, damaging one and shooting down the remaining Russian bomber. The Russian battleship advances and deals out damage in all directions . It causes heavy damage to a Prussian bomber, taking its bombs temporarily off-line. A squadron of Russian fighters finish off the wounded bomber with some loses, finishing turn 2.

Turn 3. The Russians took the initiative and advanced his cruisers. The fire on the Prussian cruisers and destroy one, causing 26 points of damage ( It sinks after 4..). The remaining Prussian bomber straffes the Russian cruisers, damaging one in a rather feeble attack. The Russian battleship advances to close range, downing the last Prussian bomber, sinking a Prussian cruiser and leaving my options extremely limited. Given that most of my fleet had become one-way submarines,  I concede the game at this point for a fairly one-sided Russian victory. Next time I will cheat and use things like tactics and a plan, rather than just running forward like a goosed muppet.

Look at all the empty space where the Prussian fleet was.

Where are my Eyebrows ?

We had a game of Dystopian wars last night. They are an unusual set of VSF rules which cover naval,aerial and land fights simultaneously. We have yet to try land combat, but started with the naval starter sets and added some aerial units for a little variety. Last night we played to 1000pts, with my usual gaming oponent, Ed using his British fleet while I used my Prussians. We normally use a few islands as it breaks up line of sight and forces more challenges for placement and manoevering.

The British fleet deployed

The Prussian fleet

Prussians converge on the British aerial flagship

Congested air space

Where did my airship go ?

We played for about 3 hours, with time lost making tea and talking. There were some quality moments, such as my battleship running into a strength  5 mine, Ed rolled one 6, and continued to roll 6's until my BB had taked a crit and was now on fire. Towards the end of the game, most of my heavier units had started to converge on Eds aerial battleship, it was damaged and I was desperate to try to bring it down. My two aerial crusiers came up behind it to engage at close range but had little effect. Ed closed with his flying aircraft carrier and shot at my two smaller airships. He scored a critical on the nearer one and rolled a double 1, a magazine explosion.This has a blast radius and all the nearby flying units were in range. The resulting fireball caused a crit on my other aerial cruiser, wrecking the engines. It caused damage on the flying aircraft carrier that fired the shot, my heavy airship and nearly caused a crit on Eds own flagship. We timed out at this stage, there was still plenty of fight left in the Prussians but the tide of battle was in Eds favour so we called it a minor victory for him. 1000 points was probably a bit ambitious given the amount of time we had to play in, so we figure on going for about 750 next time and try to play to a conclusion.

Phil