DSC

 I had my first ever game of Dropship Commander on Tuesday night. I was at the Medway wargames club and the game was put on by Dave and Paul who do both come to the Rainham club so I knew I was in good hands.

I played against Paul and Dave was kind enough to guide me through the rules and provide some (well a lot really) of coaching. I know most if not all of you have seen DSC the figures and the terrain before. I will be honest that I was drawn to the game because of the look. But look aside it does seem to be a worthwhile game.

WE played the starter scenario. Paul went first and darted up the board. I reacted ready to contest the centre large building with my infantry. Moving alternate units Paul moved his AA vehicles and demounted them. I countered with my tanks. Paul moved his Tanks and I moved my AA vehicles.

Round Two Paul with the initiative again demounted his troops into the building ready to begin searching for one of the three objectives. I moved and fired my tanks. Both Dave and Paul thought that would be decisive and Pauls AA vehicles would be toast. This was the first time that Paul had encountered my dice rolling agility first hand. An average roll would see 2/3rds of his unit destroyed. I only hit one and failed to do any damage. So my firing was totally ineffective.
Paul returned fire and scooted to cover. My AA vehicles crawled forward and fired. Lots of dice and again no effect. And Paul took that as the cue to destroy my tank transport leaving my no ground bound tanks only moving 4" a turn.

Paul took his second infantry unit to another objective and I stormed all mine into the centre building out numbering Pauls troops 2 to 1. A sure victory everyone thought. And then I rolled the dice. I did some damage but Paul did more despite me rolling twice as many dice as him. Oh dear. Paul then went on to destroy my APC's and then AA vehicles. I was running out of things to have destroyed just my infantry my tanks too far away to do anything and a dropship. All I had destroyed in turn was a single drop ship for Pauls AA vehicles.

Paul discovered the second objective and then I got a single lucky shot in from a missile on my dropship. It managed to destroy Pauls troop dropship and one of his APC's. This left his troops with the objective a mere 2" move a turn to try to exit the board.

The centre building finally yielded to me and my troops lined the walls and fired personal antitank weapons at Pauls Tanks. It worked and I took out two of them. And then with the building cleared I was able to find (one of my few 6's during the whole game) the objective.

The game ended as a draw as the turn countdown turned to 6 and the game ended. We each had one objective marker and had each failed to leave the board. I think both Dave and Paul would agree the dice did not favour me in this game. I had only my tanks and some battered infantry left at the end while Paul still had 3/4 of his starting force. Still a draw is a draw and I was very lucky to get that.

I would like to thank Paul for being a good sport and not laughing too loud at my dice rolling ineptitude and Dave for his invaluable help and advice.

Conclusion: It was a good game and terrific set up. The price of the starter set is affordable and I am tempted. The rules are quick and easy to learn and the game fun. The only reason I have not to go and get the starter set is that several members of the club already have large forces and if I was to get the starter set it would not get used because they have so much.

Thanks for reading and I will try to keep posting alternate days from now on. All the best Clint.

Painting for a friend (2)

These were mostly done before I took the break for a week. I found blogging again to be cathartic so have decided to finish these and have something new to show. As you can see two British officers of the colonial period suitable for leading the naval landing party I have been working on. (see below for a few pics of those). They have a very similar colour scheme to the mounted officer so should fit with him very well. Being on foot and with puttees and not riding boots I see these as more junior officers Lieutenant's or 2nd Lieutenants. Again painted for a friend so he is now overstocked with officers so I should show the Ratings I have finished now.

And here they are! Four ratings suitable for land operations. I have 5 more to finish, as well as a couple of machine guns. The infantry I have started so probably by the end of the week for them. As clearly seen these are all rifle armed and in advancing poses so they are suitable for most table top encounters. I did paint a few more of these for Matt (my friend) a while ago so he should have about 16 infantry now. As well as the officers and a machinegun.


 Talking of Machineguns I have two to assemble and paint for him as well. As they are not started I will use them as part of Curt's painting challenge. So maybe I will get on to them from 15th December onwards.

That's it for today. Thanks for looking. Take care and hope to see you again soon.

A Dark and Lonely Place.

Most of you will not know that I have been suffering from workplace bullying for about a year now. And last week I let it get under my skin and stopped functioning. As such I am now on medication for depression and have counselling on Tuesday morning. I have now put in a complaint in writing and asked for a transfer, but it did get me down big time.

I do not want any sympathy I am and will deal with it and bounce back stronger. I have a few times in the past and know I will in the future as well. But I have not even looked at a brush or model for about a week!

I merely state the above to explain my absence from blogging for the last week.

Ok the important stuff none of this head shrink shit wargames are far more important than that. Some of you will have already noted that I am included in the 4th Annual Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge. Which Curt runs from his blog (Link to Curt's Blog.) . I have sent myself the same target as both Ray and Fran Deliberately. This is not in anyway meant as a challenge to them personally but to encourage me to get my finger out as I was originally thinking of a target of 400 points. All the rules are on Curt's blog if you want to know how the points are scored entry fees and the like.

For example a single 28mm foot figure painted and based is worth 5 points, So I would need to paint about 120 of the blighters to reach my personal goal. There are bonus weeks which will give me an additional 50 points IF I submit the required themed model/models in that week. I may well need those if I am going to make the proposed target.

The Challenge starts on the 15th December and continues into March. I personally will be using it to paint the figures I want for the Rainhams Broadside game next June. So yes a new project is about to start. This one will become clear very quickly and I am quite excited by it as I have not seen the game at any shows in the past. You may have of course, but I have not. It will be inspired by both actual history AND a certain film. So no it is not Zombies, hard luck guys! But there will be Camels!

Thanks for reading and with luck I hope to be posting regularly again as I get over this blip!

Cheers Clint