Insects versus Arachnids

Today Crabro and I played a couple more games of Memoir '44 (both sides of the Operation Cobra scenario) and also Chad Jenson's interesting worker-placement/area control game: Dominant Species.

I wasn't expecting to do particularly well today after a few sleepless nights had left me feeling woolly-headed. Somehow I managed to secure a win both as Axis and as Allies in the Memoir games.

After lunch we tackled our first game of Dominant Species and took our time working through the rules of what initially seems like quite a complex game. The player aids are well designed and helpful though and we got through our learning game without too much further rule reference.

Neither of us had much idea of strategy at this stage but the end result was fairly close: Crabro's win by about seven points. My mistake was mainly failing to check in advance what happened at end-game and consequently not setting myself up well for the final scoring (having led for most of the game). It seems satisfyingly different from other games of the worker-placement type and I look forward to another game now that we are more familiar with the basics.

Wednesday Whinging

Tuesday games had to move to Wednesday this week and started much later to boot. We finished with Schotten-Totten, a strangely themed card game by the prolific designer Reiner Knizia which was later re-themed and made more complex as Battle Line. I have owned it for a while and was glad to finally get to play it.
 Image via Wikipedia



I have a German version of it and am unaware if there is any rational explanation for the odd theming of clan warfare between stereotypical cartoon Scots. I'm not sure whether the Scots are terribly happy to see themselves as bare buttocked, kilt-wearing beligerent bagpipe-stranglers but they know where to find Reiner if they want to take it up with him. Meanwhile I see it really as a nice little abstract filler.

One of our two games of it, which entails a string of "battles" for marker stones between groups of cards in sets of three, was the only game I won all day so I'm grateful to Dr Knizia for that at least. Is anything worn under the kilt? No, it's all in perfect working order, to quote the late Mr Milligan.

As in other recent weeks, the other games were Memoir '44 (both sides of an all infantry scenario) and A Few Acres of Snow. In the former I had some terrible luck as well as playing badly, in the latter I just played badly I think. At any rate I got trounced once again by the French despite trying a completely different strategy from last week. To be fair Crabro had stopped his stomping on Boston and tried a completely different strategy himself.

I need to do some homework before next time, although I did at least win one siege this time. The Memoir scenario pitted French resistance groups with the additional flexibility in their firing and retreating rules but only three figures per unit against ordinary German units. Unfortunately, given that there was no armour present, I kept rolling tanks, tanks and stars...lots of tanks...

A very enjoyable day again anyway.

A Few Acres of Snow

Image via WikipediaCrabro and I played "A Few Acres of Snow", the Martin Wallace deck-building board game again today.

Once again I played the Redcoat side but this time with far less success, losing both games. Crabro went for a simple military strategy both times, having decided correctly that simply besieging Boston until it fell was all he needed to do to win. Accordingly he did not bother much with expansion or any other aspect but concentrated on the French ability to raise money from trapping etc and ploughed that cash into buying military assets.


In the first game I decided that if I expanded fast enough I could finish the game quickly with the points in my favour. Unfortunately, I had forgotten everything I learned last week and most times forgot to put the cards for the new acquisitions into the discard pile to feed the deck. For a while I was frustrated by the lack of opportunity to expand the network and with four villages to go I realised that a lot of this was my own fault. Having never amassed the kind of military might to contest what Crabro was doing he won the Boston siege about the same time. To be fair I had also forgotten that this was an end condition so I didn't try to defend.

In the second game I wanted to come up with another strategy in order to continue to expand my experience and knowledge of the game. I didn't really want to be pushed into simply defending against attack, being a little worried that we might turn a good game simply into the siege of Boston game and tire of it.

Not having much of a concrete idea of what to do I first tried to carry the fight to Crabro by sieging from the first turn. This turned into a defeat and set back my potential for a successful non-military strategy at the same time. I never really worked out what I was aiming for after than and consequently didn't seed the deck in any helpful way. Towards the end I had a number of almost useless hands and even resorted to paying to discard cards. Meanwhile, despite some setbacks from my ambushes, Crabro soldiered on to another one-sided battle at Boston.

Still a lot of fun but I fear that Crabro may be happy to continue to bash Boston unless I find a way of thwarting that strategy. Meanwhile after three games it might be time to swap sides for a while and see how it looks from a different viewpoint.

Although we only started at lunchtime today, owing to family commitments on Crabro's part, we still managed another scenario from Memoir '44 as well. This time a battle among the forests between two elite Panzer units (four tanks each) with their supporting infantry and a number of small (3 figures) but nimble French resistence units. As is often the case in Memoir, the tanks were more of a liability than an asset despite their speed and range. In this case not only were they up against severe penalties in firing into forest and town but were also a tempting target being worth two flags apiece. Crabro, realising this tried to keep them out of trouble as a win was only four flags in this scenario. Nevertheless I attacked them from the air at the beginning and then managed to get a unit "behind the lines" for a useful hit and run. The depleted unit was eventually finished off by infantry in forest at close range. The remaining two flags were picked up from infantry units.

Having found it reasonably easy to win as the French I was not expecting to have a good time of it as the Germans and was relieved to gain one flag so I knew it would not be a whitewash. In the event though I was unable to keep the Panzers back owing to having exclusively right flank cards for some time but through some lucky rolls and successful infantry attacks as well I got the upper hand and won again.

A very pleasant day's gaming with overall honours even again. I must come up with a way of thwarting the siege of Boston however.

Unhappy Landings

Tuesday games and a return to Borgdom with another Memoir '44 scenario: This time bloody Omaha beach.

The Axis forces were well dug in behind sandbags, in towns and bunkers upon or behind a bluff and rows of wire and anti-tank hedgehogs.

My turn as the Axis forces first and even though from my point of view there seemed to be a great many Allied infantry and armour units, I had no great difficulty in holding them off from my defensive vantage points. Artillery gave me range and bunkers ensured that for the most part the Allies were only rolling one dice. At one point I did roll six "tank" symbols in a row when I was firing at infantry but in the end I took very little damage while gaining my six flags.

Crabro did manage to penetrate beyond the bluff and briefly occupy a town to take its flag but forced to move and give it back I believe it ended 6-1 although Crabro remembers it as 6-2 which would be nice as that is exactly the result when the roles were reversed and I had to try and get my men out of the sea and off the beach. It was a very challenging scenario and for that reason fun and satisfying to play.

After lunch we attacked a new Martin Wallace another favourite designer, particuarly of Crabro's. The game was "A Few Acres of Snow" and the setting the battle for control of North America between the French and the British redcoats.

It took a while to understand the large number of different actions available to each of us and get used to the different make up of the card decks available but it quickly began to flow and was a big hit with both of us. We are looking forward to playing it again.

Despite the board and pieces at first suggesting a standard two player  wargame it actually has a Dominion-like deck-building mechanism at its heart which made it very interesting to us. Although this was essentially a learning game we did score it at the end and at first thought that Crabro had one by a single point. We then noticed that we had not taken into account the village I had captured in a raid and adjusted the scores making me the winner by a single point.

A very close day, pretty much an honourable draw across the board and very enjoyable indeed. Roll on a return to both these games.

Tuesday is Games Day once more

A welcome return to Tuesday gaming with Crabro today after terrible family problems had turned his life upside down for several weeks. After making tea, we resumed where we had left off some weeks ago, with a Memoir '44 scenario.








This time it was the battle at Pointe du Hoc and the setup, with a line of hills representing cliffs spreading the whole width of the board, looked very one-sided.

Since each of us won in our turn as the Allies this is perhaps the case but not the way round I was expecting. The Axis forces were all dug in behind sandbags or in bunkers and the American Rangers had a cliff to scale before confronting them...but in the end the Rangers won both times without huge difficulty.

There were certainly differences in strategy as with a hand full of right flank cards and no forces at all on that flank I felt the need to move a couple of units into that sector even though it was guarded by an infantry unit in a bunker on a spur of cliff and an artillery battery. Crabro took the seemingly more sensible route which I had originally decided on and avoided that flank completely while trying to keep the artillery out of range or at its extreme extent.

There was some method in my madness though as there were two "flags" to be had by entering woods at the top of the board on that flank, two more units were all that was needed for the win. In Crabro's case he ignored the territory flags and made up all four of his points by destroying infantry units. Both strategies worked in the end although I believe my Germans achieved one more flag than his by some seemingly suicidal attacks out of the cover of the defensive obstacles.

After lunch we turned to a new game of Crabro's: Airlines: Europe, which like its predecessors Airlines and Union Pacific are shareholding "train" games by Alan Moon. Unfortunately (because I own Airlines) this proved to be a much nicer and more satisfying game.

Having learned how to play it in the first game (a clear win for Crabro) we decided to have a second game, predicting correctly that it would flow much faster now we were confident of the rules. I had obviously learned some valuable lessons as this time it was a clear win for me.

Add to this a pleasant lunch, lots of tea and gossip and it was a very enjoyable return to Tuesday games and ended happily with two wins apiece.

Montelimar Memoir

 The inaugral hosting of the Thursday games group here last night, owing to my no longer being a car owner, and regular host Crabro having his own problems.

Most of the group had other pressing issues in fact, so initially the group consisted of just myself and The Professor.




After the obligatory cup of tea, we decided on Memoir '44 and chose a scenario by the scientific method of the Professor saying the first number that came into his head.  Accordingly we prepared to fight the battle for southern France around Montelimar (where I sampled some wonderful nougats in happier times). Coincidentally it was the 67th anniversary of the fighting in question.

Initally, The Professor's forces made a lot of ground, pressing forward in the centre with his panzers and elite infantry units in blitzkrieg style. He then found that the point of his advance was surrounded on three sides by my own, allied, infantry though. A couple of useful cards allowed me to double the use of my artillery, safely taking pot shots at range from behind woods and hills, and call in an air strike on his advancing infantry, including two of the elite units.

The Professor seemed to have acquired the skill of always rolling hand grenades (wild cards in effect) and with the score about 4 flags each of the six required, Crabro called to say he was on his way and he was a welcome sight as we broke for tea and a chat in the kitchen.

Returning to the fray. I spotted a winning move but it was the Axis turn and unknowingly he thwarted my initial plan. I had no specific cards allowing moves in the centre where his weakest troops were, but then acquired one allowing 2 units to be commanded in each sector. In the centre my remaining unit of Shermans had dashed to the North, ready to take the flag available for holding ground by the Rhone. It only remained to pick up one more flag by destroying an Axis unit. The plan was for the Shermans to fire from their position by the Rhone, at a unit which was down to one piece. In the event all they could do was force it to retreat and it was down to the intact artillary to wipe out what was left of a Panzer unit on the left flank for the winning flag.

Crabro then joined us for two games of Mensa Connections (perhaps better known as Reiner Knizia's Ingenious or even Einfach Genial).

The first went my way, with a not particularly impressive winning score of 8 or 9 and with the others within one or two points. In the second of the, quite agressively played, games I struggled to move orange  and was squeezed out by a rampaging Crabro who went on to win by a convincing margin.

I thought that the Professor and I had tied for second but he was at pains to point out that he had beaten me by virtue of his second lowest scoring colour being higher than mine. I was happy with two wins out of three though. :-)

No need for the new "Spieltisch" this week but I am inviting the group round again next week when I will perhaps be hosting something like a more normal turnout.

We will fight them on the beaches

Sword Beach scenario set up

 Back to Memoir '44, the Richard Borg game using his card driven war game mechanic in a number of Second World War scenarios specifically related to the Overlord invasions of Europe on 6th June 1944 and their aftermath. Last week saw us tackle the first two scenarios which were based on the airborne Allied landings to secure important inland targets: The Ox and Bucks Light Infantry glider landings to take the Pegasus Bridge and the taking of Saint Mere-Eglise by the U.S. 505th Parachute Infantry.

Miss, retreat, any unit, infantry and armour.

 This week the scenario was the actual landing at the beach codenamed Sword, where British troops supported by Commando units and amphibious Sherman tanks were landed. The set up of the scenario includes all these elements arriving together which is historically accurate as the weather prevented the plan to land the tanks first.

I played the Axis side in our first game and from where I sat the Allied forces arrayed against me looked formidable. The main element in my favour should have been the artillery, dug in a fortification and ready to rake a wide area around it with its long range and immunity to line of site restrictions. In the event this unit got off very few shots owing to the lack of suitable cards and it was quickly over-run as Crabro's troops forced their way straight up through the centre of my lines.

I had the advantage of most of my forces being in good defensive positions such as woods, towns and bunkers which were particularly good against his Shermans which were already up against "hedgehog" tank traps strewn along the beachhead. In the end I took two commando units, a tank unit and two of his ordinary infantry units to give me the game. Despite poor results from a barrage card and some of the usual problems with not having a card to command the units most needed, I had some good rolls, and a close assault card allowed me to finish the job.

Plastic prototype of Crabro's dice tower is useful

 We then changed sides and played the scenario again, allowing me to experience just how difficult it was to make use of the tanks, which were nearly always rolling at -2 dice against troops firing out of good defensive terrain. I made some good gains on the left flank taking me up to 3 of the victory points needed and poised to take a unit and town for the final two...when I ran out of left flank cards. Tantalisingly these final targets remained and were never to fall to the Allies. The Axis played well to recover strongly and at the point when we broke for lunch, each army had four of the five medals required.

Terrain player aids and Shermans

 It was obvious that my next move had to be the win or the Axis would secure victory in the following turn. It fell to two units, one tank and the other infantry, to attempt to wipe out a unit of infantry on the right flank. At the same time I moved a severely depleted unit another step away from the artillery. The tanks scored a hit and his damaged unit retreated but they were still in range of the infantry who luckily finished the job.

Air power wasn't much help to me as Axis player

A completely different game as, far from thrusting up the centre like Crabro, I had as far as possible given the artillery a wide berth which was intact and facing an empty vista at the end of the game.

We are both now big fans of these Borg games and have played Battle Cry and Commands and Colors: Ancients. Memoir '44 is now wetting our appetite for Battlelore.

Borg Game Geek

Today saw a welcome return to Richard Borg's card driven Commands and Colors (sic) style war-gaming. Crabro and I have logged something like 80 games of Ancients and its expansions and have also played a few games of Battle Cry but this was our first session with the D-Day-commemorating Memoir '44. We were very happy to be returning to this type of game (albeit the origin of my "I whinged for Carthage T-shirt) even though we were aware that the older Memoir did not have some of the complexities of Commands and Colors: Ancients.

The game is highly reminiscent of those invented by myself and a friend in our teens, utilising our OO scale Airfix soldiers and a board borrowed from another game. These had started with the use of a Cluedo board which we decided could represent streets and buildings rather than rooms and corridors. Over some months these games evolved into large scale American Civil War battles played on a 3D landscape constructed using an assortment of model railway accessories, Plasticine, small building blocks and other items borrowed from my little brother's toy collection. Naturally it is Battle Cry which is the greatest reminder of this era but the miniature soldiers in Memoir are also highly evocative of those early teenage days.

Today we played the first two scenarios: Pegasus Bridge (an introductory scenario using only infantry) and Sainte Maire Eglise which introduced a tank unit and different terrain.

Things went downhill for me after winning the first battle as the Allies but I did manage to keep the return match on the Pegasus scenario to 4-3. After lunch Crabro's parachutists managed to dig themselves in along a perfect defensive line in woods, villages etc and my little Feldgrau failures were trapped in a pocket and massacred. The reverse of the scenario did not see me repeat Crabro's success with the initial "parachute drop" and after some limited success my hand (consisting as it did of only left flank cards) went against me, allowing the Panzer unit on my right flank which I had been so desperately trying to take out, to mop up the remaining necessary units without serious opposition.

The usual whinging about cards and Crabro's legendary dice rolling aside, it was great fun to return to this type of game and I think we are both very much looking forward to some more before perhaps moving on to Borg's later and more complex game: Battlelore.

To finish the day we added some new expansions into Jambo and just to be consistent I lost again. In a game rather characterised by debate about the correct use of various new cards, Crabro motored to a comfortable win by taking all four of the new Relic cards.