Even Stephen's

Although I bemoan my lack of wargaming on reflection I do OK, I just would like to do more, I have just been through to Stewart's for some X-Wing action to balance the scales somewhat as he is happy to play historical most of the time here at Casa Anderson. Coming up along with Club nights is a War and Conquest Sunday, it was to be a weekend but I cannot commit next month to two days, so Mark Walker is making the long trip up from Leicester, a keen player considering the state of the roads. I also have Stewart coming over for Chain of Command, so not bad really. My mate Billy in Scotland has built himself the wargaming equivalent of the Wolfschanze in his garden and is open for games, I was hoping to get up this month or next but real life has interfered, however it is always an option, maybe in October.

Enough, what about the games, on arriving my grandson James was in the huff as he was not being allowed to play with Dad and Papa, so I offered him a game if he put a smile on his face, no, larger boy. Needless to say he won and went off happy with promises of more games later.

I left everything to the last minute as usual despite having time on my hands so I copied some Rebel lists from the internet, the first had a mixture of craft, a Hwk, X-Wing, Headhunter and a Y-Wing up against Scum with a Firespray and two little things Kom'rk's I think. Anyway before we go any further I am usually just target practice for Stewart as I am not a great or good player at this, this was going to show in the game as the build I had 'stolen' was far too complicated for my skills, it did look good but needed an above average player to pull it off, not me. The game lasted a lot longer than I thought and there came a point where if I had made a better decision and not rolled such lousy dice I may have went on to win, but it was not to be and although I cut the enemy forces down to two ships my four went south eventually in quick succession.

I think this is where I screwed up in the first game.

That is a Ukrainian Air Force colour scheme on the Hwk.

 

In the second game I took a force more suited to my talents and not overly complex, two B-Wings, the Hwk and an X-Wing, I was against the Empire this time with two Defenders and an Interceptor. Again it was not a quick game and Stewart started off well but this time my dice were a lot better and I saved quite a few shots, there was also a lot of ships in a small space so at times some could not get a shot off, this was better for me than the bad guys. I tried to pull my B-Wings out to medium range in order to use their laser cannons but was followed closely by the Defenders. By sheer accident I had managed to get all my ships with firing arcs on the Defenders and my dice eventually came through, both ships went up in bright explosions, I think both Stewart and I were a bit stunned, he got his last shots off  with the Interceptor which failed to bring down the badly damaged X-Wing so we called it a day, one each, result!

It was 1700 hrs so we popped along to the pub for the Recrimination Phase before I motored home, I had to have a shandy as they had no zero beer, every big brewer now has zero beer, my favourite at the moment being Peroni but still some pubs don't get it. I must admit I felt like throwing caution to the wind and having several pints of ale just like the old days but no, besides I was driving.

So, as I sit here on this beautiful day what's next, nothing today, a walk along the prom in Morecambe to take in the sea breeze, nothing tomorrow either as you cannot go anywhere in the Lake District during a holiday unless you want to spend the day in traffic jams, looking for parking, or jostling through crowds in the heat. So getting some SYW troops ready for priming and sinking some cool Peroni's are the order of the day.