Event: OttoCon!
OttoCon is a yearly event dedicated to the more light hearted versions of war-gaming. Fictional locations, silly victory conditions, absurd troop descriptions are to be considered the norm. Fredonia:
Field Commander (Chicolini, a spy for
Sylvania, currently Fredonia’s Secretary of War)
2 Line Platoons + 2 MG Sections (Pinky sans Brain, a spy for Sylvania)
7 A7-V AFV's
6 Panzershlossollsssennsennses (The Germans seem incapable of being brief)
141 points
The Martian:
3 Tri-links of Tripods.
1 Slaver
2 Assault Tripods
1 Repair Drone
1 Harvester Tripod
6 Raider Tripods
155 points
Note: Inappropriate capitalization is used to highlight specific rules or keywords to the game.
The
new version of Martian Front takes place in Europe, Africa and Asia.
So I was looking for a new location and muse to set the battlefields
in. Previously I was running in Edmonton Canada, whose
122 acres would make a wonderful shopping area some day. The
commanders were Monty Pythons and the vehicle names were inside jokes.
Like Sergeant Cleese riding Sybil.
I had a minor epiphany with Marx Brother's movie "Duck Soup."
The Game Flyer:
Martians come to Fredonia!
Following
the famous slapping incident between Ambassador Trentino, and Rufus T.
Firefly, war has been declared between the hyper-militarized, but
peaceful country of Freedonia and Sylvania. Both recently formed after
the breakup of the Austria-Hungarian empire and both have been insulated
from the interplanetary conflict with Mars.
Ambassador Trentino boards a train back to Sylvania, never to be seen again except for the closing credits.
<on the border between Sylvania and Freedonia>
Chicolini,
the recently promoted Secretary of War, peers through his binoculars at
the border, their lenses obviously still covered. “They are late
again. Theya haven't’a been on time once since this war started...”
Firefly, the recently nonelected leader of Freedonia, “Can’t you start the war without them?”
Chicolini, “I can't’a do it...”
Firefly surprised, “Why not? You're the Secretary of War, aren't you?
Chicolini, “Yes, but I'm not working for you anymore. I'm on the other side.”
Firefly, more surprised, “Is that so? I used to think you were two-faced, but you can't be, or you wouldn't be wearing that one.”
At
this point, an unusually large shell comes crashing from above,
embedding itself, point down, in the floor without exploding. Firefly
and Chicolini rush over to look at it.
Reading slowly, moving their lips, “Acme Ammunition Company.” Both look at each other and say, “eh?”
Removing
the lens caps and peering into the distance, Chicolini proclaims,
“there they are’a. Who-boy, they hav’a some new equipment!”
<mayhem ensues>
Roll Credits…
Our Players…
Groucho Marx as Rufus T. Firefly, the leader of Freedonia
Harpo Marx as Pinky, a spy for Sylvania
Chico Marx as Chicolini, another spy for Sylvania, currently Fredonia’s Secretary of War.
Zeppo Marx as Lt. Bob Roland, Firefly's secretary
Margaret Dumont as Mrs. Gloria Teasdale, a rich widow who underwrites the budget of Freedonia
Louis Calhern as Ambassador Trentino of Sylvania, who schemes to have his country annex Freedonia
Raquel Torres as Vera Marcal, a femme fatale spying for Sylvania
Edwin Maxwell as the Secretary of War (retired)
William Worthington as First Minister of Finance
Since
this is a convention game, we have to assume that the players have no
familiarity to the game, The rules, the number of unit types, and
terrain have been simplified.
One
method I instituted for this game was assigning each player a card.
When his card comes up, he activates one of his units. This is not in
the actual game, but designed to speed up the turn sequence.
Your experience may vary.
The inaugural dinner at a near by pub on Thursday night.
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| I don't recall what I did to deserve a sandwich named after me, but I had to go with it. |
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| I do know what I did to get my name here... |
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| A simplified board. The streams and farm in the center are considered open terrain. |
Each side had a secret victory condition of which I wasn't going to explain.
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| On a nearby table a much bigger battle was about to ensue. |
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| The board at the beginning of the second turn |
The Martians advanced and took some light "shock" damage. The Fredonians started "Dug In", but decided to get out of their hasty (+1, +1) defenses and attack.
The rifles of the infantry only have a range of 10", while the shortest range weapon of the Martian is 15".
This is another case of modifying the scenario to suit a convention environment. In test games I had the infantry dug in with serious trenches. Which meant any hit was re-rolled. While that is fine and balanced, it also means as far as game play goes, the Martian has all the initiative. The Humans just sit back being a pell. Not a fun game for them.
This game was deliberately set up to mix-it-up.
One of the rules of the game is a number of command points that can be used for special efforts. Either "Double Time", "Pour it On", "Rally", or "Maximum Effort." The Human players decided to spend all but 4 command points and gave "Maximum Effort" to every unit on the board. This allowed them to double fire.
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| In turn 2, the far left squad loses their A7-V armored fighting vehicle. But the rifles and 3.7cm gun shakes up one of the Raiders. |
Raiders are relativity fragile in this game. Armor of only 6. They take 4 hits.
A7-V's have an armor of 5, and also take 4 hits.
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| Pinky pushes two squads into the farmer's field, their guns bringing down a Raider. |
Marvin manages to destroy a real panzer (armor 8, 4 hits) |
| Another Raider brought down by an unaccredited leaders platoon. |
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| There are messages ("No Step") at the bottom of the fallen tripods. |
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| Turn 3 provides one of those exploding tripods that this game is known for. Unfortunate for the Fredoniain squad assaulting it with grenades. |
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| Marvin does not need to advance at this point. His heat ray at short range is 15". And he has a Repair Drone, "K9", that is removing minor points of damage. |
Turn 4:
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| A lot of infantry has died. But most of the vehicles are still running. |
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| One odd decision made by the Martian. The last Raider tripod standing obliterates the farm house with it's rapid fire blasters. |
| | | | I
have a special reinforcement rule in place for when a player losses his
command. I expected that to happen on turn 2 or 3, but here we are
with everyone still having toys to play with. |
Turn 5:
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| There has been a lot of focused firepower applied to "Not Marvin." And eventually, it crumbles to dust. But also a full platoon has been lost as well. |
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| Releasing a reserve panzer platoon. |
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| But also releasing the Martian "Harvester" tripod. |
The Harvester is designed for close assaults. It only has "Reaper Coils" to attack, but they have a range of 6", and are "Anti-Personnel" meaning they re-roll misses. It also has armor of 12, vice the assault tripods 10.
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| Marvin has only taken minor damage. But K-9 has been repairing even that as the game goes. |
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| So the humans take out K-9 instead. |
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| Time was running out and we called it here. |
The Humans were considered the winners here as it was unlikely the Martian was going to run them off the field Fredonia was saved!
But a Martian Raider in scene 4 disrupted Mrs Teasdale's tea party, which she was having with Vera
Marcal, femme fatale, and spy for Sylvania. The farm house was shredded, a flaming roll of film seen being chased by the producer and an underpaid cameraman, completing the secret, ambiguous and nonsensical victory condition for the Martian, "Burn
the film “Duck Soup”, before credits roll."
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| FADE OUT on a shot with Groucho running madly, gesticulating, taking in Harpo and Chico turning the table... |
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| Roger's casualty pile. |
Other games.
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| I just bought this game earlier this year, but only played it once. Tracy pulled it out and we played it to turn 14. |
I had a decisive win when we were thinking of quitting, with a score of 40 - 0 -0 -0. But then we decided to "finish the turn."
One bad decision based on hubris later, and I lost, 70-40-0-0....
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| Great looking Age of Sail game. |
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| 1920's, Wednesday, somewhere south of Siberia, west of Peking. A Russian held coal mine is being disputed. |
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| Fabulous terrain. |
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| <cough>Amazingly articulated roads.<cough> |
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| Chinese like their toys. A scratch built tank and a mortar. |
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| The Chinese semi-regulars take up position near the intersection. The Russians are on the hilltop and have a Machine-Gun back and to the left, ready to hose the Chinese down. |
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| The warlord and his mistress, followed by their coollee, shout words of encouragement. |
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| The Chinese Mortar team sets up. |
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| The armored tractor trundles down the road. The SMG armed "Tin Hats" head for the wall. |
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| Special rule for the "Chechins", in that they do not care about the Chinese, just the capture of a British spy. |
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| Later... |
The Russian Naval infantry assault the chicken coop (right), which held by literally, to the last man. The Chinese mortar team put a shell right in the Russians midst, and out of the smoke, charged sword wielding Chinese, destroying the Russians.
On the left, the Tin Hats, famous for their low morale, and lacking any officer to lead them, were charged by the highly motivated Russian unit. It was the classic Morale v. 3 dice per figure fight that rolled pretty much average. With the Russians losing 7 men and their officer for the game.
Got in a game of Junta (no pictures though). I haven't played it this century. Or millennium.
You play a family in a bannanana republic. The objective is to get as much foreign aid into your Swiss bank account before the game ends.
Coups, demonstrations, assassinations, coups, riots are common place. In an unusual occurrence though, El Presidente for Life, stayed president, and alive, throughout the game. The last turn I paid 2 million pesos to have him assassinated while he was at the bank. Where I was going to pick up his briefcase of foreign aid, and dump it in my Swiss band account.
The assassination failed. We totaled up our bank notes. The El Presidente, for life, had 37 million pesos, I had 36 million. So I lost by the amount of the cost of the assassin's fees.
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| Saturday night. Last game. The wild west. This game has a unique feature where being dead is not the crimp in your career that it normally is. Players still can accrue and play "dirty tricks" card for their team. |
Game ended with both sides losing 2 men each, and the bounty collected by the both teams was exactly $3,750 for a tie game.
