The Battle of Piccadilly Gulch, Texas.

A Headless Body Production
 Location:  Regency at Providence Community Center, Phoenixville, Pa
Event:         Providence Gamer's Game Knight
Game:          All Quiet on the Martian Front
Scenario:     A variation of Scenario 1 "The Outskirts", Piccadilly Gulch, Texas.
Players:       Phil Gardocki, Scott Landis, Steve Turn: The BEF and a Texas Tank Brigade
                    Jenny, Garth Parker and Bruce Potter: Mobile forces of Pod 19, Hive 4 (फली 19, हाइव 4)
 

The Forces: Freshly unloaded from in Galveston, the BEF unloads to support American operations of the Southern Command.  There were wandering tripods sighted and the mission was to engage them.  But supply problems occurred, and while the bulk of the American tanks were pulled back to refuel.  The BEF, with their radium powered engines, stayed forward and invested a long abandoned mining town.  There, they renamed it Piccadilly Gulch, and the town center Trafalgar Bend, and the local church, "Cantebury".  Why?  Something about it struck their humor.  Who can truly understand our cousins across the sea?  Defenses fully made, they waited, and in that wait, the Martians attacked.

The American Armored Forces Midwest:  6 Mono-Tanks, 3 Kitcheners, 6 Imperials, 3 Cardigans, 3 Defiants, 3 Specters, A Lloyd command Carrier, A heavy coil gun,supported by 7 squads of infantry armed with coil rifles and machine-guns.   One Platoon of Mk III's remained behind, fully coaled by the dregs of the rest of the Texas Tank Corps.  A total of 18 units.

Marvin's Martians: A total of 10  tripods,  7 Assault and 3 Scouts.  About 1,700 points.  

The House rules are at the end of the battle report.

Deployment:

All BEF and Americans are off board, only identified as "blip" markers on the board.  On board is also 2 trapped areas, and 3 ambushes.  The areas around "Piccadilly Gulch" are all considered "low ruins"  All other terrain is considered difficult desert terrain.

Victory Conditions:
Just looking for who breaks first here.  The break point is 9 American units or 5 Tripods.

Piccadilly Gulch, Texas.  Abandoned for decades when the copper mine ran out.  The buildings are representative of low ruins.

On the horizon, tripod figures begin to appear.

Turn 1:
The humans win the initiative and allow the Martians to move first.

The Martians spread out to avoid detonation zones.  Their only targets are hidden markers.  Their heat rays blaze, and remove a few of them.

The view from the right side of the board.

And the left.

Trafalgar Bend.

 At the bottom of the turn, the BEF reveals some of their tanks.  6 Imperials rise to the crest of the hill.  One of the coil guns rolled a '1' and so needs to be repaired.

There was some success though, as they put a mobility hit on the near by Red Martian, (Code name Louie). 

Another coil gun is rolled out, but missed it's target.

 Turn 2:
The humans win the initiative and elect to move first.

The Imperial tanks ascend to the crest of the hill again, and chip away on "Louie", and damage another assault tripod.

The Imperials then drop back behind the hill, and avoid any Martian counterattacks.

The Coil gun next to Canterbury Church fires at "Huey", but missis again.

 The Martians release their heat rays against their tormentors, sending the coil gun to oblivion.

Turn 3: 
The humans maintain the initiative, and move first.

Infantry squads, armed with grenades, assault "Marvin".  The Vickers MG's unleash their full rate of fire upon another assault tripod.

A fusillade of 7.7, titanium tipped, steel jacked bullets finds a weak point in the armor.  The Martian in the hood is slain, his tripod weaves back and forth before collapsing into the grave yard behind Canterbury. 

BEF troopers are emboldened, but have no success assaulting Marvin.

The Imperial Tanks, now facing Tripods both front and flank, shoot at at both assault and scout tripods approaching their hill.

Defiant Armored Cars are revealed, and cause a weapon hit on another tripod.

On the left side of the town, the Martians have completed turning the flanks of the BEF.

Heat ray continues to spray hither and yonder, but the only loss so far was the coil gun.

The Imperials have also managed to repair their damaged gun as well.

 Turn 5

The humans maintain the initiative, and move first.

So far this is looking very good for the BEF.  1 Tripod is down.  1 has a mobility hit, and lost it's dice off, and is now out of range of most of the battle.  One has a weapon hit, and so is not effective.  Several are just damaged.  The humans have lost a total of one unit. 

Time to push. All units leap from their hiding places.  Monotanks, Specters, Kitcheners, and Cardigans open fire as one.

Imperials miss the Assault Tripod

But cause 7 hits on the Scout.

Cardigans and Specters shots bounce harmlessly off of Martian armor.

Monotanks wail on an Assault tripod, causing a pair of hits.  Assaulting infantry even manage to damage a tripod with their grenades.

The Texas Tank Platoon fire 9, 4" guns as one.  For a brief moment, there was a second sun, rising from the desert.

Followed by a third sun!

Stunned silence ensued.  But then the human losses were added up.  6 infantry squads were destroyed in the blast.

With 6 infantry companies destroyed, the Martians need only pick up 2 units to rout the humans.  The first was a pair of sweeps on the Imperials

Routing one tank troop.

Another sweep on the Texas Tank Platoon.  Which missed.

But Marvin saved the day, sweeping the Cardigans, sending them to oblivion as well.  A Martian win!

=====================================================================
House Rules:

Refined Line of Sight Rules (a work in progress):

We will start to use some refined rules for defining Line of Sight.
Unless in ambush (to be defined by the scenario) all units can see each other if within 6” of each other.

Beyond 6”, Human Infantry, Artillery, Motorcycle, BEF vehicles, and Martian Drones and Lobototons are not visible if deeper than 2” in the woods (dense or light)
Beyond 6”, Human Steam Powered vehicles are not visible if deeper than 4” in the woods (dense or light).

Beyond 6” Martian Tripods are not visible if deeper than 2” in or beyond Towering Ruins and Dense Woods, and any terrain type designated as a “Hill”.

            Note: The above is does not count if the hidden units have fired their weapons this turn or last.

The clamp tank does not count as a unit for the purposes of human demoralization.
Units brought back using American Industrial Might count as additional units.  Effectively each unit brought back raises the human demoralization level by .5.  They must be successfully brought onto the board for this purpose.

The Towering Ruins are passable to human vehicles, at half speed, but remain impassable to Martian Tripods.
Humans in Towering Ruins have their defense against heat rays and shock canisters improved as follows:
              Infantry +5/+3, Artillery +4/+2,  Vehicles +2/+2

Humans in Towering Ruins have their defense against green gas  and black dust improved as follows (wind tunnel effects):
              Infantry +2/+2, Artillery +2/+2,  Vehicles +1/+1

When in assault combat, the defenders do not get a bonus for terrain advantages for the "to hit" roll, but do get the terrain armor advantage, if any.

Macadam roads give a movement bonus to tripods.  

Dirt roads give a movement bonus to humans only.

The cost of a Tesla Gun is reduced to 175 points.

The cost of a Land Ironclad is increased to 1,500 points.