"Go for Broke!"

"Go for Broke" is the real motto for the 100th Bn. / 442nd RCT, which I am familiar with as when I lived in Hawai'i, it was the local National Guard unit and some friends were in it.


Conquest was good fun and my first more than 600 point tournament. As mentioned before I wasn't even sure I would make it until a week previous. Luckily I had a viable force assembled with the help of some of the Cav's cagey veterans, (Andy and Pooch).
1750 points of Infantry which I had run once before...
luckily for me, even losing badly can be fun for a bit in Flames.

First up was Roadblock vs Nick (Lintman) and his very well painted Kiwi Rifles.

My 'ambush' getting smashed after only bailing two out of nine shots!
I did a rookie move and use AT guns for my ambush, rolled shitty and then no reinforcements came..

Next up was Nathan's Tyne and Tees (or something English anyway;-). Crocs and Wasps and four platoons of trained infantry and a hero etc. I was in for it defending in Breakthrough.
He opted for Night Attack and used the visibility issues to move up quickly without worrying about my air or arty. I was able to hold him off and attrit his forces quite a bit, killing a couple platoons. He managed to jump on the objective on turn 6 with me out of contesting range. Game 4-3 to him. Forgot to take pictures.

Then was my bro Jason's (Kruger) Fallschirmjager in Cityfight.
He had a couple platoons of FJ and a platoon of Sturmpioneeren with Flammenwerfers and he also had two Jagdpanthers!
This is a bloody, bloody scenario, with limited fields of fire etc. Both forces were veterans and tough, we hammered each other with tens of dice of MG's at a go, 8 shots at a go of 3" guns vs 75mm Pak's.
Slugfest and very fun, finally he broke through my left before I could make it through his left.;-)
I did kill a couple platoons here as well, including his Jagdpanthers!

We adjourned for the evening and I went to a mate's birthday party in New Brighton though I wanted to hang with the veteran players and pick up some more tips. It was good to unwind from the mental workout.

Next morning was the painting challenge but I was Skypeing with my wife instead. Oh the guilt, there were some very nice armies there. Standouts for me were, Nick's, Dave's, Jason's and Andy's, somehow I missed Bob's paras who won. My Nisei weren't finished... playable but not there.

Chris was playing for the Janus beast, of himself and Jamie, and their 'democratically' chosen morally bankrupt Tankovy in the Dust Up scenario. Now Dust Up, I had played before vs the map designer Andy and Chris had just showed up with the accursed tankos and had some learning to do. Lucky for him my pilots were drunk and refused to really show up.

We had a great time killing the hell out of each other, we ended up on each other's objectives contesting each others as well. I think we called it a draw, not sure if it was actually another 4-3 for him. Anyhow FUN, killing tanks with, bazookas, close assault, 105's, P40's, and Stuarts. Luckily it taught me very well the importance of keeping your infantry gone to ground vs assaults. Discipline people!

Lastly I had another first, Breakthrough Assault defending against Andy and his Soviet Assault Pioneers.
This was on one of Craigs great tables, that was a custom built, four piece job.
Deciding factors were my boys weathering the initial bombardment pretty well and staying GTG as long as possible. Perhaps we got the obstacle clearing wrong.
In any case my arty delivered a few ToT's that hammered his infantry platoons while they were shooting down my attack aircraft.

Rough day at the office for 1st platoon which was nearly entirely wiped out. My AT Platoon was also wiped out I think
In the end I prevailed though with my first victory, unfortunately spoiling Andy's standings against Craig and Pooch. Sorry mate, but congrats to them as well as Jason who got third in this tough line up.

In all, I've got to say I was touch and go a couple times, but I learned a ton about how to play and had a lot of fun because most of the players are totally awesome.
Also the support from Cavaliers organizers, Stephen, Tim and Clinton at Comics and the staff at SAS Club was truly beyond par.
Huzzah to all.