Just to confuse matters, we tried a 3-player game with the VSF ships! We used a variant of the scenario I used last time.
ISLAND RECOVERY SCENARIO
The Royal Navy have had a tip-off
about the location where the Tong are picking up contraband and a RN force are
heading to the location to intercept them. However, the Ottomans have also
discovered the plan, and a Crescent Moon landing party have used a mole machine
to reach the location first, where they will rendezvous with a naval launch.
Layout: Water with a scattering of
small islands, jetties etc.
Place 2 counters of contraband
along the eastern edge on islands or jetties and 1 on the island in the centre.
They are valued at 10, 20 and 30.
Place the Crescent Moon mole
machine and 4 characters on land or a jetty, anywhere along the Eastern edge.
The launch carrying the other 4 characters is placed in the water along the
eastern edge. The Royal Navy start within 6” of the NW corner and the Tong
within 6” of the SW corner.
600 point companies.
Victory.
VP for enemy killed and contraband
controlled by the player. To be controlled contraband must be in contact with
only one player or on board a player’s vessel.
Game Length 8-10 turns.
Underwater movement.
Characters that can move
underwater, move a full speed, but lose ½ action to enter or leave the water.
Whilst underwater they can only be attacked by another underwater foe.
The table layout before the players have deployed. The nearest edge is West.
The end of turn one and everyone has their boats on the table (although it's a bit crowded in the Tong's corner.
The Crescent Moon have used their mole machine to seize one of the objectives.
The Dragon Lady and a cannon defend the central objective.
The end of turn two, both the Royal Navy gunboat and the Crescent Moon launch have been bombarding the Tong forces on the island. The RN launch has made a rush for the third objective...
....but so has the Ottoman Iron Man., who got there first. The launch's machinegun peppered the Irom Man but the bullets just bounched off!
In the meantime the Ottoman launch started firing at the two smaller Tong vessels intent on boarding them. At this point Colin realised that he had boobed by putting the Yeti on the punt, so his strongest close combat specialist was on his slowest boat!
The end of turn three. In the bottom corner the RN boarding party advance after the Iron Man, who has scooped up the contraband and fled. The gunboat slowly moves towards the island to land it's boarding party, the gunner has switched attention to the junk and set it on fire!
BOOM! The Tong fanatic (the sword bearing body next to the cannon) successfully got close enough to the RN boarding party to set off his bomb. This was the third time the Tong had fielded this combination and on both previous occaisions the fanatic had been killed before he could detonate! Unfortunatly he only killed one of the RN party, due to their armour, but he did kill 4 other Tong members who had jumped into the sea to escape the burning junk.
Things got heated now and I forgot to take pictures of the final turns. The game ended as a RN victory, all the Tong were dead and the RN had the 30 point objective on their gunboat. The Ottomans did have the other two objectives on their launch, but they only had two men left and the tiller had been shot away. As both RN vessels were closing in with 5 men ready to board the Ottoman boat, we called it as a RN win!
Bonus points go to Mark, playing the Crescent Moon. As the RN boarding party closed in on one of the objectives, the Ottoman diver grabbed it and jumped ito the sea, them walked out to the waiting launch leaving the CPO and his men just standing at the shore!
