30th March - 24th March Dropzone Commander vs The Wife

Got a second game of Dropzone Commander in with The Wife. Found a few bits and pieces rules wise we'd missed in the first game including some how the alternating battle group activation which made the game much more enjoyable for both of us. We just played out the scenario from the two player starter set again and this time ended up with a drawn result after six turns which came down to the final activation.

 The Wife won the first initiative roll and pushed hard on the centre building and making moves to secure her right flank ready to move her troops in for the second objective after finding the first. I held back on my troop deployment until my last activation instead moving my Reapers (anti-air) up to threaten her Eden (gate) and dropping my Hunters (standard tanks) in order to start shooting at the building containing her troops in an attempt to bring it down.

I managed to win the roll for the second turn and started by opening up on the Eden bringing it crashing down to the ground. The Wife moved one of her other two closer to the centre but didn't push it as far forward having learnt her lesson. My second activation was the Hunters who fired at the building managing to roll well enough for four points of damage, but unluckily for me not a single Shaltari troop fell from collapsing masonry. The Wife then managed to find the objective and pulled rapidly from the building getting it off table quickly securing one of the three possible points. My infantry failed to find their target this turn, but on the other flank I'd pushed into the building ready to take on The Wife's heavy defenses. Unfortunately I'd lost track of The Wife's Tomahawks (standard tanks) and lost all my Hunters to them.

The Wife won the next round and sent the now blooded Tomahawks off the other side of the board in order to threaten my troops searching away currently unchallenged. My troops finally found their objective and headed for the table edge in their Invader (APC), hopefully to outrun her tanks. Meanwhile my other squad of troops opened fire on a second Eden and managed to take it out with some impressive fire. Though she quickly countered by sending in a squad of Braves to challenge me. Her Kukri (anti-air) began to trade fire with my Marauders (drop ships) and re positioned Reapers slowly whittling me down.

Of course at this point I got a little involved in the game and forgot to take anymore photos. Turn four and five saw an epic close combat battle that would leave me with one stand of Warriors (out of an original three) with just three damage points left after finally taking down her two stands of Braves. Luckily for me I had also managed to find the objective putting victory just within reach. I managed to win the initiative in the final round and went for my gamble for the win attempting to rush my Warriors back to their Invader then it to it's Marauder, but no! Two of The Wife's three Kukri were in range and their reactive fire took it's toll with the Marauder barely staying in the air after the first salvo, then crashing down to the ground from the second. The Invader and it's precious cargo survived but I had no way of getting it off the board and with it being the last turn we shook hands and called it a hard fought draw.

The Wife is so impressed with the game that we've now expanded up to 1000 point forces, although mine are the only ones together at the moment and I just primed them this morning so I may even get a base coat on them tonight. My mate Toby as also taken the plunge, buying himself a 1000 points of The Resistance and he's coming over tomorrow night with his starter kit to get his first game in so hopefully third time is the charm and my Scourge will come up with an outright win this time.