578 - Bolt Action Tourney Aftermath: Part 2 - Prizes!

Where was I?

Oh yes: two games down and lunchtime. The important things here are that (a) I had some nice pizza, (b) I bought some raffle tickets, and (c) me and my mate Mattenbury took some pics of our paired Desert Rats forces on a themed board. Here's one - more to follow next post:

My lot's on the left; Mattenbury's lot on the right.
And yes, those are camels. This tourney was remnant v1 rules,
and cavalry in v1 was still fearsome...even camelcav!

Round 3:

Now I was up against the charismatic Pim and his dastardly Germans. It was a straight 'fight to kill each other' (I forget the name of the mission - winner is decided on order dice killed). The table was fairly open but for a cluster of buildings in the middle, but Pim pushed for us to play that infantry could only see over one wall/hedge, which really restricted lines of sight - especially on his side of the board. Including where he placed his sniper! 

Long story short, I won in every way... except in technically securing a victory: the field was mine - as, we agreed, was the moral victory - but I was only one order dice ahead, so it was a tactical draw. Fair enough!

Man of the Match? - my sniper, without a doubt. Having shaken off his shameful cowardice against the Finns, he opened up the game by taking out Pim's sniper. Nice! Having then relocated to another window, he realised that no more targets were likely to present themselves and so, after the briefest of discussions, he and his spotter leapt out of the window, pegged it past the stunned Panzer outside and fell upon the German command team, pistols a-blazin'. 

Left of centre, toward the end. The washers are Pim's pins;
my sniper (and 2 Sect) are in the building bottom-right.

Shifting right a bit . The German Officer is at the top.

Having killed of the enemy officer, my brave duo were set upon  - at short range in the open - by a squad of six or seven grenadiers (in the pic, above)...and they very nearly won that too: taking it to two rounds and taking yet more Germans with them. Brave lads. 

On the left, my sterling Humber Mk II surges forward.

Actually, it was an uncharacteristically assault-y game for me, as I soon realised that having successfully denied Pim my right flank there was sod-all that I could do to draw a bead on his units unless I charged the crap out of them.

I hadn't much choice but to leave these two units exposed, but
the 25pdr and Crusader dealt out some decent damage,
especially against his tank!

The game ended on turn five or six - had it gone to more then a firm victory would certainly have been mine, but so it goes.

A lovely guy, and a resident of the Netherlands, one of my favourite countries. Thanks, Pim!

Round 4:

Now I got the chance to play on the high table: a 12'x4' table with three parallel battles, and I was on the left of the Allied flank, trying to defend my left-flank base from the Germanic onslaught of Luke's veteran Fallschimjager. 

Luke had a cracking start - his medium mortar took out my sniper and started levelling the building with HE right from the off, but his luck soon started to drip away, and despite early advances, he just couldn't make the dash across open ground to flammenwerfer the crap out of my building without my brave Sikhs laying down just a little too much suppressing fire. It wasn't 'death-by-pinning' but it was 'infuriating-inactivity-by-pinning', and once I'd won the firefight it was just a matter of mopping up. 

Mopping up in the end-game. My table edge is the right of the pic.

My right flank was always bound to be sacrificial, but even as my medium mortar crew were butchered by the three Germans who'd pegged it all the way across to assault them, the 25pdr beside them managed to know out Luke's (woefully unlucky) panzer.

We were - as it happened - allowed to support our allies on flanking tables, but the proud Nordic God known as Svein (TTB founder and Ally on my right) was having none of it. Regardless, I'd set up my arcs to cover him just in case, and the idea of cross-game support was inspired!

Result: after a very shaky start for the Sikhs, a very very comprehensive win. Go Team!

RESULTS:

The day was absolutely stonkingly good, with a top, top group of people there, and the only things which made it even better were that...

(a) I won a prize in the Help for Heroes raffle: I chose a gorgeous Rubicon Models M5A1 Stuart/Stuart Recce...which I've already built and primed! *huge smiles - it's a lovely kit*

Mine's built as the version front-left (sans prongs, of course)
but the recce version (front-right) is interchangeable,
and as that's what 11AD's Stuarts soon became, that is how
mine will mostly be fielded. They called it the 'Stuart Jalopy'.

and 


(b) I was awarded the peer-voted 'Best Themed' award for my Desert Rats Sikhs! 

"Squeeeee!"

Needless to say, I was astounded by this turn-up, and profoundly flattered, because the competition (friendly though it was) was seriously impressive. What a delightful bunch of people the TTB lot are, eh?

My winnings. Such excitement! 11AD didn't really use Churchills -
I mostly got this one because I simply could not resist the kit.
It's gorgeous, and I think it'll become an AVRE attached to my
Sikhs when they start venturing onto Itaalian shores...

As with February's inaugural TTB 'UK Gathering' event, this was all organised by a lovely Irish-Brummie guy called Kieran: we're all indebted to him, and I personally am also indebted to another chap - a Finn called Jarkko who let me crash, borassic, on his hotel room floor.

You know a group of gamers is pleasant when you turn up to the hotel at 2030 on a damp Friday night and they've set up a beautifully themed gaming table in the hotel breakfast room, right by Reception where they're playing a doubles game of Bolt Action watched admiringly by a coachload of pensioners also staying at the hotel. 

Genius.

In my next post there'll be a breakdown of my army list, some other pics (of them and sundry other bits) and some deliberations on future projects...

Cheers all,

- Drax.