Mini-Marathon: Part the Second

spacehulk! SpaceHulk! SPACEHULK!

Mark likes SpaceHulk, he just rarely gets the chance to play.  Mark has played the first two missions form the original, so here's the third, "Rescue the C.A.T." in which a squad with a recon device has to cross a stealer infested hulk to escape , a second squad comes to their rescue .

 

Its a tough mission, back in the day when I played SH a lot, this was hard, its been a few years so we'll see how hard it is this time.

First problem, my timer -its battery is dead, no problem, I'll use my phone, but DOH! now I'm not taking pictures

First game, I'm 'stealers' and Mark is Marines.  I get an early swarm on him and get to the C.A.T., one broken C.A.T. - game over, time to reset and switch sides.

Second game - I dash to lower entry areas, use flames to cover my advances and manage to prevent the early swarm. I get my C.A.T. carrier down to the lower room with only a single casualty then things go bad fast.  I get a string of awful rolls for CPs and Mark starts to swarm the lower entry areas, and by swarm I mean a TON of bugs appear.  We don't use the standard blips, we like to play blind, using a generic marker and dice for bugs, in this games its 1-3 per blip.  During his swarming Mark has seven blips, he gets 22 bugs.  

At this point I realize I'm not being very smart - of course I can use the timer and take pictures with my iPhone!

 The swarm builds up (I use 20mm Xenomorph Aliens and 25mm GZG PA instead of the GW terminators/stealers).  I lose overwatch

 Doh! wrong time for a jam

At the other end Marks dice are averaging nicely, the swarm gets all the 3xbugs, this end gets 1-2xbugs.  This helps me get my Marines over to the lower room

 Ready, Set, Munch!

Or tactically deploy to eat up my APs and CPs to prevent my advance.  Drat!

Things look bad at the other end, a Bug breaks through and is about to fillet my Marines

 Mark's dog Xena is not impressed

The swarm goes for it, one marine, overwatch Marine jams

 C.A.T. carrier was trying a sneak around

 Bugs do more tactical APs, closing a door to kill overwatch LoS

 Wow! a Marine takes out a Bug in HTH

DAKKA, DAKKA, DAKKA!  the Marine mows down a Bug and a door, exposing the corridor to overwatch

Ah hubris, the swarm take down the Marine who won the HTH.  It moves on to the C.A.T. carrier and takes the Marine down (I forgot to place the kill markers).  In the melee the C.A.T. is damaged so it can't move -  this prevents either of us trying to gain control of it and move it away

More swarm builds!  I have no option other than to advance a Marine into the Bugs to clear a LoS for the Flamethrower

Obligingly, the Bugs take down my Marine, I block a section with the Flamer while consolidating my remaining troops

Bugs start building up at both ends, it looks grim for the Marines

CPs!, I finally get some. With CPs I advance on the exit areas, rolling the flame barrage forward while clearing Bugs from the rear.  I set double overwatch on the rear and go hard forwards in a last-ditch effort to get the C.A.T.

Whoosh, Mark tries to run Bugs through the flames to get behind the advancing Marine.  This time it does not work

The rear defenders take down a bunch of bugs (the acid-splats are dead Bug markers, we had killed so may that we were recycling them from other board areas and stopped double stacking them), but others rush forwards

A view of the long way out.  A measly 12APs if everything works out perfectly

DAKKA, DAKKA, click

CPs!  I roll 6 CPs!  If all goes right, just maybe...
Whoosh, I have two flamer shots remaining, I use one to block the junction preventing the swarm's advance.  That advancing Marine better be a good shot

Advance fire, Advance Fire, repeat, repeat, repeat, pick up C.A.T., advance.
Close, but 3 APs short of a win.  Mark has a slim chance to win by rushing the flames to get at the Marine.

Start counting squares!  Only one Bug has a chance, Mark goes for it and Whoomp, the Bug goes up in flames.  Win for the Marines. 
Or that should be win for the Marine, as only one of them is getting out of this mission alive.

At the other end we see why, there is no way these two are cutting through both swarms to escape.

What a game, it whipsawed both ways three or four times.  Everytime it was one or two key actions which decided the outcome, and in that last Marine turn, anything less than 4CPs would have been a sure win for the Stealers.  Pure SH drama, and with a knife-edge win of a single Marine too!  

This is why Spacehulk v1 had so many fans, its was and still is IMO, GW best game, its the most playable, best written and most fun.   And because in SH you switch sides we get to play two games, not one. 

Thanks Mark, that was a great SH session.