Stay Frosty Marines!

One montage of Marines moving through sweaty, damp tunnels later...

...Sarge we've got movement

 Focus on the mission, Marines.  Let's get to those colonists

 Outstanding CPs!

 But Marines are cautious

 Marines blast open doors and go on overwatch

We got contact, Front!

Its a  bug swarm, Sarge

 Braaaap!, between pulse rifle and smart-gun fire the bugs are brought down

 Meanwhile, out of sight more bugs infiltrate the area

 And more...

 These colonists are too far gone, burn this place down

 They're all around us Man!

Whoosh!, Burn Suckas!

 Uh oh...

 Bugs pour out of a side tunnel and CHOMP, Marines down

They got Phil and Mark man, those filthy bugs gotta go down!

 more CPs, time to go big or go home

 Aaargh, facehuggers spawn from un-burnt eggs

 More bugs swarm forwards

 Stay Frosty, Marines.

Burn baby, Burn

 Almost, facehuggers makes it through the flames

 Marines fall back in good order

 Watch your arcs, Marines

 Yay! CPs

Lt. Kinsey finally makes the call.  Fall back on point Zeta for pick-up

 Its a long drive

 But a longer walk in bug-infested terrain

 Meanwhile those facehuggers that survived the flames attack

 Bringing down a Marine

 Braaaap, Click.  Oh Noes, a jam

 CHOMP, ex-Marine and CHOMP, another ex-Marine

 Marines are in a tight spot here

 And finally I remember where my on-fire markers are

 Only a few Marines surviving so far

 The APC uncovers a big sneak around

 Bugs charge towards the APC

 Time for desperate measures.  the flamer Marine burns the last remaining quarter of the main room  (using old SH rules I divided the room into quarters for flamer templates)

 APC bounces more bugs

 Under the cover of flames the Marines get out of Dodge

 Nearly, the bug moves max APs leaving none left for combat.  The bugs suffer in reinforcements, for the last couple of turns they have only had chits for 1's

 Bugs swarm to get at the Marines

 Steady...

 ....Step back, and...

 Braaap! Splat!

 Flamer Marines runs for it

 APC KO's bugs swarming over it

 Flamer blocks the corridor

 Noooooooooo!  One bug got through

 Bugs lurk rather then face plasma cannons

 Lt. Kinsey dashes out to open the door for the Marines

 So close...

 So very close

 CHOMP, the flamer Marine goes down

 Bugs race to assault the exposed officer

 Run, Man, Run!

 Bugs mass behind the wall of flame

 Missed a photo, the Lt., Sarge and a Marine make it back to the APC, the Smart-gunner goes on overwatch to cover them

 Bug...

 ...Stain

  

Plasma cannons mop up behind

 Game over, Man, Game Over!
The survivors: Rifle Marine, Sarge and a Smart-gunner

Wow, this was a quick and deadly game, Space Hulk is a fun bug-hunt rule set.

Bonus!  The result from this wasn't too far from the film. Hicks, Hudson and Vasquez survive.  I also had three plus the APC crew.  Hmmm, perhaps the Medlab should be the next game...

Let's Rock! (Eventually)

I just watched Aliens, one of my favourite combat sci-fi movies.  What the heck, thought I, why not play out one of the more intense combat scenes from the movie - the initial Atmosphere processor ambush.

About 15yrs ago I put together an aliens set based on Marines and Aliens from the Freikorps range (now sold by QRF).  Since then I've added Pendraken aliens, Galoob Dropships, Konami APCs and more recently GZG Drones and Eggs (even that was years ago).  They have all been sitting patiently in their box for a while now, their last outing a Space hulk game at a GZG ECC.

But now the time for sitting is over, now its time to re-fight the ambush.  Cue the lights, cue the music, cue the Teaser!  (Sorry, tonight was only set up, playing is tomorrow or over the weekend)

Let's Rock!
Sub-Level Three; the Marines deploy on the ramp

 Stay Frosty Marines...

 The Target; colonist PDTs in the main cooling sub-station

 I'm going to use one of my favourite rule-sets for bug-hunts: Space Hulk (the first edition).  I play the Marines using the same rules as the Terminators and Aliens as 'Stealers.  The sub works well as these are Cinematic Marines and aliens.  Also as I've played these rules for years, I know that are great fun for these type of games.

Summer's over - time to play soldiers again...

Summer's over, time for autumn/winter hobbies to pick up again.  that means some soldiers to paint (I'm aiming to run a game at the GZG ECC so that's to plan for) and some games to play.

Wargaming has been ticking over this summer on side projects:

• AK-47 Republic, I finished off all remaining painting, with only basing to go
• Scenery, I started exploring Worldworks roads and streets (with thanks to the Clear Horizon blog for the inspiration, LINK http://clearhorizonsalvage.blogspot.com/)
•  Star Wars, my oldest boy is SW crazy so I've been tinkering with prepping some figs so we can play soon

But anyway, on to gaming.  I got some Worldworks streets set up on 6" tiles and decided to christen them with a game.  Its an adaptation of one of the Ambush Alley book scenarios.

Outbreak: Time to fight back

The continued push against the bug invasion.  Clones are pushing across a deserted city to establish a new security perimeter.  F-clones plus "little Brother" robots are pushing to secure the top-left most building after deploying bottom RHS

For now, a quiet part of the city.  Clones deploy bottom RHS, bugs push across in response

 Clones use an abandoned UN convoy for cover

 The target, the clones intend to set a cordon using this building as a corner

There are quite a few bugs active in the city

 Robots push up

 And beat the interrupt of a bug group, wiping three out, forcing the remainder back into cover

 Cower!

 Isolated bug leaders surge forwards

 Reinforcing faltering groups

 And boosting morale

 The clones sprint to secure hotspots

 Bug reinforcements appear to their front

 Temporarily, at least

 Very temporarily

 Robots push onto a second hotspot

 Bugs rush to ambush the robots in the open

 The other bug units move to block the advancing clones/robot forces

 Meanwhile...

 ...Robots wipe up more bugs

 More reinforcements appear, but fail to interrupt the relentless advance of the robots

 Who continue to mow down bugs

 The clones get in on the act too, long range gunnery clears the central area

 Enabling the robots to assault the remaining bugs

 While the clones rush forwards to take advantage to a respite in bug reinforcements

 Neatly annexing a hotspot in the process

 The Robots cover the city

While a last hurrah from the bugs sees a solitary reinforcement appear at the very hotspot the clones are intending to shut down

 But, again, not for long.  The clones advance into their target building and start fortifying it to create a strong point for the continued push into the city

Aftermath, lots of splatted bugs.

This was meant to be an easy game to remind myself of the rules. It was, but in retrospect it was too easy, I used Q=D10 for the clones and Q=D6 for bugs, the two die shift is hard to beat, leading to the skewed result.  Next time only one die type difference unless its a last-ditch effort against a horde.

p.s Sorry photos are poor, I'm using the old camera and as I don't have a tripod the lighting needs to be a LOT better.