VBCW Kill Team, Part 2

I am playing the Mounties, with the Red sailors on autopilot. This means they will mostly be looking for places to shoot from, except the two with Molotovs who will move forward.

Deployment: (up to three inches from board edge)

RCMP setup.

Constables look for sniping positions.

Sailor setup.

All figures in concealment. Sailors win initiative.

Turning Point 1: All sailors on Conceal orders, as they're unlikely to see anything they can shoot this turn. All Mounties except the rightmost are on Active, hoping to move and shoot; there are no opportunities.

Positions at end of Turn 1.

"Should we really be on Active,
where the enemy can see us?"

Turning Point 2: (5 pics) Sailors win initiative again. 

Sarge and his pet hide behind a Wendy house.

• The Lewis gunner kills one Mountie. 

  

  "Reach out and touch someone."

  
  
• His partner returns fire, but totally whiffs his shooting rolls - nothing but ones and twos! 
  
  
  
• In return, the Mad Bomber (number one) hurls a flaming bottle of cheap liquor at the sergeant and his dog. The dog yips and flees the field (I couldn't bear to just kill off the poor thing). Reynolds is severely injured (two wounds left) by the burns and flying glass and as the Wendy house catches fire...
• And his weak pistol shot misses. 
• Constable in woods badly hurt, down to two wounds.
• Mad Bomber (number two) takes five wounds; despite cover and limited to a 5+ save for his other two rolls, he survives to rush his assailant. The Constable is only slightly injured, cover sheltering him from the blast.
• The badly hurt sailor succumbs to musketry from the woods.
• A second Constable is killed.
  
  
  
• Return fire knocks his killer down to one wound.
• A little plinking back and forth does light injury to the right-hand constable and one of his opponents.

  

  "Eh, might as well."

  
  
• The last sailor moves forward to shoot at the sergeant, who lies in the bracken at the edge of the wood, but he misses.

  

  "I can see you - wait, who put sand
  in my mechanism?"

  Casualties: Two Mounties killed, two badly wounded. One sailor dead, two badly wounded.

Two mistakes this turn - I kept forgetting the sailors had 5+ saves and only seven wounds, and I transposed one of the bombers for a rifleman, using the latter to throw the grenade. In both cases, this may have made a difference, though not much. I might have avoided loss on the left by Concealing figures (which cannot be seen until opponents are within 2"), but at the cost of leaving them nothing to contribute to the fight this turn.

I think a retreat is in order.

Turning Point 3: (pics) The Mounties finally win init, allowing them to activate a figure first. 

• This will be the constable on the right, who is completely in the open. He kills a sailor (also in the open) and moves back far enough to be in the woods and out of sight.
• A sailor tries to pick off the badly wounded Sergeant Reynolds, but misses.
• Reynolds crawls away.

As the last unhurt Mountie retreats into the woods, I decide that to attack any of them the sailors will have to get to within two inches (per the rules for ignoring Concealment). This would, however, expose them to Counteractions even though otherwise the Mounties can't act, and none of them would get within 2". I considered crowding them around the Wendy house, but I declared it afire earlier in the game. They move into cover as the surviving Mounties limp away.

A disheartening result for the pride of Canada.

Turning Point 4: (last 2 pics) At this point, it feels like a standoff. Because both sides only have two actions (unlike the Marines in the previous games which had three) it's impossible for the sailors to get into the woods AND shoot at the Mounties. Two of the Mounties are intact (one uninjured, the other taken one wound) but their compatriots are so badly hurt (1 and 2 wounds respectively) that it makes sense they would help them off the board rather than try to kill something more. The best result would be that BOTH sides would bottle out, and it's likelier to be the Mounties if only because the Lewis gunner can stay out of view until it's his turn to unleash hell.

Besides, this was only supposed to be a scouting trip, so...

End result:

• Two sailors killed and one down to one wound, out of eight total.
• Two Mounties killed and two down to one or two wounds, out of six total (plus the dog, who, despite Reynolds' fondness for him, does not count).

The miniature meeting engagement ends with the Red sailors holding the field of battle.

So, I think Kill Team works for this. The catch is that it is largely focused either on figures with twice as many wounds (the Space Marines had an average of 14) or with rules for special actions and equipment for each figure and faction that make them more durable. The "heavy weapon" I gave the sailors, on the other hand, could easily have killed one Mountie a turn if only it could see them, which luckily for the Mounties it didn't. I've read that KT relies heavily on having a ton of cover, and I probably could have used even more. Figures in this game must expose themselves to shoot (even though still in cover) and given the low number of wounds this can lead to debilitating injury in short order. This is why Marines are the poster boys of 40K and the best beginner faction - 3+ to hit and save is miles better than 4+ to hit and save, not to mention that ordinary humans have only two Action Points. Two firing phases with human rifles are enough to kill another human.

Maybe I'll look at a few more of the special rules for individual operatives and teams. Snipers, for example, can remain Concealed and still fire (ie, firing doesn't necessarily mean they can be attacked back). Elite troops might need those extra actions. Command Rerolls would have come in handy too, and I think in the full rules the underdog (ie whoever's in worse shape or has lost initiative) gets more such "special" actions. Of course this would increase complexity.

All in all, though, an okay if quick game. Might be better with more figures on the board too. I found a scenario in one of the CS Grant books in which six elites must tackle twelve basic guards to rescue a hostage, which could easily be represented by a moveable objective. Gurkhas as Heavy Brawlers, perhaps? Something to work towards...

VBCW Kill Team, Part 1

The mess on my table put me off running a game with my Wofuns, some of which are buried under the table with everything else. Also, I was still reading and watching Kill Team material. So next will be a try with VBCW figs. I gave serious thought to just using the black side of the Kill Team board and the MDF industrial terrain - if you squint it could represent a coal spoil from Wales or the Newcastle area. As I was about to start, I was also listening to the proceeds of the 2nd Warhammer Conference in Heidelberg, Germany.

Yes, they have an academic conference now. There are enough talks on playing in schools that I can get away with watching them at work and counting it as training.

The latest talk I listened to was about terrain kits, and it contained this comment from a source:

"Terrain pieces greatly reduce the ontological barrier between players and the fictional world and therefore contribute to the players' feeling of immersion and the realism of the simulation of wargames."

OK, so I'll try to make the table more immersive. On the minus side, I don't have much 28mm 20th century terrain. On the plus side, a Kill Team board is only just over two feet square. I managed to work it out.

A ruined farmstead on the edge of a wood.
Plus a couple abandoned farm vehicles and a Wendy house
(the Quar hut at top center).

Who to fight with? I have: 

• 8th Army types (read: Mobile Division elements brought home from the Med), who could be either Royalist or "Joshua Force" (led by an evangelical general who thinks it's his mission to return Britain to godliness)
• Mounties (from Prince Albert's invasion force)
• Ordinary line infantry in flat caps
• Civilian fighters, or LDV
• Sailors, who could be Reds or Albertines
• Police

I've chosen the Mounties, who are scouting their way from the beachhead into this green and pleasant land when they come upon a squad of Navy riflemen looting a burned farmstead...

It's a xerox of a xerox, so yeah, it didn't come out well.

Clearly they are some of those damned socialists and probably drunk on their grog ration. The Duke of York has famously declared that no one who advocates social upheaval is allowed in his coalition, thus shooting it in the foot to keep the setting going. The RCMP have experience dealing with punks like these... but the ones they left behind in Canada weren't this heavily armed.

For the figure stats, I am using the Kill Team Non-Player Operative rules. They are quite generic, but with three different levels (Trooper, Warrior, Heavy) and come in two types (Brawler and Marksman). It's allowed to modify them slightly. Heavies are the equivalent of Space Marines, so will be reserved for machine-gun teams to represent their extra wounds and better shooting. Almost everyone will be Marksmen, because the Brawlers don't get ranged weapons. Here are the sides:

Sergeant Reynolds, five Constables, (8 wounds apiece, 4+ saves) and the sergeant's faithful dog Busker. All with rifles except the Sergeant (whose weapon only ranges 8") and Busker, who counts as a Brawler with only 4 wounds and 5+ save).

Eight sailors (7 wounds apiece, 5+ saves) all with rifles, two with Molotovs (counting as one-use frag grenades) and one with a Lewis gun (counts as special weapon with Piercing 1).

Adding a couple modifications to the rules from the Lite Rules document - figures can be Injured at half wounds, reducing them to 4" movement and -1 to-hits. Each team gets one Command Reroll per turn. The forested oval counts as Concealed so long as figures are not at the edge, and as Cover otherwise. Also, I'm not bothering with an objective, mostly because I can't think of one, so this is a meeting engagement and points will be scored for kills. First side to lose half its men (Busker does not count) will bottle out.

Battle report to follow...

Learning Kill Team, Part 3

So, having learned the basics of moving, shooting and close combat in Kill Team, I'm on to the final mission, which uses the full rules in the starter set - which isn't quite the full rules of the game. Next things to learn:

• Action Point Limit: Each figure in the game has three Action Points, which can be spent on actions like Move, Shoot, Fight, etc. Each of the ones in the set costs one action point, except for Fall Back (2 points).
• Turning Points: Once every figure activates in a round, that's a Turning Point, and there are four in a game.
• Counteract: This is an extra action that can be used when one side has fewer figures - it prevents the opposing side from doing all its actions one after the other. After the larger side activates a figure, the lesser who have activated all theirs already can do a single one-point action on their turn. Useful, gives the underdog player more to do, and evens things up just a bit.
• Orders: This is what the cardboard markers are for. Each figure has one, which can be flipped to assign it as Concealed or Engaged. Conceal allows figures to hide even if visible in partial cover, but nothing else. Selecting Engage (or flipping from Concealed to Engage) allows figures to move and take other actions, including Shoot, Charge, etc. Secure Objective allows figures to move away from objective markers they've taken.
• Visibility and Cover: Slightly fiddly in execution, but clear enough. If a figure's full base is visible from the opposing activated figure, it's not in cover. If part or all of the base is hidden, it's in cover. Cover allows the figure to Conceal itself, and to get a free defensive success when shot at (ie, not having to roll it).
• Choosing a Kill Team: Not all the figures in a box can be used on the table. Each squad in the box has seven figures, but only five may be selected, with some choices and selections required. For example, the good guys must take all three regular Marines, but must choose between the heavy bolter OR sniper, and between the Captain OR Sergeant.
• Weapon Rules: Finally, assorted special rules to differentiate weapons and equipment. Boltguns are Piercing, for example, which reduces the number of defense dice rolled to save, and sniper rifles are Silent, so may be fired even when the user is Concealed. Sadly, these are scattered over several pages in the book and are not even in alphabetical order. Figure cards for other Kill Teams list all the actual rules rather than just their names, which would be handy. If I do end up using this for VBCW, I'll have to limit the special rules.

In the full game, there are also tactical ploys and special orders unique to each faction. No need here.

I've selected mostly units I haven't yet got to try in the full rules, like the sniper for the Space Marines and the grenadier for the Plague Marines.

In the full rules, there are also solo mechanisms. Technically they are for basic troopers (so might work well for VBCW infantry). The NPCs fall into two categories - Brawlers and Shooters. Brawlers are fighty and shooters ... well, you know. Each has a list of actions taken in order according to situation. However, none of their actions include going for objectives. The final scenario has three:

The third is behind the wall at upper right.

Turning Point 1: Units roll initiative, and the winner moves the first figure.

• Green Heavy Gunner can see a target. It's not close enough to terrain to be in cover, so...oh, wait, his range is only 8". Skip him.
• Blue Sniper can see him, but he's concealed.
• Green Champion moves 8" forward, behind cover.
• Blue Captain moves 6" forward. Green Champion is not in cover from his vantage point and is within 8", so he can shoot his plasma pistol. No damage.
• Green Fighter moves toward covered Objective 3.
• Blue Warrior moves toward covered Objective 1.
• Green Plaguecaster moves into cover where he can see the Blue Captain, then uses Plaguewind and does 8 damage to the Captain. Ouch!
• Blue Warrior moves towards center Objective 2.
• Green Bombardier moves towards Blue Captain and blasts him off his feet with bolter fire.
• Blue Assault Marine moves towards Objective 2.

Chaos is now ahead, 1 point to zero.

I need more natural light in here.

Turning Point 2: Green gets initiative again.

• Green Fighter moves forward.
• Blue Warrior moves, secures Objective 1, and fires at Heavy Gunner for three damage.
• Green Bombardier moves, secures Objective 2.
• Blue Assault Marine charges Green Bombardier, and scores three crits! The Bombardier is eliminated in exchange for six damage to the Assault Marine, who then secures Objective 2.
• Green Fighter secures Objective 3 and heads for the center of the board.
• Second Blue Warrior moves and fires at Heavy Gunner, scoring three Crits. This reduces Heavy Gunner to two defence dice, one of which gets a free success for being in cover. Luckily, two of the resultant hits are saved by Disgusting Resilience, otherwise the Heavy Gunner would be gone.
• In exchange, Green Heavy Gunner moves, douses the Assault Marine in goo, and dives back into cover. Assault Marine eliminated.
• Blue Sniper moves closer to central objective.
• Green Champion moves to take back the central objective.

Victory points:

+1 each for slaying an opponent

+1 each for securing an objective by turn's end

+1 to Chaos for securing more objectives

Score: Chaos 4, Imperium 2.

Turning Point 3: And again!

• Green Champion charges Sniper. The sniper actually does nearly the same amount of damage as the Champion, but the Champion gets to fight twice. Despite severe injury (only two hits left) the Champion eliminates the Sniper.
• Blue Warrior charges and eliminates the Champion, who has missed all his Disgustingly Resilient saves today. Might have been smarter to shoot, though.
• Green Fighter moves to the central objective.
• Second Blue Warrior moves up to support his mate.
• Green Heavy Gunner moves into open to drench both Warriors with his weapon. It also denies the opponent a free cover success.
• 2nd Blue Warrior gets a Counteract, as there is still a Green marine yet to activate. He fires into the Heavy Gunner and manages to finish him off.
• Plaguecaster moves into LOS of the 1st Blue Warrior. While he only has APL left to get off one spell, it's his best. Again, the defender doesn't get a free cover success. With 7 damage from the first success (a crit), the defender is slain horribly by Entropy.

Victory Points:

+2 each for slaying opponents.

+1 to Green for securing more objectives.

Score: Chaos 7, Imperium 4.

The Space Marine at the top has precisely one wound left!

Turning Point 4: And, sadly, again!

• Green Fighter charges the last Blue Marine, then Brutally, Severely and Shockingly slays him.

Victory Points:

+1 to Green for slaying an opponent.

+1 to Green for securing more objectives.

End Score: Chaos 9, Imperium 4.

A rather bloody game - casualties come fast. To be fair, I wasn't playing cautiously. I did not get to try the special equipment of the Sniper or Bombardier figures, either. There are lots of special rules to keep track of, though some of them don't always apply.

Initiative might have made a difference. For example, in the final turn, Blue securing initiative would have meant being able to fire into the Fighter, twice, before getting charged. This isn't entirely reliable, in part because Plague Marines get save rolls, so it's unlikely that the Warrior would have managed to kill the Fighter. In the full rules, a figure that has taken half wounds is slower, however, and careful positioning would have made him unable to charge his opponent, who would then get to fire into him again.

So far as I can tell, there are no morale rules, presumably because Kill Teams are all fearless veterans; for VBCW purposes I wonder if a "bottle out" rule would be a good idea.

In general, I think it's a workable ruleset and I'm definitely interested in trying out regular British militiamen. For now though, I'll move the Kill Team stuff off the table and make room for something historical. See you next time!

Learning Kill Team, Part 2

On to the rest of the Kill Team rules booklet. Close combat is next. Our heroes (and villains) are out of ammo but still pissed at each other. Here goes.

This scenario includes a bit of a solo mechanism this time - the Plague Marines must move to attack, and may not fight defensively. Fighting here works just like shooting, with both sides rolling - except that the defender rolls his attack dice instead of a set three, and that both sides may choose either to nullify their opponent's dice (as the defender does in shooting) or to do damage with them instead. Also, the use of dice is alternate and one at a time. A little more tactical, then, as you can seek to block your opponent's crits, for example, or instead use your own crits for extra damage.

Again, the bad guys get reinforcements; the Plague Champion
will appear in the upper right corner if either of his men are slain.

Turn 1:

• Blue Captain moves 9".
• Green Fighter charges Captain.
• Green Fighter scores one hit (!) of five dice (needing 3+), doing 4 damage. He has the Severe special rule, which allows him to change one hit to a critical, doing a further +1 damage.
• Blue Captain doesn't need to spend any of his four hits on defense, does 20 damage back and eliminates the Fighter. Even with his Disgusting Resilience that gives him a chance to take four of those damage points off, he only had 14 to start with.

Yeah, this game can be swingy. Both figures have the special ability to fight twice in a round, but here it's not needed.

• Blue Intercessor moves 9".
• Green Icon Bearer charges Intercessor.
• This is a simpler fight. The Intercessor, fighting with fists, scores four hits, one of them a crit. The Icon Bearer gets a crit and a regular hit.
• The Icon Bearer does 5 damage with his crit.
• The Intercessor blocks the Icon Bearer's second hit with one of his own.
• The Intercessor now does 10 damage with his remaining three dice, reduced to 9 by Disgusting Resilience. Not enough to kill.

End of turn. Since one of his men has been slain, the Plague Champion turns up.

Turn Two:

• Blue Captain moves and charges Green Champion. A battle for the ages?
• Blue Captain gets five hits, including two crits. Green Champion gets four hits, including one crit.
• The Captain's powerfist has Brutal, making it harder to block, but the Champion isn't blocking anyway. The Captain uses one crit to do 7 damage.
• The Champion uses his crit to do 6 damage.
• The Captain uses his other crit. Unfortunately, the Champion had 15 damage to start with.
• The Champion uses a regular hit to do 4 damage, killing the Captain.

I just realized I forgot to move my Assault Intercessor last turn. He moves up and charges the Icon Bearer. Taking three damage to himself, he does enough back to kill the Icon Bearer.

Time to find out how multiple combats work in Kill Team...

Aaaand looks like they don't. The Champion will thus charge the Intercessor, who is closer to death, more poorly armed, and thus an easier target. The Champion may fight twice in an activation, so if he survives he can then go after the Assault Intercessor (who fights with a chainsword instead of fists), but that guy can fight twice too, so the Champion is unlikely to win out here.

• Champion charges Intercessor.
• Champion rolls three hits, one converted to a crit.
• Intercessor scores one (1) hit.
• Under normal circumstances, the Champion would use his first hit to block the Intercessor's hit; under the solo rules, he is instead forced to attack, so he does six damage to the Intercessor, not quite enough to kill him.
• In exchange, the Intercessor's 3 points of damage from his one hit finish off the Champion.

What if the Champion could be played by choice rather than autopilot? He could have instead blocked that one hit, thus surviving with one HP to the next round, while doing 10 damage with the other two hits and killing the Intercessor. This is where tactical play comes in.

Let's imagine he has. He now has a second fight to adjudicate, against the Assault Intercessor. Again, as the attacker, he goes first - but he only rolls two hits, not enough to kill the Assault Intercessor before the good guy starts hitting him.

Bad luck. At this point, he can only survive if the opponent scores only one hit, and the opponent scored five in this case. However, he does have that Disgusting Resilience save. He fails the first one. Game over.

I think I've got the hang of it now. Some of the special rules for weapons are relatively complex and I'd prefer it if they were on the datacards, but that's okay - for one thing if I mess with this to make it suitable for 20th century there probably won't BE much in the way of special rules anyway. I'll look into the Astra Militarum and Genestealer Cult rules for inspiration there.

Next time, a "full-fledged" game, which includes orders, action points and all the special rules.

Learning Kill Team, Part 1

Some time ago I picked up the current edition of Games Workshop's Kill Team starter set. Partly to build up my collection of 8th Edition 40K Plague Marines, and partly to learn Kill Team. I may never play it as is, but it might be yet another ruleset to double for historical skirmishes like VBCW. As far as I can tell, it's not the "full" game, but that's alright, because I prefer simplicity anyway. The starter handbook has plenty of scenarios that work their way up to learning the rules. I'm thinking of just playing one a day and going straight thru the book in the course of a week.

In the event, I didn't do them all in a row like I hoped; often too tired after work even to play a quick solo game, I set them up and left them until I felt ready. I spent more time reading; on the other hand, if it was Games Workshop material then that raised my interest level!

The first scenario.

This "scenario" is simply one turn of choreographed fire and movement. First one figure fires, another fires back and then the two officers (upper left) clash in close combat. Finally, the Chaos marine (top center) moves to the objective, and depending on who did better in the previous "fights" one side or the other wins. Entirely random, but not bad to give a feel for the basics. In this case neither of the shooters did enough damage to kill, while the blue Space Marine Captain slew his green opposite number, so the good guys won this round. Next, the actual rules...

Scenario Two: shooting.

Weapons have a varying number of shots - for Space Marines, they hit on 3+. Sixes are "crits" and do extra damage. In exchange, defenders get three save dice, which again need 3+ with sixes as crits again. Successful save rolls cancel out hits, but you need either a critical save or two regular saves to cancel a critical hit. If more hits were scored than there were saves to cancel them, you add up damage; each figure has a variable amount of wounds.

In my first firing phase, my heavy intercessor gunner with a heavy bolter did nine damage to the opposing heavy gunner, who still had five HP left and thus could shoot back. The "solo" programming requires him to shoot back at the weakest opponent, so he takes on the Space Marine warrior who has fewer HP than the heavy gunner. His plague weapon hits on 2+. He scores four hits; only one is saved, so the Marine also takes nine damage and next returns fire. He scores only one hit, which is easily saved. The second Chaos Marine fires into him; the good guy takes a further seven damage and is taken out.

So that's how a turn of firing goes. Three more rounds later, and both green marines are down; the heavy bolter gets a lot of shots and the bad guys rolled poorly on their saves. Obviously, this is basic and we are ignoring special effects.

I've used dice to indicate hit-point loss.
I'd prefer individual cards for each character,
but this is what the box comes with; luckily
there is plenty of room on the table given the
small battle area.

Scenario Three: Movement.

This one has a plot; the three blue Marines have to carry their objective to the far side of the board. The catch is that the green Marines get reinforcements, so killing more than one in the process is contraindicated.

Handy tactic: Since close combat is not yet a thing,
and each figure has a 1" "control range," Green Marine
can block the other side's way - as long as he doesn't get shot.

In the second round, poor shooting failed to get the Plague Marine heavy gunner out of the way, and the bad guys concentrated all fire on the Sergeant carrying the objective, killing him. The Tactical Marine hastily picked it up and fired into the heavy gunner, finally taking him down, but now the good guys were nearly surrounded:

Fourteen inches to go - with a max of nine a turn...

By the end of Round Two, both blue Marines were severely wounded, and their choices were poor. Run the objective carrier away (and into the line of fire of two enemies, one with a powerful plasma pistol)? Or blast the one green Marine with LOS, leading to two new green Marines appearing wherever they like on the board next turn?

Well, that didn't work.

Perhaps next time I should use the special rules each "operative" has - in particular, the Marines get Bolter Discipline and may fire twice in a round. In exchange, as in the 8th Edition 40K starter sets, Plague Marines are Disgustingly Resilient and thus take less damage.

So I did try it, and it was a more interesting game. With the figures' special moves there are more decisions to make. It helps, too, that the Plague Marines have slower moves - on this small board it really does make a difference!

One slightly annoying bit when it comes to setup is that the board in the book is divided into eight parts; in reality it's divided in four (by the folds). Proper setup according to the scenarios thus requires careful angling and studying the board itself, which as you can see has lots of "textural" elements printed on it. I can't line up the buildings or place a figure in a specific corner, but I can look for the bits of wreckage printed on the board and compare them to the map in the book. Takes longer though.

And, boy, so did this post. I think I started it over two weeks ago! There are still close combat, action points, an "all-up" scenario and alternate setups to deal with, so I'll stop here and come back to it. To make sure I stick with it, though, I'll have to leave the set out on my table rather than pack it away, otherwise I'll never get to the rest of it. That's the problem with being a hobby butterfly.

In other news, the BEF/Home Guard figures are about done and ready to ship to my brother for painting. Hunting for painting videos to inspire him, I also found where the extra equipment on the sprues is supposed to go on the models, so I may go back through them and add it. Here's my crude standard-bearer:

If I wanted this to be an Anglican League platoon,
I could have used the curved end of the paperclip
for a shepherd's crook...

See you next time - hopefully sooner. Busy days...