It’s also eight years since my last significant migraine and I don’t miss them one bit either!

Paul took the USA and planned a raid on eight targets by 48 B-52s supported by F-111s, SEAD and CAP.

The F-111s struck first at my airfields and effectively closed them, but not before two MiG-21s launched from Kep and Phuc Yen.

I managed to shoot down two Phantoms (one by Fire Can and one MiG kill) and two B-52s (one by SAM and one MiG kill). Two more B-52s were damaged by SAMs but recovered safely.

Paul destroyed six targets with heavy bombing and his SEAD shutdown three SA-2 sites.

Paul scored 18VPs (6×2 for targets; 3×1 for SAMs damaged; 3 for my extra MiG points); I scored 19 VPS (2×2 for shooting down a pair of Phantoms; 4 for capturing four aircrew; 1 for some collateral damage Paul inflicted; and 2×5 for shooting down a pair of B-52s).

Overall the score was -1 VP for a significant US defeat.

This was by far the largest scenario we’ve played and given it was set in late 1972 used a more complex set of rules than before.

He took his Space Marine “Taskforce Heavy” and I took all his Tau.

Vindicator, Landraider, Termiantor marines and two Tactical Squads commanded by Lysander versus two Hammerheads, Kroot, two Fire Warrior squads and three Crisis Battlesuits.

We played the Fighting Withdrawal scenario from Battle Missions.

The game started well for me with him losing the Vindicator to my first shot and almost an entire Tactical squad.

But in turn three things started to go badly when his Terminators and Lysander miss-dropped and then worked up the battlefield destroying the Crisis Battlesuits, a Firewarrior squad, a Hammerhead and moved towards the objectives. The Landraider took out the other Firewarrior Squad and then charged over the Kroot, routing them twice.

The the game ended with me still holding one objective and the other two uncontrolled, so the Tau won.

I think if the game had lasted one more turn Ian would have taken a pair of objectives and won, but he didn’t!

Its is amazing how such a simple game can lead to such intense thinking and headscratching and a real sense of achivement in winning.

I took the USN and was assigned a strike on a Haiphong POL storage site – a major target in a heavily defended part of Route Package 6B. The raid launched from the Oriskany consisted of four flights of Skyhawks, escorted by two pair of CAP Crusaders, two pair of armed escort Crusaders and two pair of SEAD Skyhawks with Shrikes. Post strike recon was to be a pair of RF-8Es.

I planned a quick dash from the sea direct to the target, egressing Haiphong to the East and back out to sea.

Paul decided to defend with a “SAM day” due to North Vietnam’s inability to deconflict aircraft and SAM defences early in Rolling Thunder.

Initially my SEAD Skyhawks were successful killing a Fire Can AAA system and shutting down a SAM site with Shrikes. Unfortunately there were four more SAM sites in the area and lots of AAA. One Crusader and two Skyhawks were shot down attacking the target and another 2 more Skyhawks crippled whilst heavily damaging the target.

The Haiphong AAA was amazingly successful in shooting down both recon Crusaders meaning no BDA was obtained!

All in all a USN disaster with a result of -22VP for a very significant defeat.

Ian sat down with her for a few minutes and asked “where are the Zombies?”

I think he is confusing Pride and Prejudice with Pride and Prejudice and Zombies!

Ian wants to know why the government is trying to put his Granddad out of business.

He also wants to know if the ban on advertising will mean Weavers will have to repaint the vans.

Paul took a USAF strike of 15 flights of Thunderchiefs escorted by some F-100s and followed by a Voodoo recon flight. The entered over from over the Gulf of Tonkin and egressed over Laos.

I scrambled MiG-17s from airfields in the Hanoi area, but they were unable to reach the strike force before it got to the bridge which was heavily defended by two medium flak batteries and a pair of Fire Cans. Paul was able to damage one Fire Can and suppress the flak and heavily damaged the bridge.

In the process he lost 2 planes shot down (a Thud bit by a Fire Can and a Super Sabre shot down by a Fresco), 4 crippled and 1 damaged which all recovered OK.

As a result it was a significant US defeat – due to the political cost of the losses.

We took a Space Marine force (Strikeforce Crimson) consisting of Chapter Master Omar, a pair of full Tactical Squads, a Venderable Dreadnaught and a Landraider Crusader.

We lost our first two games against Chaos Demons (actually lost, is an understatement – we were utterly destroyed) and won our final game against a mixed Sisters of Battle and Imperial Guard force.

Great fun!

I spend all game accruing VPs and Paul seemed hamstrung by being dealt only Soviet cards.

Good game.

First achievement on 7 December 2005
Last achievement on 28 February 2010

1,544 elapsed days with achievements obtained on 1,216 days.

Average gamerscore per day is 99,293 / 1,544 = 64.
Average gamerscore per achievement days is 99,293 / 1,216 = 82.

The most achievements obtained in one day is 30 on 30 April 2008.
My best gamerscore in a day is 1,040 on 3 December 2007.

337 “only one” achievement days.
Longest streak of 203 days from 3 October 2008 to 23 April 2009.

The game played fairly simply with Paul’s Egyptian MiGs (2 x 4 ship MiG-21 formations) flying to intercept my two four-ship Mirage IIICJ formations which idled to the East back over the Sinai and their friendly Hawk batteries.

As the MiG’s reached the Red Sea and turned to the south the Mirages reversed to head west and hit their afterburners. They pair of Mirage flights made a fast head on pass firing radar guided Matra’s at the MiGs, shooting down one MiG and damaging another (soon to be crippled by a mechanical failure random event).

The single MiG kill for no Israel loss was enough to ensure an Israeli victory, so the Mirages carried on past the MiGs and headed east at full speed to safety.

A further flight of Mirages sorted from Refidim to join the fray, but didn’t reach the fight in time along with an additional two Mirages which appears from a lucky random event roll.

Great fun .

We chose to play on one of the Cities of Death tables and rolled a “seize ground” scenario with a  “dawn of war” deployment and three victory locations – two in buildings and one in a crater.

In the first turn Ian’s Predator got imobilised in the crater whilst I positioned my units to take the other victory locations.

One brood of genestealers and a carnifex attacked one of the victory locations held by a squad of marines and Chapter Master Omar whilst the other genestealer brood and a brood of warriors went against the immobilised Predator and a tactical squad.

The carnifex’s barbed strangler made short work of the tactical squad and Omar which was mopped up an assault by the genestealers when then took the objective in the building above them whilst the carnifex took a nearby objective by lumbering up to third floor of the buidling.

The warriors and genestealers tried to attack the tactical squad covering the immobilised Predator but were all taken out by withering heavy bolter fire.

So, in the end it was two Tyranid objectives to one Space Marine objective.

I win! I win! I Win!

I took the IAF and he  took the EAF in scenario EV6 Recon in Force.

Paul’s objective was to recon Mitla Pass with a pair of Fitters escorted by a eight MiG-21s. I had six Mirages to use to try to stop him.

It was a very intense game with planes from both sides being engaged by SAMs although the only SAM kill was a MiG-21 lost to a HAWK battery.

Two more MiG-21s and one Mirage were lost in dogfights as I attempted to stop the Fitters.

In the end the EAV scored 13 VP versus the 6 scored by the IAF resulting in a Significant Defeat for me.

A very good game and one that taught me the lesson (again) of concentrating on the objective – rather than engaging the escorts, I should have kept focused on the Fitters to prevent the recon.

We played the EV4 Alert Five scenario, consisiting of a small Egyptian raid on Refiden. I took the Egyptians with two four ships of MiG-17s from Faid against Paul’s Mirage IIICs.

My raid took off, crossed the Suez Canal and headed straight for the target. As we crossed the Suez Paul scrambled a dummy flight followed a turn later by the real thing. He intercepted one of my flights, downing two aircraft and disrupting the remaining two who returned to base without attacking the target. My other flight brave the flak over the target causing slight damage to the runway at Refiden and safely returning home.

In the end it was classified as a defeat for the EAF.

He’s been reading the rules, codexes, painting marines and going to the weekly lessons since his birthday in August and finally he was ready for the battle.

He challenged Elvis (one of the Aberdeen Hobby Center staff) to the battle and we arranged to the battle for after school today.

Ian prepared his 1,000 point battleforce of Red Fist space marines (Chapter Master Omar, two 10 marine tactical squads, a Predator, assault squad, Dreadnaught and a squad of six Terminators), gave the rules one last read and we headed off to the shop.

Ian performed well, but some lucky dice on Elvis’ part led to all of Ian’s battleforce being wiped out, but since neither of them were able to take both objectives it was a draw.

What does graduated mean? Well, it means he gets a certificate and can now attend club nights at the shop to fight battles with other graduates.

Well done Ian!

How did I do it?

Basically I used http://www.gpsvisualizer.com/map_input with a map width of 500 pixels; saved the generated source; edited to include my Google Maps API key; posted the file to my webserver and then included an iFrame in the blog.

Doesn’t help you? The above was more for my reference than yours…

I painted them warlock purple with a generous wash of leviathan purple; some red for the tongue and blades; white for the teeth and green for the gun and they were done.

I’m very pleased with the results.

Now onto Gaunts and Genestealers…