So, as I am now several battles into my career as leader of the mighty 107th, pride of New York, I thought I should start writing up some of my experiences for fun.

As was a habit on previous blogs, these reports will be simple, straightforward and have a theme song.

Yes, that’s right, a theme song!

Battle 1 – Bolt Action Vs Soviets (Si) – Maximum Attrition – 500 points

Theme song: Start, The Jam

So, the first battle wasn’t K47 at all, it was Bolt Action. I got into the game by caving to Si’s continual sales pitch in a pub following Salute 2016, eventually getting US Army ‘build your own’ starter which formed the core of the ‘summer’ 107th.

So this was the tester battle, vs the soviet horde. It was going great, the sun was shining, the dice were going my way and the wind was fluttering just right to blow the Stars and Stripes elegantly on the Soviet base. I was cruising to a win, at speed, enjoying the feel of a new army.

However, this plan was forgetting a vital army special rule, not a soviet one, not a free unit of guards, but the US one, the free Air Observer specifically.

Now I will never know if young Klaus Von Marks (as he was immediately named) was so inept, so limited in his skill that divisional HQ gave him to me for 0 points just to get him away from them. Or if he’s grown up in a terrible situation and nurtured a hatred for the country that brought him up and then conscripted him. Or if he simply spilt his coffee on the radio set. Either way the result was the same, a 1 (enemy picks location) followed by a 6 (ground attack aircraft) and in 2 rolls of the dice, to the merriment of the soviet bear opposite me, my army was cut in half and the eager soviets mopped up the rest.

Damn

Result – Loss (0-1 record overall)

Battle 2 – K47 vs British (Stef) – Maximum Attrition – 500 Points

Theme Song: Boom – DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince dedicated to Wotjeck

I wrote about this battle previously here, but to recap the salient points:

• Never start your thinking with ‘It’s 500 points, he won’t bring a grizzly’ (co-incidentally this was the first outing for Wotjeck, have a look at the painting article coming soon, it’s amazing)
• Never follow this with ‘so I won’t need anti tank’
• Never put your faith in a plan that involves the words ‘so 6’s, followed by 6’s to hit’

In short, my infantry got schooled, a polish bear ran rampant and I scraped a draw by catching 2 of Stef’s units in the open.

Result: Draw (somehow, 0-1-1 record overall)

At this point I was feeling ok still, knowing that like Simon’s winter weathering technique, soon what looked like a mess would come together for a glorious conclusion.

How I look back on this innocent, foolish past version of me and laugh. Bitterly.

Coming up in part 2:

• A brutal introduction to anti-tank
• That no matter the system, ‘hoping they miss a lot’ is not a viable tactic
• That no matter what you think or how the dice roll, things can always get worse.

HQ out