Beach Blanket Banzai...or something like that....

I guess I really should get around to blogging my latest ASL round, but I've been busy over the past few days. I will content myself to writing a small report, and perhaps my opponent will chime in with his views here.

Chris and I have been working through some playtest scenarios for the next Journal (actually I should say Chris and I as well as Chris and Doug). The latest was a PTO scenario that pitted a mob of Japanese assaulting a line of Americans armed with four anti-aircraft guns being deployed as machine guns. The assault takes place at night (NVR of 1 hex for those who understand such things). Play ettiquette at the moment places the home player on defense, so they can be ready to go when the other player arrives.

This gave me the Japanese on the attack. The scenario is really short, consisting of 4.5 turns to essentially kill all the Americans and capture/burn a couple of ammunition dumps. The Japanese have the advantage of moving at night, which meant I essentialy ran right up to his positions all over the map and prepared to launch into Hand to Hand combat from close range. The attacker at night has a higher chance of ambush, and coupled with the already stealthy, concealed Japanese and thier prowess at hand to hand, it could be a long night for the Americans.

On the American side, they get two (or three?) .50 caliber machine guns, and the aforementioned anti-aircraft guns that are a direct violation of all that is civil in ASL. Two of them are the dreaded quad-fifties, laying out a ridiculous 24 FP with ROF 2 (for those that undertstand such things). Here I am trying to get adjacent to these monsters (NVR = 1), with predictable results.

Actually, I can't really complain. It's a fair test. The American crews have a morale of six, so they are likely to break under fire. The problem was my approach and inexperience to both night and Japanese. In my lust for hand to hand, I got too close to the guns, within visual range, before I had the opportunity to advance in for close combat. I neglected to use starshells to illuminate the scene and lay down fire on the weak kneed crews before rushing in. I certainly would have done some things differently now that I see....but that's the story with just about every ASL round! I always seem to know what to do after being thrashed.

The banzai charge was a key tactic (gee....imagine that when the word banzai is in the scenario title). Chris showed me how to conduct a charge, and with his help, I managed to take out a gun and some .50 cals at a relatively light cost. Unfortunately, I bungled my approach on the other side of the map, and after having two of my three leaders go down under fire, there was no one left to initiate a charge into the guns.

The best moment (for me) was the creation of a DC Hero to go and try to take out an American position. My hero stepped up and strapped the Demo Charge to his body, prayed to his ancestors, and then charged into the American position, all for the glory of the Emperor. He managed to survive the charge and flung himself into the foxhole with the frantic American squad before closing his eyes and triggering the charge.

I rolled boxcars! The demo charge was a dud. A calm American stepped up and fired a round into my hero, sending him off to his ancestors.

Such is my typical ASL experience.

Overall, I really enjoyed the scenario, mostly because I got to be Japanese and it was a night fight. Stepping back from that, I don't think the scenario is really appealing to vetern players. It's really one big banzai charge, over in one big push. The Japanese either win or lose in one big flurry. Nice for a short game, but I don't think it was one of the better scenarios we've seen so far.

I think next week we are going to do some French-Japanese scenario that looked to be fairly long. Look for that report in the middle of the week.

On the 30th, Jeff DeYoung is coming down for some undetermined scenario. He sent me two choices but I don't own them, so I'm not sure what to expect.

I also made contact with Steve Garvey, whom I met at ASLOK. He's interested in doing a Red Barricades campaign here at my house with some regular scenarios every third or fourth meeting for a break. A long Stalingrad fight....that might need to have it's own seperate blog!

More later....