Rhine Dale Raid (long)

Hello Everybody

Mike, Corporal-on-Duty, settled down for another night shift. He
configured
the security systems' main display to show scenes that were rather more
interesting than drone-supplied images of leaves and the occasional
"bat".
He didn't expect any trouble. There hadn't been any since they had
landed
and established a research base on the uninhabited planet of Rhine Dale
(funny name for a planet) a few weeks ago. Nothing much had happened
since
then.

The larger local wildlife gave the base a wide berth, and generally
seemd
harmless enough anyway. In fact, some of the vegetation was rather more
dangerous than the animals. But they had learned - the hard way - to
avoid
the nasty veggies.

Otherwise, the only event - a few days ago - had been a small meteor
strike
several Clicks away. But the scientists hadn't been interested and
nobody
went to investigate it. Mike didn't know what the scientists were
interested
in. He wasn't being told what they were doing and wasn't really that
interested. He wouldn't have understood it anyway.

An amber sidepanel flashed on the screen. Surveillance drone #2,
covering
the Southwest quadrant, had detected movement. "Some wildlife", he
thought,
giving it no more than a cursory glance. Several organisms. Too small
for
"Cattlefants". "Pigs" or "Monkeys", probably. About ten of them. He
returned
his attention to the video.

The amber panel flashed again. Surveillance drone #2 had gone off-line.
Shit! He tried to contact it again. No response
Bah. Those thingies weren't that reliable anyway. Not mil-grade drones,
just
something the scientificos had cobbled together at the instigation of
Captain Jane Way, the commander of the security detachment. The REMFs
back
at home hadn't included proper drones on the equipment list. Too
expensive,
and unneccessary for an uninhabited planet.

Then the squad leader out on patrol called in. He reported small-arms
fire
and a small explosion. Too far to be sure about the location, somewhere
in
the Southwest sector.

Could it be...Mike called up the last images of drone #2 and played back
the
last images transmitted. Yes, there were some moving shapes. Not the
right
shape for "Pigs", rather too big for "Monkeys". Could those be people ?
Humans ? But intel had said the planet was uninhabited. Last image: Some
bright flashes.

Switch to the records of drone #3. That one had drone #2 at the edge of
its
field-of-view. Yes, small arms-fire followed by the explosion of drone
#2.
Big Shit! A proper military drone would have issued red alerts on
detecting
small arms fire. But the scientificos hadn't thought of programming
that.

Time to alert Captain Jane Way and the security detachment. They
wouldn't be
happy to be waked at 4 o'clock in the morning.

-----

Those were the first steps of the Stargrunt game Derk Groeneveld, his
friends Dirk(?) and Mike(?), and I  played at the Rheindahlen Con last
weekend. Dirk had thought up the scenario and game-mastered it very
nicely.

A secret "scientific" base in the jungle region of a supposedly
uninhabited
planet.

Mike, with a platoon's worth of troops played the security detachment.
He
had about three squads of troops, and a spaceship with Ortillery was
orbiting the planet.

Derk was commander of a mixed NAC platoon sent to investigate reports
about
the secret base. They had been dropped secretly some distance away - the
"meteor strike" - and their task was to go in, gather intelligence, if
possible a prisoner - and disappear as stealtihily as possible without
leaving any evidence about their nationality. His forces consisted of a
squad of Gurkhas (nice minis, very nicely painted) and two squads of
regular
NAC Marines.

I was commander of a platoon of colonists. Some years ago, a group of
civil-war refugees had reached Rhine Dale and settled in a small colony.
They wanted to be left alone and didn't draw attention to themselves and
weren't registered on any standard planet catalogue. When they detected
the
shuttles that landed to establish the base,  they sent a platoon to
investigate and to make it clear that unannounced guests were not
welcome.
As the colony didn't have any air transport, my troops had to hike in,
hence
the delay between the landing and our arrival. Skilled in local
woodscraft,
my troops could move through the dangerous plants like through normal
brush.

I had brought my own troops, a mixed platoon that fit the description of
the
colony force well:
Standard weapon was combat rifle.
Platoon HQ squad: Platoon leader, medic, sniper with laser rifle, two
soldiers, Aided sensors (D6), Leader 1,
"Regular" squad: 8 soldiers, Hand-held grenade launcher, SAW; Marksman
with
conventional sniper rifle. Light combat armour (D6).
Amazon squad (the GZG SAS figures.nice minis, BTW), 9 soldiers, IAVR
rocket,
rotary SAW, Marksman with sniper rifle. No armour (D4)
Merc squad, survivors a of a mercenary force involved in the Civil War.
10
Soldiers, incl.medic, SAW, two Marksmen. No armour (D4)

Marksmen: It was decided that too many snipers tended to overwhelm the
game.
Each player was allowed only one proper sniper. Other sniper figures
were
toned down to "Marksmen": Shoot as snipers, but couldn't act
independently
and go into hiding like snipers

----

I came in from the Southwest (my labelling) corner of the board, Derk on
the
Northwest corner. The base was on the Northeast corner. Terrain was
fairly
close, with lots of brush and hills. There were some woods, mostly along
the
edges.	Along my South edge was a lot of

Each squad diced for arrival. Looking out of the first wood, my Amazons
saw
the first surveillance drone and shredded it with a small-arms salvo.
Bit of
an overkill, really, the markswoman would have eliminated it much more
inconspicously. But you never know. It could have been a battle droid.
I then move in cautiously, observing frequently - there were lots of
dummy
(?) counters on the table.

Derk came in leading with his Gurkha squad.

They ran into a flesh-eating Porcupine plant. One of the Gurkhas was
caught
by the tangle vine of Porcupine plant and impaled on its spikes. We
diced to
check whether he would cry out and give away the position of his squd.
But
his Gurkha discipline held. He died silently. After that, the Gurkhas
advanced more cautiously, attacking any suspicious vines with their
Kukris.
The porcupine plants lost all the following fights ;-)

In the meantime, my point squad came under fire from Mike's sniper, who
managed to kill teh squad leader, a soldier and the Medic !Breach of the
Geneva convention ! The case will be documented and a complaint lodged
with
the UN Security Council and the Interstellar Criminal Court! ;-)
The sniper single-handedly managed to hold up my advance for several
turns

When Derk's Gurkhas climbed over a hill, the Gurkhas came under fire
from
Mike's outlying patrol. Derk's regular follow-up squad wanted to charge
through the Gurkhas at the enemy. But his combat movement die was awful
and
he ended up right where the Gurkhas were, in a nice concentrated heap,
visible for miles, on the top of  the hill. This was too tempting a
target
for me to miss and I shot two squad salvos across the board. Result, two
Gurkhas and a Regular soldier dead. mike's killed another one.

While all this was going on, Mike tried to call down the Ortillery. But
the
radio operator - played by umpire Dirk - aboard the spaceship was not
too
cooperative, at 4 o'clock in the morning. It started off with comments
like
"Your drone broke down ? And you want Ortillery ? Forget it", later it
was
"So your patrol has been eating berries again and is hearing things ?",
"Your sniper is hunting monkeys, so what ?", "ok,OK, If you think it's
important I'll wake the boss. Hold the line, please"...Muzak...
The Ortillery never came in.

Mike decided to switch his sniper's attention to Derks' Gurkhas. Bad
move,
bad luck - he gave away his position. My sniper first suppressed him,
then
the merc squad took revenge for their dead comrades. My advance
continued,
hidden behind a very convenient hill and I moved towards the poorly
defended
Southern edge of the base.

Mike counter-charged Derk's force atop the hill. Too tempting a target
for
my sniper. One trooper dead. Even so, Derk's force retreated off the
hill,
and then went away without havein achieved his mission.

At that we ended the game, as the clock was rapidly approaching the
supposed
time of the game, aven if I would have liked to play through my attack
on
the base.

----
Observations:

Thanks to all involved for a nice game. Lots of fun, nice athmosphere.

An interesting psychological observation. Mike and Derk became very much
engaged in their two-way fight and mostly ignored me sneaking around the
cover. A good illustration of how a diversionary attacks works.

One thing I should have done: go around the (nicelly modelled) board and
see
how my troops looked from the other side. They must have been fairly
inconspicuous. I occasionally forgot to move some standing in the bushes
along with the rest of their squad.

A few days ago, I had finished reading Rommel's "Infantry attacks",
where he
describes a lot of his WWI actions using infiltration tactics.
Definitely
useful inspiration here, and a good read in general.

Several people were interested spectators, and the next day I gave a
short
intro game of Stargrunt to three of them. Among the spectators was a
Britsh
soldier who had served with the Gurkhas in Hong Kong.

---
Modelling comments:

The surveillance drones were very nicely done: Head and torso of GW
Space
Marines, hovering on a wire. Nicely painted.

Mike used OUDF figures, like I did for my regulars. It was surprising
how
much the same figures could be changed just by a paint job. Mine were in
scruffy two-tone green cammo, Mike's in smart black with yellow
insignia.
Totally different impression.

Cat's whiskers make good antennas for backpack radios.

---

Other highlights of the convention:

A lot of very nice people, always the most important point. From
Germany,
Belgium, the Netherlands and the British Army.

Lots of well-presented games.
A spectacular pirate game with	many large-scale vessels, including a
whiteish ghost ship. a "Darkest Africa" game of an Ancient Roman
expedition
catching animals for the Circus being attacked by Massai. Two 1/300 WWII
games on very nice terrain (Normandy Boccage and Western Desert), an
obscure
19th century South American war, Sumo, a multi-player ACW skirmish (I at
least survived it, unlike most of my Confederate comrades-in-arms)
etc.etc.
Several Full Thrust games, but somehow I never manageds to get in on one
of
them.

I made third place in a "Hordes of the things" tournament.

I got to see my first non-German Euro coins as change for all the stuff
I
bought off Dutch and Belgian traders. Actually, it wasn't that much, no,
honest.

Greetings