Notes and ramblings about GZG-ECC IV

Thought I'd add my two cents into the mix on ECC IV this weekend.  I had
a
lot of fun, and am already looking forward to next year (As I was after
only
playing one game at ECC III on the friday night.)

First off, many thanks to everyone who made this possible, from the
organizers, to the vendors, to the referees, and the players themselves.
The camaraderie was more fun than the games themselves and it was a
great
delight for me to put faces to the name I always see on the list (Even
though those same people were usually gunning for my units.....))  Thank
you
all for a fun weekend.

And as a side note from me:  Anyone that can find an extra copy of More
Thrust, please let me know.  Thank you.

On to the events:

Friday Night:  Friday Night Fire Fight

My first experience with Stargrunt, and what an experience it was! 
Terrain
and figures were excellent.  I couldn't believe figures that small could
be
painted that well!  Definitely fun to see.

Unfortunately, my troops were not long to see on the board, as due to
HORRIBLE dice rolls, many atrocities befell them (as well as them
creating a
few atrocities of their own.)  Stuart felt sorry for me and kept giving
me
new toys to play with, which were promptly turned into funeral pyres
with
catastrophic results.  (Two scout tanks were destroyed before I ever had
a
chance to activate them, as well as a mig that was blown out of the sky
by
ADA fire.  The two napalm bombs that detonated in our rear area were not
appreciated.....)

But the most fun was the APC that was air dropped right in front of my
right
flank unit.....  (Not to mention one that was dropped almost on top of
our
side commander, but that's another story....)

I had a tank buster missile (Can't remember exactly what type) which my
unit
promptly fired at the APC as a way to say hello.

The missile completely failed to neutralize the APC.  But it did have a
nice
effect.....

Note to self:  Civilians in the field of fire are very vulnerable to
exhaust
gasses from anti tank missiles.......

The backblast from the missile fried a woman and child in front of my
unit.
(The squad leader didn't worry too much about them at the time.)  The
unit
felt bad about this unfortunate occurance but agreed to stay and worry
about
the APC.  (They made their morale roll)

Unfortuntely, the news crew took great delight at filming the cremation
ceremony.  They promptly took the footage they just filmed and uploaded
it
to the city population.  Needless to say, the city population was not
pleased and promptly rioted against my unit.  Well, being armed with
fists
and rocks, and my troops with automatic weapons, the mob lasted one
activation and was decimated, all in front of the cameras.  And, my
troops
liked killing civilians so much, (failed morale roll), they went on a
rampage and killed any civilian they could find in the city, much to the
delight of the news crew that continued to gain footage, and for some
reason
I could not shoot at.  (I guess my troops all wanted copies of the
footage
for their kids....)

Note to self:  News Crews are EVIL and should be destroyed on first
sight,
with extreme prejudice, as our highest priority.

Ok, the rest of my notes will be much shorter.

Sat AM:  Carnage con Queso.

Lots of fun.  Mike Sarno did a great job of pumping everyone up for this
ahead of time with a separate list to trade in game barbs with.  It was
a
bring your own squad game, and we had quite a variety of squads:

Nuns with Guns:  (My unit)
Ben Kenobi and his Harem
Ghurkas
Power armor
Grunts
News Crew with Vehicle

Most minis had very high quality paint jobs and were a delight to
behold.
(Mine needed some work....)  The terrain was excellent with lots of
hills,
buildings (Starport), caves, and places to hide.

We were all spread out, and had to acquire cheese crates that were
sporadically left on the board.  So, maneuver was key.	At the beginning
of
the game, Ben Kenobi's harem and the Ghurkas ran out in the open to go
after
cheese crates.	One small arms fire and one artillery blast (Courtesy of
a
cheese card) and half of the harem and half of the ghurkas were going
after
cheese.....

It was cat and mouse after that...  Highlights:

The PA stomping the daylights out of the grunts in close combat....
The no fighting zones of the starport and med tent....
The 'my guys don't have guns' of the news crew, who proceeded to clean
up
with cheese and drive it off board....
The realization of everyone that the news crew had too much cheese, and
the
subsequent chase....
The 'unarmed' newscrew popping the PA, killing one and wounding another
(with some help from a cheese card....)
The final close assault rush of the nuns against the ghurkas and news
crew
hiding in the med tent.....
(Nuns were decimated to one man, with the news crew even killing a
nun....)

(Remember my previous note about Newscrews?  ;-))

All praise to the news crew....  The current Queso King

Sat Afternoon:

The game I was in was cancelled, but I got in a full thrust (Vector)
game.
This was my first time with vector, and took me a bit to get used to it
(As
noted by pointing my main gun in the opposite way of where it was
intended,
by failing to overshoot the craft I was approaching.)  It was a
variation of
'hunt the convoy' and was quite entertaining.

Sat PM:  Defense of Sol.

The big Human vs Kravak full thrust game.  Highly entertaining.  The
Kravak
did some early damage from range, but the fun occurred in the middle,
where
the big scrum when the two fleets passed each other took place.  Lots of
carnage given and taken on each side.  As the two fleets split, we were
running late on time and decided to call the game.  The humans were
awarded
the game, but with more time, it could easily have gone the other way. 
Had
some neat weapons from the UN units that were played, and a fun time was
had
by all.

Sun AM:  Sundiver

Another Full Thrust vector game, where we were defending a research base
at
the edge of a gravitational field of a star.  If you got gravitationally
pulled off the left edge of the table, you were incinerated in the star.
 I
learned some of the drawbacks of salvo missiles as mine were eliminated
almost to a missile (I think one survived out of about 36) by Area
Defense.
But the game ended with quite a contingent of the attacking force being
sucked into the star, Indy's dreadnought holding on for dear life at the
edge of the gravity field, and EVERY defending ship pounding on it as
well
as they could.	We ended up creating a mini star at the edge of the
research
base.

Thanks everyone for the fun time this weekend.	All best wishes to those
who
travelled in the horrendous weather that came up as Sunday came to a
close.
Hope you all made it home safe.

Mike Hudak
mihudak@state.pa.us

Fact is, there's nothing out there you can't do.....
Yeah, even Santa Claus believes in you.....

Dr Teeth and the Electric Mayhem,"Can you picture that", Muppet Movie
Soundtrack

Growing Smarter Land Use Conference 
-- March 18-21 in Hershey
- Take the Green Communities Track!
- Visit: www.dep.state.pa.us (directLINK "Growing Smarter")