CampCon short (relative to what went on) PM/AAR

Just FYInterest :) 

This weekend, Games Afoot in Sayre PA (perhaps unwittingly) hosted
Campcon 02. This years attendees included a couple of local kids, Mike
Sarno, Mike Hudak, David Raynes, Joel "Boba" Frock, James Hilchie
(Comrade Hil Chi) and your scribe (Tomb Raider). The last two being
Canadians, Mike S. being from PA (as I think is Mr. Hudak IIRC), and the
other two (Joel and David) being from Maryland (sp)?.

For those who don't know, CampCon is a get together of the GZG faithful,
spawned after an ECC meeting. We decided one time a year is too
infrequent and that WCC is just "too durn far". 

CampCon is "Camping" Convention, though as of yet no one has pitched a
tent... ;) It is a costs down affair which aims to be a fun weekend. 

CampCon 01 was held last year around the same time (give or take a day
or two) and featured four or five games. The first was an ESU orbital
assault on New Providence against a thin screening force of NAC. The
second was a Dirtside assault on the PDC. The third was an SG2 battle
for the Downport. The scenarios were linked so that failure or success
in one led to better/worse forces for the next episode. The NAC and NPM
defenders sent the ESU packing (ESU landed troops, but took a bit of a
drubbing in their attack on the PDC (they won, but they lost a lot on
the way), and the NPM and NAC regs proved very tough in the key Starport
battle). So the NAC team under Brigadier Sarno were awarded the Gold
Medallions of Victory and the ESU the Silver Medallions of somewhat less
Victory. (Along with the instructions from Brigadier Sarno to "Get Your
Ass Back To Eurasia!").

This year, five scenarios were run. Force compositions of enemy forces
were unknown and four reinforcement chits (representing a 10% force
increment) were available to be played as desired. Scenarios were not
linked directly, and campaign victory was to be determined by most wins.

-------------------------------------------------------------

Battle One: Refueling Stop

5000 pts of ESU ships were refueling at a gas giant, but the NAC found
out. They had 5000 points of ships, none larger than a heavy cruiser.
The ESU needed to skim gas from the gas giant before moving more than
half thrust. 

ESU forces included several heavy cruisers (Voroshilevs and Gorshkovs),
2 Konstantins with standard fighters, one Komarov, Two BDNs. NAC forces
seemed to include several vandenburgs, ticonderogas, hurons, and an
escort cruiser or two. 

The NAC setup inside the gas giant's atmosphere. The ESU had to come get
them. We sent the fighters in and the fleet closed slowly. This
leveraged our advantage in heavy beams. The fighters savaged the NAC,
and our ships (ESU) ended the game just about to enter the gas giant and
refuel while the NAC fleet was reeling from fighter attacks and long
range concentrated gunnery.

With a kill total of 200 and some points for the NAC to about 1200+ for
the ESU, once again the TMF imbalance and the fighter power were
demonstrated... (the ESU tactics were solid too though). 

ESU had only one or two ships damaged (the NAC tried to kill the
Komarov). Joel's NAC fleet segment was pristine. Fire concentration was
the order of the day.

Result: Decisive victory ESU. No reinforcement chits played. The NAC
focused on the big ESU ship, and the length of the rows meant it didn't
suffer any to soon, nor did it blow up. In opposition, the ESU fighters
took out the escort cruisers then started lunching on other cruisers.
The great majority of the ESU fleet didn't even have a scratch. This was
a route for the NAC. It would have been better for them if 1) They'd
been allowed to bring some fighters, 2) the ESU had brought fewer
fighters, 3) They'd had about a 15% fleet size increase to account for
the TMF imbalance. (Or use the conjectural TMF correction formulas to
determine point costs for the big ESU ships). 

-------------------------------------------------------------

Battle Two: Sayre Canal Shuffle

A reinforce platoon of ESU SF attempt to capture a key bridge. A mixed
bag of NAC MPs try to hold the bridge so the Engineers can wire it and
blow it sky high. They are in platoon strength, but have green units. A
single Coonhound FSV is deployed from the King's Own Albion Hussars.

NAC deploys for 360 defence. ESU enters the board and engages two MP
squads (one is command squad) with fire after taking some overwatch
fire. ESU brings MAWs to bear on enemy units. MP forces on far side of
the board begin to cross the bridge to enter the fray. Engineers working
on setting charges. 

ESU moves dummy counters down the river and up the river. Two of these
are actually submersed infantry walkers. 
They leap out onto a small island when recce by fire from MPs force
their hand. Fire from the Coonhound (HKP/3 vs. armour 1) destroys one
ESU walker, and David Raynes, in the move that earned him the "Without a
Prayer" medallion for the campaign, took the remaining walker underwater
to strike from the bridge side which was not seeing intense combat (The
ESU was close assaulting onto the bridge.... the first unit discovering
that NAC engineers use slightly downgraded PA which kicks butt in
HTH...). David just failed to observe the NAC MP veteran squad (whose
leader took over when the platoon LT went down to an ESU close assault
on the other side of the river)... who promptly IAVR'd his mechanical
backside into the next planetary system. (This prevented him from
massacring the remaining MPs). 

One green MP squad held against the fire of three smaller but higher
quality ESU SF teams AND against a close assault by one of the teams.
They gave up cover to form a line across the bridge and keep the ESU
from engaging the surviving engineers as they strung charges. This
heroic stand prevented the ESU from sweeping the bridge in time. 

One highlight was Mike Sarno's repeated comms failures (before his MP
command squad was overrun). He rolled a lot of 1's and 2's. The off
board pre-registered artillery never came... (there were lots of jokes
about batteries for the NAC radios made in China). Mind you, when Greens
beat Regs or Vets in HTH (Comrade Hil Chi's inglorious assault against
the NAC MPs protecting the engineers), you have to say bad die rolling
happened to both sides. 

Result: NAC victory, though everyone on the bridge probably died. The
only survivors would be a single Vet MP squad that never really got into
the battle. Each side used one reinforcement chit (NAC for arty which
they never successfully called... and ESU for the two Class 1 infantry
walkers). The scenario came down to the wire and was determined by a few
final combat engineer quality checks. One more bad roll and a draw could
have been achieved. Two more bad rolls and an ESU victory would have
occured. 

-------------------------------------------------------------

Battle Three: Zeguma Beach 

5000 pts of ESU forces attempt to reinforce a single element holding the
starport at Zeguma Beach. 5000 pts of NAC attempt to stop them. Board is
an archipelago of about 15 islands with urban terrain on them and a
causeway and starport. One ESU squad (PA with Arty Obs of course!)
starts in the starport (infiltrated on the Ambassador's ship) and both
forces enter from opposing board sides to vie for control of this
"resort area". (ESU trying to get a starport to launch another landing
attempt). NAC doesn't want to destroy premier resort, and ESU wants to
capture starport. Floating starport CAN SINK if hit repeatedly with
arty/big weapons.

The NAC arrived with a number of conventional boats with light weapons
(some larger PBRs with some heavier ordinance with conventional infantry
aboard, some grav MICVs with normal infantry, and a pile of PA in
zodiacs! as well as some grav tanks). The ESU arrived with a few grav
tanks and piles of amphibious tracklayer MICVs and tanks (slow, but
still dangerous) and a few interface landed PA with GMS/L. The ESU had
no command vehicles and no casevac ("Comrade, you are still alive. Your
wounds are not that severe. Rejoin the fight or be shot."). The NAC had
casevac, a command vehicle of some type, and an aerospace fighter with
RFAC and some DFO and spotter capabilities. I think the NAC had a medium
gun on call with HEF MAK and SMOKE and the ESU a large gun with DFO and
MAK. 

Round 1 saw the ESU interface land 3 more PA stands in the Starport. It
saw the slow ESU force motor onto the board and the zippier NAC arrive.
NAC forces soon came under fire from the observer in the starport
calling MAK on MICV formations and HEF on the open assault boats. The
NAC responded with HEF into the starport (risky!). 

In a round or two, the somewhat mauled NAC advance arrived at the
starport (taking a few GMS/L on the way in) and began to CC the ESU PA
there. On the other side of the board, a single ESU grav tank platoon
(with a few stray GMS shots from other units) blew away a platoon of
heavy grav tanks and a platoon of lighter assets and were in turn
heavily damaged by another NAC grav tank formation. OTOH one unit tied
down 3 of the enemies, so that was good. 

The ESU were smart getting more PA into town early. The NAC were smart
picking a lot of infantry on mobile platforms (note to ESU designers:
open water is POOR for amphibious tracklayers... OOPS!). The ESU needed
more speed, the NAC needed more units and better firecons (ESU had
superior on most things, NAC enhanced). 

Great game, wonderful scenics, some great action. 

Result: Draw. Both sides had substantial forces inside the starport (I
think the NAC had 3 infantry stands and 3 PA stands and two or three
IFVs and the ESU had 3 PA stands with GMS/L). However, the ESU had 5
MICVs with 5 more infantry stands only a couple of turns away along with
about ten MBTs. And the ESU had another round of heavy MAK if the NAC
wanted to bring out lots of armour. We conceded collectively that no one
could predict the exact outcome, it would come down to whether the NAC
could evict the 3 ESU PA stands in the next two turns or not and whether
the ESU reinforcements would be able to do anything if that was the
case. So we called it a draw. Each side used two reinforcement chits (so
we each had 6000 pts). Don't know what the NAC bought, but the ESU
bought the grav tank formation that did so well on the rightmost flank.
This left one reinforcement chit for each side. 

-------------------------------------------------------------

Battle Four: Bottom of the Ninth

A convoy of ESU vehicles (tanks, APCs, trucks, and a missile launch
platform) tries to get to launch position, setup its launcher, and get
off 4 intermediate sized nuclear missiles. A NAC company plus some air
assets and a Coonhound and a Diemos MBT attempt to stop them. Gurkhas
and SAS were also present. 

Close terrain on the board resulted in the first vehicle to vehicle
encounter at about 150m. The NAC pushed forward to deploy infantry, the
ESU (who hadn't reached launch point) immediately started worrying about
if they could launch. Some recalculations by the launch crew showed they
could. They setup the launcher, set the jacks, raised the launch
package, started programming missiles. 

Meanwhile above the battelfield, a NAC VTOL appeared, dropped some
Gurkhas on a flank, popped up, GMS/H'd an ESU Grav APC, got shot down,
and crashed destroying a NAC APC. An ESU VTOL appeared, GMS'd the
Coonhound, then was blown out of the sky by DFFG/1's from the NAC APCs.
The middle of the board became a vehicle deathrap (two smoking ESU APCs
and a dead tank, two downed VTOLs, a smoking NAC APC and Coonhound FSV. 

The NAC started getting desparate after the ESU fired their first
missile. They then inserted the SAS by parawing right about 100m from
the enemy flank (and immediately took fire). By the end of the scenario
the NAC had lost about 50% of the SAS squad and never fired it. It did
tie down the the ESU walker reinforcement that latterly appeared.

The second missile popped out and was shot at by NAC GMS/AA which
missed. Scratch 2 NAC targets. The NAC got daring here and their Diemos
flipped on its APFC belts, charged past some blocking infantry, taking
shots as they went, killing most of them with the APFC and then rammed
the launch vehicle, nearly knocking it over. The ESU desparately fired
their third missile (and counterjammed NAC jamming). (Missile #4 was
destroyed in situ by NAC APSW fire). 

Result: ESU Victory. The ESU got off 3 missiles that were neither jammed
nor shotdown. This meant three NAC centers were probably nicely
radioactive. The NAC felt they didn't really have a chance (the game ran
somewhat differently than the two playtests revealing some issues the
playtests didn't catch), but in retrospect I have to (respectfully)
disagree. The had GMS shots at the outbound strategic missiles in their
boost stages, they had EW jamming tasks, and they had a last minute MBT
to launch vehicle ramming attack, any of which could have resulted in a
draw result, and any two of which could have resulted in a win. So the
issue was contestible. 
Still, in all fairness, there are things I would amend if I'd do it
again and these will be covered in the actual post mortem AAR on
www.stargrunt.ca when I get to it. 

-------------------------------------------------------------

Battle Five: Black Belt Brouhaha

5000 points of ESU square off against 5000 points of NAC across an
asteroid laden field that gave cover to small ships and beam dice of
damage for passing through to most ships (PDS, thrust and B1s could
reduce this, as did shields). 

The NAC force deployed on one side of the board in tight formation
(unlike game 1). The ESU deployed in a looser formation with no unified
orders (so Admiral Hudak raced to contact, while Admiral's Hil Chi and
Barclay hung back (letting the fighters work) and Admiral Raynes did
something half way between). The NAC lost all their fighters to a mass
dogfight, then started loosing ships with a 54 point strike on their SDN
and similar strikes on the BB and BDN present. The fighters were almost
out of endurance by the end of the game (most from attacking, 3
squadrons from stopping all the salvo missiles aimed at Admiral Hudak's
Konstantin). 

The basic rule seemed to be that the ESU cruisers and SDDs would die if
they came out of the belt on the NAC side. A "line of death" seemed to
be established. One voroshilev went from no armour full hull to dead in
one round... after emerging. 

The asteroid field, although total science bunk, was a fun mid-board
terrain point. It also took its toll on some ESU ships (a Gorshkov and a
Warsaw). 

Result: ESU Victory. This one was tight (about 1600 pts to 1850 or so
pts destroyed) but the ESU fleet attacked disjoint (we intentionally had
no coordinated planning). My own inability to fly resulted in the
destruction of a Gorshkov in the belt without a single enemy shot!!! NAC
learnt from the first FT game and focused on whacking small ships
(cruiser or smaller). They did much better as a consequence. They lost,
but only by about 15%, which is a marginal victory for the ESU. 

-------------------------------------------------------------

Campaign Results:

ESU Victory. Gold Medallions awarded.
NAC not-so Victory. Silver Medallions awarded.
Much fun had by all.
David Raynes receives "Not a Prayer" for turning his back on the enemy
and losing a key force component. 
Joel Frock receives "Most Feared/Respected Enemy" for his stand on the
bridge and for having an entirely intact force at the end of the first
FT battle and for the Diemos "Tank Ram" assault. 
Mike Hudak earned the other side's "Most Feared/Respected Enemy". He
played competently in both Stargrunt games, and in the last FT game, he
pushed aggressively towards the enemy with his force. 

With one campaign to the ESU and one to the NAC, CampCon 03 will be the
deciding series, then we'll move on to another theme. Next year we
expect to see a couple of relatively urbanized ground battles, and some
interesting space scenarios. 

To the participants, I tip my hat. Great gaming. To the organizer, Mike
S., I tip my hat. Fun was had by all, and only a minimal amount of
whinging went on, and that was defeated by the invocation of the "No
Whining" sign in the gaming area (thank you, Mr. Sarno!).