I bought a little disposable camera on the way to the convention on Saturday, having conveniently forgotten my digital one. For some perverse reason, I bought a black and white .. hadn't taken a b&w picture in years, and thought it might be interesting. Due to getting stuck behind an accident scene and running late, I paid for a garage place, as I figured I'd be there almost all day. I was right. Fortunately, I have switched GMing philosophy from bigass, heavy grandiose concept games like Le Grand Cirque to small, portable, fun games like Gladiator Fighting, and Tavern Brawl games, and Lilliput, and the Tibetan Corpse Racing Olympiad, all of which can be toted up hills in the heat without having a coronary. Parking is an issue with TriaDCon, which was just as sticky this year as last.. however, this time we had signs up, and got the word out well in advance about Parking, what's free and what's not, and the risk of ticketing at U-Md. Point taken for next year.

I got to the convention around 930 that day, and the crowd was already quite good, considering a large portion of the floor space was behind a construction curtain, You can see the new "Mongolian Barbecue" construction space on the left in this picture.


and to the right in this one:


As you can see much of the space is taken up with boardgaming of various genres. One element I added this year, as the miniatures scheduler, was the three "Island" tables on the left, above. You can see Hal Dyson's wonderful AERODROME game in the center of the three "Islands" in the picture above.

I noticed that no matter what was being run on an island table, that guy usually had a full house for players. point taken for next time.

Mr. Goon's resurgence of the Go teaching opportunity (below) was once again welcomed. I'm not sure if it drew many outside players or not, but I did take the time to bombard many of the local Go email lists for this area, and I think I even emailed the IGF. We definitely had a nice stream of players, so I hope he returns for next year.



One element definitely new to the convention was a roleplaying track. We had (I think) four events and some discussion panels. We were a little light on space for discussions and hosted them in the Gazebo Room. Oddly enough for a first time event, these were a bit of a draw and we had some dedicated players. Point taken for next year.

Here we see Mike running his Serenity Role Playing Game. I'm not a huge RPG fan (not having done much in the genre) but I loved the look and detail of the RPG Mike was running. He did a fine job and his players enjoyed themsleves.


It's always nice to see Joan and David Wendland of Blood and Cardstock games. She was the silly hats vendor, having gone to the annual Toy Fair and picked up a lot of truly silly hats cheap. Joan is a very talented designer and I sat in on a playtest of her new game in the works called.. something something pie fight. The game is ostensibly about monsters shuffling around and having a pie fight, with magickal pie-flinging spells which tickled my fancy.



Whatever it was called, it was silly, involved pie, and was nicely balanced. Nice job, Joanie!

I ran a gladiator game early in the day, mostly with Curt and Grant Daniels. We had a fourth player, but he wussed on us after one turn because his pals were signaling for him to play Die Macher with them or something. Too violent for a Euro Player, I guess. Hey, who am I to complain, he bought my copy of GALAXY by GMT.


Seems like we had some of that magical marketing Synchronicity left over from WBC and Historicon this year. "The Great Convergence" (wince) was on display at TriaDCon, too! Many wargamers played Euros, many miniatures game players played RPGs and board games.


Some conflict sim fans playing Napoleon's Triumph, the new Austerlitz block game in the series that began with Bonaparte at Marengo (above).

Games Club of Maryland was there in force and contributed greatly to the success of the convention. I would like to extend our thanks for the wonderful job done by Mr. Keith Levy and all the tournament organizers he assembled for our humble little convention. Thanks, guys.

We made use of the right side foyer more this year than we did last year. We moved registration up there to provide more floor space below on the main floor, and held several events up in the rightside foyer. Above you can see what a nice mixed crowd we had, of all ages. I personally think the OTHER foyer, on the left, may be a loser. People just don't know it's there and any event held there was ill attended by HMGS convention standards.

Here was a very interesting game concept being put on by Jonathan Miller. It's a naval battle between the Bismark and the Prince of Wales, but the focus is not on moving ships and comparing armor to broadside weight. The real game is about keeping the ship afloat after it starts to take damage, and how you allocate damage repair resources. A fascinating game idea that would make a brilliant boardgame.



Bob McDonald ran his somewhat famous FOUR MACGUFFINS game, a pulp adventure/skirmish using the Chain Reaction rules (above). Many thanks, sir, you were tireless at this.

Some Historical and not-so Historical games...




Taladega Nights...


My friend Ben Pecson considers a move at what looks like DBR from this angle..




(Above) The folks from WADBAG start setting up De Bellus Vashingtonium, our annual DBA tournanment. A big thank you to the folks who set this up, you provided a lot of fun for a lot of people for a lot of hours!

(Results here)

DBV is always welcome at TriaDCon, never fear!

Lastly, we did have a bring and buy flea market event, and it was stellar. I sold about 90 dollars worth of games that I wasn't going to play any more, and promptly spent the money buying NEW stuff...


Free Enterprise at its best

I did run a game on Sunday, Return to Lilliput. Said game is detailed elsewhere.

AAR Summary:

Financially, we did not loose our shirts this year. The convention actually paid for itself, and grew attendance, although not as much as I would like.. maybe only about 20 to 30 above last years' figures, but that's not at all bad for a local convention.

Facilities: There were issues with the site location, and many of them aren't going to be easy to overcome. The big one is parking. Parking is some distance away from the dining facility and drive up access is very limited. We have tried to negate this by being johnny on the spot with handtrucks and the freight elevator. Secondly the facility is not exactly handicap friendly. It's possible to maneuver around it, but it takes some effort. Some of our game space was taken up with construction this year. We were told they would be finished in time for TriaDCon, but this did not prove to be the case. I don't sense it had a huge impact on the show. The separation of the far left mezzanine from the rest of the con was a problem, even with signage and helpful people giving directions. It just isn't a starter. Conversely, adding some miniatures events directly to the main floor was very good for the miniatures games. It's all about location. The big plusses to the site location is limited free catering that comes with it (free, giant cookies that cost and arm and a leg elsewhere, and soda), and being located next to a nice cafeteria. It's not the Four Seasons, but its' better than just about any food I ate at the Eisenhower during Fall In (not knocking that convention, at all, I just don't like the hotel's caterer).

Vendors-- it would be nice to have more, but really, we are about maxed out on the available space. We appreciate the local support for our Con! We even gave up the reg table to add another one in. At this stage, I'd rather see smaller, local guys like Blood and Cardstock over a mega vendor, but heck, we'll take what we can get.

Price: We had to pay a little extra for insurance.. and had to cover the cost, so we knocked it up a buck or two. I think our price is a pretty good bargain for a convention held inside the DC Metro area (inside the beltway!). We did offer a few incentives here and there that some people took advantage of (special prices for GMs and Boy Scouts). We can't afford to give anything away on a massive scale at the moment, but we can at least do the right thing for GMs and scouts.

Staff: Much better this year.. and I mean by LEAPS AND BOUNDS. Many, many thanks to the stalwart lads of the Southern Maryland Partizans, who showed up in force to help schlepp tables, stand a watch at the front desk or flea market, and generally help by being helpful and unfailingly polite and cheerful about it. To give you a good idea of HOW helpful these volunteeers where, we were at the convention until 9 or 10 last year, breaking down tables. We got out by 7 or so this year.

Advertising and ROI: Last year, we were a brand new convention relying on strict word of mouth and postings on the Internet. This year, we tried to put in a much better effort. We placed adverts in Wargames Illustrated, the Historicon and Cold Wars Program books, the NoVaG newsletter, spammed various forums and yahoogroups repeatedly, and dropped fliers in all the stores. We didn't see a hoarde for our efforts, but we held last year's numbers easily and have even grown somewhat. At least I can feel that we did what needs to be done in this regard.

In closing, many thanks to the many, many people who contributed their time, effort, volunteerism, and creativity to putting on TriaDCon and contributing so much to its success. This is not just the GMs and Volunteers and the Convention Cabal (the closest thing we have to a board of directors), but also anyone who took the time to attend. We have worked hard to return the concept of a good, old fashioned local convention with a mixed format to the DC region, and we just might be suceeding due to your efforts.

Slaves of the Elephant God

Here's a short, incomplete and confused version of what happened. I am hoping that Walt, Nigel and Bruce can add their own impressions, as I know bugger all about what they were doing ---

It's been a tradition since 2002 (I think) that a group of us-- myself plus a varying cast of Table Directors, of whom Bruce Pettipas, Nigel Clarke and Walt O'Hara have been present at most-- to run a pulp mega-game at Historicon. The set up has been four tables, each showing a different location, running at the same time. These serve for the first two scenes (possibly with a bit of moving scenery between scenes). The director is free to run his table any way he sees fit, and with any changes or omissions to the rules he likes. In fact, I don't think Walt knows the rules. 1 It doesn't matter at all. Each scene lasts 30-45 minutes, so it has to be run at lightning speed, and turn sequence is often ignored by players shouting, pushing in, and doing whatever they like whenever they like. Indeed, I take the chairs away, so nobody can sit and relax during "the take".

At the end of each scene, the director recounts to all what has happened at his table. Then we resume, some players going to different tables (because they have a plane, or, like Wooster, they are lost), some continuing where they are.

Bruce took the marketplace at Chunderpore, since I'd just built the city for him (cash was involved). Things blew up, elephants ran amok, and Kimball O'Hara's 2 intelligence agents hunted cultists and vice versa. Was Fu Manchu there? I don't know.

Nigel is an old jungle hand, so he took a rain forest (where? Malaya? Burma? Burbank?) location. There were local caveman-type aboriginals, a crashed plane and a zombie Amelia Earhart (Nigel just made her up on the spot), and a jungle lord character called, er, Tarzam. Most of the loud fun I heard was the interaction between legendary film-maker Erich Von Schnitzel (Hoochie Coochie Girls of 1935) and his star, the always glamorous Roxy Smothers, filming an "art film" called Naked She-Devil: Temptress of the South Seas. There were lots of shower scenes involved this pair are largely responsible for bringing in the Hayes Code. Nayland Smith of the Burma police was there as well, and possibly LA PI Phillip Marlowe, in trench coat and parked car. And Biggles flew in, because he likes to land his plane in dense jungle.

Walt's scene involved a lamasery in Tibet. It was loud, and Fu Manchu was definitely present. Indiana Jones, as well. I don't know what happened. Walt's GMing philosophy is to get caffeinated and make things up at 100 mph. He's a genius, actually. 3

There were several sets of Nazis, as is so often the case. I don't know where they were, mostly. 4

My own scene was on the North-west frontier, where King of the Khyber Rifles, now a Colonel , was played by the same gamer who had portrayed him as a young subaltern the night before in my "Science versus Pluck" game. He came up the same valley to face his old adversary Mahmud Khan, and knocked in the door of the Pathan's tower just as he had in 1897. They joined forces, however, to face the Nazi menace, and drove off the Hun with excellent shooting and sharp steel. Jeeves and Wooster asked directions, and found there was no BP station anywhere in the vicinity. 5

Okay, so if I'd listened more carefully, I'd know what happened in everyone else's scene.

In my second scene the Khyber Rifles and those damned Jerries (now reinforced by Zeppelintruppen) went with Mahmud Khan (not a bad chap for a lifelong enemy) to a frontier hillfort where evil, ungodly goings on were offending the decency of the Pathan tribes. A lot of people knew of it, since Phil Marlowe was parked outside, inconspicuous in his 1932 Ford (I can't find a model for a Plymouth). Well, not as inconspicuous as in LA, but there ya go. I think Roxy Smothers must have had a beef with him, since she immediately ran her Rolls Royce into his parked car. Von Schnitzel started filming. Soviet agents and Nazis began fighting, just because. Nayland Smith arrived in a van, with the eastern dancing girl Karamanieh strapped to the roof. Nobody seemed to think this was odd.

The tribesmen in the fort watched (some taking photos) as the crazy westerners chase done another about, and tried to commit vehicular homicide all over the place. However, the no-nonsense King rammed down the gates (as he seems to, a lot) and the Khyber Rifles stormed in. As did Nayland Smith and his pals, and those sneaky Soviets. But, when the bayoneting was finished and the Zeppelintruppen had rappelled (curses!) into the tower where the cultists weren't meeting (Ach Du Lieber! Too late again!) it was Zelda the script girl/US treasury agent who was able to drag the cult priest out. Using her chief weapon (her flat and tedious monotone voice) she forced him to tell of a great gathering at the island of Rikki-Tikki where .. under the belching volcano ... the cult would bring forth the great Elephant God himself, to wreak destruction (etc etc ... the usual stuff).

After a break (in which Hercule Poirot apparently became distracted by something shiny and forgot to come back, for which he later apologized) we had a grand finale under the volcano. All the cultists and Nazis (who had gone beyond a mere anthropological interest by this time) were arraigned at the base of the volcano, with a human sacrifice. A beautiful maiden? Well, no. It was Biggles, the ace British pilot. I have no idea what they were thinking (although, since there is no sex in the Biggles stories, who knows?) 6

Anyway, we ran this at even more breakneck speed than usual, with Nigel running one side of the board, Walt the other and myself taking the middle. People ran about and crashed things. Zeppelintruppen landed on the crater rim. There was fist-fighting up there, with Phil Marlowe. Miss Wonderley tried out for a screen role. The Khyber Rifles shot holes in the zeppelin (imaginary, but hovering over the volcano. Roxy ran off in Biggles plane with Dr Petrie (Nayland Smith's cohort), giving her a chance to marry a doctor. Lots of cultists were killed. The volcano gave every sign of erupting (which gave warning to players to finish up now or die). Most of the players had the sense to escape as the volcano boomed and the Elephant God itself appeared.

End movie as heroes run for safety and the screen is covered in lava and smoke.

I always end the story by having the players tell what they were trying to do, and how it worked out for them. Mr Guttman (from The Maltese Falcon) reported that, although he was trapped on an island which must sink beneath the waves and cause a tsunami, he still felt there was an opportunity for profitable business here.

The Oscar went to young Michael, a regular these last three or four years, whose heroic portrayal of Short Round (bravely surviving a personal combat with Fu Manchu) was worthy of the award. 7

Notes from the Tibetan Director:

1) Just enough to get by.. I believe you call this the "frantic version" for convention play.
2) No relation.
3) Aw Shucks... just doing muh bit. BTW, the phrase is "Drink a lot of coffee and wait for the magic to happen"
4) The S.S. Expedition to Tibet started at the Lamasery and stayed there in Act 2. The Gestapo started in Tibet and were replaced by Biggles when it became clear I was having a Nazi pile up in tibet. The Bolsheviks, as well, started in Tibet and were sent to Jalallabad. To be replaced by a very confused Jeeves and Bertie.
5) In fact, Bertie drove Algy's beloved Bentley into a coolie pack full of Nitro Glycerin, which made a very stunning impact on the car's front end. They debated the moral concept of boosting a handy Ford Model T truck for a solid turn or two before heading out at high speed.
6) Biggles, by the by was sporting a spot-on Gary Cooper accent... which caused for some uninentional hilarity for those who are in the know. Imagine John Wayne playing Raffles, and you get the idea.
7) Michael won this award because of Short Round's incredible luck in resisisting Fu's hypnotism (twice) and then having the presence of mind to act hypnotized so he could free Marian from a fate worse than death! Yeah, Michael!!

The Lord of War

Cold Wars Main AAR

Well, the day had come at last, for my last show as CW Director (in name). In truth, I was relieved. It hardly seemed like "my convention" for the last three months, and poor Frank Preziosi had to shoulder quite a burden stepping in to virtually run things as my new job had me working long hours incommunicado. Talk about learning under fire. Frank, your efforts were appreciated. I nosed my truck into the parking lot Thursday morning after picking up the shirts late Wednesday night.

The tables were already setup out front and downstairs. Rich Wright was running around making last minute adjustments. Frank and Mrs. Prez were very competently shooing people about hither and yon as all the little last minute things were getting done. Shirts out and sorted by size, pre-reg shirts pulled for the people who ordered them. Program books arrived on time and addendum being stuff as we speak. Rutherford busy making sure the machines and label makers were working. Our seed money already distributed.



Over at the tennis barn, Neil Schlaffer was honchoing vendors into position with effortless ease. The peg board crew (The Crouches) were busy ratcheting away at assembly points down near the Help and Events desk. It looked like chaos but it all made sense. Things were happening.



I dropped into a pre-convention meeting with the hotel staff and met some of the new faces and names. I was sad that "Big John" the night manager had moved on, as well as Gloria, the front desk lady that made counting out relatively easy. The new folks, including Medium-Sized Carl (Big John's replacement) and Patty, are quite good at what they do, and very personable.

At six we started taking registrations, selling shirts, and handing out pre-reg. We had some lines but we really handled it efficiently, due to the layout. The homemade stanchions the Preziosis made for FALL IN came in very handy for line control.

The Flea Market and Tournament area were laid out in an unusual configuration for COLD WARS but I approved it. Traffic was great and for once, ALL PARTIES WERE HAPPY! Hooray! It can be done. I might add, that Bob, Neil, and many tournament luminaries had a meeting at this con and resolved a game plan for HISTORICON that seems to be amicable to all parties. Well done, gentlemen.



Look at that happy Tournament GM!!



I should mention the weather. I was wearing shorts on the way up. By the end of the day I was bundling up-- the temperature had taken a plunge. Snow.. and ice! were expected, and the reports were varying everywhere from 2 inches to a foot in places. Oh the joy.



Well, they don't call it COLD WARS for nothing.

The mood in the bar (for people who had showed up on Thursday) was restrained and pleasant. Chances were we would be stuck here over the weekend, but could you imagine a better place to be stuck (that's rhetorical). The restraunt and food services department from the Host were not complaining.



Nothing like having a naturally hungry crowd as a captive audience.

Naturally, there was 'talk' about the impending referendum at Saturday's membership meeting. I went to bed (early, for me at a con) at 1 AM.

Friday sprang up but I did not. Somewhere during the night, my nemesis, arthritis, set in.. and I could hardly stand up. My knee joint had locked up during the night and I felt awful. The only meds I take for an attack are ibuprofen and I didn't even have that. Or even a winter coat and gloves! And it was now icing and sleeting. As you can see, things were NOW looking ominous:



So I hobbled to the reg area, bummed an Aleve and drove over to K-Mart to buy some Ibuprofen, a cheap disposable coat and gloves. Friday's games were in full swing when I got back around 9. Some of them were vastly impressive. Phil Vevrito's massive SIEGE OF CARTHAGE was a shoe-in for best thematic game, in my opinion. HMGS President Pete Panzeri had gone out of his way for COLD WARS, both in suggesting Phil as a Guest of Honor and contacting the WOMAN'S ARMY MUSEUM to provide little statues as awards. Thanks, Pete, you done good!

I was very bummed that I could not get my stuff together to run a game on Del Stover's table on Friday. I had planned on a nice four hour slot to run RED ACTIONS in, but the fact is we had got the game to being about 80% ready for public play but had not had time to complete it. Sorry, Del, didn't meant to let you down. Thanks for the great work on the newsletter!

WHAT WE PLAYED The entire convention featured many OUTSTANDING games being played Here are but a few..

(For reasons of blogger.com compatibility, I have to host the slideshow offsite. Click on the Pig's Head to start the show)



I managed to get in to a game of THE SWORD AND THE FLAME (French Foreign Legion) run by Ed Watts. Details elsewhere.

The best part of an HMGS convention is meeting people in the flesh you only get to talk to on the phone or via email during the course of the year. Some things you don't WANT to see... of course. Here's John Camarano, doing his yearly Frodo at the Crack of Doom pose.



I was so annoyed at his hijinks, I banished him and Dewey to the kids table.



Heather's painting program gang showed up and got right to it on Friday. They are located in the "Lancaster Room" (read: the old Gift Shop). This proved to be a great location. Lots of bright light, and natural light filtering in from the glass walls. Hard to miss, too!





I was impressed by the sheer number of board and card games at this convention. Seems like anywhere there was a free table or little nook in the lobby, there were a gang of gamers playing a Euro, wargame or boardgame of some sort. I event got in at the tail end of a game of ARKHAM HORROR very late Saturday Night with such luminaries as John Drye, Dudley Garidel, Frank Chadwick and Bill Rutherford. I only regret that they wussed out and halted the game early. What a pity! I love Arkham Horror. Apparently the complexity factor really sells this one to wargamers. I also saw another favorite, DESCENT (also from FFG) being run by Mike Lorenzo (Goldwyrm from TMP). There's never enough time to play EVERYTHING you want at a convention.

Cool Slideshows

I did my bit for wargaming commerce, and in an act unlike me, spent every dime but five bucks for lunch on the way home at the Vendor's hall. I got (finally!!!) my Japanese Yalu fleet from Outland Games (former Lyzard's Grin). Some more huge-ass 54mm gladiators (must get around to building a stadia one of these years!). Some buildings for 20mm Red Actions (farmhouse and stone country house). A "Jack the Ripper" tableau and rules kit from Old Glory. Various dits and dots here and there, including some serious poundage from Iron Wind Metals, who were doing my favorite thing, selling old Rals by the pound. Sure wish they would do that with historicals!!!







Saturday dawned with a thick crust of ice on it covered by a light powder. Day trippers were up from the day before, but weekend passes waaaay down. Sigh. What can you do?



I went to the Membership meeting expecting fireworks due to the recent proposal to trim the board of directors down to a certain amount plus three con directors. The proposal, by an HMGS Member, had been withdrawn from the floor via phone call. I was pleased to hear this-- we avoided another implosion!! Nominations for the BOD were heard.. and I was very pleased to see Mike Pierce, Gunner Garidel (who did a bang up job as Pre-Registrar for this con and previous Historicons), and John Drye on the ballot. This is a great group of candidates to choose from!!! None of them are particularly political, all of them are hard working and concietionous. Heather Blush was also nominated, and I also think she can do great things-- as she has proven. So it will be a hard choice this year!



REMEMBER, CHECK YOUR MEMBERSHIP STATUS, HMGS MEMBERS! (vote! it's important!)

the rest of the meeting was remarkably civil and pro forma. They got me to painfully stand up and say nice things. During which, I acknowledged the huge debt I had to Frank for helping with this convention, and had HIM read the numbers. He gave a short speech about plans for CW08, and the theme, which is GOLDEN AGE OF PIRACY. Fantastic idea!

At this stage in any convention, it's all over but the screaming (and count out). So I limped around, trying to be helpful here and there, and staying out of the way of those folks who knew their job. A person, who shall remain nameless, gave me a little topical something for my knee that had it feeling loads better in short order.

I flitted here and there and all seemd to be going well. Saturday afternoon and night was more (and bigger) games, including the awards ceremonies. Phil "Classical Hack" Vevrito won for SIEGE OF CARTHAGE, which deserved it. His report on CW07, and the Siege of Carthage game, is HERE. Much better shot photos of the game, too!



The Peking game got the PELA. Did I mention Ilove those statues? I also presided over the judging of the COLD WARS MILITARY ENGINEERING CHALLENGE,and even built my own contraption. Saturday night, I avoided the bar for once and got in a very interesting game of RUGGED ADVENTURES run by Jeff Simpson and Ed Watts (details elsewhere).

Had a nice (unvirtual) beer, and off to bed.



Sunday dawned and so did the sun, doing its best to melt off two days of ice. Numbers were given, count outs were done, and expenses recorded. I will not have the final report until all the expenses are recorded and paid out, but my SENSE is we did as well as we could with the bad weather. People made an effort to come, as evidenced by the all time high for day passes. And the vendors were happy. those that DID come, spent money (I know I did). I won't reveal the final totals here as that is the business of the BOD (and we truthfully don't know all yet).

And so, I nosed my truck into the traffic and headed home after chipping it out of the ice. We had done well. Things had come together in spite of my new job, the weather, and the Host's always changing construction schedule. I have to thank Frank Preziosi for being a hard worker and virtually the REAL con director from January onward, Neil Schlaffer for the Vendor support, Pat Shields, Sandra & Ann Marie Bennecke, Kathy Higbee at the front desk, Dudley Garidel for the pre-registration work, Richard Wright for the Events management, Jim and the Flea Market gang for one more year's effort, Heather and the Painting Gang, Geoff Graff for the Cold Wars Military Engineering Challenge and the various other staff members I haven't mentioned. Your efforts paid off handsomely.

In closing, it's been a fun four years. Some of them were better than others, but I wouldn't have traded it for anything. I will now go back to the many projects I have let linger over the last few years... (grinning).

Other Galleries:

Bill Gray's AGE OF EAGLES Dennewitz game at CW07

Chris Vaughn from TMP posted a rather comprehensive CW07 photo album on the web. Mostly .45 Caliber Adventures stuff.

"Yeah, I saw the Lieutenant, hanging from a tree about a mile back"

This one was put on by Jeff Simpson and Ed Watts on Saturday night. Jeff came trying to recruit players (see lousy weather in the general report post). I was happy to oblige as I was looking for a game to get in.

The Rules were RUGGED ADVENTURES, the setting WW2, Western Front, D-Day, during the airborne landing phase. The setup was pretty simple. The players were all American sergeants, leading a squad in from the edge of the board to the other edge. Some of us had some specialists along with like a heavy weapons squad. All seargeants had s "RPG attribute" we had to play off of during the game. My guy (the first sergeant) was a dithering ass that could never make up his mind and so had to spend a lot of time rolling 1D6 to overcome his "fieldcraft" score in Rugged Adventures. Other sergeants, like the one played by Harry Morris, were smart in most things and probably should have been put in charge.



One of the interesting aspects of this game was that EVERY SQUAD possessed imperfect information. We were all working off of a ripped and torn piece of map that was all that was left of the titular dead lieutenant's map case after he took a mortar round. We had a piece of a tactical map plus some vague instructions about taking a bridge, plus one wider scale Airborne landing map.

The game moved along briskly, the map building itself as we went... and always the feeling that there was a German around every corner... very atmospheric stuff. At one point, a group of 2 US Jeeps drive up and confer with my 1st Sgt. and the other leaders. They are recon units from the 441st Glider regiment. They'll be happy to scout ahead, they say, and then they zoom off ahead, never to be seen again.

Slideshow:

click on here for direct link to the Slideshow hosted at ImageShack

Along the way, My squad encounters some fire as well.. Germans keep popping in, engaging, both sides take a few casulaties, and the Germans bug out. We encounter some Anti-Aircraft prime movers and oddly enough, for once we're positioned correctly to support each other in the attack. Harry (the smart sergeant) takes out the lead track with bazooka fire, and I jump up and fire up the following track from behind, killing the driver and making the vehicle crash into a tree.

What appeared to be our objective (as small village with a bridge we had to take) was around the corner. we engaged in a sharp firefight with the Germans and both sides were taking casaulties quickly. At this point, Jeff called the game, citing that the game was really about our reactions under fire with imperfect information and an unknown hostile force popping in on either side of us. The game, he said, was based upon the movie A WALK IN THE SUN (1945) which featured an American platoon caught up in an almost identical situation. We didn't know it, but our sergeant RPG characters were drawn from this movie.

I had a fantastic time, myself, and thought it was a unique and innovative idea for a game.