Category: Gaming

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8th Air Force

My interest in the B-17 Flying Fortress was reawakened when I recently started playing B-17: Queen of the Skies, though I’ve just made a quick check of games that I’ve ordered, and I have THREE other B-17/8th Air Force games coming in sometime in the near future.

Even though Memphis Belle is the movie that really made this bomber popular,  I remember reading about the 8th Air Force long before that, even before I played my first game of B-17: QotS.

And then there was one of Harrison Ford’s lesser known films, Hanover Street.

Harrison Ford stars as an American WWII pilot stationed in England who falls in love with a married British nurse (Lesley-Anne Down). When his plane is shot down behind enemy lines, he discovers that the secret agent he must protect is her husband.

I think I saw this on on cable, once, in 1979-80(?), and then it was on again recently at a Chinese restaurant near work, of all places.  Ford’s character flew a B-25 Mitchell instead of a B-17 Flying Fortress.  The newer games appear to have the B-26 Marauder available, which is historically more accurate from what I’ve read.

Anyways, I’m looking forward to these games, as each has a different take on game play.  Queen of the Skies put you in command of a single bomber, while a couple of the new ones have you commanding the entire squadron on the bombing run.

And I recently bought a new book on the subject:

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Warfighter WWII

I ran the sample mission, and totally had my ass handed to me.

4 green/novice GIs, cut to pieces by a German Half Track and a dozen riflemen and sturmtruppen.  They didn’t have a chance.

Maybe next time I won’t play with the Elite German troops deck.

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Randomness

Took a long drive around the Bay Area today, running errands from Gator Games to Fry’s Electronics to Game Kastle Fremont, and finally to Nelson’s place in El Cerrito for our Games Night, this time on International Tabletop Day.

*whew*

I lost track of time at Game Kastle, and along with a traffic delay on 880N, I arrived a little later than I intended to, about 20 minutes after our scheduled start time.

Games were played, food was eaten, and I actually won in a game that I had never in the past.

—

The Giants lost again.  Arrgh.

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I’m behind on a couple of shows for the first time in a while.  Arrow and tonight’s Doctor Who, I’m probably going to catch them on Sunday.

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I’m hearing the siren’s call of some of my sports games again, but not enough to set one up.  That may change, though.

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About Warfighter WWII

I’m really like the Modern Day version, I hear this one is harder…

The rules appear to be identical to Warfighter Modern, with changes appropriate to the time period.  For example, there’s lots of different pistol/rifle ammo sizes in the modern version, but only one basic ‘bullet’ type in the WWII edition, called ‘Ammo ‘.

I looked at the available expansions, which I’m holding off purchasing because I’m told that there’s plenty of replay in the core box.  If I were to get any of the expansions, I’d probably get the extra US, and UK card decks.  Maybe the Germans, but I’d have to see if I don’t mind playing them.  I really have no interest in the Russian and Polish expansions.

I’m not sure what the next couple of waves of expansions will be, but I’m hoping for Pacific Theatre card decks for the WWII game.  As for the Modern setting, I really don’t know.

I hope to get a game play in sometime this weekend.  Luckily the WWII Call of Duty figures were delivered to the office today.

And I may or may not start taking turn-by-turn notes in order to create a mission narrative for an after action report.

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Mega Construx Call of Duty

I noticed that I was using Call of Duty figures with desert uniforms for jungle ops, so I checked to see if there were any jungle figures available.

Jungle Rangers set

And then I checked to see if there were World War II figures for the Warfighter WWII game that’s coming in:

Classic Infantry Pack

They even have an authentic 48-star flag in that set.

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Games Incoming

Not that I have time to play them all…

I’m really like the Modern Day version, I hear this one is harder…

And another from World War II, closer to my heritage…

And there’s a Corregidor boardgame under development as well.

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D6 Star Wars

Introducing Gaba Gabahey, Space Marshall!

Male Sullustan

Dexterity 3D
Blaster 4D

Knowledge 2D+2
Bureaucracy 3D+2
Law Enforcement 3D+2
Streetwise 3D+2

Mechanical 4D
Space Transports 5D
Starfighter Piloting 5D

Perception 3D

Strength 2D+1
Brawling 3D+1

Technical 3D

Special Abilities:
Enhanced Senses:  +2 bonus to Perception/Search under low light (vision) or hearing
Location sense: Never gets lost once he visits an area; +1D to Astrogation if previously visited system

Move: 10
Force Sensitive? No
Credits: 1,000

  • Equipment:
  • DL-18 blaster pistol (4D)
  • uniform
  • medpac
  • vacuum suit

Languages: Basic, Sullustese

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B-17: After Action Report 04.19.2017

B-17 Flying Fortress “Facebook”

Crew (taken from my FB friends list about a year ago):

  • Pilot: Captain Chris S.
  • Co-Pilot: Lieut. Bob F.
  • Navigator: Lieut. Kalu E.
  • Bombadier: Lieut. Lando G.
  • Engineer: Mst. Sgt. Jen V.
  • Radio Operator: Sgt. Eleathia L.
  • Ball Turret: Sgt. Timothy N.
  • Port Waist Gunner: Sgt. Robert S.
  • Starboard Waist Gunner: Sgt. Maria S.
  • Tail Gunner: Sgt. Alicia P.

2 missions completed.

Mission 1: Rail yard at Amiens – Bomb Run percentage: 5% – no damage to bomber, no enemy planes shot down, no crew casualties.  This mission was flown about a year ago, I just now logged the data to the composite mission record sheet.

Mission 2: Airfield at Abbeville – Bomb Run: 40% – hit on starboard waist gunner’s heat system, tail gunner shot down ME 110, no crew casualties.

Of course, these early missions are usually a cakewalk.

Can the Facebook get to 25 missions?  We’ll see.  The most missions I’ve completed with the same bomber (Thunder Head, circa 1989?) was 17, when it was rendered irreparable after that 17th mission.

The No Comment was destroyed on her second mission, by a shell or flak hit to the bomb bay, killing the crew.

The Golden Gate suffered a fuel tank fire on her 7th mission, the crew bailed and all but one were either captured or killed.  The engineer served aboard the Thunder Head until he was killed on the bomber’s 10th mission.

The Gang Buster completed 4 (of 30 total) missions before I shelved the game indefinitely.

More to come soon.

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Damn Bundles of Holding…

The latest: Rocket Age RPG

“It’s an alternate history pulpy retro-sci-fi space opera planetary romance. It’s throttled up rocket packs burning radium on the long blast to the farthest reaches of the Solar System. It’s hunting thunder lizards in the upland jungles of Venus. It’s battling Ancient Martian killing machines piloted by the Deutsche Marskorps across the baking red deserts of Mars. It’s exploring the deadly skies of Jupiter under the constant threat of Europan disintegration. It’s RAY gun wielding heroes bulls-eyeing mutants in the blasted ruins of Io” -Ken Spencer, Rocket Age Line Developer

Will I ever get to run or play this, along with many other RPGs sitting on my shelves and hard drives?

Only time will tell.

Spoiler: probably never. Alas.

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SW RPG REUP

So here I have a stack of blank character sheets for the D6 Star Wars Role-Playing Game (Revised, Expanded, UPdated edition), with no plans to run a campaign.

Hmph.

Maybe I’ll create a character, for old times’ sake.