Author Topic: Gamestorm 13 Day 2, Assault the Castle Brian  (Read 4224 times)

FedCom4Ever

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Gamestorm 13 Day 2, Assault the Castle Brian
« on: 20 April 2011, 11:55:35 »
Day 2

After securing the dropzone, the coalition forces were tasked with attacking the local Castle Brian in a coordinated effort with other forces in the region. The Coalition troops kept their artillery and long range mechs out of the dropzone battle so they could bring them the second day.

The Castle defense consisted of a Level 4 armored wall. The white poker chips in front are small single level turrets, each containing on Gauss Rifle, ER PPC and LRM 20+Artemis. 150 points armor and 150 points internal construction factor. The wall was 2 hexes deep with 45 armor and 45 internal CF per hex. A front door also had the same armor/CF rating.

The fanatical Word of Blake celestials waited in hidden positions until the coalition came close enough to fire at. Their orders were to die at the wall, no retreat no surrender. They used the small berms as partial cover.




Back at the Castle, 2 Long Tom's used their might to send rounds down upon the enemy. The Long Tom's had 3 pre-plotted round locations and got lucky enough to catch the Thunderhawk in one of them. It caused damage but not enough to take it out. A couple command detonated mine fields also layed about but the coalition forces managed to skirt them. The coalition forces concentrated all of their fire on the celestial mechs. In an effort to help their fellow soldiers the Long Tom's tried to force the enemy away but scattered a round and had it land on a toppled Archangel.



WOB also had infantry that exposed itself from hidden positions to help their fellows but it was useless and they died from an artillery round dropped on them from a Fulcrum tank. The WOB forces continued to imped the Coalition as the turrets group fired into them. 3 turrets fired into a pristine Cestus turning it into a ferro-titanium mulch. A ShadowHawk raced up to the wall and jumped over only to find himself in front of a Kanga tank. Behind the wall lay 2 Kanga tanks and 2 Regulator tanks. They caused some frustration for the coalition. Mostly the tanks became another distraction, that were quickly crushed.



Down the center of the map was the train track that allowed the Castle to bring in it's heavy equipment. Along the sides of the track lay a concrete road. When the coalition blew through the door they bypassed the outer turrets and began to flood into the door. At one point a coalition mech skidded on the road and smashed into the wreckage of the door causing some major damage.



The previously mentioned ShadowHawk began to run to the door only to find himself in the midst of a minefield. He was halted when he took 30 points of damage to the legs. After the wall was a 3 hex deep safe zone, after the zone lay a 6 hex deep 30 point mine field. Mechs had to roll over a 7 to activate the mines. After the mine field were 6 hexs deep of mech pit traps. If a mech over 40 tons landed on one of those hexes they had to roll 2D6. If walking you had to roll over 4 to miss the hole, over 6 if running and over 8 if jumping. If you fell in you rolled 2-5 your mech landed upright with falling damage to the legs, 6-10 you narrowly miss the hole but take falling damage to the front chart, and 11-12 you fall into a level 3 hole taking damage on the punch location table. The ShadowHawk jumped from his mined position to only land in a mech pit. Failing his roll he landed in the hole only to rip off a leg. The pilot opted to eject afterwards.

Only 2 level 4 towers remained as the last hurtle to the Coalition forces. These towers were nasty. Each was armored and had a devastating array of weapons. On their turrets they contained 3 Gauss Rifles, 3 ER PPC's, 3 LRM 20+Artemis. The other levels also had weapons. Below the turret each hex side had 2 LB10-X autocannons, after that 2 Ultra AC-20's and the final level contained anti-infantry weapons. During the game I chose not to use the other weapons on the tower, the turret was enough.

The coalition forces that survived the wall entered and began using the road, only to be picked off by the towers.

All in all it was a frustrating game for the coalition forces. A Castle Brian defenses are just impossible to defeat without 3 times as many forces as were brought to the table. Lots of planning went into the event. Using the JHS: Terra book as a guide I tried to use some of the defenses there but they would have been too strong without orbital bombardments. I built all of the defenses myself, including the towers, and got lots of input from friends. I wanted this event to be something memorable and I definitely think I accomplished my mission.
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Alex Keller

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Re: Gamestorm 13 Day 2, Assault the Castle Brian
« Reply #1 on: 20 April 2011, 20:17:06 »
Thanks for posting.  I'd love to see more photos if you got em.

Lesson Learned: Don't assault a Castle Brian without heavy artillery.  Got it!

17th Spartans

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Re: Gamestorm 13 Day 2, Assault the Castle Brian
« Reply #2 on: 21 April 2011, 00:46:37 »
Bring more than one Long Tom if you do. a castle Brian is all kinds of nasty to battle indeed. More Pics will be coming.
 
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Alex Keller

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Re: Gamestorm 13 Day 2, Assault the Castle Brian
« Reply #3 on: 21 April 2011, 01:20:13 »
Well... I've got 2 Long-Toms and 2 Thumpers.  That's the extent of my artillery units. 

What about Bombing the fortifications with ASFs?   I've got a squadron of ASF's that could drop some bombs from altitude.  Have you thought about that?

MoneyLovinOgre4Hire

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Re: Gamestorm 13 Day 2, Assault the Castle Brian
« Reply #4 on: 21 April 2011, 01:35:24 »
This fight was nasty.  That Long Tom's biggest accomplishment wasn't actually hitting the Thunderhawk (which was the only damage the Hawk suffered all day), but that shot also splashed into the Pilum Fire Support Vehicle and got a motive hit, reducing it to a 2/3 and leading to its demise.

Ultimately, the biggest thing the Thunderhawk did was using some direct fire with its Arrow IV to nail the Purifiers, thanks to Artillery targetting the hexes and Robyn having been kind enough to keep them bunched together for easy squishing.
Warning: this post may contain sarcasm.

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17th Spartans

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Re: Gamestorm 13 Day 2, Assault the Castle Brian
« Reply #5 on: 21 April 2011, 14:29:00 »
here are some more pics from day #2 Enjoy!







Well thats all from me Folks. George get to Day 3 now.














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Alex Keller

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Re: Gamestorm 13 Day 2, Assault the Castle Brian
« Reply #6 on: 21 April 2011, 14:57:18 »
Yes!!!!

Alex Keller

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Re: Gamestorm 13 Day 2, Assault the Castle Brian
« Reply #7 on: 21 April 2011, 14:59:23 »
Tactically, didn't the the WoB made a huge error?  Why put mechs outside the walls?  Why not just put them inside the walls and wait for the coalition forces to bottleneck through the wall?

MoneyLovinOgre4Hire

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Re: Gamestorm 13 Day 2, Assault the Castle Brian
« Reply #8 on: 21 April 2011, 16:02:44 »
Yeah, but then the entire day would have consisted of the Coalition fighting the wall.
Warning: this post may contain sarcasm.

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Alex Keller

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Re: Gamestorm 13 Day 2, Assault the Castle Brian
« Reply #9 on: 21 April 2011, 16:53:37 »
Yeah...  true.

Slade, The Grey Fox

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Re: Gamestorm 13 Day 2, Assault the Castle Brian
« Reply #10 on: 22 April 2011, 21:19:24 »
*makes note to bring orbital fire to next game*
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Re: Gamestorm 13 Day 2, Assault the Castle Brian
« Reply #11 on: 23 April 2011, 01:31:33 »
Well no orbital bombardment was available for us. no bombers to drop bombs. a Castle Brian is a wicked nasty thing to battle. I am still having bad dreams about my poor Cataphract being blasted away by those darn Turrets. it was a fun Mech to pilot though. did a good job Blasting the Blakest Onmi's to scrap. the Blakest won day two but Day 3 was a hole diffrent story. Next George the great! }:)
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MoneyLovinOgre4Hire

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Re: Gamestorm 13 Day 2, Assault the Castle Brian
« Reply #12 on: 23 April 2011, 02:05:06 »
Yeah, that Cataphract got caught in about 8 kinds of nasty.  Wasn't much you could do after finding yourself in that kind of crossfire.
Warning: this post may contain sarcasm.

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