Sorenson's Sabres at Bonnie Brae (Denver)

[Alex Keller]

Here's a few pics from on ongoing campaign for Sorenson's Sabres!

After some brutal fighting on Luthien, Albert Benton takes a contract with Chandrasekhar Kurita to protect Hachiman Taro Electronics' ("HTE") Headquarters on Hachiman. 

Soon after landing on planet, a small Word of Blake force launches an attack on the capital city of Masamori.  Albert Benton sends a lance east into the city to intercept a lance of BattleMechs.  Meanwhile, Blakists attack from the west!

Sorenson's Sabres
AS7-K Atlas (2/3) Command 'Mech Quirk
MAL-1R Mauler (2/3)
AV1-OB Avatar (2/3)
PNT-9R Panther (4/5)

Word of Blake
APL-1M Apollo (4/5)
Padilla Heavy Artillery Tank (4/5)
Padilla Heavy Artillery Tank (4/5)
Marksman Artillery Tank (4/5)
Marksman Artillery Tank (4/5)
Zephyr (4/5)
Zephyr (4/5)
Pinto Attack VTOL (4/5)
Pinto Attack VTOL (4/5)
Magi UCSV (4/5)
Purifier BA Squad (4)


Word of Blake forces approach from the west! 


Word of Blake artillery set up for their assault on the HTE headquarters building.


Sabres move to protect the headquarters building.


WoB Zephyrs move to TAG the HTE HQ building for artillery strikes.  This Zephyr takes damage to the hover skirt which slows it down some.


The Atlas and Mauler take a while to get into position to take on the Apollo.  After some long range sniping, they eventually drive the Apollo off.






Meanwhile, the a pair of Pinto Attack VTOLs time their strike perfectly as their lasers and missiles combine with Arrow V and Sniper Artillery rounds to take down the HTE headquarters!



The second Sabres lance returns too late to save the HTE compound, but they hunt down and destroy both Zephyrs.




The Magi fumbles a skid roll and slides into an intersection, only to be surrounded by Sabres.  To add insult to injury, a stray artillery missile lands directly on the hapless Magi.  Once the Zephyrs are destroyed, the Magi surrenders. 


 

[Lyran Archer]

Fantastic pics!

[vinlander]

I want to play at your house!!!! :D

 O0

[Ouchies]

Nice terrain man, big props!  O0

[Alex Keller]

Thank you for the compliments.  I prefer playing on three dimensional terrain, but it takes some time to set up and tear down.
 
Sorenson's Sabres was pretty beat up after the campaign on Luthien, but they had first pick on salvage.  The Sabres' Commander (Tai-i Albert Benton otherwise known as "rimp" on these boards) decided to take some heavy and assault designs after losing mostly lights and mediums on Luthien. His new pilots are really good (they rate as "elite" save for one "regular") but the unit has lost some of its tactical flexibility as demonstrated in this battle.
 
The Atlas and Mauler were too slow in responding to the threat posed by the WoBM artillery and spotters.  The Avatar and Panther were not much better.  I think the Panther pilot learned that it's best to jump 120 meters in a city then run and risk falling down.  That particular Panther fell at least 2 times, once sliding into an Hachiman Taro Electronics Tech Building. That combined with the loss of his HQ building and I'm sure Uncle Chandy was not impressed...
 
The inaccuracy of artillery is astounding.  Not once, not twice, but three times my artillery missed the target building and somehow managed to hit once of my own (WoBM) units.  One Arrow V missile managed to hit my Apollo, 17 hexes away from the target hex. The TAG certainly helped, but boy was it dangerous getting my Zephyrs in place.  I had planned to deploy a squad of Purifier Battle Armor equipped with Light TAG, but my Magi UCSV slipped up and got caught before I could.  I like the Magi UCSV, but I think I'll use Blizzard transports next time I want to deploy Battle Armor quickly.  I suppose I could also convert the Pinto VTOLs into the transport versions, but I love them as attack birds.
 
Benton's Command Lance is actually the most flexible now.  His Black Hawk-KU and Mark Kisomita's Grand Dragon are mobile enough and Grace Shiro's Jenner can use its manueverability to harass the enemy's flanks and, if possible, his rear.  Hohiro Utsonomiya's Hunchback is pretty good at providing support fire.
 
The rest of Benton's company are basically fire support mechs, though the Avatar Omnimechs provide limited flexibility.
 

[Ouchies]

The inaccuracy of artillery is astounding.  Not once, not twice, but three times my artillery missed the target building and somehow managed to hit once of my own (WoBM) units.  One Arrow V missile managed to hit my Apollo, 17 hexes away from the target hex. The TAG certainly helped, but boy was it dangerous getting my Zephyrs in place.  I had planned to deploy a squad of Purifier Battle Armor equipped with Light TAG, but my Magi UCSV slipped up and got caught before I could.  I like the Magi UCSV, but I think I'll use Blizzard transports next time I want to deploy Battle Armor quickly.  I suppose I could also convert the Pinto VTOLs into the transport versions, but I love them as attack birds.

Absolutely.  The game takes on a different scale if you are to use it properly.  The only games that I've seen it used properly (without guided munitions) is where the artillery gets 2-3 turns to zone in on the target with a spotter- which is plenty time for anything but the slowest buildings to get out of the way.

It either requires some sort of unassuming infantry in a convenient position or a spotter plane of some sort.  Neither occurs often enough to make it preferable over a Riever F-700(WoB)/Jagatai(clan) making bombing runs.