Greek Tragedy-The Final Act

Saturday 13th May

Couldn't find a German one

                         
                       The final part of our three part Greek tragedy came to its conclusion at the Caronnade Wargame show at Falkirk today with a dramatic own goal by the Germans in the form of an air attack on their own men which in our games is par for the course.

A couple of snaps of our favourite holiday island.

                             The Caronnade show was the next visit on our calender so I put on the Aegean Island game that we had taken to the re-enactment day last week at East Fortune and it seemed to go down very well with both gamers and visitors alike.
                            I had tinkered with it a little  bit since last week adding in another colour dice for the Greeks and also putting some colour on the back of the German bases to distinguish them in the heat of battle.
                                Bill Miller had brought along the newly finished Ju 52 and it proved to be a bit of a conversation piece with a lot of interest with the spectators.

The defenders gathering.Katy placed all the defenders rather skillfully.

The Pilot's view of the drop.

The navy having a run ashore.

The local vinyards.

                            Mr Ray graced us with his presence after his gruelling rock and roll tour around the States and seemed to be looking for a nice game to bring him back down to earth.Enough said.Our usual sensei Colin Jack had today brought his lovely granddaughter Katie with him as she wanted to see what grandad got up to on his Saturdays away so I took the helm and ably aided and abated by Ray,Bill and Bill Gilchrist set the game up and waited for the hordes to come and peruse our game which had been a few months in the making with a few hiccups along the way.

The tanks getting ready to land.Not knowing what's in front of them.

                       The hordes arrived and between the four of us we entertained the onlookers with our gameplay and also indulged with them when they had any questions or comments.Mr Ray was the leader of the glorious German paratroopers,Bill Miller once again took charge of the combined force of German mountain troops and Italians who once again were conspicuous by their absence.

German paras scattered all over the north island.

Local Andartes

                         We knew that at these shows playing the game is usually down to a minimum so I worked on the principle of a couple of game turns then we took turns of looking at other games,chatting with friends old and new and seeing what we could spend our hard earned cash on.

"You wanna do what?"

                   After a couple of turns of looking like it was going to be an easy German victory calamity struck in the form of Luftwaffe support deciding to attack its own forces who were in the process of landing armour from a landing craft.Instead of attacking British defenders the bombs were dropped on the German's biggest tank destroying it in the process and causing minor damage to the rest of the invasion flotillla.

The result of their chit chat

                    After the groans and differences of opinion between the two axis players I thought it was time for an ouzo break.

It's amazing what a visit to the local pet shop can do.

Prestonpans on a normal Saturday night.

What a waste of a Beetle.

7TV

"Reivers!"

Nice castle or Peel Tower

During the break I had a wander around the games and the traders but couldn't find anything that really jumped out at me.The lads with the Indonesian Comfrontation game from Kirriemuir were on hand but I wasn't going to fall into the same trap for I knew that there were aliens involved.

Not falling for that one again.

                      Another game that took my fancy was called Panzerfauste which rather than being a WW2 game actually involved German clad dwarfs knocking five spots out of each other.
Unusual game but the buildings were brill.

Nice abode.

Don't like the look of the estate agent.

Different.

                                  After wandering and taking a few photos I came across the cafe but decided against it as Bill Gilchrist was filling me up with cheese pastries back at our table.I returned to our table and after giving Ray and Bill M some R&R time to peruse got back down to the business in hand of playing our game.

Pretty little tanks all in a row.

The only Italians to turn up.

Greek hunting party

The Ju 52 slowly making its way over the table.

                                    The game went back and forth with the Greeks having the better time against Mr Ray's paras with the German advantage mostly coming on the south island where Bill M was getting his mountain troops to charge into the harbour buildings clearing out my British defenders along the way.

Paras finally getting their act together.

Brits heading for cover.

                          As time was ticking on I gave the Germans another chance of an airstrike which this time landed on target destroying one of my tanks and scattering my infantry all over the place.

On target!

                   At the end of the game it had all the makings of a score draw and therefore since I am not biased and it was my game I gave victory to the Allies solely due to the misdirected air attack.Heh Heh!

Heading home.

                           A great day had by one and all and many thanks go to my partners in crime Mr Ray Neal(budding rock star),Bill Miller(Ju 52 builder extrordinaire) and our Bill Gilchrist(supplier of vittles).My thanks also go to Colin Jack who after realising he couldn't put on the game due to babysitting detail put the game my way giving me a chance to put on a game that I have wanted to do for nearly twenty years.Colin also supplied a lot of the figures and buildings and a lot of the scenery was also provided by Dave O'Brien who couldn't attend.
                        See you when I see you.