Catch A Few Waves-Lurkers of the Deep Style

Date- Wednesday 16th November 

Place-Some Garvaldian Rocky Outcrop.

            Tonight’s adventure was a continuation of the Lurkers of the Deep scenarios that we have been ploughing through and was to feature the arrival of General Jumbo and his band of Rangers(and I don’t mean the Follow Follow kind)with a mission to either relight the light in the lighthouse or destroy it in order to ward off the navy destroyer who for some reason was going to torpedo the reef/rocks underneath the lighthouse.The locals had put the light out in order to draw the destroyer on to the rocks.Who makes up these scenarios and hopefully they are now in locks and chains?

My Eldritch horror showing how armless he was to prove.

The Rangers getting all tucked in.

The Lighthouse in question.

           Anyhoo enough of my ranting.El Presidente had placed his Rangers around the lighthouse and their task was to defend it and occasionally delegate some poor soul to go and collect explosives from a nearby shed in order to barbecue the lighthouse.All myself  and the fishy type locals had to do was turn the Rangers into shark bait-easy I thought until the random rules were mentioned and this came in the form of randomly dice generated weather rules and believe me it was four seasons in one hour ranging from Tsunamis to Tsunamis.These were diced for after the random event card was drawn usually adding insult to injury.

The first tidal wave hits.

General Jumbo doing his fair share.

“We’ll try that again!”

           El Presidente dug in and awaited my onslaught and my figures being wet and slithery things with not very many plot points it was going to be a long night especially getting periodically hit by a tidal wave and thrown back into the ocean.We played the first act with El Presidente’s Rangers cowering behind a wall giving cover to the poor squaddies delegated to bringing the explosives from the shed.I’ll give General Jumbo his due he done his fair share of humphing the barrels.

Fighting a lost cause.

Sniper in the tower.

Once again boys!

        My Eldritch demon led the way up the cliff paths hoping to get up close and personal with the Rangers but half way up the path he lost his big stick and not finding any superglue to stick it back on he just had a kiddy-on one which didn’t do him much good for as usual my dice rolls were c**p and he ended up being my first casualty as the Rangers were spot on with their rifle fire helped by a sniper who had been placed conveniently on the top of the lighthouse.Luckily steak pie and ale break had arrived so I could wail in my ale about the demise of my fishy hero.Luckily I wasn’t having him with chips.

Finally climbing the cliff.

The Eldritch not so horror goes down.

A wee bit revenge.

       The Second Act of the game saw the arrival of the other Garvaldian yokel-sorry local!Young Andrew had arrived after forsaking the company of the family Spaniel pup and was given charge of the Rangers although it seemed to be a joint effort between himself and El Presidente.Since the demise of my not so demonic Eldritch horror the plot points were few and far between so I had to ration them and just as I had slithered to the top of the cliff paths another tidal wave would come and throw my fishy folk back into the sea.My only saving grace were the pistol armed humanoid fishy folk armed with revolvers who had originally been armed with sub machine guns had made it by hook and crook to the top of the cliffs and started to fire willy nilly at the Rangers causing a few scratches and eventually a casualty of one of the barrel fetchers.That was to be my only success of the evening.

One of my fish devils plays peek a boo with the Rangers.

“And you are?”

“Sergeant Rock is coming to get you!”

               The gunfire from the Rangers was beginning to take effect and my poor fishy folk were beginning to be filleted out.One of my fish devils did get into fisticuffs with one of the Rangers but he was ganged up on by some more of the bullying Rangers and was turned into pot bait.Finally the random card was drawn to signify the lighthouse blowing up but alas the only damage done to the Rangers was the sniper falling on his butt from a high height but not incurring any damage except to his pride.Alas the  destroyer was saved and everybody went home happy except the fishy folk but they will be back for a last hurrah when I am told it will be a cast of thousands.See You Then.

General Jumbo peruses the opposition.

Boom!Up goes the Lighthouse.

          All figs and scenery provided from El Presidente’s vast collection.

          See You All When I See You-hopefully with a stack of seasonal games.

          

          This has been a Garvald Film Studios Production.

Here Come The Planes,They Are German Planes-Made in Britain!

Date- Wednesday 9th November 

Place-Some future Ryanair airport in Sicily.

Our lads having a quick fag before hostilities.

          Back to basics tonight after a few weeks hiatus due to exotic diseases and whatever.I arrived at the Garvald Film Studios with my Pulp rules in hand expecting a rip roaring Lurkers of the Deep game only to find that the gaming table had been set up for an attack on a Sicilian airfield.What made it even more peculiar was all the aircraft were straight out of a WW2 aircraft handbook with planes of different nations due to the fact that that was all the planes El Presidente had.There was even a Sopwith Camel in Japanese markings.It looked just like a 1950’s war film using any type of plane they could find.Also in attendance was North Berwick’s most wanted Dave O’Brien so it wasn’t going to be a sightseeing game.

A “selection”of “German”aircraft.

Another “German “aircraft.

Yet another “German “aircraft.

             The scenario was based on an attack by the Royal Scots Greys on the airfield where in reality about forty aircraft were destroyed before German reinforcements arrived and chased them off the pitch.Dave took on the mantle of the Allies whereas I took my usual Teutonic guise.We were later to be joined by the perineal latecomer Andrew who has decided in his infinite wisdom along with his lovely wife Lesley to bring up a very lively Cocker Spaniel pup called Barley.Good luck with that.

Waiting for the whites of their eyes.

“Come and get us!”

A proper German plane wit AN Other.

    The game kicked off in the usual way with Dave trampling over the airfield fence with a Sherman tank and hoping to end the game quickly and for a while it looked that way.My men were all in ambush ready to pick off the interlopers.The problem with ambush rules in Bolt Action is that the enemy don’t know that they are there even although physically they are so we have the lack of activity in the firing range of the defenders.As if my puny bullets were going to do anything to the Sherman except scratch the paintwork.”Wait till my Tigers arrive!”I guffawed.”El Presidente doesn’t have that many Tigers”he replied with his usual cackling.

My Stug comes on to save the day.

Dave’s forces arrive.

Ready to dash for the hangar.

           When I finally opened up with a machine gun I managed to do away with one solitary figure before it felt the wrath of the Sherman and the accompanying heavy machine guns.The one good factor to come out of the skirmish was that the British squad didn’t move for the rest of the game.Dave’s objectives were the destruction of all the aircraft and possession of the hangars and the control tower so he began the onslaught on my aircraft right from the start causing the sight of some burning aircraft.My plan was basically to hang on for dear life to the buildings and let the planes smoulder.This was to prove valuable in our eventual victory.

British flamethrower team-who did b****r all.

A “German”plane aflame.

           My reinforcements arrived on the park almost immediately so I set about the task of doing away with the intruding Sherman with some accurate gunfire from an arriving Stug.Fine chance!After a pathetic shot from the Stug the Sherman replied in kind and set the Stug on fire.Bummer(in German)!This was going to be a long evening.My only anti tank capability rested on the iron shoulders of my other tank a Panzer IV which emerged on to the playing field and done away with an encroaching Priest SP gun.”Rache!”but only for a short while.Half time was called and we trooped of to the local Gasthof for ale,pizza and steak pie.

Priest hunting.

And it takes care of business.

        The second half resumed with Andrew in attendance paving the way for El Presidente to take charge of half of the allied forces and indulge in some inter unit rivalry with Dave.Dave’s Sherman was waylaying most of my aircraft.It took him a bit of time as missing the barn door was a phrase oft used.Our solitary tank was given the task of taking out the Sherman but alas he didn’t have his shooting boots on and missed giving the Sherman a chance to fire back which he did and although he didn’t damage it,it had to retreat right into the line of fire of El Presidente’s 17 pounder which turned it into scrap metal.Our evening just got worse.

Stug coming to a sticky end.

“Booyah!”

              After that debacle it was just a matter of getting into buildings and let the Allies dig us out.This we did and was to prove to be the turning point of the evening.El Presidente decided in his infinite wisdom to call for an artillery strike on two of the remaining aircraft.The first salvo was delayed and when it eventually came it rained down on his own forces cowering in one of the hangars causing them to retreat. This gave my lads the chance to enter the previously occupied premises and prepare to repel boarders.My command squad took possession of the vacated premises and held it by the skin of their teeth until the full time whistle albeit with the close attention of some heavy machine guns.

Plane hunting.

Closing in.

      The allies went for broke with Dave moving his tank and half tracks forward to take the control tower even throwing his PIAT team in for a bit of hand on hand but too no avail as Andrew’s lads held on first decimating the machine gun team and then filleting Dave’s command squad.When the full time whistle was sounded the Germans had held on to the buildings and on totting up the victory points  a victory for the defenders was acclaimed.As if it was ever in

Hanging on for dear life.

doubt.

     A good game played in the usual  hostile way.  All figures,scenery and scenario were provided by El Presidente .      See you all next week for our Lurkers of the Deep after match report.

    This has been a Garvald Film Studios Production.