LBWS Alien Squad Leader tournament 2019

Every year, the club holds an internal Alien Squad Leader tournament, and the 2019 edition was held on Sunday 1st December.

There were eight entrants this year, and four tables over which our 150pt armies would battle. The first one was nasty. The river was impassable and troops could only cross on the roads.

Non-human forces dominated proceedings, with only one human force being fielded. Here is a gallery of battle pictures. I seem to have taken more photos of the games I played than others, but I suppose that is natural.

Overall, there were a lot of drawn games, so getting a win was a real success. I drew two games with my Alien Imperial force, and was heading for a draw in my final game but ended up with a loss on points due to losing a combat against Nick's Alien Enslaver flyer in the very last minute of the third game.

The final standings were;

So, congratulations to Richard who ended up as the overall Champion, with his army of Alien Tribal Mercenary mushrooms.

Alien Squad Leader - a new AAR

OK, hands up, this ASQL game was a few weeks ago, but I decided against photographing yesterday's game at the club, because it was S&SF  with my Hyborian barbarians (again) and I thought it would be a bit samey. 

I would be defending the base in the distance with my GZG Corporate Mercenaries against Richard's multi-legged Alien Imperial army made up from GZG Xar, plus various other figures.

The Galactic Seafood Corporation had set up a luxury food processing plant on this remote planet, having discovered that the immature version of the locals (a.k.a. the Crabbies) tasted like a superior version of the best crab or lobster ever previously tasted. This exciting new product was being marketed across space as "The Sunday Roast Where Everyone Gets A Leg".

The locals were, understandably, outraged and had called in a punitive expedition from their relatives on the nearest Crabby Imperial homeworld.

Here are my opponents, looking suitable Crabby and Outraged.

There were some anti-grav vehicles too.

My Mercenaries were equipped with two new additions, combat mechs with laser katanas, not that I was planning to use them in close combat if I could avoid it. The yellow beads indicate that the units thus marked are on Overwatch.

My Force Commander was close to the objective, but not actually in that forward position, preferring to stay in the less advanced built-up area.

I deployed a variety of troops on Overwatch defending the Objective, included power-armoured Samurai. There was a question over these, as the rules state that they are equipped with Heavy Weapons, but a discussion with the author, Alex Self later revealed that this was in actual fact a typo, and they should properly be given Small Arms. However, having played a few moves before Alex turned up, we agreed to keep the HWs for this game only.

The Crabbies began to swarm forward, both from the central forest and also on their left flank. I was worried about those light armoured vehicles with their Superior Energy Heavy Weapons.

We exchanged fire, with both sides taking hits. The green bead markers show Pinned status. Corporate Mercenaries never Fall Back, neither do they suffer an activation penalty when Pinned.

The LAVs advanced. I knew that I'd have to try and take them out.

I got my own AFVs moving to counter the threat. These were equipped with longer-ranged Primary Weapons Systems. Unhappily, my commander soon took a hit.

In the centre my battered Ashigaru were holding their own, and were dishing out a lot of hits on the Crabbies. The GSC production lines were soon gearing up for a mass canning session of its new BBQ Crab speciality.

Things were looking OK, but I was worried about the amount of damage my small army was taking. The Corporate Mercenaries are an expensive force, and my break point was a measly eight stands.

My fears were soon exacerbated when the AFV containing my Force Commander (who had stupidly hopped aboard for protection) was on the receiving end of a double six from HW fire, causing two damaging hits and I failed my saving throw, so Bye Bye Big Boss.

Despite previously being stealth-shielded, my Ninjas were soon exposed to the unwelcome attention of the Crabby Light Vehicles and Beasts. No good could come from this.

Gradually, my defenders began to fall. The loss of my Inspirational Force Commander left me low on command options and I began to fail activation tests with annoying frequency.

The amount of fire I was receiving from the Crabbies was leaving my troops Pinned and vulnerable to hand-to-hand assault. There could only be one outcome.

The Aliens were damaged, but had greater numbers. The coup de grace couldn't be too far away .....

................ and it soon arrived with the demise of the Ninjas.

With eight stands lost and an enemy stand inside the Objective area, my battle was over. The Crabbies had their revenge upon the unscrupulous and exploitative Galactic Seafood Corporation's latest evil business venture.

Well, this was a hugely fun game. My mechs performed pretty well in their first outing and I couldn't really complain about getting Broken, seeing as the army is so small. In hindsight, the Ninjas weren't a good choice, but I love the figures so much I hate to leave them behind. To be honest, I'd love an all-Ninja army, but they would just get shot to bits the moment they revealed themselves, even if the rules allowed such a thing (which they don't!).

Back from holiday - time for another Alien Squad Leader AAR

Sunday was my first wargaming activity since the beginning of July and it was a 200pt game of Alien Squad Leader with Owen at the club. Owen has recently brought his Human Imperial Strikeforce army up to 200pts, so I knew that I'd be facing that particular enemy. I decided to take my Alien Imperial army, but with a few modifications since its last outing, back in December last year. I decided to drop the power-armoured Elites and replace them with a Phase tank with an aiming device and a homing missile. I thought that the extra long-range firepower might come in handy.

The battle scenario we fought was Scenario 4 - Envelopment. This meant that Owen could reserve up to four stands to deploy from a flank and I had to defend an objective. As the defender, I set up the table. Most of the cover was on my side, understandably. I was unsure where the Human reinforcements would arrive, so I thought it might be useful to station some robotic forces on the left, where they could operate without any need for a command stand.

In the centre I had two urban areas. In the left-hand one I had my phase tank and some troops and a heavy weapon stand. The right-hand one was the objective I was defending.

I put my other Heavy Droid in the objective area, supported by another H/W stand, the Force Commander (Inspirational Leader) and some more infantry (behind the buildings).

I deployed more infantry on my right flank and had all my Trained Beasts and Tribal Auxiliaries, including a sub-commander behind the main lines.

Before long, Owen's Strikeforce advanced, taking advantage of its Sudden Strike rule.

I began to move troops up to counter, hoping that my infantry on the right flank hill could defend against the deployment point there.

Things began to go well for me. My Superior Energy Weapons were scoring plenty of hits on the power-armoured Humans. I was worried about the light vehicles emerging on my right flank, though.

I brought the phase tank into play, scoring a few hits, destroying a Human APC and pinning the Human heavy weapons team in the ruins across the table. My Heavy Droids were in play, but the Robotic infantry had nothing to do. I tried to being them closer to the action. 

My Trained Beasts despite a few stands getting shot up, crashed into hand-to-hand combat with an APC, ripping the vehicle to pieces with their claws and generally going on a rampage. This, for me was the turning point in the battle. The Beasts made mincemeat of stand after stand of Humans (who had already taken a few hits). I did lose the most successful set of Beasts in the end, but the rest of the Beasts went into a mad fury, ripping the light vehicles to pieces and forcing the Humans to breaking point.

Eventually I only needed to knock out one more Human stand to force Owen's troops to break. I managed to do this with some accurate fire from a H/W stand. Game over.

This was a tricky battle really, a lot less one-sided than it appears from the pictures. If Owen had succeeded in his plan of unloading his troopers and having them storm into the objective, I am sure that he could have won, but my Beasts really were on top form. In the end I only lost two stands of Beasts and one of Imperial Infantry.