More Black OPS

Played another game of Black OPS Saturday night. This time with Patrick and Mikey. I kept the same orbat for the Taliban as in last week's solo game. For the JTF2 team I replaced the sniper team. With the freed up points each fire team now had 4 men, a UGL and C9 and a leader with the "medic" skill. The command team had a designated marksman instead of the C9, because I only have two.

I changed the table a bit; removing the mountain and adding a heavily bombed compound to that corner. With the quick reference sheet downloaded from the Black OPS Facebook page we set about an encounter game with both sides seeking a downed pilot. Patrick took the Taliban and Mikey and I took JTF2. Patrick won the die roll and opted to come in on the table edge the Canadians used last game, mainly because that's where he was sitting.

I deployed the Command team into a compound on the left. The JTAC with his UGL and the marksman moved onto the roof for the better lines of sight while the commander and the rifleman covered from the wall by the road.



Command team occupies the compound while the assault teams move into the pot field





Meanwhile the two Assault teams moved through the pot field and ruined grape hut to get to the irrigation ditch.





Moving through the ruined grape hut

On the other side of the table Patrick sent one cell of Tier 3 along the flanking irrigation ditch while the rest of the locals moved up to the grape fields. The Tier 1 cells moved along his right flank into the ruined compound. The sniper took up a position on the roof of the central compound.



Tier 3 Taliban move up the ditch on the flank

Tier 3 fighters move into grape field

Tier 1 Taliban move through ruins on other flank

Sneaking down the road

Seeing the two Taliban cells moving in the open, the JTAC called in his airstrike. I had thought about saving it for an emergency or to cover my withdrawal, but couldn't resist such a juicy target and the opportunity to take out Patrick's main strength. The airstrike was pretty effective this time, killing 4 of the 8 fighters and putting an impressive 9 suppression on them which kept their heads down for a while.

Airstrike! 4 hits and 9 suppression on the Tier 1 cells!

Meanwhile Mikey's teams were trying to finesse their way across the ditch. It didn't help him that he didn't see one of the two foot bridges, because a tree blocked his view. Fog of war I guess.

As his operators came up to the ditch side brush a shot cracks out! Patrick's sniper takes out one of Mike's C9 gunners.

My leader dashes over and making use of the extra activation leaders get and his 'medic' skill stabilizes the down man. My other rifleman then fireman carries the wounded comrade back to the LZ. The leader grabbed the fallen C9. Meanwhile the marksman on the roof draws a bead on the Taliban sniper through the trees and shoots him down from long range.


Ready to cross the ditch

Mikey's two teams then skirmish over the foot bridge and the fire team leaders enter the grape hut to find and retrieve the lost pilot. So far not a lot of fire has been exchanged.



Approaching the objective

Taliban advancing cautiously

More cautious moves

With the pilot in tow, the two teams start to retire. Mikey is trying to cover his flanks and is moving slowly in case Patrick rushes up. Seeing the objective being moved to my table edge did get Patrick moving more aggressively and he started pounding Mikey with RPG fire.


Pilot in hand (near the corner of the grape hut), starting to exfiltrate

This was starting to cause me a lot of worry as I had visions of Mikey's rearguard C9 gunner wounded and on the far side of the ditch when everyone else was trying to pull back. Fortunately a close burst from an RPG made our last man retreat (which we wanted him to do anyway) and covering fire cut down the RPG team.

As I was getting the Command team off the compound roof, Patrick rushed his Tier 1 RPG teams up. A near burst on my Commander caused him to retreat off table too, when his C9 would have been useful covering the others. But they managed to extract themselves without further fire by dropping off the roof behind the compound.

As Patrick's advance scouts closed on the compound, the last of our riflemen dashed from the pot field for the LZ and the helicopter back to KAF.

So much smoother this time. Only took 3 hours included pregame talk and referring to the rule book. Next game I'll introduce the 'stealth' rules and maybe do a raid on a Taliban HQ.