Momos? Good Oh!

I took Snorkers! (Good Oh!) down to Chatham for KEGSCon this year, naval games being very light on the logistical burden and I wanted to promote it a little. I stayed Friday night at the Comfort Inn and while doing a route recce noticed that The Gurkha Restaurant was very close by. I didn't want to dine alone and Keith and his wife Tam volunteered to join me. It's tucked away in a rental hall on a small industrial road and needs better signage, but it's worth the adventure to find it. Service was very friendly and we shared a platter of steamed momos as an appetizer and then I had a positively gianormous bowl of shrimp biryani, which I took half of it back to my hotel for next day's lunch. The hostess was very nice and packed me some plum sauce to go with it, I guess that is a traditional way to eat it cold.

Saturday arrived bright and early and I set out a scenario from the Rising Sun Over Java far east early war supplement. I modified it for my Mediterranean fleets and used the standard card deck so new comers would have a better sense of the rules, but pointed out that modifying the card mix was a useful scenario building tool.

In the morning I ran it with 4 players. The Italians were trying to intercept a Malta convoy.

Italians moving from left. RN is pushing forward with destroyer flotillas.

Italian and British destroyers clash

First kill. HMS Kipling is lost to torpedoes.

HMS Kashmir from the same flotilla is limping off table with flooding damage, lower right corner. I had the player do some damage control checks and she eventually sank.

After getting heavily embroiled in the center and drawing off the RN Covering Force, but losing the Zara (she ate three torpedoes!), and a Condotierri CL, the Italian DE flotillas dash forward on either flank.

Convoy successfully attacked. All four targets sunk. 

So that was a rather pyrrhic RM victory. They lost the Zara (CA), the Luigi Cardorna (Condotierri class CL), and two DEs (Lupo and Sagittario). The RN lost two destroyers.

After my lunch of left over shrimp biryani I reset the table and had the RN attacking a convoy running from Sicily to North Africa.

RN advancing from the left. The RM still arriving from the upper right, although the Zara has pushed ahead to engage the British. She's going to keep all four RN cruisers busy until she goes down flaming.

RN destroyer flotillas breaking left and right to try and get to the convoy. RM units trying to cut them off.

Bottom of photo flotilla of J class DDs getting intercepted by the Condotierri CLs and some Navigatori DDs.

Js dieing bloody but putting a bit of hurt on the Italian CLs.

RN player remembers his objective and pushes forward on his left flank, eventually sinking all four transport ships.

A bitter victory for the RN. They successfully attacked the convoy but lost three DDs doing it. Although killing an Italian CA and seriously damaging a CL was perhaps a fair trade.

In both games the RN didn't lose a single CL.

I managed to do a quick survey of some other games. There was quite a variety.

Pillage

Midgard. I think the skulls are Keith's measuring sticks.1 spear throw x 2 spear throws. 

General d'Armee in 15mm

Xenos Rampant

The Full Nelson

something with pirates

Sharp Practice

I didn't get a pictures of some Check Your 6!, Chain of Command, and more Xenos Rampant. In total there were 15 games and 50 or so people.

After I packed up,  I headed home, giving Big Dave and Son a lift to London. Big Dave offered to buy me dinner and while talking food, and how much I enjoyed the momos the night before, he mentioned there was a place near his that he went to all the time. Fortunately, I was still full of shrimp biryani, so we eschewed highway rest stop burgers and pushed on to Hakka Momo House. I let Big Dave guide me and had a sumptuous meal of Malai Momos, Hakka Chow Mein Noodles washed down with Massala Lemonade. He insisted I take the large quantity of leftovers home to share with Mrs. Rabbitman for Sunday (and Monday's!) dinner.

Another picture of the really lovely 1:700 scale ships in The Full Nelson game.

A pretty good adventure all told. Hakka is my new favorite ethnic cuisine. 

A Most Excellent Day

I've mentioned before that my Gaming Friends are spread from Hamilton and Collingwood to Chatham. About a 3 hour drive at highway speeds from end to end. 

We're sort of the middle intersecting bit of a vast sprawling Venn-diagram of many Southern Ontario interconnected Gaming groups, clubs, or local scenes. So we don't get together as much as we'd like.

One of the lads, finding himself centrally located now, has organized game days during August in between his and another's birthdays.

So Saturday I rolled up my sea matt, packed my ships, and drove off to join a dozen of my friends,  old and new, for a day of barbecue and dice rolling.

I playtested a Snorkers! (Good Oh!) scenario I want to run next month at KEGSCon. I'm hoping to accommodate 6 players.

Swordfish get some good hits on Italian cruisers

British cruiser squadron under attack. This game saw a first. Not one, but TWO flights of aircraft getting shot down.

Italian DE flotilla making a torpedo attack on British light cruisers 

British destroyers finish off the Italian light cruisers

HMS Glasgow crippled by Italian torpedo 

Another view of the Swordfish making their attack

Learned some things. I'll review the fleet composition before the convention. Hopefully my friends had fun.

The gang

After dinner it was a game of Blücher with Keith's lovely 6mm armies. Joe and Paul ran the Imperial army. Rico and I played the Allies.

Allies in foreground. 

Swedes

Prussians

French, foreground. Not as many Prussians as I had started with in the back.

Danes

I'm not sure how it ended. I had to leave.

There were some other games on the dinner table. Age of sail using The Full Nelson.

And something involving pirates.

And there was cake! 

I can tell I had a good time because, despite being completely knackered, I had trouble settling down and getting to sleep. 

Mail Call!

Some arrivals this week, just in time for the Civic Holiday Long Weekend. Tuesday UPS delivered my hardcopy of Clash of Rhyfles. and the new plastic cavalry. 

I was going to wait, but Zombiesmith had a sale on, so I ordered direct and got the printed pieces to convert them into Toulmorese Dragoons and Gwynt Lancers. The Gwynt Lancers will be a mounted troop for Princess P'trysha's Lifeguards.

Both sets include dismounts. Toulmorese Dragoons can dismount to skirmish, but anyone might end up dismounted if their mount is killed. People have recommended around 30% for dismounts, so not sure how to split the boxes between Crusaders/Toulmorese and Coftyrans/Gwynt yet. 

So this weekend I plan on charging about with my metal cavalry to get a handle on how they work before I start gluing figures together. 

These also arrived in my mailbox today.

Rising Sun Over Java is a scenario and campaign supplement for my favorite naval rules Snorkers! (Good Oh!). There are some new rules, and 16 scenarios. Fortunately I have some older USN destroyers on order from Donski's Printer Farm. I might also see if they can be reskinned for Royal Navy vs Regia Marina or perhaps the Kreigsmarine, since I've got several German ships also on my print list.

Gunkan Kōshinkyoku

The Gunkan (Warship) March

IJN Surface Action Group conducting high speed sea trials

The first 1:1800 scale units for the Imperial Japanese Navy are painted and undergoing sea trials until they get their labels. 2x Takao class heavy cruisers, 2x Tenyru class light cruisers, 6x Fubuki class DDs and 6x Kagero class DDs. 

Japanese heavy cruisers were very much the same in profile, so this one stl will do for many of them.

Takao Class CAs

Most Japanese CLs were intended as Destroyer Division Leaders, and they also looked much the same. At least the early war ones used around the Solomons up until 1943. Although the Sendai class had a different arrangement of more guns and torpedoes. But for game purposes their profiles aren't much different.

Tenyru Class CLs

IJN paint schemes are very simple: dark grey hulls, linoleum brown decks for anything smaller than a battleships. Tamiya helpfully makes IJN ship colours.

There are different shades of grey depending upon the shipyard, but I'm not getting into the weeds that deeply! I used the darkest grey for the hull and the lighter shade to dry brush the upper works. Successively lighter greys are used to drybrush the upper works some more and paint the boats.

Fubuki class DDs

The big difference in the IJN destroyers is with the torpedo load out. The Fubukis have 3x triple torpedo launchers, the Kageros have 2x quadruple launchers.

Kagero class DDs

Like the USN I have some other types of destroyers getting printed. Once they arrive I'll print everyone's labels.

These models caused some problems. Some supports from the turrets were stuck to the deck and I caused some damage trying to clean them up. These prints also had quite noticeable curving at the bows. I applied liquid putty to try and remedy both issues. I don't think anyone will notice mid-game.

Note odd little bits sticking out from torpedo launchers and turrets, and the big ding in the fo'castle