Wargaming from Hertfordshire & Beyond!

Saturday, 3 July 2021

A Long Time Ago in a Galaxy Far Far Away

Wednesday 30th June saw the groups first Star Wars Chain of Command game.

The game was hosted, and reported, by Rob. Mal played as the Empire, Steve as the Rebels.

The scenario was as follows:

“As part of the preparation for the main Rebel force’s attack on the Empire’s main base on the Forest Moon of Endor, the Rebels must destroy the Empire’s communication array to prevent them from summoning support from the Empire’s fleet orbiting the moon.

A small Rebel force, led by Luke Skywalker, has therefore landed on the moon, with orders to destroy the communications array, at any cost!”



The Empire’s communication array was positioned on a rocky plateau in the Empire half of map.

The attacker (Rebels) deployed first from the West edge of the map, and their use of a U-Wing Fire Support Pre-Game Barrage gave them 2 rounds advantage before the Empire manged to deploy any troops. This allowed the Rebels to quickly build up superior numbers and advance 3 squads within blaster range of the objective, and deploy Chewbacca and his Wookiee Warrior squad in the nearby giant trees.

In defence, the Empire deployed a unit of Stormtroopers on the hill, protecting the objective, and a second unit in a woods to their right.

Both sides deployed Sniper teams, but neither team had the opportunity to fire.

The Rebels laid heavy fire onto the Stormtrooper unit defending the objective, slowiy whittling down their numbers.

Once Luke and Han appeared, and the Stormtrooper unit had been pinned, the charge up the hill towards the objective commenced, with a fourth squad deployed to their rear to provide covering fire, if required.

However, this advance started taking fire from the unit of Stormtroopers deployed in the woods on their left.

To combat this, Chewbacca heroically charged the Stormtroopers with his Wookiee Warrior squad, which had deployed in the nearby giant trees. Unfortunately, poor movement dice rolls left the Wookiees stranded in open ground, and subsequent heavy fire from a third Stormtrooper unit, suddenly appearing behind the woods, eliminated all but Chewbacca and one warrior.

Not deterred by being outnumbered 4:1, Chewbacca’s squad continued their charge, and managed to wound the Stormtrooper squad leader and kill 4 troopers before being wiped out.

With their position still looking bad, the Empire deployed Darth Vader into the woods to support these units, but he quickly took a stray shot from the follow up squad of Rebels, and had to call on services of the Empire’s medical droid.


Meanwhile the main Rebel force continued to charge up the hill to claim the objective, firing as they went, causing the remaining Stormtroopers defending it to take more losses and shock, until they finally broke and retreated back to their barracks.

With the objective now undefended, and the Rebels storming the hill in numbers, victory was awarded to the Rebels and Steve.

The Empire still had one unit in reserve, which could have deployed next to the objective, but the pre-game barrage would probably have delayed them long enough for the Rebels to claim the objective.

Overall, this first attempt at a Star Wars version of Chain of Command worked quite well. Both the Rebels and Empire have a set of National Characteristics, and the Force Users (utilised as Ranking Senior Leaders in this game) come with several special abilities, which, although they add complication, help reinforce the Star Wars feel of the game.

As this was the first Star Wars game, no vehicles or special weapons were used, although there are many itching to get on the table.

A second game, based on R2-D2 and C3PO’s escape to Tatoine in an Escape pod with the plans for the Death Star is being planned.

Rob

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