Saturday at COW - part 1

On Saturday morning I had a look at several sessions and stayed for a while watching Trebian’s Culloden game. I think you’ll agree that His Royal Highness Prince Charles (Jim Roche) gave an excellent wargames point while Lord George Murray (Nigel Drury) looks on despairingly. 

The villains on the Hanoverian side were led by the wicked and bewigged Duke of Cumberland (John Bassett). I understand the wig has now been released back into the wild.  Mr Bassett remains in captivity.

All of the of the toys at Culloden were 20mm plastics, many of the Government infantry being from the no ancient Airfix 'Washington's Army' set.  Oh, the irony.

In the evening Bob Cordery ran his very popular 'Carry on up the Nile' game.  Players included notorious fellow-bloggers David C and Mark F.

John A running 'A Bridge too far.'  Actually this was on Friday but he ran it again on Saturday.

Trebian and Phil Steele presented their impressive Battle of Edgcote game

Scary Space Spider Strike - game 2

This time the spider was more aggressive - perhaps incensed by the outcome of the earlier game.  It swiftly 'webbed' a Jeep and then looked about for another victim.

It soon found one in the shape of Sgt. Nigel Drury's tank.  Here the spider can be seen rummaging in the strangely shaped tin can for that last delicious morsel of Nigel.

When other humans approached more webs were deployed.  Despite throwing in all the latest 1950s military technology things were looking bleak for the Earth.

But in the end the humble footslogger prevailed.  This brave fellow was one of only two survivors in this game!

Scary Space Spider Strike - game 1

John A found this game on the 'Pz 8' blog some months ago.  We played it at the Sheffield club with John's 15mm toys.  Aside from it being rather jolly, I thought the game would work rather well with 54mm toys.  Having made the mistake of saying so, some other fool suggested it would fit in well at COW.  Having (successfully I hope) spread the blame, it's back to the game.  I established that I had most of the required toys - Deetail US for the infantry, a pair of scruffy Tamiya Jeeps and an M-41 Walker Bulldog of dubious origin!

The spider cost about £2 from eBay and is suitably scary - especially the red eyes!

The game was inspired by those dreadful old Science Fiction movies of the 1950’-1970’s. A meteorite hits the countryside somewhere and turns out to be the egg of a giant Spider. You are in command of an Army unit with a vital mission: kill it.... and save the Earth!

At COW I ran the game twice with three players each time.  Two of the players each commanded three infantrymen (think of them as representing a squad or thereabouts) and a Jeep with MG.  The third had a tank.

The spider is cornered - human forces are approaching from top left, top right and bottom left.

The spider didn't move about very much and was soon overcome by sustained gunfire.

1973 - The COW 2019 Plenary Game

The plenary game - run by Ian Drury - worked rather well. Even Ian’s rationale that a game which had taken three hours with 20 players would obviously only take 90 minutes with 40+ players seemed  to stack up. Teams represented USA, USSR, Israel, Egypt, Syria and individuals represented UK, France, UN, Saudi Arabia, West Germany and Libya. An elite team of er, ‘volunteers’ formed the Game Control team. I was the air umpire, so was completely occupied with the rather busy skies over Golan and the Canal Zone. I have only the haziest idea what went on at a political level - and even that is based on a chat over breakfast with ‘Colonel Gadaffi’ - hardly the most reliable witness!

In the air, the EAF and IAF contested the skies over the canal and despite the Israelis generally having the upper hand, most of the Bar Lev Line was soon in Egyptian hands. Over Golan things started a bit later, the Syrians ignoring an UN-sponsored ceasefire which meant that the full weight of the IAF was headed their way!