Infinity N3 - It was the best of wargaming, it was the worst of wargaming.

Attempting to write a blog every week is a silly self imposed rule. Occasionally it has me struggling. Content is not a problem, I can usually get in two games a week; the Friday club night and Mike's very kind offer of a midweek game. But, it can be problem to write of my wargaming adventures when perhaps the games don't have a great deal of notoriety, or perhaps I have to admit to a mistake or two.......or eight. Dear reader, I just ask that you be kind with your thoughts on this week's offering, as I recount my two most recent Infinity games with my favourite Manga Space Travellers.

Above: A packed Friday club night.

For Tuesday night, it's round to Mike's for Infinity playing the Supplies Mission. Mike continues to feverishly paint his JSA and currently has a variation of two lists; one with Yo Jimbo and bunch of other bikers, and one without bikes at all. All of the varieties of his list do contain a model which has begun to strike fear into my Nomad models, Oniwaban Shinobu Kitsun. Was there ever a better model for the decapitation mission? Mike swears by her, and I swear at her.

Above: The table for the mid-week match.

Above: Mike's freshly painted new Yu Jing HVT.

Tuesday night, and as we listened the Radio Five football commentary Mike and I began our game. My list was as follows: 

Group One 

Moran - Forward Observer - Combi Rifle and two Crazy Koalas

Moran - Forward Observer - Combi Rifle and two Crazy Koalas

Intruder - Multispectral Visor, X-Visor, Multi Sniper Rifle

Zero - Combi Rifle - (Mine Layer)

Zero - Combi Rifle - (Mine Layer)

Jaguar - Chain Rifle, Smoke

Spektr - Combi Rifle - Deployable Repeater

Spektr - Combi Rifle - Deployable Repeater

Interventor - Hacker, Lieutenant, 1 Fast Panda

Total Reaction Remote - HMG

Group Two 

Jaguar - Chain Rifle, Smoke

Jaguar - Chain Rifle, Smoke

Salyut Remote - Baggage

Morlock - Chain Rifle

Morlock - Chain Rifle

Morlock - Assault Pistol 

I had decided to take on board the advice given by the world on the internet regarding board control. Hindering my opponent with mines and Crazy Koalas. The two Zero Minelayers would help if Mike took the option of first turn. Perhaps some inconvenient mines covering the supply crates would slow his bikes down a little?

Above: Yo Jimbo sets off a mine and attracts two Koalas hoping to pass his dodge, which he didn't. 

Mike did take the decision to go first and sent bikes to his right flank, and a link team towards the left flank. My crazy koalas caused him some difficulties (bikes always dodge with a -3 modifier). Did Mike struggle against the mines laid by my Minelayers? Well he might of, if I had remembered to deploy the mines before the beginning of turn one!!!

Mike gained two supply boxes from the Tech-Coffins on both flanks. In my turn a Moran secured the last supply box from the centre Tech-Coffin. The rest of the game revolved around my attempts to steal a second box, but without success. Mike took it 8 to nil.

My opponent for the Friday night game was David E-S and his Pan-O. I made a couple of changes to my list; both my usual two Tomcat specialists returned, and I took a second TR Remote. Now I appreciate that there are ways to take out the Remotes, but to achieve this, your opponent still has to spend orders to silence them. 

Above: The table set up.

As a wargamer with a tendency to make regular errors, it is not unknown for me to go on long and protracted losing streaks. Up until this week's club night I had not won a game for two months (15+ games, with my last victory at November's Warfare tournament playing DZC). Thank the gods that winning is not everything? 

[SPOILER ALERT] In this game I secured my first win of the year, but let's not pretend that it wasn't achieved without a huge slice of luck. And if you will obliged me, I shall just extend the metaphor a little further. It was achieved with a three course meal of luck, including a starter of 'you jammy git', a main course of 'blessed burger', with all the trimmings, and to finish, a dessert of 'fortuitous fool.'

Above: The view of my prone Intruder covering two of the Tech-Coffins (the yellow topped things).

Above: I took the option of first turn, but my Moran was left unconscious after making an unsuccessful attempt to open the middle Tech-Coffin. However, he did draw a TO Hidden model out of his hidey hole.

My next attempt at securing Supplies came from a Tomcat engineer coming on from the right hand side of the board. He was successful, but I had to use a faster moving TR Remote to scurry away to get the box to safety. On to David's first turn, and he focused on the left hand Tech-Coffin.

Above: My TR Remote, benefitting from Assisted Fire from the nearby Interventor, covers the left hand Tech-Coffin. 

My Remote was a star, achieving two consecutive critical hits on 5s, whilst David was rolling his 4 dice looking for 15s. David was eventually able to silence the annoying robot using a coordinated order, but by the end of his turn he had yet to secure a supply box of his own. 

With the death of my Moran the centre Coffin was dangerous uncontested so I decided to move my Lieutenant Interventor up the table, using White Noise to take pot shots at an annoying Nisses Sniper. At this point I made a very stupid error (in the Alex Mistake Category System, this balls-up came in at a level 4. And for information, my categories of mistake making are as follows:

Level 1 - Whoops, silly me.

Level 2 - Oh dear that was dumb.

Level 3 - Just silence. Walk away from the table there is nothing to see here.

Level 4 - For heavens sake $€^%>¥+%#~<}@& - Dice thrown out of window.

Level 5 - That's it, I am never wargaming again.

The Interventor hit the Nisses but David passes both his dodge and guts rolls and the model stays put. The Interventor walks calmly out of his covering White Noise still in the line of fire of the Nisses, fluffs his shooting attacks and is rightly shot through his stupid head.

Above: The forgetful Interventor running out of his covering White Noise, is unsurprisingly nailed by the Nisses in ARO.

Above: My Spektr appears from TO Camo to take out a specialist next to the left hand Coffin. David later recalled that the model could have achieved almost immediate revenge, if he had used the model's Nanopulsar in ARO, rather than taking the suppression fire option.

David's turn two was just plain silly. He had got a specialist to the centre Coffin and attempted to open it. Five, yes five! Failed WIP rolls later and still the crate remained unopened. Perhaps my Moran had applied super glue to the latch?

For my final turn I was at loss of lieutenant so it was irregular orders all round. I spent a little time deciding which I was to turn to regular using my unused command tokens. David had achieved one of his classified, so I needed to stop the centre Coffin from being opened.

First to take on David's very unlucky specialist was my Tomcat Doctor. David's response to this attack was a critical hit with his one shot in ARO. My next option was my Spektr, with TO Camo and in cover, I thought he would have a good chance. David again achieved a critical hit in ARO. Now I am beginning to run out of options. A nearby Jaguar began to move up the table, using my pool of regular orders he began moving and shorting with his pistol. On each occasion David shot back and hit the Jag. Fortunately for me the Jag passed his armour saves. With my final order from the pool the Jag got into Chain Rifle range, and David's model final succumbed.

Above: The Jaguar on his mission to save the game.

David's final turn involved his attempts to rid the back field of my Intruder. He was successful, but unfortunately it didn't leave him enough orders to secure a crate. 

Wow, what a game. This is why I love Infinity so. So many dramatic moments that by the end I was knackered. We both made some silly errors, although my White Noise error will live with me for some time.

My win was a very flattering score of 8 - 1. I must plead guilty to some joy about the result, which may have been obvious to all around (I apologised afterwards to David for being a bit of douchebag), but it was caused by the huge relief about finally getting a win, rather than gloating over my victory, which we both knew was down to great deal of bad luck on his part, rather than any strategic expertise on mine). 

Happy wargaming to you all.

Alex.