AK-47: How to lose

I love Peter Pig's AK-47 Republic. It's a great game, tongue in cheek, a dose of humour, good gameplay and a diverse setting.

Tonight, Nathan (toxic) and I played our last games for this, the battles for turn 7. The victory point system is fairly simple and straightforward. Up to 5 points difference is considered a draw. Over 21 points difference is a major victory in which the winner "writes the histroy books". Anything between is a fairly normal result. Um, what do you call a difference of 83 points? Ouch?

So, what I've learnt.

Range matters

No matter what it looks like, a massive swarm of infantry is useful as the attacker, but useless as the defender. The attacker can just charge forward and hope he's got enough men left to storm the baricades. That's how I won most of my initial games against Zob, who is now, by the way, completely vanquished in the campaign. So, tonight, I had two large units of infantry. One didn't turn up till mid game, but the other? It sat in an objective template, holding it effectively, but doing no damage.

The defender wins by killing the attacker, not holding ground

The attacker has to take the objectives, the defender merely has to destroy the aggressor. Ergo, the defender needs troops able to engage at range and defeat the attacker before he gets close.

Morale Matters- use weaponry that causes tests

The game is won or lost not really on the casualties inflicted, but on the morale tests to chase units off. I killed as many of Nathan's units as he did of mine in two key engagement. The casualties he inflicter were by mortars and tank guns. Mine were by AA guns, small arms and recoilless rifles. The latter don't cause tests, the former do. Given that a unit only has to fail three tests total, and can fail up to two per turn, if you take a few casualties in the open caused by mortars or tanks, the unit will be close to running.

So, how to win

When assembling your forces, you can choose to spend lots of points on troops, or spend some on political actions. As a PPF, it's not worth spending more than 40 points on political as that's where your best results are. Against religious movements, you're likely to be the defender. So, assume you are, and take mortars. Don't waste points on RRs, range of 18" isn't enough. Take tank guns, mortars and AA guns, giving you range and morale - consider tank guns as well. Don't do what I did, spend no points on politics and take an aggressive force, it's a waste of time.

I love the game, really enjoy playing it. When I'm the attacker, I can win. As the defender? Haven't run a succesful defense yet. That has to change, Nathan's religious movement and Panjo's Colonialists are circling. Still, at least I don't need to try to figure out what Rob's up to next turn. Watching from the sidelines, his "President" in jail.

If you've never tried AK-47, try it out. Easy to pick up, figures are easy to paint, we use a selection of old toy cars to represent the trucks at times, and it's quick, simple gameplay makes it fun. I'll, I suspect, continute to die horribly on a regular basis.