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.

Press Release: M'Tor'Hed retakes Laire and liberates town of Nainne

The M'Tor'Hed Peoples Popular Front of Zoosia has serious concerns about the claims made by the spokesman for the near-vanquished dictatorship of Maine.

They seem to be unable to tell the time; our dawn raid into Laire in which our forces triumphed greatly was followed up later in the day by a full on assault to liberate our brothers in the town of Nainne. If the renegades now without a homeland of their own wish to in some way claim that afternoon now happens before dawn on the same day then they are as delusional as they are badly led.

Given that our forces now once again hold Nainne itself and much of the surrounding province, if the remnants of the vicious dictatorship forces do not wish to accept our terms of surrender we shall attack them again with renewed vigour as we liberate their remaining territory.

Alternately, if the remaining forces wish to rebel against the self-styled "President", we will assist them and welcome them into our structure in the continued liberation struggle.

Power to the People!

Wl'fee, spokesman,
on behalf of L'mee, first citizen.

New Campaign log, template tweaks

OK, I've added in a page for the Band of Brothers campaign, and I've also tweaked the front page using a nifty tool I discovered that displays the headlines for the sub pages in the sidebar. I really like the way Rob's after action report comes out as a web page; After Action Report: Cherbourg.

Not bad.

Also, if anyone is interested, I've set up a generic Warhammer blog on a separate bit, the idea being that Jason and I can write up any news or games we play there, which may be useful; will probably invite others as and when...

Useful wargames sites

Added links to

• Warflag
• Free Wargames Rules

because that's the only sites the lazy gits can think of; any extra suggestions for free wargames resource sites welcome.

The Chuckadice Squad

Us, in our particularly ugly glory. Left to right, back to front:
Colin, Panjo, Jason, Stumpy, Rob and Mat (seated). Andy took the picture...

Picture test post

Group shot of the Africa World War II game played Christmas 2005