I'm slowly growing the base of SG players at my FLGS. Played a game last week with two friends new to the game. The scenario was the ambush in the SG rulebook.
The setup was a platoon of green rebel troops, led by a squad of Special Forces, ambushes a platoon of regulars escorting a supply convoy.
Rebel Sit-rep
The rebellion on Triton is growing but rebel forces still need time to prepare. Your cadre is leading one of the first units of the new army you have armed and trained. The CEU has landed a battalion of the Foreign Legion to back up the Colonial Government troops. The Legion has begun patrols and supply convoy escorts through the rural countryside. Now it is time to show the forces of tyranny that the people of Triton will no longer bow to their Terran oppressors!
Objective
Ambush and defeat the escorting troops and capture the supply trucks. Some losses to your forces are acceptable but heavy casualties are not. If the trucks cannot be captured, you should attempt to destroy them before withdrawing.
Foreign Legion Sit-rep
Your forces have landed on Triton to support the Colonial Government in its efforts to suppress a growing rebellion. The government is corrupt, incompetent and based on your experience, will eventually fall, but orders are orders. Your unit has been conducting patrols and convoy escort through the rural countryside, a known rebel stronghold. Intelligence reports the rebels may have UDSS assistance and warns of an ambush. Regardless, no one will stain the honor of the Legion!
Objective
Get the supply trucks, or as many of them as possible, across the table and exit them at the far end.
The game began when the ambush was triggered by the lead APC going up in flames. Fortunately for the Legion troops inside, they all got out. The Legion supply column was all on the board, with the head of the column about 1/3 of the way across. A scout jeep out in front was not hit. Behind the burning APC were the two supply trucks, and another APC bringing up the rear. All Legion troops were mounted in their vehicles to start.
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Rebel troops were lined up along both sides of the road. One panzerfaust team was on a hill near the end of the vehicle column, another was hunkered down behind a stone wall about halfway up the board. The trailing APC immediately swung its turret around and hosed the team on the hill. The green troops managed not to panic but were suppressed.
Other rebel troops stayed put, but the special forces team found themselves out of position for a good angle on the enemy column and broke cover and began to move up.
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The the anti-tank team behind the wall took out the lead scout jeep. The driver was injured and the gunner pulled him out of the wreckage.
Now the Legion troops were quickly unloading from their vehicles. One squad came under fire from a rebel squad in a nearby building and was suppressed, but the Legion was quickly getting its troops into action and the rebels were finding themselves outnumbered and out of position.
The special forces team, heading for a better firing position, were themselves taken under fire by the jeep gunner, who managed to get a suppression counter on them. Another squad of Legion troops took them under fire, getting another suppression counter on them.
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Now pinned down, the special forces platoon commander realized what a jam his force was in – the AT team with the best shot on the APC was pinned as well. So, the SF commander reactivated the pinned AT team and they managed to remove their suppression. But with the SF squad still pinned and their infantry plasma guns out of action because of it, a major part of the rebel force's firepower was negated.
The Legion pulled its two supply vehicles back as the rebels tried to get more fire on the Legionnaires. The firefight was in full bloom at this point. One of the Legion squads began to move to the left to try to flank the rebels in the building by the side of the road. The Legion fusion gun team also tried to get in position for a shot but the dug in rebels were too hard to lock up.
The special forces commander tried rallying his men but the enemy fire was too heavy and they were still pinned (managing to remove two out of three suppression markers). The second AT team got a solid hit on the APC but the rocket failed to penetrate.
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By now it was clear that the Legion simply needed to get its supply vehicles moving, so the drivers moved out, shooting out of the freefire zone and making it 2/3 of the way across the board. The only rebels in position to take them under fire was one squad covering the far end of the road. They opened up but missed entirely as the vehicles sped by.
At this point, the game was done. The following turn, the only thing the Legion needed to do to win was move their trucks off the board, which they did.
We could have continued the game, playing out the withdrawal of the rebel force but we decided to wrap it there.
When we stopped, the fighting was looking to get bloody as the Legionnaires were almost in position to close assault the special forces troops, and their flanking maneuver on the other side of the road was about to go in. The rebels still had two squads unengaged and moving up, and the APC was still in action.
With my green troops and lack of heavy weapons, I knew I had to basically win on turn one. But, I failed to set my troops up properly. My SF team, which could really have done some damage, was totally in the wrong place and got themselves pinned for the whole game. The actions of the jeep gunner who pinned them the first time were definitely worthy of note. I could have fired them up from other positions, but I was in enough trouble that I didn't want to waste activations and actions trying to take out one man.
So, in all, good game!
