I have been wanting to incorporate more terrain into my Dust Tactics games, so I put large trees on top of the walls.  I find myself forgetting the terrain is there if its not popping out at me.  You might also notice that I based and painted my Anti Tank Traps.

I stacked six ammo creates together to represent the explosive objective.  As far as terrain placement goes the Germans placed their pieces to block LoS to the bridge and provide cover for their attack, while the allies used theirs to fortify their flank.  The missions in the Victory Bridge campaign call for smaller forces then those found in some of the other campaign books.  This mission only allows for 130 AP (army points).  So did the last several missions.  I have found that this means you get a limited number of units, which is probably a good idea for starter games intended to be used with the troops that come in the Revised Core Set.  I have not been overly impressed or thrilled with the walkers from the RCS, so I opted to build forces made of all infantry.


Allies
OZZ 117
Hammers
Reapers
Hell Boys
Death Dealers

Notes on the Force:
I really, really like the Hammers for fighting in close combat, plus their speed 2 and jump ability allows them to stay out of LoS and avoid being shot before they pounce on their target.

I have been using Rhino, who is a Master Crafted Hammer ;) but I have found that when pairing him with the Hammers they don't get a chance to soften the target before close combat.  Instead I tried out OZZ 117 who has a flame thrower.  The flame thrower gets to shoot before close combat, ignores cover, and makes one attack against every infantry figure in the target.  He also gets a Heroic Attack which makes him and his men in his squad immune from hits for one turn when activated.


Axis
Grenadier Z
Zombies
Sturmpioners
Heavy Recon Grenadiers
Laser Grenadiers

Notes of the Force:
I recent bought a horde of Zeds so I wanted to try them out with Grenadier X who is a bad mamma jamma.  Zeds are damage resilient Solider 3, which means they are more or less always in soft cover.  They are also fast, which lets them move an extra square each turn and Grenadier X has the assault ability which allows his men and him double their move one turn.  Which means they can scream (or moan) across the board.

The mission required the Attacker to stop the Defender from blowing up the Bridge.  I didn't quite read the mission right and assumed the troops on the bridge where trying to secure the explosives before they could be set off and the troops in the building were trying to set the explosives and blow up the bridge.  Technically it was reverse.  I should have had the Axis defending for story line purposes, I think.  Oh well it still worked with the Germans trying to stop the Allies by securing the explosives.

As a side note remember it is important to read the mission objectives and keep them in the front of your mind when playing any game.  If the Axis player did this it would have changed the outcome of the game.

Mission Note: The mission calls for the attacker to deploy in the building, but not on the center square.  The Errata indicates the attacker can also deploy on the three square adjacent to the building on the side opposite of the bridge as well.


Units move up on their first turn.  The Allies take cover behind the building.


The Hammers and OZZ 117 lurking in the shadows


The Germans move up as a group


Hell Boys rush forward


The Hell Boys manager to torch and blast three Zeds and wound Grenadier X


The Hell Boys kill another Zed in close combat, but Grenadier X buzzes through three Hell Boys


Heavy Recon Grenadiers move up into heavy cover and lay down fire on the Allies killing a Death Dealer


Not wanting to risk it, the Zed squad zips around the flank


The Heavy Recon Grenadier avoid taking damage from Allied fire


Laser Grenadiers take out another Hell Boy


Since the Heavy Recon Grenadiers already shot, the Hammers move into heavy cover and prepare for their assault


The Sturmpionieres take out the last Hell Boy


The Hammers and OZZ 117 launch their assault, but wiff the attack


Zeds close with the target


Reapers move up and kill a Zed with gun fire, then kill X in close combat, but two Reapers fall to X


The Sturmpionieres move toward the objective next


With the Hammers in the way, the Death Dealers can do nothing, but wait


The Heavy Recon Grenadier wound OZZ 117 and kill a Hammer with sustained gun fire


The Reaper takes out three Sturmpionieres, then retreats back into the building


The Heavy Recon Grenadiers gun down two Hammers


OZZ 117 then burns a Grenadier


The Laser Grenadiers kill two Death Dealers from their cover


Two Laser Grenadiers fall to Victory MG fire


Sturmpionieres get closer to the objective


But instead of jumping on the objective and winning the game, they turn and shoot the Reaper


OZZ 117 finished off the last Heavy Recon Grenadier


Laser Grenadiers finish off another Death Dealer


The last Death Dealer hoses the Axis troops in the building with his Victory MG


With a chance for victory the Laser Grenadier jump out of cover and take down OZZ 117


They then come under heavy fire from the Victory MG


The Allies go first the next turn and lay down more fire taking out anther grenadier


The fire power drives the last Laser Grenadier into heavy cover


They exchange fire, pew, pew, braaap braaap, braaap, pew, braaap


But the rate of fire from the Victory MG overcomes the Laser Grenadier

The allies win it with one man remaining.  The Germans made a HUGE blunder by not jumping on the objective when they had the chance.  Instead of winning they lost a desperate game of attrition.   The new troops I used where interesting.  I liked the Zeds and Grenadier X was a beast.  Their speed and power is nice.  Plus damage resilience is a major plus.

OZZ 117 was cool, but I made the mistake of using him against a damage resilient S3 unit.  He would have been great against a S2 unit instead.  He ended up wiping out the squad, but it was a bad match up.  Plus he didn't use Heroic Attack unit after all his men where dead.  This was not well played by the Allies.

In the end the Allies did win, but it was a minor victory.  There is one more scenario on the Victory Bridge Campaign.  It also calls for 130 AP, but I think I am going to use 200 AP.  I have a bunch of new walkers on the painting bench and want to end the campaign with a large climactic battle.  Plus their is not bridge in the final mission, so there will be more room to move troops around.

Stay tuned.

I have been buying and painting up an Allied and German force for Dust for about a month and figured it was time to get a Tactics game in to test out the rules.  I played through the Recon in Force from Victory Bridge to get a swing for things, then jumped right into the second mission, Bridge in Sight.  I built two forces using all the troops from the Revised Core Set.



Both sides move forward, the Germans spread out and the Allies advance together as one


The Germans take cover behind the terrain


The Allies move up, the Hammers close with Laura and the Heavy Flak Grenadier



Hans makes a sustained attack and fails to score a single hit


Laura and the remaining Heavy Flak Grenadier fight back, but only cause three hits which Rhino absorbs.


The Hammers and Rhino destroy Laura and the Flak Grenadier then jump away from the Sturmpionieres who move up and destroy the Blackhawk with Panzerfausts.


The Death Dealers fail to take down Hans.  Meanwhile the Hell Boy finish off the Heavy Laser Grenadiers.

Hans fires on the Hell Boys with Sustained fire, but only scores one hit


The Hell Boys move in a burn Hans down.  Allies win. (note: I replayed this scenario with my dad using the same forces and the Germans won)

It took me a bit to feel comfortable with the rules, but it wasn't hard to pick up.  I had to look up a couple of the special rules a few times, but by the end of the game I had the feel for how things shake out.  After re-reading the rules I noticed I did a few things wrong, which likely would have benefited the Germans.

I got done with this scenario in about 30 minutes, mostly because I was looking up rules.  Once done I decided to play the next scenario and mix the forces up a little bit.  The next from Victory Bridge is called Forward Men and requires the attacker (Germans) to storm across and secure the Victory Bridge.

I love the look of the heavy infantry in Dust so I decided to try fielding all Soldier 3 infantry.  I also took the heavy command squads to try out command.



Allies
Rhino
Hammers
Reapers
Corps Officer
Blackhawk


Germans
Laura
Heavy Recon Grenadiers
Heavy Flak Grenadiers
Heavy Commandtrupp
Hans


Here is the deployment.  The Germans put their two cover pieces on the bridge to cover their assault, while the Allies used their two cover pieces to cover their positions on the other side of the bridge.


The German assault begins with Laura leading the way attached to the Flak Grenadiers.


Reapers move up, taking shots at Laura causing two hits.


The next turn the Reapers go first, shoot and then jump out of the way from being a target.


Lead by Hans and supported by the Kommandtrup, the Germans press the attack.


The Reapers move in one more time and take a shot at the Recon Grenadiers, but wiff.


The Recon Grenadiers return fire and eliminate the Reapers.


The Flak Grenadiers move into cover and shot at the Hammers, causing a few hits on Rhino.


After avoiding damage the Hammers leap from their hiding spot and pounce on Laura and her men


One Hammer, Laura, and all of the Flak Grenadiers die in close combat.  Those Hammers are beast in close combat.


After watching their brothers fall, the Heavy Grenadiers avenge their death and destroy the Hammers.


Hans fires his weapons in a  sustained attack and kills Blackhawk.


The Allied HQ moves up and score hits with rocket punches and their flamethrower.


But the German Kommandtrupp make sure thats the last German they kill.  The surviving Germans secure the bridge.

This game went quicker than the last one.  I liked it, but the battle all took place on the bridge and there was little room for maneuvering.  There were some odd kills here and there, or hits on the walkers and the HQs helped keeping those units in the fight, which was nice.  I also came to understand how much more valuable the German S3 units are because of Damage Resilience, however there were times that the Allied S3's move 2 was nice as well.  I guess it really depends on what play style you like, hard as nails or fast and deadly.

I played the next scenario in the Victory Bridge book, Counter Attack.  I didn't take pictures, but the Germans had to hold the bridge they captured from the Allies counter attack.  The Germans made a tactical mistake and lost their AT troops early on which left the Heavy Recon Grenadiers to fight Blackhawk.  Since they are just armed with MGs and were unable to hurt Blackhawk the Allies won.




I recently ordered a few more boxes of German and Allied units.  The next few missions will feature more walkers and I will try a few units I haven't played with yet.  After that I plan on getting my hands on some SSU.

This was my first Tactics game. If you have played Tactics feel free to share on the forum.