Space Weirdos - A Day in the Woods

Introduction

In the woodland outside of Grozniansk, Senior Sergeant Orlov's Federal Special Forces team are on a mission to ascertain what has happened to Commander Sukofz.  The Commander was travelling back to the city through the woods when contact with his BTR-80 was lost.  The woods have long been the domain for the outlaw gang the Druzhina.  Are they responsible?

Orlov's mission is to locate the BTR and search it for signs of Commander Sukofz.  The Druzhina have used the BTR as bait to draw in Federal forces and then attack them.  The Commander has in fact been kidnapped by the gang.  The rest of the crew were killed in the attack or directly after and their bodies removed from the site.  The stats for both forces can be found here.

Round 1

Round 1 starting positions

Senior Sergeant Orlov uses his Tactician trait to win the Initiative Phase, and he sends Private Rebrov to search the BTR.  During the rest of the turn the Federals and the Druzhina take it in turns to position themselves for subsequent action.  The Federals move to cover the BTR while it is being searched, the Druzhina move up taking advantage of the woods to assault the Federals. 

The two enemies on the point of contact

Round 2

Round 2 starting positions

Orlov uses his Tactician trait to win the Initiative Phase again and spends a Command Point to put Corporal Pekarsky the sniper onto Overwatch.  Private Rebrov uses an action to clamber inside the BTR and 2 actions to perform the Use Item action to search the vehicle. 

Druzhina Olga moves forward so she can get a better shot on the BTR but with Pekarsky on Overwatch he spots her and gets to take a shot.  He hits with double the score and she has to Take Cover going Down.  

Private Akinfi opens up on Olga as he sees her dive for cover.  Uses one action to Aim, he fires off 2 shots to no effect.

The fire fight develops, Akinfi opens up.

From the cover of the treeline, Druzhina Oleg aims and then takes 2 shots at Akinfi.  The shots ping off the BTR as Akinfi takes cover avoiding being hit.

Senior Sergeant Orlov now fires on Oleg.  He Aims carefully and squeezing the trigger hits once then twice.  Rolling 8 twice on the Under Fire table, Oleg is Staggered twice which means he is now Out of Action.  First blood to the Federals.

Bang! Bang! Orlov takes down Oleg.

The rest of the turn is quite uneventful. Rurik leads Igor through the trees to outflank the Federals. Corporal Pekarsky has no targets so holds his position.  Svyatoslav and Vlad, the remaining Druzhina,  converge on the BTR still keeping as much in cover as possible.  

A drone's view of the action

Round 3

Round 3 starting positions

The Druzhina wrest the initiative from the Federals.  Leading the way, Rurik moves forward and then opens up on Private Akinfi from the rear.  Spending a Command Point to Power Up the first shot he still misses with both shots.  It seems he hasn't set that good an example!

Akinfi spins round and fires back.  Aiming once to increase his chances on his first shot, he doubles Rurik's Def roll who rolls a 10 on the Under Fire table - he's Out of Action.  That's the risk when taking on the professionals.  The numbers are now even and having lost their leader the Druzhina could be at a disadvantage. 

Rurik and Akinfi shoot it out.

Incensed at seeing Rurik shot down, Igor moves and fires twice at Akinfi.  The first shot hits but the roll is Return Fire and Akinfi snaps back a round which sees a result of Snap Shot, with Igor immediately firing back but missing.  Igor's final shot misses too.  It's like an episode of the A-Team, bullets flying everywhere but no one getting hit!

Senior Sergeant Orlov spends a Command Point to Power Up and take an aimed shot at Svyatoslav who is just in sight.  Both shots miss as Svyatoslav hunkers down behind a tree as the splinters shower down on him.

Svyatoslav now decides to give some back and opens up 3 times with his assault rifle.  Orlov's Def is too good though and all 3 shots fail to do anything.

Corporal Pekarsky can just about see Svyatoslav.  Aiming his sniper rifle, he squeezes off a shot.  Being in partial cover saves the outlaw once again as the heavy calibre slug embeds itself into the tree by his head.  

Olga, who had to go Down in the last round after coming under fire, uses an action to Stand and then steadies herself taking Aim. Her third action is to fire her RPG at the BTR where Akinfi is standing.  She hits and Akinfi is Staggered by the blast.  Luckily Orlov is just outside the Area of Effect and escapes unharmed. 

Olga (with Svyatoslav) surveys her work.

Private Rebrov has been stuck in the BTR all this time hearing the fire fight develop.  Taking a chance he uses one action to climb out and then two actions to move away from the action.  His orders were to search the vehicle and get back to the 4x4 and he intends to follow them.

Rebrov retires back to the 4x4

Vlad moves to support Igor and blasts twice with his shotgun at Akinfi.  The first shot hits but Akinfi's body armour saves him as does the second one.  He's very fortunate.  

Akinfi's armour saves him from the shotgun blasts.

As they have lost their leader, during the Maintenance Phase the Druzhina have to make an unopposed Willpower roll to Check for Broken Warband.  They fail the roll and will now roll at -1DT for Initiative.  To counteract this, they spend a Command Point to regroup for the next round.

Round 4

Round 4 starting positions

It's the final round.  For the third of four rounds the Federal troopers win the Initiative.  Mission focused as always, Senior Sergeant Orlov signals, and leading the way he fires once and then retreats two moves to the waiting 4x4.  His shot misses Svyatoslav but is enough to cover his retreat.

Being pissed off at seeing both his shots hit but do nothing, Vlad again fires his shotgun at Akinfi.  The first shot hits and blasts the soldier Down and Staggered.  Already reeling from the RPG blast he was caught in last round, it's too much and Akinfi is Out of Action.  

Corporal Pekarsky pulls back to the 4x4 to join the rest of the team and be ready to make a tactical retreat.

Igor moves forward once and fires at the retreating Federals.  Both his shots miss Private Rebrov, his intended target.  Rebrov fires back a full burst: his first shot puts Igor Down and Staggered; his second is Return Fire which Igor is unable to do; and the third shot gets a Staggered result which stacks up to Igor being put Out of Action. (13:45)

Igor and Rebrov exchange fire.

Olga the RPG girl moves forward once, aims and then fires at the soldiers about to enter the 4x4.  Even with the aimed dice shift her shot is wild and the projectile sails above their heads.  

With all the soldiers having activated, the last to activate is Svyatoslav.  He moves forward and fires twice at Rebrov.  The second shot hits and it's a Snap Shot result but there's no effect with the dice throws cancelling each other out.

And that's it.  The Federal team have completed their mission and will now escape in the 4x4 leaving  the Druzhina three outlaws down and possibly searching for a new leader.  

Orlov's team reach the safety of their ride.

Conclusion

This was the third visit to Grozniansk (AARs here and here) and the third adventure for Orlov and Pekarsky.  I decided to set this one outside the city and use some of the scenic items I'd recently worked on.  It was also a lot quicker to set this up than the city based games!  

I've really enjoyed playing these games and adding more story and narrative to the setting as I play more.  I find it really liberating to use my own setting. Although it's obviously derivative of the real world, I can take in any direction I feel like.  I've got ideas for a few more games and hope to get them on the table sooner rather than later.