'Nam project - campaign game 1

I played my first game in my Vietnam Campaign today, and it was an odd one - not a single shot was fired!

The Mission

 Team 22 is to position itself near a trail and observe any enemy activity before withdrawing from the area for ex filtration.

 They are to observe the enemy and collect information only. They are to count the number of enemy in the area and make a note of weapons and equipment.

Once in the vicinity of the trail they are to set up an observation post and remain undetected. 

 Should the Team be contacted they are to conduct a fighting withdrawal to a PZ.

area of operations

Intel

 Intelligence indicates that trained local VC are operating  in small groups.

The Set up

 Using my charts I determined that the enemy would be local VC that are trained but with poor T&E. I placed my LRRPs in their OP.  Due to a poor insertion, the threat pool for the game would be at +1 for the game, meaning a blip would appear on a 1 - 7 at the start of each turn.

 The mission would last until all blips had been used (a total of 6 blips were rolled for) or the LRRPs were contacted and forced to withdraw.

The LRRPs set up their OP with two men watching the trail, with the other four pulling security around the perimeter. 

 The LRRPs would get one Victory Point for every blip spotted, while the VC would gain 1 VP for every LRRP removed from play.


The Game

 The first blip placed turned out to be nothing. Maybe it was a wild animal in the undergrowth.

First blip was a false alarm

 The next blip was a party of VC moving east to west along the trail. The LRRPs spotted the VC and started making notes for their debrief back at base.

 Chattering amongst themselves, the VC failed to notice how close they were to death.

chattering VC - discussing what was for dinner maybe?

 The next few turns saw two more blips appear, both moving east to west.

activity on the trail increases

The first of the two blips turned out to be a false alarm, but the second one was another group of VC.

The closer blip was a false alarm

Again the VC failed to notice the lurking LRRPs. Realising that only two watching the trail could cost a VP or two, I pushed one of the LRRPs into a position closer to the trail, but making sure he remained hidden.

But the next one wasn't.

After a bit of inaction another blip turned up, this time traveling West to East along the trail. They were spotted, but luck remained with the LRRPs, who remained unnoticed.

The repositioned LRRP is hiding near the trail.

The final blip appeared on the East end of the trail, and the VC and the blip crossed paths.

The VC automatically spot their own.

  This final blip was nothing of importance.

No enemy - time to go home.

With all the blips now activated the mission parameters had been met and the LRRPs moved off to their PZ for the return trip back to base.

Final Notes

 The LRRPs gained a full 6 VPs for the game. As I mentioned, not a shot was fired. This would have changed had the VC spotted the Team hiding near the trail.

 The poor T&E of the VC is what made this mission a success. They basically needed to roll a 1 on a d10 to spot the LRRP team lurking near by.

 Due to their higher T&E, the LRRPs had a 50% chance of spotting a blip, and given that their activation pool was higher too, they had more chances to make spotting attempts each turn.  As it was they almost missed spotting one blip.

 I created a number of charts for determining the set up for the game - what type of enemy, their level of training etc.

 I need to come up with a random terrain generator, and make some extra trails and river sections to allow for this random set up.

 Not all games will be this easy, and a better trained and equipped enemy would have busted the LRRPs earlier on, setting up a fire fight.

 I also want to have a crack at making some small sampans so I can have some river traffic to observe as well.