"In Country" Playtest

It's time to go 'In Country"!

Had the rules for a while, but with a box set on the way I had to hit them and see how they played. They *read* well, but the proof is on the table!

Below, I grabbed my new Infinity terrain and assembled the last few buildings.  This wasn't too difficult, and they definitely look better than I could paint anything [more on this cardboard terrain in another post!], plus you get a play mat.

So who should fight on this futuristic terrain?  Star Wars flunkies, of course!  Below, Rebel Scum as 2 x Tier 4 Insurgent Groups and a Veteran Insurgent Group [2 Rebel commando advisors].

Facing off against them, trying to preserve peace and order in the galaxy, two Stormtrooper teams as US Ranger Assault Elements - the grenade launcher is the big tubed thingy...

Scenario is "Intel Grab".  The Insurgents must search the two droids at table center and exfiltrate with them.

THE RULES

A quick overview is probly in order...

1. Turn is IGO-UGO alternating by teams, but if enemy teams are not in a Defensive or Suppressed stance, they will likely react to the activated team by Returning Fire.
2. Activating Teams may do one of three things: 
• Reposition- Move Full and take cover, 
• Engaging - Fire at full effect, 
• Assault - shorter Move w' a Fire.
3. Key mechanic: Grips. These are a sort of quality level, each in three values, e.g. 4+ / 8+ / 10+ for Easy / Normal / Hard. A model must roll that number or higher to succeed in a desired action, such as shoot, rally etc.  They are intelligently used as the main shooting mechanic. 
• Rather than have lots of charts or modifiers, most mechanics are expressed by Grip difficulty. But quality varies by team, as you would expect, with elite Special Forces having much better grips than Insurgents.
• This means that if two sides are both Firing at each other and the shot is such that a Normal Grip is needed, based upon Quality there could be a difference of 10-30% btw their chances to Hit.
• This makes Team quality the most important factor in the game. The value statement here is that training matters most in modern warfare, where similar - deadly - weapons are available to everyone. FWIW I agree.
4. The many relative nuances of weapons are largely abstracted, using tried and traditional wargame mechanics.
5. There are numerous scenarios, most of which are sketched out, so the host needs to make intelligent decisions about the specifics.
6. Generally, the game emphasizes recent / contemporary "reality" in its terminology, attitudes, terms, etc.

The rules themselves are a sort of living document, quite in fashion now, whereby they are easily available [free or cheap] from the publisher.  They are a half-side booklet of 50 pages, so really 25 pages at full size. The company is really making money on the hard product: figures, vehicles, card decks.

Scaling up / down. There are a few different ways to play the game, activating by Teams of 4-6 models, or Elements of 2 models, or squads of 2 Teams.  Ergo, it is easy to scale up or down according to availability of figures, time to play or desired level of combat, i.e. Team, Squad or Platoon level fights.

This is great as it means a new gamer with 8 painted models can host a small game with the same rules as an accomplished gamer with 80 models, and you aren't learning different mechanics.  The contrast would be Games Workshop, where you play 40K with 80 models, Killteam or Fireteam with 8 models, and an RPG with just a few figs, and each set of rules is different.

Culture.  In game culture, Enemy Spotted Studios emphasizes keeping it real and having fun, not power-gaming in tournaments. If winning matters a lot to you, the best approach would be to set up a 2-sided fight, play each side, and the winner is whoever did best overall. This is also a best practice for Newbies who are still learning how to balance forces, set up fair scenarios, etc.

It should also be noted that the company is veteran-owned and donates 10% to help vets out. There seems to be a fair amount of actual Soldiers and vets involved, and therefore the language and terms that get tossed around in forums, etc, may be offensive to those not in the military / first-responder professions.

Hopefully, this short explanation will keep you from getting lost in the following BATREP!

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As the Attackers, Insurgents take the first turn, choosing the board edge that has the most cover and higher buildings. Team 1 Repositions left, Team 2 Repositions right. This allows them to move onto the board as fast as possible, then they take up a Defensive stance [blue shield markers].

R4 Astro droid and Medical droid objectives.

Team 2 with their Defensive marker.   Basically, it makes them a bit harder to hit.

Stormtroopers Assault! onto the board, moving a little less but they get a [poor] shot at the end of the move. They roll two '9's and hit a couple of creeps despite their Cover!  Only one passes his Normal Grip to save the hit, the other is down.

Encouraged by Team 1's success, Team 2 likewise performs an Assault! onto the board. However, in more typical Stormtrooper fashion, all three shots miss [the GL can't shoot on an Assault! Measure, i.e. action.

With a third team, the Insurgents kinda get to go last [I think], and the Veteran Insurgent Team also Repositions onto the board, but takes advantage of the Locals special rule to enter a flanking board edge.

The Stormtrooper guard is just there to look cool.  It's the Security Police HQ, after all...

Turn 1 ends with Insurgent Team 1 easily passing a Normal Grip to avoid Suppression, with a 9. The Injured Insurgent is removed as Critical [in these basic rules...].

Turn 2, Insurgent T1 fires and misses. Stormy T1 does a Return Fire and Aces two rolls [badly missing with the third].

They choose to use their Ace rolls to force the Insurgents to roll against a more difficult save, aka a Hard Grip - neither makes it. He then goes Suppressed. Can't blame him!

Insurgent T2 just plain misses, needing 8s.

Stormy T2 Returns Fire and misses as well.

Stormy Player Turn 2 begins with T2 performing a Reposition to get into better cover. Insurgent T2 gets a hit with their Return Fire. The Stormy blows his Grip [save] and goes down.

Team 2 then rolls for Suppression, and fails w a '2'. Now this is more of what we're used to from the films...

Stormy T1 Performs and Engaging! Measure, and shoots at long range with the Grenade Launcher at Insurgent T2. Another model performs a "Mark" Task and marks a spot on the Board for the GL to try and hit. Amazingly, it does despite rolling a '3'!

"+" Marks the spot, and all models within 2" are whacked!

...and removed from the table.  Ugly!

Insurgent T3, the small Veteran Team also Engages and Hits a Stormy - the Grenadier, no less!  He fails his Grip and goes down.

The Team has just one model that can Return Fire, and he Hits a Veteran Insurgent. They also fail their Suppression roll for take a casualty.

The Veteran Insurgent fails his Grip [save] and goes down. The survivor then fails his Suppression roll.

At the start of Turn 3, the Insurgents have two models left!  The Veteran fails to Execute and remove the Suppression, so will not Perform this turn.

His buddy from T1 shoots and misses.

The Return Fire from the 2 Stormies that can see Mr. Ugly both hit, and he fails one Grip [save] and is down. However, they are Suppressed and shouldn't have fired...oops!

Turn 3, Stormy T1 successfully Executes and removes the Suppression completely.

T2 fails to do so with a '2'.

But they convert it to a Defensive token as part of their turn.

For Turn 3, Stormy T1 Repositions to better Cover.

Insurgent Turn 4 starts with the last Insurgent, a Veteran, successfully removing the Suppression, then missing T2.

As both Stormtrooper Teams are Defensive, they cannot Return Fire and so the Insurgent Player Turn ends.

Stormy Turn 4, they decide to use the Grenade Launcher on the Veteran Insurgent. Again, a model Marks the spot and then the GL gets an Ace hit!

Final Insurgent is dead multiple times over - no save.

Well, that was pretty intense!  I hope I got the Grenade Launcher part right, but it says under the "Explosive" special rule that they ignore Concealment and Cover when firing at Infantry.  As the GL is also Penetrating (1), all models within 2" take a Hit with no save.  Definitely a good reason to spread out!

This was a short sharp fight.  

I figured the open terrain in the middle of the board might be a problem for the Insurgents to maneuver to the objectives. However, they never even had a chance to - the Stormy fire [as Rangers] enabled them to establish Fire Superiority over the Insurgents and then finish them off with the Grenade Launchers.

Overall, there was nothing radical about the rules.  It is basically an IGO-UGO with Reactions possible. A small game of two teams a side means IGO-UGO as you get to Perform twice, once with each team.

The system of shooting and saves is interesting, and this little firefight had good feel with the back-and-forth between the two sides.  The Ranger Assault Teams with their GL are pretty brutal, however, and I carelessly allowed my Insurgents to cluster up too much. Theoretically, I would've only been able to hit one Insurgent with the GL if I spread them out to the max, but I got focused on shooting instead of spreading them out.

The most difficult thing to remember was the unique terms that the game uses, like "Execute" for Rally, "Grip" for Quality, "Measures" for Action, etc. I don't know if the terms were chosen to be more authentic, or if they were chosen just to be different.  I would have found them easier to remember if they were "the same-old, same-old" and if I hosted the game and made a QRS, I might very well switch them to more typical terms.

The Scenarios are pretty rich, and I look forward to trying out some more but with more Insurgents so that the Stormies won't get an easy 2-10 win like this time!

There is also a 1 fig = 1 Unit variant called "Close Quarters" where figs do not act as a team but by 1-2 figs.  That has some more detailed injuries also, which I consider important in these low-level scraps where neither side wants to allow the other to take prisoners.

Definitely looking forward to going In Country again!