You will forgive a "Me Too" post.

Another great convention!

Friday night I played in 'Eye of the Storm' (FT game). The UNSC had the
unenviable task of protecting a support transport from pirates. A good game
but tough task. The UN group did a quick (Blue Angels) cross to face the
dread pirates quickly closing from the rear. The transport chugged away at
its amazing maximum thrust of 2. The UN tore into the Needle ships of the
pirates (deemed the largest threat to the transport). But it was to no
avail, the needle armed ships were able to axe the transport's lone screen
generator. The UN Destroyers valiantly attempted to do as much damage as
possible, but the transport succumed to blistering fire from the avenging
pirates. Reinforcements arrived for the UN, and extraced a heavy price from
the pirates, but the majority of them were able to escape. -- A good game.
Protect the transport are tough scenarios to balance. Jerry did an admirable
job in putting the scenario together.

Saturday morning I was in Tom's 'A Change of Orders' (Stargrunt). MANY kudos
to Tom who put this together very quickly when KR had to pull out of the
convention. I currently only get to play SG about once per year, so I VERY
MUCH appreciate his stepping up to the plate (and hitting a home run) on
this. In typical Barclay fashion, the game started out with simple goals.
Get to an area with a downed satelite and recover as much of the reckage as
possible (both for the ESU and OU). The beginning went fairly well for the
ESU (my side - strains of 'Hymn to Red October' fill the air) as we managed
to pin several OU squads and get some pieces of the wreckage. But (also in
typical Tom fashion), the game had a sudden twist when one of the squads
that recovered some of the wreckage suddenly all layed down with white and
black skull counters next to them for no apparent reason (other than the
sounds of gun fire and explosions). It was quickly determined that the OU
was _not_ responsible for this! Moving quickly to help our fallen comrades,
another squad was met by supprise as a squad of Kra'Vak suddenly appeared
from the bushes. Perhaps we should have suspected this, since it has been
awhile since 'A Grey Day to Die' (see GZGECC III). Then everything went in
the can. Mortars fell on our humanitarian aid to the fallen as well as
_ortillery_. Then a VTOL disgorged Gurkas, a KV spaceship landed, ESU tanks
and walkers entered, the KV ship fell to orbital fire from both ESU and OU
ships...  The ESU commander ordered a withdraw of the initial squads (for
which he was later shot). OU pull a victory by capturing an unconcious
Kra'Vak

Saturday's painting seminar by Stuart was excelent. A lot of good advice. --
thanks Stewart!

Saturday evening and Sunday morning I ran Full Metal Ogre. This is Ogre
brought into Dirtside II. Of the 5 games, the Ogre was destroyed 4 times
(the last one was contested when time ran out). While the rules were
extensively playtested, the time limit (45 minutes per game) made it tough
for the Ogre to apply very many tactics. I tried to give everyone the
opprotunity to run the Ogre, but this necessitated a manditory time limit.
The next time, I will run a scenario with a less stringent time limit. Rules
can be found at http://www.cygnusx1.info/ds2/multiverse/fmaogre.asp . I will
post some pictures and units tomorrow.

All in all, a very enjoyable time. I look forward to next year's con.

-- Brian Bell