The Battle for Skynyrd Station (a Station 42 War battle report)

 June 17th 3032 just a few kilometers outside of Station 42 on Titania the Hell Knights mercenary company engaged renegade planetary guard and Titania militia units at an outpost owned by Venture Star Prospecting called Skynyrd Station.  This is the largest reported engagement of the conflict that has been going on in the Station 42 region for over a year now.  Just over 100 combatants were involved in the fighting and over a dozen vehicles.  The Hell Knights seemed to be making an attempt to grab Station 42 but were intercepted by a combined Titania in route.  

 A "Guardian" class mech was seen among the Titania forces as well as two medium tanks, three MRAP troop carriers, and a technical vehicle.  The Hell Knights fielded three LAGEREV APCs, one Landshark AFV, a mechsuit, and a light hover tank.

 The armored units classed in the middle of the field.  Both sides dealt considerable damage to each other.  The Hell Knights took up position on and around a hill near the station.

 The Hell Knights concentrated fire on the mech and finally destroyed the walker but the Titania forces had begun to envelope their main position.

 The Titania forces lost a MRAP but continued their advance taking over the hill position previously held by the mercenaries.

 The Hell Knights fell back behind the main office at Skynyrd Station.  A Titania tank and a Hell Knight mechsuit traded heavy fire.

 Another Titania medium tank took a commanding position on the hill overlooking the Skynyrd Station office.

 The Hell Knights formed a new battle line and began to push the Titania tank back.  Titania forces continued to advance under the cover of their armored units.

 Fighting continued around the station office.  One of the Titania medium tanks was destroyed and another MRAP seriously damaged.  Neither side seemed to be able to gain an advantage.

With casualties mounting and many vehicles smoking the Hell Knights commander agreed to withdraw on the condition that they be allowed to recover their wounded and damaged equipment.  General Drake the commander of the Titania forces agreed to these terms.  Although their bid to take control of Station 42 was unsuccessful the Hell Knights did manage to do considerable damage to the Titania forces who withdrew to Station 42 after the fighting.

This has been Clara St. Clair for the Titania News Network.

Notes:  This was a 3000 point No Limits battle for our Station 42 War campaign.  It's the largest one we have played so far for the campaign.  We really wanted to have a set piece battle between the Titania Planetary Guard and the Hell Knights and we wanted to use as much of our armies as we could field.  It was really quite a bit of fun for us to have a battle with this many vehicles and troops with all of them being painted and on finished terrain.  We've been working pretty hard for the last few years to get up to this stage of playing again and we are really happy with the results.  
The game played out pretty well with our usual number of weir die rolls.  My snipers continually hit and continually failed to wound which seems to be their curse.  The Titania mech was actually taken out by two light laser rifles and a frag grenade fired by one of the Hell Knights Veteran rifle squads due to nearly impossible rolls.  We are getting better at the rules and better at playing our armies and we plan to have even larger battles soon with a 4000 point battle we hope to play over the 4th of July weekend.  We will also be playing a number of skirmishes leading up to that.  We just finished a 1500 point skirmish tonight in fact.   

Moon Miners and Terraformers

After playing in our generic sci-fi setting for a couple of years now we have finally settled on a name for the setting.  After many hours of debate and numerous "list" of name ideas we are going to go with "Moon Miners and Terraformers".  It's a bit of a mouth full but we like it.  This is the setting that our "Station 42 War" and "Maxed Out" campaigns have been taking place in.  I'll be putting up a basic guideline about the setting soon. 

Painting progress on Hover Tanks and Mech!

I've got the new hover tank for my Hell Knights mostly painted and I've also been painting a mech made from a Transformers toy.  All I have is a wash and some weathering and these will be ready for the table.  I have two more of the tanks I've started working on as well.

Medium hover tank for Hell Knights and two new Mecha toys!

 So I picked up three Matchbox tank toys over a year ago with bog clunky wheels and started messing around with one of them to try and turn it into a hover tank.  Here is the original thread. Progress went pretty slow on it but I finally finished it.  This was one of those projects that got put on the back burner for no particular reason.
The original toy had a fixed turret but I managed to fix that problem.  The turret still hangs up a bit on the pilots hatch but it won't really affect it's play ability and it's still much more useful than having a fixed turret.  I had to glue a piece of plastic pipe into the top turret and then I glued a piece of heavy cardboard under the turret hole with a hole in it to make the turret turn.  Nothing on the conversion was all that technical so I'm not sure why I kept putting it off.  It's going to serve as a medium hover tank for my Hell Knights army.

 I went out today and picked up two new Mecha models from the new Pacific Rim movie.  I know almost nothing about the movie but the toys looked like they had potential.  They both stand about 7.5 inches tall which puts them in about the right size for medium mecha in my setting.  I'm going to do some conversion on both of these models.  The extra arm on the red one will be turned into some kind of over the shoulder weapons mount and I will probably add some weapons to the blue one.  The models cost $19.95 each at Hastings which I thought was a pretty good value.
There are some down sides to these toys.  There seem to be made with quite a few vinyl parts which will make them difficult to paint without dealing with off gassing.  I think the Krylon "Fusion" paints may work the best.  They are a good selection when painting any plastic toy and they seem to have worked out fairly well when I have used them on similar projects.  Another issue is that they have very odd articulation.  It's likely I'll pick a pose and glue them into place anyway but it's still annoying.  They are also lacking in weapons so I will have to add a few to them.

I think they blue one has a striking resemblance to the Quasit Militia Mech from the Battletech setting.  I've been wanting to do some 28mm Battletech mechs so I may pick up another one or two for that purpose.

3000 point No Limits battle for the Station 42 War in progress!

Just wanted to post a preview shot of the "Station 42 War" battle we have in progress.  This is a 3000 point No Limits battle and it is so far the largest we have had in the campaign so far.  We started with over 100 models on the table including 10 armored vehicles and two mecha units.  Everything on the table is painted and we scratch built almost all of the terrain.  This has been the goal of our Station 42 sci-fi project and we are really happy we are finally able to play these types of games again.

Station 42 Conflict Update Part 2

 Late March 3031:  After a long pause in the fighting the Hell Knights discovered that Titania Militia forces had re-built and supplied the "Ghost Compound" and were using it as a base of operations.  A sizable force was dispatched intent on either retaking the compound or at least destroying as many supplies as possible.

 The fighting began around the smaller "Specter Compound" when a Hell Knights scout squad engaged mercenary and security forces there supported by a light hover tank.

 Another scout squad attacked the main compound held by "Boon's Irregulars" supported by a sniper.  Supplies were stacked in both compounds and the surrounding area.  

 After a brief skirmish between the scout and militia forces mechanized infantry and armored units from both sides entered the combat.  Hell Knight and renegade Titania Planetary Guard units engaged head on in the open ground between the compounds.

 Casualties began to mount quickly for both sides.  Specter Compound was over run by Hell Knight forces and the supplies there were destroyed.

 The assault on Ghost Compound did not fare as well.  Planetary Guard Tanks stalled the Hell Knight advance and even though a single Lagarev Hover transport managed to break through both it and the majority of the scout squad were destroyed.

At the end of the battle the Hell Knights were forced to withdraw with heavy casualties although they did manage to destroy about half of the militia supplies.

 Early May 3032 near Pleasant Valley:  After reports of increased militia activity in the town of Pleasant Valley the Hell Knights set up a checkpoint on the main road running between Pleasant Valley and Station 42.  Titania Militia units attacked the checkpoint in an attempt to make the road safer for their activities.

 As militia units advanced the Hell Knight armored units moved up to the ridge across from there checkpoint.  The militia were using light civilian vehicles for transports which were little use against the Hell Knights heavier guns.  The militia also had two field artillery pieces and a few improvised armored vehicles.

 The Hell Knights commander piloting a Battle Suit and Light Hover tank pressed into the militia ranks and did significant damage cutting down many of the lightly armored troops.

 The commander managed to also take out one of the Improvised armored vehicles but was eventually stopped by combined fire from the militia and field piece.

 The Mercenary hover tank also took out several militia troops and improvised armored vehicles until it was taken down by the militia's AC 10.

Even though they lost several armored units during the fighting the Hell Knights managed to force the militia to withdraw.  The veteran rifle squads and remaining Lagarev light transport managed to hold the checkpoint against the few militia that made it past the ridge.

Alphonso Marks for the Titania News Network.

Notes:  The 2nd battle of the Ghost Compound was one of the largest battles we have had in the campaign to date at 2500 points using the No Limits system.  We were very happy to bring a number of units onto the field for this one.  It was a lot of fun to have a large battle with combined arms.  The Battle of Checkpoint Bravo was a 1500 point skirmish.  Although we plan to have more skirmishes we plan to ramp the campaign up with much larger battles involving Mecha and air support as well as tanks and infantry.  

Titania Media blackout lifted! An update on the conflict in the Station 42 region (Part 1)

 When a Hell Knights Battle Cruiser arrived in orbit over Titania last August citizens in the contested lands around Station 42 feared an overwhelming escalation of their conflict with the Smith and Wilson Agriculture corporation.  What they got instead was several months of court battles and a media blackout.  Through buyouts, bribes, and blackmail Smith and Wilson managed to gain control of the local media agencies.  Meanwhile their lawyers engaged in several legal battles to try and put pressure on the locals to abandon their property claims.
On August 19th the Hell Knights conducted three small raids on some of the more stubborn locals.  

 The Hell Knights raided a mining camp owned by the Venture Star Prospecting Company.  Expecting only light resistance Hell Knight forces consisted of mostly infantry units.

 Venture Star had however received had received an anonymous tip about the raid so they hired units from Nova Securities and the Wolfhound Friekorps mercenary company.  They were also backed up by renegade Titania Planetary Guards units.

 The Hell Knights situation became desperate early on when they realized that the Planetary Guard units included a battle tank.

 A Hell Knights assassin managed to kill most of the Wolfhound mercenaries and some of the Nova men before being taken down.

 Their other troops were however no match for the Planetary Guard Tank.  Most of their riflemen were cut down quickly and only a few assault troopers managed to escape the fighting.

 The Hell Knights also dispatched a force to the Redwing farm where they believed a number of Titania militia units were hiding.

 Hell Knight scouts managed to gain a good position early in the fighting using stealth to infiltrate deep within the compound.

 Another Hell Knights assassin was seen during this battle.  These types of troops have previously not been seen in this conflict.

 The Hell Knights Heavy equipment moved into the center of the compound and engaged the militia units and light vehicles.

 The Titania Planetary guard also arrived with a tanks but even that was not enough to secure the farm.  The Planetary guard tank and all the militia light vehicles were destroyed and the Militia units routed.

 The Davis Farm also came under attack by a Hell Knights infantry force backed up by fast moving Lagarev apcs.

 The defenders consisted of Planetary Guard and Militia units with a few improvised light vehicles.

 The battle was a close one and both sides took many casualties but the militia units took the brunt of the damage.

 At the end of the battle the remaining militia member retreated into the farmhouse as Hell Knight assault troopers close in.

Among the militia casualties was Mrs. Davis who was shot during the fighting at the farm house.  The Hell Knights were able to secure the farm and destroy a cache of supplies dealing a heavy blow to resistance forces.

For several months afterwards the conflict in  the Station 42 Region died down.  The Militia and renegade Titania Planetary Guard units had suffered numerous casualties and loss of supplies just as the Hell Knights received some significant reinforcements.  It seemed as if the conflict would finally be settled in the courts although that battle still continues while hostilities seem to have flared again in the region.  More reports on the renewed conflict coming soon.

Alphonso Marks, Titania News Network.

Notes:  We had a long unexpected break during this campaign and didn't play any battles through the last four months of 2012.  The last three battles we fought were a set of 1000 point raids using the No Limits rules system we have been using for this campaign.  We decided that the resistance had been dealt a pretty nasty blow and had mostly gone into hiding while the Smith and Wilson Agriculture Corporation went back to the courts to settle disputes over their claims.  We have had some other battles this year but I just kept putting off the updates about the campaign so I never posted that information.  I will be posting another report in the next day or two hopefully to bring things up to speed and get back on track.  We hope to bring this campaign to a close in the next few month with some larger battles.