Deathwish 888 2017

ivankent

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Deathwish 888 Tournament 2017



こんにちは

Kamusta

Halo

ជំរាបសួរ

여보세요

สวัสดี

chào bạn

ສະບາຍດີ

G’day!

The third year of Deathwish!! A VASL tourney that has exploded in the Asia Pacific region in a very short time.

Now is the time to join the fastest growing ASL community in the world.

8 games against 8 opponents in 8 months! Can you meet the challenge?

The third year of this tournament will focus on early war action across all theatres (however the PTO will definitely feature).

This tourney is organised and played in the fastest growing region in the world J, and so all games are expected to be held in the PTO timezones, so we can maximise our working day and income to pay for all the ASL product being released.

The tournament runs throughout the year with 3 distinct phases;

Firstly entrants will be placed into groups, and play a round robin within the group; secondly the entrants will be shuffled with players from the other groups in a second round robin; this will then be used to rank the players into playoff divisions for final placings.

Initial groupings based on AREA, second round based on first round placings, third round based on combination of results from first and second round results.

The aims;

To have different opponents in the round robin sessions throughout the year, to build more friendships in the region, and to get the region more visibility in the tournament scene.

Round 1 (3 games) Round Robin

Round 2 (2 games) Preliminary League

Round 3 (3 games) Final League

More details to come soon…

Let me know if you are interested at ivan (dot) kent00 (at) gmail (dot) com

If you do enjoy this melange of cultural diversity, meet your opponents at the Asia Pacific F2F tournament planned for July 2017 in Cambodia in Siem Reap (Ankor Wat).
 

ivankent

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Hi all
Just to be clearer... There is no restrictions on where you are located, just that you should be prepared to play in a time zone friendly to those that live in the region
If you can play at a weird time in your time zone that matches the local zone then you are most welcome
I prepare a sheet with all players locations and zones to help match ups work best for all
Obviously it is up to the player concerned to agree
I just add a presumption to the entrants rather than an edict
Roll low
Ivan
 

ivankent

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Dear Squad Leaders

Looking for battle-hardened heros and meek conscripts alike!

The third year of the Deathwish VASL competition starts in January. The focus this year will be early war actions, but across all theatres. There will be 8 rounds, 5 of which are round robinesque, with a final 3 round tourney for placings. Therefore you should end up playing many different players through the year in the APAC timezone.

We have had many players from across the region, and it is a great way to get to know the people you will be playing in Siem Reap in July 2017 :)

Let me know if you are interested...

Scenario List for first 3 rounds coming soon...

regards

Ivan

Roll low everybody!!!
 

sunoftzu

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Jim and I finished our Deathwish 888 Tournament game . Our scenario was DftB-102 "Les Hommes De Neige", with Jim playing the attacking French, and myself defending with Germans. With the nature of the immediate VCs, we both thought the Germans looked to be the underdog, and each bided Attacker +1. I lost the dice for sides, and set up as Germans (plus balance), with platoon pickets in each VC area, and a central 'Deathstar' on board 9.

The mutually supporting defense worked a treat, and I inflicted a lot of damage early on vs Jim's French. By the APh of French turn 3, CVPs had gotten as high as 18, and Jim decided to call it a day, giving my Germans a quick victory.

John.

DB-102-Fre-03-APh-jpeg.jpg
 

sunoftzu

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Will and I finished a close (round 2) game of Tac-044 ("Lebanese Drama"), which went to the last MPh. I was able to exit all 3 of the light tanks for 18 exit points, and my 60mm mortar got a few spectacular critical hits, but they were about the only breaks that went my way. I took the patient route and played it vanilla, knowing that I didn't need to do much more to win. It might have been plain sailing for me if my OBA SR didn't keep taking big drifts and landing offboard, leaving me without any covering smoke. But in the end, Will's British passed most of their MCs, whilst my units just couldn't whenever it mattered. And in the last turn, I was left performing a desperate suicide charge off the map that wasn't to be......

Tac-044-Fre-07-MPh-jpeg.jpg

Congrats to Will's British for holding out. A pretty close game in the end.

John.
 

bprobst

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Round 1 result:

Scenario U20 Fighting at World's Edge

Germans: Xavier Zhang
Allies: Bruce Probst

Bruce's Allied forces proved victorious over Xavier's Germans in a somewhat strange game that went to the next-to-last turn.

I'm going to say up front that I don't like this scenario much. There's no real subtlety in it at all; it's two strong forces smashing into each other, and whoever rolls the best dice will end up winning.

The Allied reinforcements are ridiculous. There is an ENORMOUS difference between 2 radioless AFVs turning up on Turn 1 and 1 tank turning up on Turn 6. I managed to get 1 on Turn 4, and he spent half the game twiddling his thumbs because of failed Non-Platoon TCs. With a Turn 4 arrival there was, in theory, enough time for it to actually have an impact on the game, but the actuality was that it just proved to be a vague threat that never actually did anything.

What kept our game interesting is that both of us were rolling very silly dice. 2s, 3s, 11s and 12s were the normal results for both sides. By the end of the game there were 2 French heroes, one of the German 9-1s had been promoted to a 9-2 (neatly replacing the original 9-2 who had been cut down by a Norwegian KIA the turn before), and both sides had several battle-hardened units. The Norwegians even managed to acquire an extra 7-0 along the way.

Units on both sides were shrugging off 2MC and breaking horribly on NMC. There were KIA results all over the place, although the Allies did more damage by using their numerical advantage to force many German surrenders.

At the end, although the silly dice persisted, the balance of luck favoured the Allied side enough for sufficient forces to make it off the board edge.

Xavier thinks the scenario is good for training someone in hill LOS and appropriate tactics, and while I agree that is true, I wish the rest of the scenario was more suitable for more advanced players.

The game result has been added to ROAR.
 

bprobst

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Round 2 result:

Scenario AP54 800 Heroes

Japanese: Bruce Probst
Chinese: George Bates

Bruce's Japanese have defeated, barely, George's Chinese in AP54 "800 Heroes". The issue was decided in Japanese Turn 6 when the last Chinese defender of the factory was eliminated, giving the Japanese control of the building, and with exactly one player turn remaining, the surviving single Chinese squad + leader didn't think they were going to manage the task of entering the Factory and eliminating all of the remaining Japanese -- but it was a very near thing.

Not a single player turn went by without something freaking weird and/or highly unlikely happening to both sides. At no point prior to the end result did victory seem assured for either side. Of particular note was the Japanese determination to perform poorly in almost every single CC attack -- and there were a lot of them! Naturally, in the last turn, a Japanese HtH CC attack of 1:1 @ -2 DRM achieved absolutely nothing. Fortunately the 1:4 CC @ -1 attack from the Motion-in-bypass tank was sufficient to seal the win. In this game, such a stupidly improbable result was, in fact, perfectly normal.

The game result has been added to ROAR.
 

GeorgeBates

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Regardless of the disappointing result, a very enjoyable if often dramatically irritating match. Sincere thanks to my estimable opponent. Nothing wrong with Bruce's play, but responsibility for the loss is in large part due to my overextended setup, a frequent fault. Had I been positioned farther back the severe attrition Bruce suffered might have prevented him from taking his objectives.

Here's Bruce's description of the action after the first three turns:
So, here I am as the Japanese, ready to (attempt to) blanket the Chinese defenders in WP and launch a killer banzai charge guaranteed to get me into an ace position to take the factory. First DR of the game = 10, so it starts raining. Sigh, alright, I guess the killer banzai charge will have less cover than anticipated, we'll manage. No longer able to fire SMOKE, I instead fire HE at the biggest threat, the Chinese HMG perched on the factory rooftop. Improbably, I actually hit them -- IFT result: snake-eyes for a 1KIA! Random selection targets the squad, who falls off the roof, taking their precious HMG with them. Chinese 9-1 leader breaks, of course. The odds of the killer banzai charge succeeding have now significantly improved, the Japanese are doing happy dances. Oh wait, that TH DR triggered the Chinese sniper. Result = 1, target: he unerringly heads straight for the hex containing the Japanese leader preparing to wave his sword to launch the banzai. There are five different targets in this hex, RS hits three of them -- one of them being the leader (of course). My opponent selects him (of course) and rolls the Sniper attack vs. the other two: "1" and "1". The Japanese stop their happy dances. The rest of my Turn 1 turns into hasty improvisation and general gloom.

(The rest of the game has been almost equally outrageous on both sides so far. Chinese heroes being generated on the one hand, Chinese squads blowing up on NMC results on the other, Japanese charging forward triumphantly only to die uselessly in HtH CC, Chinese Set DC trigger-men refusing to detonate their DC twice in a row ...)

I am now taking the frustrations of two first round losses out on poor Xavier, who is suffering from what I must modestly say is a considerably better defensive setup in A119, "Showdown In Syria," than what I showed Aaron and Bruce.

Happy hunting to all participants.

Cheers!

- G
 

bprobst

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Round 3 result:

Scenario TAC44 Lebanese Drama

Commonwealth: Bruce Probst
Vichy French: Aaron Cleavin

Bruce's Commonwealth forces have conceded to Aaron's Vichy French in TAC44 "Lebanese Drama". The game featured many outrageous dice results, both good and bad, on both sides, but overall the luck favoured the French. The CW forces are a tad fragile and it only takes a few bad results to make their position quite desperate.

I used to like this scenario, but on playing it again, discovering the numerous wording problems it has, and observing that the combination of French OBA and nearly-invulnerable vehicles makes for dubious balance (despite the good numbers it has on ROAR) both Aaron and I came away less than enthused. The ROAR numbers themselves are even open to question -- how did the various players interpret the VC? (There are a couple of different ways even if you use the exact wording -- and if you happened to be using the original Tactiques-supplied English translation -- as opposed to the original French, or the CFGG translation -- you don't even get the "correct" VC wording!) Basically it's all a bit of a mess, and sadly way past the point where any "official" errata might come along to save it. The scenario needed more "time in the oven" when it was originally being put together.

Which is not to say that Aaron and I didn't have some fun with it. On the CW side the initial British forces turned out to be have some very high marks indeed on their rifle accuracy scores, with seeming hordes of broken French squads to confirm it. The French in turn found much inner strength, with rallying coming very easily to them (and generating two new leaders in the process). Faced with such determination the senior British commander, while trying to escort the MMG out of the blinding smoke laid by the French OBA, found that OBA turned into HE which dropped on him while he was in the open -- so he promptly BH and went heroic, which was just as well since the accompanying MMG operators were not nearly so enthusiastic. Said heroic leader then managed to break yet even more scores of French squads until finally he was overwhelmed by sheer numbers and slain in CC. At another point a berserk French HS found itself facing a berserk British squad. Both berserkers were to end up dying futilely in their respective charges. Of course, the French had squads to spare, which was more than the CW forces could say.

The brave carrier crews did manage to immobilise one of the French tanks, but then two of them of went down to Critical Hits from the other tanks, who were then in a position to serenely drive off the board virtually unopposed.
 

sunoftzu

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Mark and I just finished our playing of AP-054 "800 Heroes". Mark had the attacking Japanese, I had the defending Chinese.

AP-054-IJA-06-CCPh-jpeg.jpg

A bit of a tale of two halves, with my Chinese not being able to do much right for the first 4 turns, but luckily getting a lot sharper on their CC DRs in the final 1.5 turns - where they wrecked all 4 tankettes, with 2 reduced to burning wrecks. The resulting smoke, fortified building locations, and heavy rain made taking the factory outright a bit too difficult, but the Japanese could still win by controlling all other buildings +3 factory locations. But CC fortune was not with the Japanese, as 1 Chinese squad survived 2 CC attacks, and was able to take back 1 building (3aI10). This along with 3aJ12 meant that the Chinese pulled out a very close victory.

Thanks for the game Mark. Best of luck for the rest of the way......

John.
 

GeorgeBates

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This is a brutal, bloody and bone-crushing scenario. You weren't able to blow your set DCs either, huh?
 

bprobst

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You're only saying that because both of us were brutalised, bloodied and had our bones crushed.
 

sunoftzu

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Hi Ivan,

Darryl Lundy and I just finished our Round 5 scenario of J-185 "The Haunted Castle" (myself as defending Russians, him as the attacking Germans). My Russians definitely enjoyed the better of the DRs, and my reinforcing units were able to stack the multi-level VC building and turn it into a fortress, which pretty much remained resolute the whole game. The German field gun wiped out a 447 and its MMG (which never fired a shot) with a CH, but that was about the only generous bit of fortune that the Germans got to enjoy. The only hope left for the Germans when their turn 6 arrived was to grab and throw a DC at the 'castle', and then hope for a domino rubble effect, but the game ended when the nearby leader failed to even grab it (dr6).

J-185-Ger-06-MPh-jpeg.jpg

The scenario is very simple and plays fast - we got to the final turn (German 6) in 2 hours, where the last German hope evaporated and Darryl graciously conceded. Thanks to Darryl for the game, and best of luck for the rest of the way (he is definitely owed some !!!). I will be keeping this scenario in mind as a good 'intro to guns' ASL scenario.

John.
 

ivankent

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Deathwish 888 2017

The tourney ended with Aaron displaced as champion by Alan Smee; the final positions of the Elite Division were as follows:

1 Alan Smee
2 Darryl Lundy
3 Steve Bond
4= John Knowles
4= Brian Wiersma
6 Aaron Cleavin
7 Bruce Probst
8 Will Fleming

The game for the championship was FrF45 Totensonntag, the summary from the champ himself...

Darryl set up strongly in the southern woods. He also had a squad in the stone building and behind the wall in the center. A final squad was in the woods on the German right. The Poles stacked the German right flank and boldly moved forwards. Unfortunately for Darryl, his Germans did only limited damage, and he also suffered a couple of key cowers. The Poles were able to use mass, assault fire and concentration to get some big IFT attacks, clearing the way on the German right. After turning the flank, the Germans were gradually compressed, and then encircled. Finally they were defeated at the end of game turn T3.
At last different result, as playing Darryl had previously been like playing All Blacks. I’m happy as this is the first competition I’ve won in a decade!


50 games played across Asia Pacific by 17 players very successfully...

Results will be posted to ROAR and AREA.

New Year sees the start of the next competition, focusing on scenarios with vehicles, send me an email to join... ivan (dot) kent 'zero', 'zero' (at) gmail (dot) com
 
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