Dystopian Wars - Saturday Afternoon Shootout

This afternoon I was lucky enough to get in another game with my wife. We played Dystopian Wars this time around. We played AK47 Republic a few weeks back and she rather enjoyed it, so she was up for another. She preferred the land game to ships (mainly because of the way the tabletop is decorated) so I put together two lists. She chose the Prussians, which left me with my usual troops, the Japanese. For what it's worth - I'm still playing DW version 1.1 - I haven't made the switch to 2.0 yet.

Our lists:
EoBS (780)
1 Taka-Ashi
1 Ryuo
3 Chi-Ri
2 X 5 Ke-ho
4 Bansan

Prussian (775)
1 Metzger Ausf B
2 Schildtrager
1 Sturmpanzer
4 A6-V Medium Tanks
2 X 5 Walze

I left the tiny fliers in the storage cases - they're another level of complexity that wasn't appropriate for a beginner game.

My hover squid and some small tanks hold up my right flank

The Prussian horde. Shield-bots out front, protecting their buddies.

I got a great lucky hit on one of the Schildtragers with my Bansan's rockets disabling its generator. She never managed to repair it!

My mediums take control of the beet farm but are unable to get a hit on the blasted German robots!

The Sturmpanzer rolls forward and hits two of my medium tanks for 1 damage each and one for my four-legger, Stampy. Her small tanks also zip forward and put a hit on my squid. The squid retaliates by damaging one of the Walze stands and vaporizing another with this roll:

Yup. Natural Yahtzee. ** spikes football **  ** taunts crowd **

Fire at that walker back there! Another good volley - two damage scored on the Metzger.

Stampy gets up close and personal with the strength of the Prussian force. Aside from causing two more hits on the Metzger (including a weapons crit!) and smashing a stand of Walze tanks (the white ones off to the left), it was really just a lot of smoke and dust. Feh.

Wifey turns out to be a quick study. She parks the fucking super tank in front of pretty much my whole army and unleashes a shitstorm. Three turrets, one tesla cannon and two broadsides. The A9 did some kind of damage to Stampy and my medium tanks.

I pounced with my Ke-Ho unit on the right - blasting away at her small tanks on the hill. One of my rolls, in utter defiance of logic and statistical probability resulted in this...

** drops mic **

And no time later, her group of four Walze tanks rolls up to Stampy and sends it packing. 

The A6es get inspired and get a WHOLE LOTTA shots, wiping out my mediums and damaging a Ke-Ho nipping at the big robot's feet. Those dice indicate how many she needs to roll at each target.

A little retaliation - Squiddy crits the healthy Schildtrager and kills a few boarding parties in the process!

And a bit more as my little balls of anger topple the big robot!

The A9 shot up Squiddy pretty good, so rather than shooting, I had it assault the nearest Schildtrager, derelicting it. Woo Hoo!

My joy was short-lived though as her A6es proceeded to shoot the bejeezus out of the big metal beast. Wifey got on one of those wicked strings of rolling sixes. One crit roll later resulted in a Magazine Explosion! Squiddy's death throes destroyed the derelict Schildtrager and double-critted the A9! Finally I'd managed to damage the damn thing!

She wanted me to include this...

The game was done - final score, 430 to 275 in favor of the Prussians. I have the worst fortune with my Blazing Suns land forces. The game was a hoot and as the game progressed and Wifey got more familiar with the rules and rolls she really started to enjoy it more. We'll definitely have to get in a rematch soon.

One of these days I may pick up the 2.0 rulebook but I'm not looking forward to a) spending the cash, b) new unit cards and c) learning new rule nuances.

Comments

  1. Everything I've seen of this game suggests that it's gorgeous figures, with a set of rules I know I'm not going to like. So it really boils down to finding another way of using the pretty toys. I haven't found it yet.

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  2. I understand - in fact I'm not in love with the rules myself. My two primary complaints are the whacked-out scale of movement and weapon ranges and that there really isn't a trade-off between movement and weapons fire. It seems like there should be some kind of shooting penalty for moving, to force a tactical decision for the player. I could go on...

    Most of my gaming buddies also have hefty DW collections which means it is one of those "default" games that we can put on the tabletop any time; we all know the rules and can just play without looking at a rulebook. That primarily why I chose it for my "wife game" - I know the game and could just concentrate on helping her move, shoot, etc.

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