I am back from my first Advance the Colors convention. Not as large as I expected, but quality can make up for quantity. It was well run, with a good selection of games and some really very well done terrain. I shot a lot of pictures -- 100 more on Sunday -- and played in four games. A fairly large DBA tournament -- some of the armies looked familiar, but I think it is just the lines of troops with sharp pointy things.

Friday night was "Last Stand at Schure Manor," Battleground World War II rules in 20mm, hosted by Danny Meador. Danny's partner didn't make it, so he had to run it himself. He did a pretty good job for a new judge. I was the Soviet commander. My plan was to cover with the two T34/85 and a heavy Machine Gun, while our two T34/76 moved up with a squad of infantry each on their rear decks (one a SMG squad), fortified by vodka and a Commissar. Our other two squads supported by another Heavy Machine Gun followed up.

It is a 12' table, so we had a long way to go. It turned out there were no Germans outside the Manor except for a Panther tank on our left flank. That forced the two T34/76 to move up a slope to a position a little closer to the manor than I liked. They were ambushed. A quick firefight followed but we made it into the building. My infantry commander and T34/76 commanders did a stand-up job getting in, plus had a bit of luck when an ambush failed in the building when a panzerfaust wouldn't fire. The other infantry commander swung to the right, located a hidden anti-tank gun (a nasty one since it had the penetration of a Pak 43/41) and blew a squad of Germans off a balcony. We didn't "take" Schure Manor in the time allowed, but we would have needed a full company of infantry just to get to every room. Good job, Soviets!

Saturday morning was "France 1940" run by John Leahy using Company Commander rules. This game had four players. Two Germans, one French, and I had the British. My plan worked again -- the French delayed the main German light tank force of Panzer 38t and truck borne grenadiers. Although their left flank was covered from infantry, I counter-attacked with two Matildas, went past the German infantry, to the main road and cut off the road by parking one tank on it, covering the bridge over the river, and the other covering that tank. Then, I started shooting up the trucks, along with some French infantry. The French player then counter-attacked the light German tanks and I brought up two anti-tank guns, and anti-tank rifle and enough infantry to block off the German advance line. Our mission was to hold for two hours which we did handily.

Saturday night was back to World War II France, using Battleground WW II rules in "Early Morning Over Ste-Mere-Eglise." The judge was Jeff Love. This time, I specifically did NOT command the American side and instead took one small unit -- a M-20 armored car and five man crew. Both sides' mission was to take a bridge about 3/5 of the table towards the German lines. On their side was a town in ruin, on ours, hedgerows and woods. However, we had a road to start on. Jeff was also trying some new random events cards, each of us receiving one on the first five turns.

My first card let me start my armored car 10" in from the table edge, and I drew one of the first cards allowing me to move. U.S. M-20 armored cars have six wheels and a .50 cal M2 heavy machine gun. Movement is 15" an action (I had two actions), tripled on roads. That was 45" a turn. My first action was to move 45" down the road. My intent, get across the bridge and hold it until the infantry caught up. At conventions you often have a limited time to play, so going slow and careful means nothing happens. Also, we would be getting reinforcements (so would the Germans). So, if I was wiped out ,I would just be the first to get the reinforcements.

Next action had me over the bridge, firing the LCHMG and unloading three crewmen. They had a SMG and a bazooka. I had a hedgerow to hide behind and some trees to my left rear. Bring Ôem on! That worked real well. While the infantry support moved up the 55" at 12 per turn, the Germans poured everything they had at me, including as many of their cards as they had. My LCHMG was jammed with a card, a fake radio message had my armored car ordered back, and I lost the bazooka team -- forgot the judge was speeding up the game by not using the spotting chart. I had a 251/1 half-track let loose on my vehicle commander, forcing me to bob him up and down in order to fire the LCHMG, and my driver to pop his hatch so he could use his grease gun on anyone coming up the road. One German squad was working in to my left, one coming up on the right, and a MG42 MMG fired at me from a building window. There was a panzerjager squad also moving up. Plus the lead German squad had grabbed my own bazooka.

Then one squad of U.S. infantry made it up to the river on my left and moved down and across. Shallow water but high steep banks. Both sides received a tank -- the Germans a Pz IV/F1 and I received a M3 Lee Medium, which promptly lost a track from a German random event card. I got one round off with the 37mm hitting the MG42. Literally. I had AP loaded and of the four targets - 3 crew and the gun, the round hit the gun. A German tank commander tried to throw a grenade in the M-20. My driver threw it back at him. The German with the bazooka fired at the car, hit the hedgerow. He received a burst of .50 cal. Another burst at the Germans on the right. More U.S. infantry came up and the .30 MMG in the ruins opened up on the Germans as well. My crew fixed the track on the M3 and I moved it up, after one turn halted due to another card, to bring the 75mm hull gun into action. And the game ended. Another plan that worked. Three for three -- getting scary.

Sunday morning was the "Battle of Port Republic," run by Bruce Woodworth & Rich Oster using. Fire and Fury, Regimental ACW. We had three players for our Confederate forces and rolled off for the commander. Good, I lost. The infantry was divided up and I took the two gun batteries with first dibs on reinforcements. There was a river to our left and woods to the right, and across the table the Union forces were sitting behind a wooden fence next to a bridge. All we had to do was destroy the Union forces, take the bridge, take the crossroads, and move a unit off the far table edge in four hours. Yea.

The Union forces promptly moved out from the road and advanced, both over the open ground and in the woods. Right now, they outnumbered us, so they must be moving up to inflict as many losses as possible and mess up our deployment. Fine with us. My co-player on my side was also a World War II player, so we decided to soften up the unit on the end of the Union line. Hurt it enough and I figured we could turn the Union flank. One of my guns opened up on that unit, the other counter-batteried one of the two Union guns. Our first reinforcing brigade rolled in and reinforced the center and right. There were a lot of Union troops in that woods.

My partner took over all of the original Confederate troops and our other player took over the new Brigade. He pushed most of the troops into the woods because the Union was advancing there. Then my troops arrived. Our next brigade reinforced the center. We pushed there. My gun took out one of the Union pieces, and the other was taken out with rifled musket fire. My first brigade arrived and moved up by Regiment in four columns, followed by two Regiments (Squadrons?) of Cavalry. The wood battle was turning into a stalemate. We pushed on the open ground. The first result was taking out the second Union gun. That one Regiment on the Union right flank was looking kind of weary by now, so we pushed one original and two reinforcing regiments up, plus the gun and let them have it. Next turn, the original Regiment went in with cold steel behind the fire of two Regiments and the cannon. I rolled unrestricted advance -- full speed plus 3" -- for both my infantry and cavalry. One cavalry regiment went right past the Union line and raced for the bridge. One small Confederate Regiment also went completely around the flank, and the formed cavalry regiment turned the flank and charged into the flank of the Union regiment. Hit by rifled musket fire, canister,an infantry regiment from the front with fixed bayonets, and a cavalry regiment from the flank the Union unit disappeared. The infantry regiment halted and the Cavalry Regiment hit the next Union regiment in the flank, destroying it as well - yea, a successful cavalry charge in ACW! Left was a field gun out of canister. Its left was open as well, as the Union regiment there had also fled from cold steel. We hadn't made it to all our objectives, nor destroyed all of the Union forces, but their line was torn wide open and we had Cavalry unopposed ready to exploit.

And of course, I picked up $$$$ of 15mm figures and some buildings I needed, so ATC was one very good weekend. Nice con.