CanCon Briefly

I journeyed to Canberra in the searing heat.  So extreme was the temperature that even the cow commentary was lacklustre and intermittent.  It would appear that most of the cows had found somewhere to hide from the Sun that involved hiding from me as well.  The journey was ghastly, the heat bored into me until I thought I was going to die.  Well, when I say the journey was ghastly I mean the journey from the door of the air conditioned car to the foyer of the air conditioned hotel.  Still it was a pretty ghastly two and a half seconds.


The next day fifteen ageing cardboard warriors braved the heat and incipient heart attacks to do battle under a blazing sun and (more directly) an airconditioned roof.  We veterans know better than to fight outdoors.  I had high hopes for my CanCon results this year.  I felt I was playing well and peaking at the right moment.  This just goes to show exactly how flawed my judgment can be even without self inflicted head injuries (see below).  Before the inevitable slide into failure and despair there was one brief shining moment when my opponent proved to be slightly more off his game than I was.

Riding to the Rescue

The first scenario saw me pitted against Mark McGilchrist in Riding to the Rescue which involves a bunch of second rate British armour trying to rescue a bunch of second rate British infantry from being monstered by a bunch of definitely first rate Germans.  You may be familiar with this, I played it against Ivan a couple of months ago.  I won it as the Germans and history repeated itself at CanCon.  Mark attempted to go south but found the going slow against my inspired defence which largely consisted of me sitting where I was and hoping the smoke would hide me.  Eager to sweep aside the German rabble Mark plunged into close combat but failed to kill my guys.  Not learning from experience he reinforced the close combat so I moved a squad next to him, broke everyone in the hex and advanced in to butcher two squads and two leaders as they attempted to flee.  My taking out one of his tanks with a critical hit was flashy but had no real impact on the game.  With his leadership destroyed and his surviving troops getting nowhere Mark conceded.

The Chockos

I may have got a little cocky after the early win but I was brought crashing back to earth in the next scenario which saw me commanding a bunch of Australian militiamen defending a bit of the Kokoda track from some high quality Japanese.  My opponent was Joe Moro, he had four and a half turns to sweep across the board and capture a bunch of huts.  If I could hold so much as one hut Joe would be denied.  For the first couple of turns it looked hopeful.  I was maintaining a decent front and skulking effectively as the Japanese rolled forward but eventually Joe got around my right flank and positioned himself for a massive banzai charge at the huts.  There was blood, there were casualties but Joe got up into the village and slaughtered most of the occupants.  While he was doing this I managed to advance into a previously captured hut occupied by a Japanese half squad with a full squad of my own.  If I could kill the half squad in CC I would win.  Kill the half squad I did, unfortunately in return he killed my entire squad leaving the empty hut officially in Joe's possession.

The Glasgow Twins

Well a 50/50 result from the first day wasn't bad and on the second day I settled down to play Eric Topp with still a little confidence in my heart.  We played The Glasgow Twins which has a bunch of not particularly good French troops clinging on to a village in Syria while a bunch of Australian pioneers backed up by some carriers and light tanks.  Should the French survive that long they get a pair of late arriving "armoured cars" which appear to be some convenient trucks that they've bolted locally sourced scrap metal onto.  Eric acted aggressively with his tanks and carriers plunging deep into my rear to block rout paths while his troops pressed forward to inflict the required breaks on my defenders.  It was a tough battle that went the distance (I had the advantage of being in buildings surrounded by orchards) but eventually Eric drove my few remaining squads out of the last buildings to claim a win on the final turn.

Bounty Hunters

My final game in the main competition was against Gordon McClelland.  It involved a bunch of financially motivated Chinese troops trying to seize a village from a group of strung out Japanese.  Just before I was due to start playing this game I managed to split my forehead open on a bathroom door.  I'm not really sure what happened during the game but my opponent informs me that I lost.  He also said I played bravely and the game went to the last turn.  He may just be being kind as my sole clear memory of this game is moving a squad and leader into the open and watching them die under a 4-4 attack that a child could have predicted.

That was it for the main tournament, I'm not too displeased.  I was competitive in each game (the occasional concussion induced cock up notwithstanding).  Just to remind me of my place in the ASL pecking order I played a Hatten in Flames scenario against Jamie Westlake the next morning.  A better term would have been Hatten in Smoke.  It largely consisted of Jamie's Americans advancing behind smoke, killing my Germans and repeating.  I think I did rather well, I drew it out to part way through the second turn before conceding.

Thanks to Andy Rogers for organising another excellent tournament and congratulations to Novak Djokovic who beat an ageing cripple to win the Australian Open title at the same time.