Game: Taiwan Assassin's Mace, Scorpion Sting

Image

elijah234 — 2007-09-27T02:43:31+00:00

Turn and Event Record Sheet

Image

elijah234 — 2007-09-27T02:42:52+00:00

ROC counters

Image

elijah234 — 2007-09-27T02:41:36+00:00

PRC counters

Thread: Re: A podcasters review

FNH1 — 2007-09-23T10:18:20+00:00

drunkenKOALA wrote:
Please use Taiwan instead of Tai because it may be confused with Thai or even hentai.

Fixed!

The designer is also working on a revised version that includes more of the naval aspects of US involvement.

Thread: Re: A podcasters review

drunkenKOALA — 2007-09-23T00:19:26+00:00

Nice review. I've never played a hex and counter wargame but the context of this game may make it interesting for me (I am from Taiwan). Please use Taiwan instead of Tai because it may be confused with Thai or even hentai.

Thread: A podcasters review

FNH1 — 2007-09-22T21:35:43+00:00

This is a hex and counter wargame in the traditional style. Its focus is entirely on a proposed invasion of Taiwan by China.

The history of the games development is that it was created for a monthly competition on the old ( now defunct ) PaperWorlds web site.

The game board is based on a hex map of Taiwan, about twelve hexes by five. It details terrain, cities, airports, landing zones and what I call marshalling areas in the Chinese mainland.

The counters are beautiful to look at and highly colourful. Each counter has a symbol indicating the type of unit, its fighting capability and some have additional symbols for extra abilities, such as air-drop capable.

Setting up can take some time as you have specific localities for each counter. The Taiwanese player splits his forces into three groups and places these as he wishes within deployment zones.

The Chinese player has specific marshalling zones.

The Marshalling zones are linked on the map by lines and these lines indicate allowed movement bewteen them. When the chinese player puts his troops into these he is effectively forming a quere to the top most box which is the sea transport box. Its from this box that troops can be transported to the Taiwanese island.

Each turn consists of Chinese movement in his marshalling areas, then movement by both sides into the Air Superiority box when aircraft fight for superiority. Then players take turns moving their ground based units.

Combat betwen ground counters is quite conventional wargame mechanics. The fight for air superiority is a seperate fight each turn and the winner is able to support ground troops with air power and able to drop air-srop capable units. The Taiwan player is also able to attack the sea carrying capacity with his air power.

The Chinese player has an additional capability. He can use missiles fired from the mainland to attack the Taiwan forces on the island. Use of these missiles links into a nice feature. There is a seperate track that indicates the international interest in the fight. If the track moves to the right then the USA becomes involved and reinforces the Tai player. If it goes further then the Japanese do likewise. The use of missiles against city hexs moves this track.

The Taiwan player has interesting decisions here. If he stacks his counters a missile can take them out. If he doesn't stak he has less chance of winning a fight. If he stacks them in cities, will the Chinese player risk internation involvement?

Combat uses a clever CRT. Even if you win you will lose troops eith a stepped los or a counter loss. It makes you very aware of the effects of attrition. In one of my games I won the fight for air superiority but was left only with a non ground attack aircraft!

There is also a special feature, the "Assassins Mace" and the "Scorpion Sting" are operations that each side may carry out once, and these can have drastic effects.

For instance the Taiwan player might blow dams on the Chinese mainland and this moves world opinion against them!

All in all I think this is a good game. Not great perhaps, but you cant expect more from a game developed and produced within a month. Its best played twice, once on each side, as the game is purposefully designed to favour the Chinese.

Image

FNH1 — 2007-08-06T20:07:56+00:00

main board

Image

FNH1 — 2007-08-06T20:07:05+00:00

Cover Art

Thread: Battle for Taiwan

FNH1 — 2007-08-06T17:58:50+00:00

China invaded Taiwan by landing just North of Tainan. This mobile landing was suported by a few air units and quickly eliminated the forces defending the beach. The Chinese had thier beachhead.

The counter attack used limited ground forces but included the entire Taiwanese airforce . The beachhead was crushed.

The Chinese revenge was swift. Two more landings were proceeded by multiple missile attacks that wiped out multiple divisions. The devastation of urban areas brought the USA close to becoming involved. The two landings were pounded from the air but the Chinese airforce was holding its own in the skies.

The commanders decided that air superiority was the clincher. A terrible fight for air superiority reduced both sides to half strength.

While the fight in the air was going on the massed Taiwanese forces moved against the Chinese in the south, which lead to a battle of attrition that the Taiwanese would lose.

Another huge air battle took place that decisively destroyed the Taiwanese airforce, not a plane was left. Fortunately for the Taiwanese the only remaining Chinese air power had no ground attack capability.

Chinese paratroopers dropped all over the island. Cities changed hands. A general melee took place. The United states and Japan could stand by no longer and landed thier troops on the island. The Japanese troops landed at Taipei and the US Marines in Hsin Chu. These two landings surrounded a Chinese unit but the Marines had the sea at thier back and enemies on three sides.

The new Taiwanese allies were totally successful in thier inital attacks and pushed the Chinese back. Sadly their victory was short lived. Just as the Japanese moved into Su Ao a missile attack destroyed them completely. On the West coast two US brigades were also destroyed by missile attacks.

The south of the island was in Chinese hands, the Taiwanese main force decimated, and so the Island government undertook a secret mission into the Chinese heartland. They blew 3 dams which destroyed three brigades on thier way to the island.

More Chinese landings in the north squeezed the Taiwanese into the mountains in the islands middle. Attrition was having a terrble toll on both sides but in the end the sheer numbers of Chinese forces forced the last two battered and bloodied Taiwanese infantry units to surrender.

China had reclaimed thier territory.