Bolt Action AAR: Spinner and Dinner Bolt Action Event

As I mentioned, we had a special Bolt Action event this past weekend for my friend who is moving out West.  I had no idea what to expect but I really wasn't expected a massive 4 v 4 game on a 12' x 4' table.  It was AMAZING!!!

The view looking west down the table...

...and the view back to the east.

The table was a beautiful set up with lots of interesting terrain for us to deal with.  As luck would have it, I was on the same side as my friend Matt and paired myself off against my friend Chad, the organizer of this and most of the other BA events at the Greenhouse Games.

My fiend Chad pretending he's a pirate as he looks for a target.

To try to put some order on the chaos of having eight players, there were sixteen order dice put into the bag, eight for each side.  When a side's order die was drawn, all the players for that side of the table would active a unit and mark it with their own order dice.  If a player lost a unit and dropped below the eight we started with, then they had a pass they could use instead of activating a unit.  A really elegant way to handle the situation and the game really moved fast, especially on the first couple of turns.

The Big Cheese rolls onto the board, attacks its first victim... and rolls a 1.

There were also four objectives along the length of the board.  The building up on the hill in the above picture was one of them, along with some drums of defective super serum next to a barn, a mule leading an animal uprising by the farm, and a spire in the town square.  Controlling these objectives at the end of the turn would give the side one point for each.  As an added twist, each side also got one of eight special "power ups" the first turn they held an objective.

With my infantry sprinting across the board, I managed to get into the barn next to the serum and pulled the first special power...

It says "Traitor" even though it looks like "Traπoc"

With this power, I rolled a die (in this case a d42 due to casualties the other side had suffered) and counted down the board to from east to west.  The unit that matched the number I rolled was now a dirty, stinking traitor.  Thanks for the flamethrower unit Chad!  Jumping out of their Bren carrier, they lit up a nearby Centurion that was threatening Matt's tank.  The flames didn't take out the tank but they add to the pins and helped keep them out of action for a bit.

I was also able to make ample use of my cheesy pin tokens.  The other side dropped an artillery strike right on top of the Big Cheese and would up putting pins on all of my troops except for the mortar team.

It's raining death... and cheese!

The crazy part was that with all of that death raining from the sky, not one of my units took a casualty!

By the end of the game, our opposition on the eastern side of the board had pretty much collapsed while the western edge was on its way to doing the same.  Big Cheese was the center of attention from Chad's forces which was perfect as it left most of my other units untouched and let Matt and I focus on mopping up the lighter units we were facing.  In short, our side dominated the game, giving Matt the send off that he deserves.

Matt's Afrika Korps storming the hill to take the shrine!

All in all, this was an amazing game and I loved the format.  The other BA games I've played have always been one on one but this larger game gives this great interactive dynamic that you just can't beat.  Chad really enjoyed running it and said he's going to try to put together another event like it soon which will be awesome!  Until next time...