Saturday 12 December 2015

Black Ops

We had an opportunity to try the new Osprey rule set "Black Ops" last Thursday at the Club.


A high ranking diplomat had been kidnapped by local rebels some where in Central Asia.  The rebels were a mix of poor quality militia, mercenaries and an FSB team on site to interrogate the prisoner.  A special forces team supported by regular troops were despatched to rescue him.

We played the stealth game with 5 guards in position and the rest of the defenders unable to act until the alarm was raised.


Overall table layout.

In the first game the attackers hadn't really got to grips with the stealth concept.  They ran (which created noise) and tried to take out a sentry with a shotgun!  In addition the support squad couldn't hit a barn door and with some 16 noise tokens in very short order the defenders were soon up and ready. Seriously outnumbered the spec ops assault team were soon taken out and the attackers called it a day.  The mission failed, casualties were heavy and questions were asked in the House!

By the second game things had improved.  The assault team moved in quietly while the support sniper quietly took out three of the guards.


The bulk of the defenders were taken out before the alarm was raised leaving the FSB team, who were quartered on the other side of the village, to try and get away with the hostage.

It looked like they might have got the hostage to a landrover but this was quickly destroy by the support team when they realised what was happening.


The game came down to a great final scene when inches away from the table edge, the final 2 FSB agents with the hostage were chased down by the assault team leader.  With 2 shots pistol shots he took out both agents and avoided hitting the hostage.  

Hostage rescued, minimal friendly casualties and commendations all round.

These really are a fun set of rules. We did somethings wrong and the rules are a little vague in some places but a quick look at a couple of posts on the Lead Adventure Forum has cleared these up.  I highly recommend these rules to anyone who wants to play small action modern games.  Equally they would work for a whole host of scenarios and periods.

Highly recommended!

I used my Copplestone Future Wars figures but am seriously tempted to invest in some of the Empress and Spectre Miniature moderns.

Here's a few more shots of the game

Hostage (with briefcase) in the central building


FSB agent faces off against the Support Team while an RPG armed rebel cowers behind cover.


Support Team in cover.


Rebels, mercs and FSB defend the village.






4 comments:

  1. Fantastic looking game and an interesting report. These rules really work, it would be nice to see other write ups as well!

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    1. I agree. Hopefully we'll get some other games in and I'll post as well.

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  2. Great looking table. I use these rules with an eclectic mix of sci-fi troops - and that's without touching the sci-fi material in the rulebook. We figure a pistol is a pistol; whether it shoots bullets or plasma the game effect is the same. We haven't tried the stealth rules yet, but from reading them it's easy to see how those NOISE markers can pile up on you quicker than you think.

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    1. Thanks Warren. Yes the rules really are very flexible. The stealth rules are very well done. if the players take care not to make noise (don't run, fire etc) they can control the noise quite well. In our second game the only firing was initially done by the sniper and he hit 3 out of 3 targets and took them out. It was interesting seeing the decision making of the players and them having to weigh whether to take an action that creates noise. Definitely recommend playing the stealth game, it adds a whole new dimension and is quite a different game to the normal skirmish games.

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