Handing out swim suits to the French

Half of the French Fleet I was facing tonight. Did I mention Stonehead is an excellent painter? :-D

The other half. Yay, more flying ships. ^^

So tonight was the third round of the Swiss DW Cup in Basel with the winners entering the semi finals. Since I never intended to go beyond the group stage I saw this as an added bonus. The bonus got even better when I saw Stonehead's beautifully painted French fleet again. :-)

Swiss DW Cup, 3rd round

Stonehead vs. Parcival
1'000 pts each
Republic of France vs. Empire of the Blazing Sun

This is how we set up.

As it turned out later, Stonehead picked the Field Order to kill all my medium sized ships (only my three Tanuki Class Gunships) whereas I decided to kill his small ones (two small groups of vessels). He surprised me, though, when setting up the table by putting each group of small vessels into one of his corners so I'd have to stretch myself quite a bit to get them.

End of round 1.

In round 1, my Tenkei Sky Fortress started eating up fire exactly as she was meant to do according to the teachings of Master Rufus.
On my left flank, my Uwatsus and the elegant Fujin started to sail using the protection of the island towards Stoneheads group of four small destroyers in the upper left corner in hopes of bringing me significantly closer to accomplishing my field order.
On my right flank, my wings of torpedo bombers flew forward to hunt down the two small whatevers in the upper right corner.

The French carrier (right next to the island in the back) suffered a magazine explosion in round 2 which was a significant moment.

In round 2, a significant moment happened when I scored ten hits against the French carrier which resulted in a Critical Hit which resulted in a Magazine Explosion on a roll of snake eyes (double ones). The French carrier was no more meaning that the French airplanes couldn't land, refill, and take off anymore either.

End of round 2.

On other news, in round 2 my fast Fujin started to harass his destroyers in the upper left and managed to sink one. Two groups of Uwatsus were steaming up behind them to finish them off in the 3rd round since he didn't pull them back towards the center.
In the center, my third group of Uwatsus and my Dreadnought let hell loose. My Sky Fortress did what she always did - eating up damage.
On my right flank, my Torpedo Bombers attacked the French medium sized ships because their heat lances were a significant danger to my Dreadnought. I figured my flyers could still land on the Sky Fortress for refills and then take off again to finish off their two small targets.

In the middle of turn 2, Stonehead asked me if we could finish the game after turn 3 since he had another appointment this evening, too, so the next round was going to be decisive.

The Dreadnought felt like clearing the path.

In round 3, I proceed to eliminate targets on the flanks to achieve my Field Order whereas Stonehead was laying down the law in the center of the table. My Dreadnought ate some more damage, but when it was finalls its turn, it steamed ahead for three inches and rammed this funny French ship - scoring a Critical damage and another Magazine Explosion. With its reinforced ram, the Dreadnought was neither impressed by the collision nor by the following explosion at all. :-D

End of round 3.

On my left flank, my Fujin and Uwatsus ringed the French destroyers and finished them off. In the center, the Dreadnought fired its three main canons at close range into the enemy ships causing even more damage. The last tanuki and the Sky Fortress tried to shoot the remaining small ship in the upper right corner again, but failed to do so. The airplanes didn't do anything since they were empty on torpedoes and reloading them made no sense as it was the last round.

Counting together the points at the end, the game ended with a victory for me (554pts) and an unfortunate defeat for Stonehead (195pts). In other words, despite my expectations I made it into the semi finals. :-D Now I wonder who I will play there. :-)