WBC West - Day 3 - A Most Dangerous Time, Pt 1 (of 3)

Since A Most Dangerous Time has extremely variable (and many) turns, I am eschewing the approach I used with the last two days and instead reverting to a series replay approach. Not may photos here, I do include one in this post just to give a sense of where the game was at halftime, and it will be in the next posting.

I am taking Oda, Mike takes Anti-Oda.

Turn 1 -
Nobunaga: My negotiation rolls go nowhere. Standard opening, but a terrible movement roll (1). I move Sakuma to Mt. Hiei in prep for the Enryaku Ji's appearance next turn. Takigawa moves to the transit spot with the idea of Negotiating with the adjacent minor next activation. A bit risky, but not too much I can do with a roll of 3.

Anti-Oda Minors: Myoshi moves into Ibaraki to besiege Shibata.

End Turn: No regroup, and I get a card, #43. Not terribly useful yet.

Turn 2 -
Nobunaga: Up first again. No more restriction against going into Azai spaces! Again no luck with negotiations. I roll a 2 for movement, goes up to 4. I move Hashiba with three units into Sawayama, where the two Azai units are besieged. Niwa does the same in Mitsukuri. I assault in Mitsukuri against the Rokakku, but loses a unit to no gain. I don't assault in Hashiba, figuring I'll get negotiation chances against them.

Anti-Oda Minors: Mike makes no moves, only assaults Shibata in Ibaraki, loses a unit for his trouble.

End Turn: Deja vu! We each have units to regroup., my single Oda unit goes to Araki who is in Kannon-ji, Mike's to Noda. I also notice that the monks put Nobunaga out of communication, so I'll need to do something about that.

Turn 3 -
Oda: This is starting to feel like a broken record. This time I am able to negotiate Obama, but that's just one more unit to get out of Dodge. I move Nobunaga and his eight units down to Mt. Hiei. No combat this turn.

Nobunaga: Negotiations all fail. Time for new diplomats. Better movement roll, a total of 7. I move Nobunaga to Ibariki to lift the siege. I also move Takigawa with three units to near Miyazu to continue converting minors, and a couple of units from Otsu to Minakuchi to help Nwa against the Rokokku.

Azai/Asakura: Mike rolls a one, takes back Kanagaski.

Anti-Oda Minors: Mike chooses to leave his units in place.

Ikko-Ikki: We notice that the Ikko-Ikki chit was not in the cup. Whoops. We give Mike the activation automatically. He rolls three, moves units to Mt. Shigi to attack Matsunaga, we trade units in the assault.

End Turn: Mike gets some units back, not so much for me. I now have three cards, 62, 43, 31.

Turn 4 -
I draw Turn End immediately, use the Good Fortune (we are using modified rules for this) to redraw because I got things to do as Oda.

Anti-Oda Minors: No activity.

End Turn: Crap, didn't need that. Mike regroups his Myoshi, nothing else to do. I draw card 53, utterly useless to me.

Turn 5 -
End Turn: F*ck me. I draw card #32, which *is* useful.

Turn 6 -
I use the Brilliant Maneuver card to draw Nobunaga.
Nobunaga: I convert the minor in Kakegawa, but no joy anywhere else. I move two more units into Mitsukuri to assault, but just lose them for my trouble. As Takeda comes in next turn, I choose to move Araki and two units to Gifu to cover my home castles.

End Turn: Holy Crap. Takeda comes in, i take card 33. Some of these are starting to look useful. I regroup the two killed units into Kiyosu and Ibaraki.

Turn 7 -
Ikko-Ikki: Mike assaults Mt. Shigi and takes the space with one loss to himself. Matsunaga falls and goes over to the Anti-Oda faction and is placed in the Ikko-Ikki box.

Shingen: Shingen and three units advance into Iwamura to assault my castle. Yamagata assaults and takes the betrayed unit in Kakegawa. Iwamura holds out but fails to take any units. He's better off trying to negotiate anyway.

I use Master of Tactics to take back the Brilliant Maneuver, then use it to play Nobunaga.

Nobunaga: I convert Futamata and Tanba Kameyama. I convert Araki to a Daimyo, then add two through Forced March to my movement. I leave skeleton forces in Gifu and Kiyosu, move the remaining force to Iwamura to relieve the units there. I also move Nobunaga to Noda to try to alleve some of the pressure in the south. Nobunaga wipes out Myoshi but the clan is intact as their home castle is hard to get to. At Iwamura, Araki blows a very good chance at an upset, but Shingen gets the initiative and wipes out a good portion of Araki's force. However, Araki gets out with one unit, saving the two units in the space from being converted.

End Turn: I reinforce at Kyo, Ibaraki, Kiyosu, and Kuwana. Mike gets a few II units and one Myoshi.

Turn 8 -
Anti-Oda Minors: Nothing for Mike to do.

Takeda: Rolls 2 for movement. He advances into Toki to assault, loses two units for his trouble.

Nobunaga: Negotiations all fail. I move Nobunaga to Kuwana to try to take on Shingen.

Oda: Yay! Plus, I finally convert one of the units in Sawayama. It and the remaining unit fight in the castle and eliminate each other, so I take the space. I roll well for my movement, and Nobunaga runs all the way out to Toki to relieve Araki, which is successful as Shingen retreats with two units. I also move Hashiba up into Yokohama to press the Azai, hopefully to kill them off.

Shingen: Mike brings up one unit to reinforce Shingen.

Ikko-Ikki: Mike brings up forces to try to take back Noda Fukushima. In the assault, I take out one II unit, and Mike whiffs.

End Turn: Whew. I place my three units in Kyo, Ibakari, and Mike gets a couple of II and Myoshi units. More important is the two Takeda units he gets back. I draw 48 to go with 47 last turn.

Next up: Turns 9-16...