Firebase Vietnam (1)

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Firebase Vietnam is an insert game which arrived with C3i 34. It's a single sheet of 3 status tracks with a sheet of rules, 8 counters, you supply 4 dice. Basically, roll dice and see what happens.

The basic idea seems to be elimiinating as many VC as possible to choose among several "Bronze Star" awards which adjust the status track accordingly. This is the only thing I intend on tracking for this game.

Bronze Stars:

  1. Eliminate all VC squads in outer perimeter.
  2. Ignore Phase 1 next turn.
  3. Increase defense by 3.
  4. Increase Support by 1. Now all I need to do is roll a 5 or a 6 to win it.

Rolled a 6 to get the win.

The strategy here is just rolling all the dice all the time on the VC, and, and let the VC elimination get free status movement. Ignoring phase 1 allows rolling all 4 dice on the Support track.

Apparently, the game was inspired by the book Abandoned in Hell the fight for Firebase Kate, which I have on Kindle.

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What to play next?

Deciding what to play next is always a tough call when faced with a closet full of games, all of which were purchased with intent to play. Here's one I'm dealing with the decision.

  • Something New: this means both something new to me and a game which has been published recently, within the last two or three years.
  • Something Classic: I've acquired a number of games properly considered "classic" which haven't yet been played. The current example would be PanzerGruppe Guderian.
  • Something Again: mastery requires constant practice, which means playing games many, many times to allow nuance to appear.
  • Something Vietnam: as I'm on a Vietnam binge. I don't have all the Vietnam games ever published, but I can say that I have a lot of them, and probably more than most people.
  • Something Obscure: as it's fun to poke around in the dustier corners of game design.
  • Something Different: break away from the same old publishers and try a game from one of the new kids on the block. Or, conversely, dip into legacy with a classic tried and true.
  • Something Light: once in a while it's nice to actually finish a game all the way through in one sitting, in an hour or two.
  • Something Heavy: if possible, it's nice to set up something big and complicated which can be left out for days or weeks or even months, for a leisurely stroll through a very large or long game.

There are surely many more ways to choose, but the above method keeps me busy enough, helps me get both breadth and depth into my play, and provides me with a sense of progress.

The odd man out

When there is an odd man out:

  • Have a solo game ready to play.
  • Keep score or advise on a game in progress.
  • Referee a game in progress.