Chicago Skirmish Wargames

Since the early 2010's, CSW has played a variety of games with armies of re-based, pre-painted "Mechwarrior Dark Age" clix miniatures that we purchased in bulk after the demise of that game. The scale of these miniatures is alternately known as 10mm, N Scale or 1/160. That does make them significantly larger than the traditional 6mm size of Battletech miniatures.  However, even with the advent of reasonably priced plastic 6mm Battletech miniatures, we've stuck with our 10mm units. We've already got so many (more than one army per member) and we find that our miniatures being pre-painted (more time to paint 28mm figures), still relatively affordable and having the impressive look of the larger scale still weighs in favor of what we've got.

We've occasionally dabbled in Battletech's "Alpha Strike" rules over the years, but we have given the game a bit more attention lately. It's a great fast-playing ruleset that works well for 10mm without modification and all unit stats and cards are free from the Battletech Master Unit List. Additionally, I've been on a tear to replace all my cardboard 10mm terrain with more traditional model structures (expect a blog post on these structures at some point).

This all came together at the end of last year and beginning of 2024 with a few games played, two of which are pictured below. No detailed battle reports were recorded, but lots of fun was had!

January 22nd 2024.

This was a simple objective battle. It was also a test to see how much N-Scale (or nearly-N-Scale) terrain I had on hand.

February 26th:

A month later and I had built quite a few new structures (mostly from model railroad kits) and expanded a few others. I also brought out the "Hot Wheel World City" roads I had collected over the years. I almost sold these recently and now I'm glad I didn't. The result was a much more impressive looking battlefield.

I like the look of the roads quite a bit. I may remove the yellow center line stickers (wide enough to be 10mm sidewalks) and dust the road sections with a bit of light grey spray paint, but even as-is I think they are a good solution for 10mm gaming. Also needed are some generic concrete pads (probably cut from VCT) to go alongside the roads and place the buildings on.

Very happy with the way these games and the terrain have come together. Though I never could get to like the classic Battletech rules, (much prefer Mech Attack) I'm a big fan of Battletech designs and lore and Alpha Strike makes it possible to fight larger, more dramatic, battles in a reasonable amount of time with a more streamlined, faster-playing ruleset.

In addition to the work mentioned above, I've got a few more building kits to complete and units to base up. Looking forward to playing more and better games of Alpha Strike in 2024!

Karl