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The morning's light brought us ill news.  Some time over the course of the
night, the Americans dropped in some reinforcements to increase their
numbers.  It seems that they are not content to occupy our country, but they
also wish to destroy our economy and intimidate us with their numbers.  The
local peasants are terrified by the aircraft flying overhead regularly now,
fearing a "mistaken" airstrike against them.  We do our best to offer
security to our people, but the Americans will attack civilian targets
without a second thought, claiming it a "war on drugs."  We will show them
war.

[The first mission was to intercept some reinforcements heading for the
base.  They were dropped into the north field and had to make their way
along the main road leading into their base.  We sent out our main force to
intercept them and attempt to control the bridges that act as access points
to the north field.  We quickly gained control of the west bridge and moved
to the central.  Here, we met some light resistance, but soon we gained the
middle bridge as well.  Alpha squad then moved to the area west of the
trenches and began to engage the enemy at longer ranges.  We took some
casualties, but our medics were able to keep people in the fight.]

As we assaulted the Americans, we learned that there were pieces of a plane
we shot down earlier somewhere in the area.  Our fearless leader ordered us
to recover the seat of the plane in order to prove to the world what is
going on in our country and to show the Americans the very real threat they
face by meddling in our affairs.  Some of our countrymen gave us the general
area where the plane went down, but due to their poor education and terrible
directional skills, it took us some time to find it.  We only happened upon
it when one of our fighters was chased into the thick woods by enemy
soldiers.  Right before he was killed, he transmitted the location of the
seat so that we could recover it.  In light of this difficulty, I have taken
it as a personal initiative to help improve the education of our poor
country.  Once this is all over, I hope our people will have a basic
understanding of distances and directions.

[We were tasked with finding the seat from the F18 recon plane that was shot
down earlier in the story line.  This, for some reason, was the most
difficult mission for us because we couldn't seem to figure out where the
sparse intel we had intended us to look.  After scouring the entire north,
north east, and extreme north west sections of the field, we gave up on the
seat.  It was not until the second day of action that one of our medics just
happened upon the seat as he was being chased from the trenches.  He
broadcast the location of it to the team incase he was hit, and we quickly
mounted a recovery team to get it.  Myself and the majority of Delta cell
recovered it and Delta made the successful delivery to our base.]

After we had bloodied the Americans' noses, we began to get our mortars in
place.  Our fearless leader himself moved and assembled the mortars, leaving
the rest of us to continue showing the Americans what a bad idea it was to
come to our island!  With the help of these mortars, we were able to fight
on the same terms as the intruders, raining down fire and destruction from
the sky, keeping them in constant fear of our just retribution for invading.
  Once these were in place, it was now time to strike at the traitors within
our own border.  One whose name I will not speak, a traitor to his own
people and country, was en route to meet with the Americans to give them
information against us.  Ha! Those swine shot the traitor's own body guard! 
The Americans killed one of his escorts, then realized who he was. 
Thankfully, they left him with only one guard while they ran off, in fear no
doubt.  My own lieutenant and medic stumbled upon the waiting traitor and
killed him and his escort.  Death to all those who would oppress the people!

[We were tasked with setting up our mortars and securing them.  At this
point, we were able to hold most of the combat at the east end of the field,
keeping the Americans occupied just outside their base and then up into the
northern field.  Our commander was able to carry out this mission himself
without any interference.  Once this was done, we were to seek out Rico Diaz
and assassinate him, as well as eliminate any guards sent with him.  Two
Alpha cell members were moving through the trenches when they spotted the
waiting Diaz and eliminated the entire entourage.]

As the battle grew, we decided to recover some hidden weapons to help us
repel the invaders.  Our weapons were stashed all across the island, so we
had to do a little leg work.  We made it to one of the caches, just as the
enemy was coming up on it.  We secured the weapons and got them out. 
Another group of our soldiers quickly found a second cache and extracted it.
  We had a hard time fighting to the north side of the island, but we
eventually got a foot hold and sent people to recover the last cache. 
Things did not go so well.  The Americans found the weapons before we could,
largely due to the time it took us to get into the north.  They destroyed
the weapons before we could recover them, but hey, two out of three ain't
bad, or so that American rock singer says.  Despite this set back, we were
able to arm our mortars and rain doom down upon the doomed heads of our
doomed enemies!

[We did, in fact, manage to get two of the caches back to base.  We had some
heavy fighting over one case, however we were able to secure it and
transport it out safely.  The last case, located on the extreme north end of
the field, was never recovered.  The plan was to punch a hole across the
creek and get Bravo cell across to search the field.  We had a hard time
gaining access to the northern field, but we finally got them across, albeit
too late.  Later on, we were able to recover the one cache we lost, but we
did not know that it had already been removed from play, just following
orders.  We then sent some of the mortar rounds to the weapons to arm them
and put them to use.]

Once our mortars were armed, we had to take out a communications relay tower
nearby.  The Americans and the pitiful Federal troops were using it to
assist in their field communications, and they had to be taught that any
structure they place on our land will be destroyed.  We do not tolerate
foreign governments using our airwaves against us!

[Now we had to destroy a tower by actually gaining access to it and planting
a charge.  Since we had control over most of that end of the field, we were
able to easily make our way to the tower and plant the charge.  This mission
went off without any interference or fighting.]

A courier from Soro was bringing us a message when he was intercepted by the
Americans.  We were tasked with finding him and escorting him back to our
commander.  Sadly, this brave soldier was killed before we could come to his
aid.  When Soro learned that his courier was down, he quickly made his way
to our position to help out.  We learned that the Americans had dropped
another package into the area and once again, we set out to close their post
office!

[The courier we were supposed to protect and escort never stood a chance. 
Before we could even find him, he was eliminated.  I never even saw the
courier.  I don't think ANYONE saw the courier but the enemy.  Next time,
I'm going to request that he not go waltzing through a combat zone.  Stoopid
shortcuts!  Not dwelling on this defeat, we had new orders to once again
intercept a package that was dropped by the Americans into the field.  Yet
again, we were unable to even come close to the area without having to fight
our way through.  We killed quite a number of them, but ultimately they were
able to recover their package.]

We learned the terrible news of the latest package.  The American scientists
developed a virus to kill our coca plants, destroying our economy
completely.  Many people on our island depend on the money earned from the
coca plant.  The foreign invaders wish to strip these people of their
livelihoods, forcing them to starve, simply because they do not approve of
what we do on our own soil, with our own resources!  We took the war to
them, once again, but sadly we were unable to locate any of the bombs. 
While our coca production is now ruined, we have succeeded in forcing the
invaders out of our country and off our soil.  We inflicted heavy casualties
all the way to their helicopters, never once letting them forget that WE
drove them out.  We do not falter in the face of a bully; we will not step
down; we will not retreat from those who oppress us!  The people will rise up
and speak with one voice!  And soon, the Americans will hear that voice
echoing across their land!

[There was another package dropped into the area and we had to recover it. 
We failed to do so, but yet again we inflicted serious casualties.  We
learned that the items were bombs and the enemy had to place them around the
field, then extract once they were set.  Despite our frantic searching, they
were able to set all three bombs and extract.  The fighting was extremely
fierce all the way to the LZ, but they succeeded in getting out.  We may be
down our main cash crop, but next year, we're playing for keeps!]

After Thoughts:

This was one of the best produced games I've attended to date.  I have to
give Team Blackjack credit for their props and new medic system.  It was
great to be hauling around a weapons crate that actually had AK47s in it,
even if they were cheap springers.  The mortars were well built, and that
ejection seat was damn heavy!  Silly me for thinking I'd just take a little
stroll through the woods with it.

The medic system used for the game was truly innovative.  Blackjack had
decks of cards made for the medics.  Each deck had 4 cards in it, Grazing
wound, Light Wound, Serious Wound, and Lethal wound.  The card drawn
dictated how long the medic had to stay in contact with the player to heal
them, 1 minute, 3 minutes, 5 minutes, and the final card indicating that the
player was dead and had to respawn.  At first I wasn't sure how this would
work, but providing that everybody was shuffling their decks and following
the rules, it worked out great.

Adam Phillips

Team Llama