The players arrived early Saturday morning at Stryker Airsoft. The sunny skies and 40º weather seemed practically spring-like after a month of blizzards and a recent Nor'easter dumped snow and slush around the countryside. Today was a good day to be playing airsoft.

Operation: Second Dawn was a 3-hour long CQB scenario game written by Moondog. It was inspired by the Second Battle of Fallujah which took place in Iraq in late 2004. OP:SD used MilSim hit rules where only head and torso hits could kill you but limb hits caused disabling wounds. If a player wore a hard helmet or simulated body armor that too could protect you from one or two BB hits.

To familiarize the players with Moondog's new MilSim rules, the first game was a short team elimination game. Winning the round, Mark Twain's team choose to play SECFOR for the first half of the game. Demon's team put on headwraps and took the field as OPFOR. Moondog and the staff at Stryker had dressed the fields with Iraqi movie and election posters to help set the mood.

The field was split into 4 sectors. SECFOR had to clear each sector of OPFOR players before they could proceed across the phase line to clear the next sector. OPFOR players got 1 life per sector and after they were killed would vacate the sector and respawn in the next, in a delaying action against the unlimited respawns of the SECFOR assault.

Twain lead his SECFOR team in a very deliberate manner. As they cleared a sector they took the time to plan out the assault on the next sector. Still, Demon's team put a spirited defense and managed to hold off the SECFOR for nearly a half hour. But 2 minutes before the end of the scenario, OPFOR managed to capture all four HVTs (High Value Target) and complete their mission.

In the final scenario the tables were turned, with OPFOR staging a counter attack on SECFORs recently captured HVTs. OPFOR would get unlimited respawns from the central mosque whilst SECFOR were limited to 1 respawn. OPFOR's objective was to rescue the HVTs and locate captured weapons caches. Demon was able to recover 1 HVT alive but only managed to recover 4 cache cards.


MOONDOG's ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Thanks to Evike for sponsoring the event and supplying the players with swag and prizes. Thanks to Connie and the staff of Stryker for the use of their excellent CQB arena. I'd also like to thank Phridum. of Airsoft Commando, for sharing his first hand experience from serving in Iraq, which helped me devise the scenarios and rules for this game.

Finally I'd like to recognize all the players who weren't scared off by the Nor'easter and came out early Saturday. Some players driving out from as far away as Long Island and Central Pennsylvania.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Moondog is the founder of Moondog Industries and New York's definitive guide to airsoft: NYCAirsoft.