I'm your huckleberry...

 

A change of games this week as Andrew and I managed to squeeze in a couple of boardgames in one evening.

First up was an outing for the old Avalon Hill game 'Gunslinger', one of my favourite games back in the 80s.  My original set was purchased on a family holiday appropriatley in the USA where I remember being amazed at the availability of games in mainstream shops.  My original set vanished at some point (I think when I moved down to England) and I picked up a rather battered set cheaply a few years ago.

Each player manages a number of characters with clichéd Cowboy titles... the Marshall, the Quiet Man, the Sodbuster etc, there's even a floozy for the bar room scenarios!  Each turn is broken into 5 phases and players allocate action cards (move, draw, cock pistol, shoot etc) for each phase (or phases, depending how long the action takes).  A separate card deck determines whether an attack is successful and what the outcome us, so it's a dice free game.

As neither of us had played for a long time we went with the introductory scenario which pitches 2 opponents facing off close to each other in a  empty corral.  The rulebook claimed this was based on a historical encounter between Doc Holliday and Johnny Ringo although checking afterwards it looks like in reality Ringo shot himself in a drunken fit of depression so not quite the encounter of legend.

In our first run through we blazed away at close range, generally failing to hit each other despite taking the time to aim properly until a lucky shot from my character Ringo hit Doc Holliday in the leg and left him bleeding in the dust (like the pesky varmint he was, etc...).  Holliday is limited by having fewer endurance points thanks to his nasty case of TB.

We replayed the scenario and this time I decided to go for a more cinematic approach ignoring aiming and blasted away fanfiring the gun like they do in all the best movies... again Andrew was very unlucky with the result card and Doc went down with a shot to the body

We both had great fun with the game... inevitably we ended up making suitable gun noises and spouting cowboy clichés which is all part of the fun.  Definitely one to try again with a more complex scenario soon.  I've always reckoned it would also be an easy game to play using miniatures instead of counters.  I've always found Gunslinger gives a really good narrative game that feels.like a movie.

We finished off the evening with a quick run through of Undaunted Normandy as Andrew hadn't played it before.  I've played this a few times but never got beyond the introductory scenario!  

It's easy to pick up and, despite me failing to add some important cards to the deck until part way though, we rattled though the game with Andrew's Americans winning comfortably (although we missed this for a turn or so because we hadn't counted the VPs properly!).  A nice combination of a simple game but one that you need to think carefully about tactics in.

Strength and Honour: take 2

 Earlier in November we tried our first game of Strength and Honour (details here) and the verdict was very positive.  Because it was our 1st game it all took a while to get going and we didn't get too far into it, so we had another attempt this week with slightly reduced forces and less faffing about as we were a bit more familiar with the rules....

This time the Romans were facing off against some Germanic tribes (I've just finished watching 'Barbarians' on Netflix... recommended!).  We quickly worked through the set up and deployment and found that the vast German forests had disappeared, leaving a largely open battlefield with only a marsh and a couple of hills to break it up.

As we had fewer units this time deployment was a bit easier, especially for the Romans.  As units deploy off of the previously deployed one it can be easy to get in a bit of a muddle... the marsh hindered my German Warbands but as they can be supported from the rear I was able to add in the last of my Warbands at the back.  The Romans dont get this rear support bonus so needed to think more carefully about where to go (but there were fewer of them so not such a challenge).  

I'm still not sure I've fully grasped the rules on deploying skirmishers... these can be deployed as a unit or attached to other formed troops.  We think we needed to deploy the skirmishers on table 1st and then allocate them so this meant they could only be attached to the rear units but we may have got this wrong and I need to re-read the rules on this

The rules reward what feel like appropriate tactics... charging enthusiastically for the Warbands and a steady controlled advance for the Romans.  I decided there was nothing to be gained by hanging back so my Germanic hordes headed straight for the Roman lines.  

The Romans were a bit more cautious, trying keep their lines intact and both sides had units forced back and began to gather Setback cards.  The Romans had a single cavalry unit and I really ought to have paid more attention to it as it successfully wheeled and charged onto the flank of kne of the warbands, driving it back across the rear of the German lines.

Crunch...the cavalry charge into the flank of the rear Warband

The tussling continued on both sides and we did eventually run out of time again but much closer to a conclusion.  Based purely on Setback cards the Germans were slightly ahead but my warbands were now lacking their rear support and were pinned down by the Legions.  It seems you can only initiate an attack if you can equal your opponents combat factor (so no possibility of a brave but doomed charge) and the Romans were in a very strong position and unless I was very lucky would have been able to crush the warbands if we'd played on a for another turn or 2.

Very impressed with these rules... I'll need to add some more Romans as it would be good to see how a Civil War game plays out.

Warfare 2022

 

I missed SELWG the other week as they've moved it to North London and the journey across town was a bit too convoluted for me, so my last wargames show of the year is Warfare which has moved from Reading to a much more convenient Farnborough (although some traffic jams on the A3 and a road closure on the way meant it wasn't quite the smooth journey I'd hoped for).

The new venue is the Farnbrough Exhibition Centre next to the airport which makes for some interesting views as you drive in

Warfare is a 2 day show with a lot of competition games as well as the usual demo and participation games.  It seemed pretty busy... I didn't get there till after 1pm so I suspect it had been even busier in the morning.  

A couple of traders said they'd been having a really good day so fingers crossed the new venue has worked out well.

I was very restrained and nearly didn't buy anything but inevitably I weakened at the last minute and picked up a box of Gripping Beast Picts for a very good price.  They can be added to my Arthurian/Dark Age project.

So here are a  selection of photos... as usual I generally forgot to not who was putting on the game so apologies in advance...

Wagram

Carentan- Retired Wargamers Reloaded

Imjin

Vietnam game using Bohica rules which I nearly bought

Excellent Cold War game by Sheppey Wargames Club

Battle of Nice-Malvern Old Gamers

Finally a special mention for the Guildford Wargames Club...an excellent demo of the fictional Battle of Dorking from the 1871 novel (link).  The game looked excellent  even including some Victorian versions of those annoying cyclists I always get stuck behind when I go to Box Hill!

Guildford was my regular club for many years... it's been nearly 4 years since I've made it there for a game so it was nice to see some of the guys again and I'll have to get down for another game soon.

 

Happy 10th Anniversary to me!

The other day it occurred to me that this blog had been in existence for quite a few years now and when I checked I discovered that today is it's 10th birthday!

I started the blog really as a way of recording what I was playing and to try and inspire me to stick at some projects.  Lots of bloggers seem to report similar reasons for starting (and to feed the ego of course 😉) and its interesting to look back on some of the old posts.  Often it just reminds me how slow I am to get a project onto the table and to see which ones have fallen by the wayside.

Sadly a lot of the early photos seem to have disappeared but many are still up there.

My gaming has changed a lot since 2012.  10 years ago I was a regular at the Guildford Wargames Club and most Monday evenings were spent there.  Thanks to the blog I connected with Eric the Shed and his collective of gamers and increasingly I moved my Monday night games to the Shed.  It turns out I knew some the Shed group from a previous games club several years before. It's a great group of gamers with the sort of attitude where a good game is more important than a win (although a win is always nice!) and I count myself lucky to have fallen in with such a great group.  I also game with a couple of good friends, both ex-Guildford members who, like me were struggling with getting to the club (Guildford's a great club but I was struggling to get there in time)

Looking at the stats there have been 457 posts to date and lots of views... some of these have even been by real people and not the regular drive-by bots.  

The most popular seem to be anything to do with boardgames or reviews of shows like Salute, which makes sense, but bizarrely also a post about a game based on the Battle of Falkirk, one about the game Congo (which I haven't played in years and really ought to), and one about Donnybrook which I bought and have never played (but again really ought to).

Thanks to everybody who pops in and comments.  It's never been about racking up views but it's nice to know that my ramblings are landing somewhere.  Here's to the next 10 years!

Roman in the Gloamin'

(Apologies for the terrible pun in the title... I blame Tradgardland)

 So, after much snipping and gluing, my Romans and Ancient Britons finally faced off for an inaugural game of Strength and Honour this week.

The squares on the mat looked ok (as long as you didn't look too closely) and we decided to go for the full effect and stick to paper terrain as well.  To be fair we didn't get far enough in to reach a conclusion so this is very much my initial impressions.

The game is designed for 2mm figures although it can be stretched to larger ones without difficulty, and we were using 10mm giants.  It took us a while as, despite careful pre-reading of the rules and watching a playthrough in YouTube, there was still a bit of flicking back and forth to check things.  I think we'd be a lot quicker next time round.

Once we'd sorted the terrain (generally open... partly because I'd forgotten to bring hills) with a village and a wood being the only features) we began deploying.  This is the first interesting feature of the game.  Units have to deploy adjacent to the most recently placed unit (imagine them all gradually marching on from a long column) and manoeuvring isn't easy in S&H so getting your deployment right is tricky but important.  You can place units elsewhere on the table but at the cost of a valuable Strategy Point.

Each player has a number of points to use to aid Combat, Defence, Movement etc...these let you re-roll dice, remove bad stuff etc.  As you'd expect the Romans have more of these than the Britons.  Roman troops are also significantly better quality but the Britons get a lot more points to play with.

This was more of an issue for the Romans than the Britons (who get rear support while Romans don't) so Anthony had to spend a lot of time trying to reorganise his lines once we started.  I actually quite like this... I've always felt Ancient games shouldn't allow too much fancy manoeuvring and shuffling about as the command and control wasn't sophisticated enough to allow this.

The battle opened with the Roman cavalry charging at the flying column of British Light Cavalry and Chariots on my right flank (I'd used a point to reposition them off to one side in the hope that might be able to turn a flank).  It quickly became obvious that my Light Cavalry was very outclassed by the superior Roman horse but they managed to hold on for a turn which allowed me to bring up supporting units and even the odds.  This tussle went on for the rest of the game.

The British flying column of cavalry and chariots

In the centre the Roman Auxilia unit had advanced bravely and looked like a sitting duck for my Warbands but I failed a Manoeuvre roll and play passed back to Romans (failing certain tests for movement etc or a bad combat result is classed as a Reversal of Fortune and play switches).  This meant the Roman Legions could march up in the centre, with some difficult manoeuvres, and support them. A series of clashes in the centre then saw a Warband pushed back but the Auxilia forced to turn away and Retire.

When bad stuff like this happens the loser takes a Setback or a Disaster card without looking at them...each card has a value ranging from 0-3 for setbacks and up to 7 for Disasters.  The opposing player can challenge and ask for the values to be counted which, if it has reached a high enough score, can lead to the army becoming fatigued or routing.  Of course if you challenge and the score isn't high enough then the challenger has to take their own card so timing this is important 

So we'd both taken a number of cards... Anthony, being a wily Roman, had used some of his points to cancel these.  Even so, the game was finely balanced... and then we ran out of time...

We'd been quite slow to get going, faffing about with the terrain placement and working our way through how deployment works, so it wasn't surprising that we wouldn't reach a conclusion  So what's the verdict...?

Based on this I liked the rules.  Plusses for me were the importance of deployment and manoeuvring, the hidden Setback cards and the back and forth of combat.  The Minuses were, I think, mainly down to us being slow and having to check the rules a lot.  The rules do have a decent index though which is always a good thing (and is often missing from rules).  Combat was less bloody than I expected (again this may also be a good thing) and it felt like it was going to take us a long time to get to a resolution but I think this may have been my fault in being too ambitious for a first game and having too much on the table.  It's always tempting to get all the toys out when fewer would have been better for a first attempt.  Next time we'll cut it down a bit and see how it goes.

 Overall though a big thumbs up (or summitatibus manuum) for the rules.  The paper armies looked the part too... en masse and in this scale they look really effective.