A visit to the Shed...

No game at Guildford this week...instead I ventured a couple of miles down the road to visit Giles and his famous Shed.

This was its first outing after a bit of a revamp and it was even more impressive than before with a huge 15' long table and some fantastic scenery.  Giles had very kindly agreed to put on a game for Legatus Hedlius and I along with fellow Shed-ers [is that a word?] Matt and Mark.  On this occasion it was a Bolt Action game in a VBCW setting...my first encounter with both the rules and the setting.

No photos from me as I was too busy rolling dice and trying to keep up with the fast pace of the game.  Despite managing to just about hang on the central objective and Mark being close to seizing a second the clock counted down and the Evil Fascists managed to clinch the game.

There's an excellent write up and lots of photos here.... Shed Wars

Hammerin' Iron

This week saw a rare outing for my ACW Ironclads and the Peter Pig Hammerin' Iron rules.

My ships are 1:1200 models that I picked up from Ebay years ago... Peter Pig do a lovely range of ships in 1:600 and I did buy a few of these last year, thinking to upscale my collection.  I've put them somewhere safe... unfortunately I've no idea where!  One day I'll stumble across them and it'll be a pleasant surprise I'm sure...

As with most PP games there is a pre-game sequence which determines who is attacks and who defends.  The attacker gets all his ships they arrive in a staggered manner over several turns.  The defender has even fewer out of his starting 6 ships and they are even later in arriving, but does get a fort.

The attacker's objectives are to defeat the enemy ships [obviously] but also to attack some transport ships and some riverside warehouses.

Finally, having worked out who is attacking and defending and set up the shoreline depots, islands and sandbanks, the players spend points on 'assets'.  These range from fire rafts.torpedoes and submarines to improving a ships gunnery, causing something 'bad' to happen to an enemy ship and causing night to fall.

The central island with the markers showing a line of mines.

 

 

I was the attacking Union player with Mike's Confederate fleet defending, or at least they would have been in most of them had bothered to arrive!  For half the game he only had 2 ships actually on table with a 3rd arriving later on.

He managed to release the first of his fire rafts directly into the path of one of my ships early on and continued to hound it throughout the game with his late arriving ship finishing it off by ramming. Unfortunately the turn after his successful ram he rolled a double 6 for a critical hit and his ship exploded!  On the other riverbank 2 of the Union ships ran past the guns of the fort which proved less than effective, causing hardly any damage.

The Confederate fire rafts drift downstream...

 

 

A union ship on fire...luckily it went out quickly

 

Like many PP games there is also a 'clock' counting down to the end of the game and shortly after the exploding Ironclad incident the clock struck 8 and the game ended.  The result was 2 Confederate ships lost to 1 Union but the transports had been wiped out and the warehouses pretty battered giving a major Union victory.

The Union ships head for the defenceless transports

These have been the best Ironclad rules I've come across so far.  There are several good sets out there but they can often descend into rolling dice for hitting, penetrating armour, causing damage etc and if the ships are too well armoured it can prove hard to actually cause any damage at all...probably quite realistic but it doesn't make for an exciting game!

Wales...

So, not much in the way of wargaming for several weeks (or painting for that matter)

In the meantime however we've been off to North Wales for a week in a lovely converted barn in the Lleyn Penisula (the sticky out bit next to Anglesey).  I've only ever been for a couple of weekends to Wales so this was a new venture for all of us and was largely determined by finding somewhere nice where the dogs could stay... it was only after we'd booked it that we considered the impact Trigger might have on the local wildlife, and especially sheep!  I'm pleased to report that there were no negative dog/sheep interfaces and apart from a squirrel that didn't get out of the way of the car in time, everything had a lovely week.  Wales was really interesting and felt very 'old'... not sure if I can explain it any better than that but there seemed a real connection to the past.

So... can I stretch this to bring in some wargamey links?? Of course I can...

Apart from sheep, the other thing that Wales is full of is castles and we managed to squeeze in 4 of these over the week [3 really, and one on a technicality].  Despite staying relatively close to Harlech and Caernarfon we ignored these major sites and focused on some alternatives.

First up was Criccieth Castle which is a 12th Century Welsh rather than English Castle, sitting on the edge of Cardigan Bay.  It had a few scorch marks on the walls left over from the Glendower revolt.  Very pretty and with an excellent fish and chip shop round the corner [brilliant planning by these Welsh Princes!].

Criccieth

Our next castle wasn't planned and we came across it after climbing the 371m high hill next to the cottage.  My son had been keen for us to attempt Snowdon and this was a bit of a compromise as I wasn't sure we'd survive the climb!  After 90 minutes of trekking, and dodging sheep, we made it to the summit to discover that the top was actually an Iron Age Hill Fort and also the site of a 12th century castle.  The descent was a bit easier and fried banana and bacon sandwiches afterwards made it all worthwhile.

It was higher than it looks...honest!

The view from the top... a long way to climb to reach your Hill Fort!

The 3rd castle is a bit of a cheat as we only really walked pat it en route to the Ty Coch pub on a lovely beach a few miles from our cottage... again it was a hill fort, in this case sited on a promontory.   We gave it a quick glance and then in the spirit of historical adventure headed straight to the pub for a ploughmans.

The pub...not a castle...

Finally we'd been saving the best for last... my son and I are keen Kingmaker fans [my wife grudgingly plays and I suspect enjoys it more than she lets on... more on this later...].  Obviously castles are pretty crucial to the game and our favourite [sad, I know] is Beaumaris...mainly because it's an ideal place to stash your Royal family members as it's technically overseas! 

Beaumaris

The original medieval dock at the castle entrance

My son and I spent an afternoon exploring the site at Beaumaris which is a World Heritage Site and probably the best example of concentric castle building.  It was Edward I's last castle in Wales before he got distracted and went to stomp all over Scotland and is really lovely.

And so to Kingmaker...this seems to have become a bit of a holiday tradition and this game went on over 3 nights as a break from watching the football.  Unfortunately early on the first night I made the mistake of leaving the room for 5 minutes to bring in the washing and returned to find an evil wife/son alliance poised to attack me and wipe out most of my nobles.  I never really recovered from this underhand attack and my few attempts to strike back were delayed or failed.  I then had all my remaining nobles and my only royal counter struck down by plague in London....happy holidays!!!  Unusually for Kingmaker the game did actually reach a conclusion with my son's uber-powerful faction crushing all opposition and ruling the kingdom with a fist of iron..

Of course all of this has left me thinking of how to relate it to the tabletop and I've been looking at Dux Brittanarium from Too Fat Lardies for a dark age/Arthurian type game because obviously what I need is a new project!!

Bag the Trucks

This week we played a game of Bag the Hun for the first time in ages.  I haven't really found a better set of air rules which are as quick to grasp and very playable as these.

 

For tonight's game I pitched a flight of Spitfires against some Me109s and a couple of Stukas.  In order to give the Stukas something to do there were several trucks heading across the table which the RAF had been tasked with protecting.  As it was the Stukas strafed the convoys once to little effect but the Luftwaffe were definitely gaining the upper hand over the enemy fighters.

Good fun, especially as I haven't played them for some time.  I've also heard good things about 'Check Your 6" which I think are more detailed involve smaller actions that BtH but any suggestions for good air rules would be gratefully received... not that I'm unhappy with BtH but you can never have too many rules!

Musket and Tomahawk





 

 

 

I haven't played Musket and Tomahawk for ages [at least 18 months if this blog is anything to go by] so when Andrew at the club asked if I could arrange a game of something but foolishly left the choice to me, it seemed like a good excuse to dig out the rules and give it another bash.

 

 

After a quick run through the mechanics [which are fairly straightforward and bear some similarity to Sharp Practice which Andrew and I have played before] we were off.  M&T uses a set up system where each player roles to see what their objective is... this can lead to games where both sides could theoretically win [it's happened once when I've played] but this is unlikely.  In our case the objectives matched nicely: Andrew's British troops were tasked with protecting the villagers while my Frenchies were given the appropriately names 'Slaughter' mission.

 

Both sides had a mix of Line Infantry and Indian allies... the British also had a lowly unit of Militia while the French had some hardened Canadian Irregulars.

 

 

The British were able to deploy in and around the village and quickly moved out to screen the villagers who began streaming back to the houses.  The French Line infantry meanwhile advanced steadily with one unit struggling to make it's way through the woods.  Their Indians and Canadians who were using hidden movement [using counters with 1 dummy counter] circled wide to the left using the woods and cornfields to ensure that they weren't spotted.

 

The woods are full of Indians!

 

 

The British Iroquois allies spent a couple of turns wandering around somewhat indecisively before settling in the hedged field next to the village.  The British also had 2 units held off table as reinforcements. The Militia turned up first and quickly sheltered in one of the houses as they could see the advancing counters of the French Indians.

 

The opposing Line units had advanced to meet each other and exchanged some long range fire which resulted in one of the French units being wiped out completely.  The other did manage to inflict some casualties on the British forcing them back from the hedged field which was rapidly becoming the key feature of the game

 

 

 



The French firing line...just before the left hand unit was wiped out!

Over near the British table edge the Canadians and one unit of Hurons were beginning to approach the nearest house in which the Militia were hiding.  I had a bit of a premonition at this point and swung the Canadians round to face the table edge as I had a feeling the remaining British Line unit was due to make an appearance and sure enough Andrew immediately made the required roll to bring them on, directly facing the Canadians. 

This now became a game of chicken... waiting to see who's card would come up first and luckily it was the French Irregulars.  As I suspected I wouldn't be able to win a firefight against a Firing Line the Canadians charged, throwing tomahawks as they went in.. a couple of rounds later and the British recoiled back off the table and were lost!

The other French Indian unit tried a similar charge against their Iroquois enemies which drove them back and then tried the same trick against the British Line troops in the field.   They forced the enemy back but they happily responded by reforming and pouring fire into the Indians, driving them back out and into a nearby cornfield

The Canadians and Indians, flushed with success,  tried advancing up to the nearest house and taking on the much derided Militia who managed to force them both back repeatedly with close range fire.

By this point the casualties had mounted on both sides but crucially my French were nowhere near getting to their objective of massacring the civilians... sadly the piles of dead British infantry didn't help with the victory conditions.... so the game ended as a British victory but one that would surely lead to awkward questions back at Horseguards about the heavy price [or at least that was my small crumb of comfort!]

As always Musket and Tomahawk gives a great game with a dramatic feel to it... we both forgot about our side missions along the way: Andrew's officer was meant to prove himself by taking on the enemy in hand to hand and I was meant to capture a prisoner... I might have been able to salvage a draw if I'd thought of it instead of merrily scalping everyone we met!!

Skirmish Sangin - first game

Last week Keith and I played our first game of Skirmish Sangin, the skirmish [..duh!...] level game based in Afghanistan and produced by Radio Dishdash. Both of us had been tempted, separately, at Salute and ended up buying the rules.  Could this be an alternative to Force on Force.....

The rules come in a very nice 172 page book or can be bought as a PDF.  One of the things that's very noticeable about the rules is the range of troops that it covers and the fact that most of these are non-US troops.  The rules include stats for Australian and NZ troops as well as British and the photographs that are used throughout the book are from the MoD.  The supplement which has also been produced includes stats for some European troops and Afghan Police etc  as well.

The game is aimed at very small-scale games... in the game we played, which is a scenario in the book, there were only 8 figures per side and a lot of detail is needed for each figure.  It feels a bit like a cross between a tabletop game and a Role playing game which fits with the authors intentions of emphasising the narrative and story of the game.  The game is aimed at 28mm figures but we played with 15mm minis but kept ranges etc the same.

 

Each figure has scores for their Body [which determines who goes when] and a range of skills [eg rifle, hand to hand, first aid etc].  Turns are divided into a number of combat phases and characters act in a number of these, depending on their Body score, with higher rated figures going first.

The scenario involves an ISAF patrol which has ended up trapped in the centre of an alleyway with Taliban fighters at either end of the street.  The ISAF troops were assumed to be in the best cover possible so were mainly crouching or prone on rooftops in the centre...it's important to note who's crouching, standing etc and the game uses counters to mark this.

 

For the first couple of turns the Taliban stayed out of sight, creeping up into position and using walls to stay hidden. Keith [playing the Taliban] then ran one of his figures over a wall and into a courtyard.  Here we discovered the pitfalls of the turn sequence as the ISAF soldier on the roof above him moved next... a target standing in the open makes an easy target and the Taliban fell, seriously wounded.

One of the other features of the game is that you have to spot each turn, unless your target is in the open so often figures are unable to shoot, especially if targets are behind walls or on higher ground.

Several phases of creeping around, failing to spot and making an occasional shot followed before one of the Taliban who'd made it onto a roof managed to draw a bead on the ISAF Corporal who was hit and seriously wounded.  Unlike the earlier Taliban casualty he remained conscious, meaning he had a chance to crawl to cover or perform some self-First Aid, but also that his screams had a negative morale effect on everyone else!

Morale plays a big part in the game... coming under fire, whether it hits or not, will cause a morale test and these can quickly mount up.

Each ISAF squad contained a Grenadier with an attached underslung grenade launcher and these proved very effective although we discovered that there is a very large 'Wound Zone' where shrapnel fragments can hit anyone...thank goodness for body armour!

Eventually the grenade fire and some lucky rifle fire finished off one of the Taliban squads and we called a halt, assuming the ISAF troops would be able to extricate themselves and  having managed to play through precisely one turn!

So, does the game make a good alternative to Force on Force??

Pros....

The spotting rules make a lot of sense... just because you were able to see a target a few seconds ago doesn't mean they'll sit still and wait for you to take a pot shot.

The morale rules feel right... even coming under inaccurate fire must be pretty terrifying so the mounting morale factors force troops to become pinned down or retire quite regularly unless they can stay in cover.

The small scale... increasingly I find I really like games with only a handful of figures [...and not just because I'm a skinflint!]

The rules succeed in their aim of providing a game with a real story to it

Cons...

The reliance on counters is bound to be a turn-off for some players.  Counters are needed to show Morale effects but also whether you're prone or kneeling or even if you're walking, running or crawling [we didn't use these ones].  Counters can be downloaded and I'd laminated there and they were a bugger to pick up!  If  a figure is prone, crawling and has been under fire they could be buried under a pile of counters.

The level of factors in spotting, shooting and morale... there are lots of modifiers which can mean turns take a long time to process.  By the end we'd got the hang of this though and it had sped up.


There are lots of additional rules which we didn't get into including heavy weapons, vehicles etc  and it would be good to try it again and add some of these in.  Overall I think the verdict could be summed up as...hmmmm.....

I think we both enjoyed them and can see some real potential for Afghan games.  If we could speed things up a bit [which may be down to us rather than the rules] and maybe find a way to reduce the reliance on counters they could be really good.  Of course as there were only 8 figures per side in this game it wouldn't be unfeasible to have a standing, kneeling and prone figure for each man which would help.

Definitely worth checking out if modern games are your thing though.

More info can be found here.... http://www.radiodishdash.co.uk/   and here...  http://skirmishsangin.blogspot.co.nz/

Black Powder Zulu review

 Way back at Xmas my wife kindly gave me a copy of the Black Powder Zulu supplement [I did have to leave lots of hints and website addresses lying around for a while!] but I haven’t really got round to reading it properly.  I thought it was time to give it a proper read through and a somewhat belated review, and I can confirm it’s an excellent supplement, well worth getting if you’ve in interest in leading your Zulu hordes against the plucky Redcoats.

 The book is 94 pages long and, as you’d expect from Warlord Games, chock full of excellent photos and illustrations.  It begins with an overview of the Anglo-Zulu war and some specific rules for the period, to be added to the advice in the main BP rule book.  It then presents a series of battles, beginning with [of course...]:

• Isandlwana

• Rorkes Drift

...before outlining some of the less Cinematic battles...

• Nyezana

• Hlobane

• Khambula

• Gingindlovu

Each battle is summarised and forces are outlined, along with any specific rules that are suggested for each scenario.  There’s then a report on a playthrough for each battle.

 

 

Finally the re are some nice [but I felt somewhat pointless dioramas] and then a useful guide to Zulu regiments and some info on the David Rattray Memorial Trust, a charity supporting  education and development work in KwaZulu Natal.... http://davidrattraymemorialtrust.com/

Like many colonial games, the Zulu wars can feel a bit one sided if you’re on the side of the guys with the pointy sticks and inevitably it’s going to feel a bit one sided without some specific victory conditions or careful planning around the scenarios.  When I’ve used BP for this era before we’d tinkered with the Shooting and Melee values for the British, swapping them round to reduce their effectiveness in hand-to hand, but making them more deadly at longer ranges, and I saw some discussion at the time the rules came out about this.  This meant that it was hard for the Zulus to close with the British but they were more effective once they managed to reach the enemy

 I’ve noticed that the supplement still has the ratings  higher for HtH so it might be interesting to see how much of a difference this makes.  I noticed there’s a special rule for the British to deliver two rounds of Closing Fire against enemy that are some distance away so perhaps this, combined with making the Zulus ‘large’ units vs the smaller Redcoats might balance things out.

Some of the scenarios have very specific victory conditions too...perhaps the most interesting is Gingindlovu which effectively has  all the players as Zulus against British units formed up in a square.  Points are awarded for being the first regiment into combat, coming under sustained fire etc and, of course, breaking the square, pitting each player against the other in trying to outdo each other in the pointless slaughter stakes.

 
As I said at the beginning, well worth getting if you’ve an interest in this period and if nothing else it’s tempted me to dig out my Zulu and British armies again which is no bad thing!