Wargames Weekend: Carson Smith and the Tomb of the Prophet

Our first game of day two was an adaptation of a Pulp scenario for the Too Fat Lardies' Through the Mud & the Blood. Lenin made a few alterations to the original to reflect the figures he had available and so whilst I played to type taking the part of Doctor Zyklon and the forces of EFLUENT, the Evil Forces League for a United Empire of Nepotism and Terror; Lenin took the part of Carson Smith, the famous archeologist, and FLANGE the Forces of the League of Associated Nations for Government by Enlightenment. In this instance FLANGE was represented by Commander Tom Collins and the brave sailors from the USS Sangria. Their mission was to shadow Dr. Zyklonʼs expedition through the bush and establish just what it was he is seeking in Darkest Africa.

Of course as Dr. Zyklon, I knew exactly what I was seeking - an ancient stone of power revealed in the ancient scripts that I had recently ʻacquiredʼ from the Moscow Imperial Institute in the last days of 1917.

Only having vague guidance from the ancient scripts I first ventured into a nearby native village to see if I could extract any help from the locals.


Meanwhile Carson Smith tried to locate the tomb before us. As we surrounded the village Sturm-Leutnant Anatolya and his men spotted a group from the Sangria. One of the advantages of playing the baddies is the ability to shoot first and ask questions (using the appropriate tools) later. So it was first blood to EFLUENT.

Dr. Zyklon and Sturm-Major Werner von Blott quickly established the location of the tomb but with more sailors from the Sangria coming into view a more defensive strategy seemed prudent. Of course I ordered Sturm-Leiter Bulgarov and his men to secure our flank. Unfortunately he ran into yet more of the Sangria crew and another firefight ensued in the jungle.


Whilst we were dealing with the US sailors, Carson Smith was taking his native allies to locate the tomb.


Taking care of the opposition took a little while and that gave Dr. Smith the chance to excavate the tomb and decypher the inscriptions. Of course having dealt with most of the opposition I had one of my teams keep him under observation and once he had entered the tomb and retrieved the stone we moved in and surrounded him. Dr. Smith had little choice but to hand over the artifact but swore revenge!

Wargames Weekend: Follow that Camel!

Next up was another outing for Two Hour Wargames' Colonial Adventures - mainly so I could use my Redoubt French Foreign Legion and my new desert fort.

Legion Brief
There have been signs of a major uprising coming (and not as a result of the poor food). The local Tuareg leaders Sheikh Yerbouti and Sheikh Yermahni have been gathering their forces and the Legion garrison at Fort Zuassantneuf is now under attack. Supplies and ammunition is running low. Their only hope is the arrival of a supply column...

I made Lenin roll for his officers' Reps which produced some interesting results.

With the fort under attack and supplies running low Captain Clouseau was keen to ensure the supply column reached the fort. So he took a patrol out to meet it, leaving Sergeant Frakov in command of the fort.

No sooner had Clouseau left the fort than some hidden Tuareg cavalry charged from behind the oasis; but some quick thinking from the Captain and the iron discipline of the Legion saw them fight off the Tuaregs who were forced to flee having taken significant casualties.


Meanwhile the supply column under the inept Lieutenant Le Pice and the charismatic Sergeant "Beau" Nydell had a brief false alarm when they thought they had spotted a possible enemy force but it turned out to be a mirage. Their relief was short lived as they had only advanced a short way when they spotted some of the enemy for real and came under rifle fire.

The Lieutenant decided to hunker down and shoot it out with the Tuaregs. Meanwhile Captain Clouseau and his patrol were slogging their way through the desert to the sound of the rifle fire. On their way the patrol spotted the main Tuareg force under Sheikh Yerbouti on their way to seize the supplies.


Unfortunately the greater speed of the Tuareg camelry meant they reached the column first and after a desperate struggle the column were all killed or captured.


On his way Clouseau came across the group of enemy riflemen and engaged them. His men were holding their own until Sheikh Yerbouti and his men - fresh from seizing the supplies arrived. After initially seeing them off the Legion began to withdraw to the fort. But the Sheikh rallied his men and ran the Legion patrol down.

After yet another desperate last stand the patrol were killed and Captain Clouseau left to the tender mercies of the Tuareg.

Wargames Weekend: Blunte's Battery

After having to reschedule our last weekend, Lenin once again popped over for a few games. We started with a 28mm Napoleonic game set in the Peninsular campaign using the Too Fat Lardies' Sharp Practice rules and Front Rank figures. The British brief was as follows:

Background
The French army has taken up positions on a ridge directly in the path of the British advance. Ahead of your position they have occupied the village of Villar Formoso and set up an artillery battery on the edge of the village. If it is brought into action this battery will command the entire flank of the British assault on the ridge.

Objective
Your orders are to take part of the light company of the North Essex and seize the French battery at dawn in a coup de main thus allowing the main British assault on the ridge to proceed.

Forces
Captain Richard Blunte, Status III
A jolly good chap an average stamp but no looker. He has never done anyone harm and started life as an urchin from the Orphanage. He is a fair hand with a sword but a novice in the saddle. An honourable and lion hearted man he is nevertheless somewhat lecherous and know as a ladies man.

Lieutenant Harry Pryce-Waterhouse, Status II
Sergeants Smith and Jones, both Status I
Forty men of the light company who are good troops

Sergeant O'Leary, Status II
Ten riflemen who are good troops and include two Chosen Men

The Game
The British assaulted the ridge at dawn but the French sentries managed to spot the riflemen as they started to cross the river at the base of the ridge. fortunately the redcoats fared better and managed to get somewhat closer to the French position before being spotted.


The French took some time to respond to the alarm and Blunte seized the initiative taking on one French group whilst they were still in their billet. The French artillery crews initially rushed out of their billet but quickly had second thoughts as their comrades came under volley fire.

An assault on the the building with the first French group caused several casualties and forced them to withdraw pursued by the British.


The remaining British troops under Lieutenant Pryce-Waterhouse discovered the French Captain Camembert ensconced in the church and immediately attacked. After an initial firefight the British assaulted the French position and eventually pushed the French out of the church; however, after a couple of counterattacks the French recaptured it but suffered heavy casualties in the process.

In the meantime the French artillery crews had regained their nerve and tried to reach their guns but came under heavy fire and were forced to withdraw.

Captain Camembert decided it was time to drive the British from the ridge. He regrouped his men and made a last ditch charge. The attack started well but under the coordinated fire from the various British groups it faltered and the day went to Blunte and his men.

Why I Don't Like Rules with Saving Throws

What the hell is he on about? - you may ask, but I just don't like rules with saving throws. My main gripe is that they usually don't tell you why they included a saving throw mechanism in the rule mechanics. Now I can come up with post event rationalisations for most things, and there are reasons why saving throws might be appropriate, but I often think they've just been included due to the limitations of using the d6.

So you can probably justif saving throws where they represent armour or cover, you could also include them as a way of representing defending in a melee combat but including them in 18th or 19th Century rules as part of a fire combat mechanism just mystifies me. I suppose you could argue it does give the inactive player something to do but the net result is pretty damned frustrating for the active player and that's not a good result (paeticularly when the inactive player doesn't know why he's actually rolling any dice!)

However, being a deeply flawed and cynical individual I think it's probably more to do with the fact that the people writing the rules are used to the saving throw mechanic as opposed to there being any actual logic behind it. Or if it was really thought about it was just to address the way probability works when modifying d6 results - if that's the reason then use a die with more sides would be a better option IMHO!

Anyway, there it is and so now you know why (a) none of the rules I write has a saving throw mechanic (although if I did ever use one I would tell people what it was intended to represent!) and (b) why none of my favourite rules has it either. Alternatively I could just be too damn picky or just p,ain old bonkers - I'll leave you to figure that out...

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Wargames Weekend: The Photos

Wargames Weekend: West Germany 1979

Our last tabletop game was a playtest of the Cold War Commander rules using Lenin's new 1/600 Oddzial Osmy kit.

I took the US forces facing Lenin's Soviet onslaught.









Fortunately for me the Soviet advance didn't start too well with their right flank immediately rolling a Command Blunder and began to withdraw. On the following turn they rolled another Blunder and opened fire on their own command.






Unfortunately these problems for the Russians didn't last long and their advance soon began to gain momentum. As soon as they came into view of my tanks on my right they opened fire and we began to properly test the rules.









With their superior numbers and artillery support the Soviet forces, whilst taking some significant losses especially for the infantry, overwhelmed my US troops and the game ended with what was left of my forces reaching their breakpoint and withdrawing.

The rules were not all that clearly laid out or comprehensive as some obvious issues which came up in our game were difficult to resolve. The mechanics were a little too clunky for my taste (I've never been much of a fan of saving throws) but they produced a reasonable game. My overall impression of the rules were that were OK but didn't contain any particularly special ideas or mechanics and so whilst we may well use them again (probably in their 2nd edition Blitzkreig guise) I doubt they will make it into our preferred category.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Wargames Weekend: Jariban

Our second Two Hour Wargames outing was a 28mm modern game using an adaptation of FNG to cover a GIGN operation in Somalia. Lenin had designed the game to enable us to both to play the French against the system.

Initially we landed by helicopter in some rough ground near the habitation where the Somali pirates had been located. Unfortunately the pirates spotted the landing and we soon came under fire - fortunately not too accurate as it included an RPG7!





My group put down some covering fire to keep their heads down and to allow one fire team to advance on their position. Meanwhile Lenin's group advanced to search the first building on his side of the road.





I managed to deal with the two Somalis I had initially encountered but didn't discover anything else in my building, most particularly no sign of the ransom we had come looking to recover.

As we began to advance building by building we discovered more of the pirates and some gave us some trouble, not least those with the RPGs.




Unfortunately, we lost a couple of men whilst clearing the buildings but we either killed or captured all the pirates and recovered a small part of the ransom.

Wargames Weekend: Arctic Assault

Having spent the first day of gaming using the Lardies' rules we decided to have the second as a Two Hour Wargames' day. The first game was a 28mm WW2 scenario designed to allow me to field a few toys which had not seen the table before including my Bolt Action Soviets (which are all Lenin's work BTW).

As part of the Petsumo Offensive the Soviets were an advance force which had been pushed through the German defensive lines under cover of the poor weather to assault and, if possible, capture the Luostari/Pechenga Airfield to hamper German air operations in the area.



The Soviets initially began with a Leitenant and two squads of Razvedchiki (Rep 4 Scouts) with the possibility to being joined by parts of the main attack force. The Germans had an Obergefreiter commanding a single squad and the flank crew in defence.

The initial fog lifted but it continued to snow reducing visibility (to 16") and hampering movement (-25%). With the conditions and the Razvedchiki's camouflage and training (stealthy) they were hard to spot initially; however when one of their snipers moved forward to engage the German gate guards he was spotted! The Germans tried to open fire with their MG42 but found the mechanism had frozen and were forced to take cover. The Soviets took advantage of the gate guards' predicament and rushed forward to the perimeter fence.



With the alarm having been raised the German forces let into action; however the troops in the buildings near to the gate had something of a shock when they came under fire when leaving their barracks!



Fortunately the flak crew were not within sight of the Soviets and reached their position unscathed. After a couple of near misses one small group of German troops reached the gate position but under fire and having to leap for cover. A Soviet grenade quickly followed but fortunately casualties were light for the Germans.

The other German group, who had been trapped in their barrack block by the advancing Soviets used a rear window to escape, disappear into the falling snow and take up a covering position behind some trucks near the ammunition store and fuel dump.

Meanwhile a Soviet sniper trying to get a bead in the Flakvierling was spotted and regretted it! The German unit at the gate decided to return the favour to the Soviets and tried dropping a grenade over the sandbags onto them. Unfortunately he fumbled the grenade and it landed back in amongst them! One of the Germans managed to leap out over the sandbags but the others were caught in the blast.

More Soviets had now joined the attack but reluctant to move forward on the left flank in the face of the flak unit they used the masking of the falling snow to move to the right flank where a hole had now been cut in the perimeter wire.

With the Soviets through the fence there was a last desperate fire fight between them and the German unit by the trucks. The Germans gave a good account of themselves but were overwhelmed by the Soviet numbers.

With clear access to the ammunition and fuel and with no reinforcements appearing for the Germans (so much for 7 being the most common number rolled on 2d6!) the Soviets achieved their objective.

Wargames Weekend: Firebase

Our next game was our first chance to try out the published version of Charlie Don't Surf! The new Vietnam rules by the Too Fat Lardies. We had tried a playtest version of CDS some time ago and it was interesting to see how they had changed.

I took the role of the Free World player whose objective was to clear the area of hostile forces to allow the construction of a new firebase. I was given an infantry company and a mechanised platoon in M113s for the task.



The VC began the game on blinds in the jungle - something which made the APCs rather redundant as the jungle was impassable to vehicles! Despite several attempts I entirely failed to spot the first two blinds and allowed one of them to ambush me, which resulted in one squad being eliminated and a second withdrawing after suffering heavy casualties.

I continued to press forward and managed to engage one of the enemy units in the front and flank but my flank was exposed in a clearing which didn't do much for that squad!



I managed to get some co-ordinated fire in from two platoons plus one squad of the one who got the pasting earlier and it began to take its toll on the VC (not least due to their lack of Big Men). Eventually the VC decided they managed as much of their objective as possible and fell back.

In the end the game was a draw militarily but a political victory for the VC.

Wargames Weekend: Furia Francese

Our latest weekend of wargaming was a little later than intended but once again Lenin was kind enough to pop over and gaming commenced.

The first game was Great War and so gave a chance for me to use my new trench along with my Brigade and Scarab late WW1 figures. Lenin took the Germans and the trench with me on the attack with Les Poilus. Through the Mud & the Blood are our rules of choice for this scale and period.

The game started with a French artillery barrage, first on the German wire and then moving onto their trench line. Meanwhile the French advanced up the table, trying to make best use of the cover available from earlier shelling.




Initially the I had difficulty spotting the Germans, probably not surprising after the barrage but they soon recovered and we came under fire. Unfortunately for Lenin the Germans didn't have the benefit of a heavy machine gun and, whilst their Maxims gave the French a few problems, they were still able to advance.

Having specially picked up some VB grenade launchers from Scarab (Brigade only release their's after I had bought the Scarab ones) I was somewhat less than impressed by their performance. With a decent range and treating cover at one level lower than normal, if they hit, they do have some advantages; however, losing half the dice for acquiring a target and only having three in the section hampered their effectiveness. The Chauchats proved a little more reliable than usual, actually laying down some fire rather than simply jamming each time they were fired.

The French slowly advanced across the table, mainly due to the card turns rather than any special ability on my part. The Germans, who had sensibly taken cover in their dugout, eventually plucked up the courage to move up to the fighting step.




However, a squad advancing up the communication trench had to cope with one of their original units deciding they had had enough of shelling and French fire and were attempting a withdrawal. The resultant confusion gave the French a chance to move up with only limited return fire.

The French platoon sergeant was hit which slowed the advance on the left flank but the Lieutenant kept things going in the centre with the Grenadier section.




Eventually the French reached the wire, which hadn't been cut by the barrage but was crossable. Fortunately the Germans had taken a bit of a pasting and weren't able to take advantage of the French being hung on the wire. The Lieutenant and his men made the German trench and despite a heroic counter attack by the German Feldwebel and a couple of men the French held on.

With more French crossing the wire the Germans decided to withdraw and make ready for a more serious counter attack - which will have to wait until another weekend (not least because I need to build the rest of the trench network!

The Kent Militia

Having already fielded my Kent Militia I felt they desperately needed a standard to rally to so prior to buying the official Musketeer standard bearers, I converted one of my Militia riflemen whose rifle barrel had broken.  Here he is with the rest of the command group:

The Anglican League Arrives

I have now expanded my VBCW collection further with a completely new faction - the Anglican League. Here is the Musketeer Miniatures command pack:

The General

Another addition is "General Clearwell" from the Artizan Designs Thrilling Tales range:

The Long Arms of the Law

I have just added a few Artizan armed police to my Musketeer force for VBCW:

Another Project Update

Apologies for the lack of posting recently; however, it has been a fair reflection of the amount of gaming related stuff I have been doing!

Fortunately I have had a little more time this weekend and so I have started to make some more progress with a couple of projects whilst being distracted by yet more ideas.  First the progress:

Dahomey 1892
I am just in the process of basing up my Dixon French Foreign Legion figures and some opposition for Dahomey.  The figures are a little bit of a mixed bag, with some being lovely sculpts but a couple of the others do look a little odd.  I have about a platoon of French with mules and bearers and around 40 or so Amazons and other Dahomeans (I plan to have some casualty recycling).

I am a little uncertain as to which rules to use.  Colonial Adventures is an obvious one but I would like to have a different feel for this game to some of my other Colonial outings.

Dieppe 1942
The Foundry Commandos I picked up on eBay have been added to the two sections I already had and are now ready for basing.  I managed to pick up a couple of LCAs from Grand Manner before their recent price rise too.  This should allow me to cover the Orange Beach operation.  Next on the list are beach defences and then the assembly and painting of the artillery for the main objective.

VBCW
A few more Artizan armed police are about to join my existing Musketeer force and with a few Anglian League figures also to be based I can see a game in the offing.  I am just wondering about flags now...

WW1
Having been reasonably pleased with my first attempt at a trench, I decided I might like to expand that project to include communication and support trenches.  So far I have just laid them out but I am currently wondering about the balance between aesthetics and usability regarding the sections between the trenches - shall I keep them relatively flat (with the option for separate shell craters) or build more in? Decisions, decisions...

Pictures will be following.

As to potential new projects, I have been distracted (as usual) by more figures prompted by a couple of the half price Foundry books I picked up.  Mutineer's 28mm Indian Mutiny and Pontoonier's 3rd Anglo-Burmese War ranges both have potential so I am currently reading up on both to see which might get bumped up the project list.

Clash of the Titans: First Impressions

Two Hour Wargames recently released their Eastern Front supplement for Nuts! entitled Clash of the Titans. Given my growing interest in winter warfare and the eastern front I decided to pick up a copy.

Clash of the Titans (CotT) comes in at 98 pages and so, since I bought the PDF download, it came as two separate 8.2MB files. The supplement is intended to cover warfare on the eastern front from 1941 to 1945; however, elements can also be used for the earlier Winter War too (another reason I picked this up!)

CotT starts with a short introduction and then moves swiftly into 9 pages of background on the eastern front broken down into the various major periods and campaigns of the theatre. Whilst obviously not in a great level of detail this background provides a pretty good overview and enough context for the supplement as a whole.

The next section provides lists for the various armies involved which, whilst covering some of those detailed in the main rules, provides plenty of additional forces. It includes Soviet, German, Italian, Hungarian, Romanian and Finnish army lists.

There are also additional units covered including airborne (sic), assault troops & stosstruppen, cavalry, engineers, militia, naval infantry, NKVD, penal units and also rule modifications covering women in combat. Each has a short section and some have special equipment, attributes or tests in addition to being included in the army lists - which are laid out pretty much as in the main rules.

Next is a new character attribute "Ruthless" which has been specifically included for Komissars. This is followed by new morale advantages "Plucky" and "Fanatic". Following this there are rules for new Soviet equipment specifically dealing with the SN-42 assault vest and the anti-tank dog teams.

Having covered the infantry combatants CotT then turns its attention to the vehicles. This section covers all the main vehicles and guns used in the theatre by each of the same armies as are covered in the infantry section, but also some of the more specialised ones including multi-turret tanks, aerosans and tchanka. The lists are, again, laid out pretty much as per the main rules and are pretty comprehensive and, I found, rather useful for earlier period equipment than Nuts! itself. The following section covers rules for boats including types, movement, combat and swimming. It also includes some sample generic boat stats.

Next up are some reinforcement tables for each army which replace those which appear in the main rules. Vehicle availability for each country is split into the various main periods. This is followed by special rules for cavalry, ski troops, bicycles, airborne landings and then the effects of the weather & environment. The latter covers the obvious snow and freezing conditions but then goes on to address privation and out of supply effects.

Additional vehicle rules are also included if you want more detail and these cover track damage, top armor (sic), mines & explosives and booby traps. Artillery and air support is then addressed.

There are then several pages devoted to terrain including rachels (sudden folds or gullies), barbed wire, building damage, rubble and ruins, sewers and fortified structures. Perhaps unsurprisingly this is followed by a section covering campaigns in urban combat areas which contains all the mechanics and supplementary rules for setting such campaigns, support levels, missions, encounters and the resupply and replacements.

Finally there are six scenarios each covering a different type of eastern front warfare; however, it should be noted that some of these are rather large encounters with one requiring around 20 vehicles (so probably not for 28mm on a 6x4 table!). I have to say that, whilst interesting, the scale of some of the scenarios and specific nature of some of the forces meant that these were the least interesting part of the supplement for me, although it did inspire some ideas!

I have certainly found plenty of useful information in Clash of the Titans and, given the effort clearly put in, I thought it was worth the $17 price for the PDF (a hardcopy is $20) but obviously your mileage may vary.

Trench Project Update

Here are a quick couple of photos after the main drybrushing:

From Workbench

From Workbench

More Inter War Armour from Copplestone

Copplestone Castings have just released the latest model in their 28mm Inter War range of armoured vehicles. This time it's a Lanchester 6x4 MkII armoured car:

Grand Manner - Metal Shuttered Shop

I was lucky enough to get an order into Grand Manner when they had their free shipping offer and also before the recent price rises (which is pushing their stuff almost out of reach).

I picked up one of the WWII 28mm Carentan-05 metal shuttered shops:



I am planning to use this for both WW1 and WW2 so I should get a decent amount of use out of it.  As you can see from the slideshow it is nicely detailed with removable roofs and floor (in the two storey section).

Yet Another Project Update

By now you will probably have realised that I mostly do these updates for my own benefit!  They help me to think through what I am working on and also keep a record of what progress (if any) I am making.

New Projects
15mm Marlburian - I have been thinking about doing this period for a while.  I have now done a bit of reading up (and a lot more to go!) and I have picked up a couple of rule sets which I would like to try (Beneath the Lily Banners and Lace Wars).  At the moment I am trying to figure out which figures to go with and how many to buy as an initial batch.  Of course there is a bit of a relationship here between the number of figures required and the rules as, rather inconveniently the two sets have differing approaches.  I think I will probably be constrained by my wallet and go with the smaller option and make the appropriate adjustments.

15mm/28mm AWI - I am currently reading Fusiliers by Mark Urban which has got me thinking about this period again.  It's one I have had a desire to do for quite some time but have been held back by not having fulfilled the core requirements of figures/terrain/rules/scenario(s).  As you can see by the title I am still undecided as to which scale to go with but am definitely leaning toward 28mm (Perry) which would allow me to use some of the American buildings I already have potentially supplemented by Grand Manner perhaps.  As to the rules I suspect I'm going to plump for an adaptation of Sharp Practice.

Existing Projects
28mm Sudan - I picked up a unit of Highlanders and another unit of Egyptians plus quite a few more Mahdists (all Perry of course) when I was at Salute (the postage saving justified the trip).  I'm in the process of cleaning up the figures - not much in the way of flash but lots of run offs, ready for painting.  I have another scenario in mind which will not only allow me to use these but also my desert fort that I got at Cavalier earlier this year.

28mm WW2 Mediterranean - I decided to start this project from a slightly unusual angle - the French.  So I bought some Artizan Goumiers and Afrika Korps to kick me off, which should allow both North Africa and Sicily/Italy scenarios to be played (using Nuts! of course).

28mm WW2 Dieppe - Having got a small number of Foundry Commando figures already I managed to pick up a few more for a pretty decent price on eBay and intend to run a couple of scenarios around the unfortunate landings at Dieppe in 1942.  I do have quite a few other bits and pieces to get for the scenarios to work though.  I may even expand this to the main landings over time (budget permitting!)

28mm Late WW1 - I am currently in the process of building a trench to allow me to use my Germans and French for a more traditional WW1 set of scenarios using Through the Mud & the Blood.


It's taking sometime to put it together but the result isn't looking too bad so far, although there's certainly plenty of time to muck it up!

Others - My two French Foreign Legion projects (Dahomey and Beau Geste) are both off for painting along with the Scarlet Pimpernel and a few top up figures for a Very British Civil War.  So I will have plenty to keep me busy with basing when they return.  I am also pondering basing my 28mm Redoubt Montrose figures for a game although I am currently trying to figure out which rules I want to try using.