September 2024 Report

Slightly late going to press due to holiday away in Spain being cultural – I now know the complete ins and outs of Romanesque and Gothic architecture 🤔

First game of the month was from the Iran Iraq collection, another scripted scenario. This one was set in June 1982 in the Central Front and involved a brigade level clash around the town of Chananeh with both sides tasked with securing the town and its rail link. As with previous games both sides were given an orbat of the basic level force and then a series of options to upgrade/reinforce the battlegroup.

The Iraqi’s chose to insert a commando battalion via helicopter as their option and the Iranians went for additional manpower in the guise of a motorised Pasdaran battalion.

The perennial problem of getting troops to deploy first time (or second time, or third time 😂) was no different in this game than in any other but the Pasdaran were game on and roared into town alone.

The bulk of the Iraqi mechanised infantry brigade soon deployed to contest the town and in the absence of the dreaded Iranian Chieftains pushed their T554/55s forward. The commando coup de main however was being slow to arrive and a vital opportunity was being lost.

Unfortunately for the Iraqis the Iranian Chieftains did arrive and stared taking long range pot shots at the Iraqi BMPs prior to the infantry debussing 😮

Despite losses from the Chieftains and off table 120mm mortar fire the Iraqis pressed the attack from the west and secured the immediate outskirts.

Finally the commandos arrived and started fighting their way into the town from the railway yards, but was it too late?

The battle for the town intensified with the commitment of the Iranian mechanised infantry supported by close up fire from the Chieftains; it was now two infantry battalions versus three but the Iraqis had already been whittled down.

Rightly scared of the Chieftains the Iraqi armour hung back and offered support fire but it was largely ineffective.

At the pre-programmed final turn neither side had achieved its primary objective but the Iraqis had reached their breakpoint and the subsequent test saw them fail their moral and cede the ground. Another excellent CWC game.

Next was another run at the El Cid project which is in danger of faltering due to a lack of a rule set 😔

Against my natural inclination I agreed to do a rough stripped out version of our Successors rules (mainly because they work and we know them well) and adapted them to suit the unit sizes and base sizes Dave had already gone with 😟

Not surprisingly there were some issues, mainly around unit sizes and numbers of figures to a base, but the overall effect was pleasing and we got ourselves a game. The down side, of course, is that I’ve now got another rule writing job 🙄😂

What a coincidence our next game was Successors! Well the mat was out so why not.

For this one we deployed Demetrian Antigonid against Imperial Seleucid – very historical. The army of Demetrius was the more numerous but very diverse in terms of troop types and troop quality, low on pikes but high in terms of Greek allied and mercenary foot an his cavalry were a bit of a mixed bag. Seleucus had the advantage of better shock cavalry and pikes but his lack of numbers might be a problem although he did have the scythed chariots! Both sides fielded elephants.

Demetrius opted to split his army either side of the river that ran diagonally through his deployment area. On the right he placed all of his hoplites screened by levied Persian skirmishers with the intent of advancing on the ford where the road from the enemy side cut the river – the plan seemed to be two fold, 1) prevent a possible Seleucid use of the road to gallop their cavalry up the road and onto the Demetrian flank and 2) to cross the river onto the Seleucid left flank if no such attack manifested itself. The forces on the other side of the river were the pikes flanked by peltasts and screened by elephants & psiloi in the centre and all the cavalry, light & heavy out on the flank to sweep around the Seleucid right.

The Seleucids chose to concentrate their elephants & chariots on the right flank supported by a single unit of Median cavalry mainly because this seemed to be the best cavalry ground – they were right 😀. Next to them and in the centre were the pikes, screened by psiloi and flanked by peltasts and out on the left were the Xystophoroi cavalry and on the extreme left an independent command of Tarentines and Hetairoi. Apologies for the non based elephants, a rare oversight.

Once the game got going it became pretty obvious that Demetrius’ allied Greeks were going to have very little to do and were largely reduced to the role of spectators.

The early blows of the battle were struck on the Demetrian left where first the skirmish cavalry and then the formed cavalry fought it out with the elephants and chariots. This contest occupied the bulk of the battle and was hard fought with elephants dying and chariots crashing, in fact quite a mess 😁

While the elephant/cavalry duel rumbled on the infantry centres closed with the elephants being the dammed nuisance they’re meant to be.

Elephants died and men died but no-one could make the breakthrough that was needed and unfortunately for the Seleucids they couldn’t make their strike cavalry count either.

Back on the Seleucid right it was all going a bit wrong and Demetrius was about to get the breakthrough he needed.

But what of the Demetrian right flank I hear you ask? Well, this was all a bit embarrassing. One of the hoplite battalions got itself a bit isolated and after being softened up by some skirmishing Tarentines it fell to a mighty charge by the Hetairoi. It didn’t make any difference to the battle but it did make the Seleucid commander feel good 😁

Ultimately the battle kind of petered out and once the Demetrian cavalry were amongst the Seleucid baggage it was over.

Our next foray was into the ice cold waters of the Pacific and another Victory at Sea with both sides picking their fleet from an umpire generated list.

Once initial dispositions were made this looked like it was going to be a Japanese walkover, the US forces were spread thin and seemed to have no chance of achieving their objectives – I’ll admit to some low level whinging here as a US commander 😳

As we are beginning to learn with these rules, aircraft can be crucial – here waves of Japanese aircraft roar into action.

Unless your anti aircraft fire is effective you are going down to the bottom of the ocean.

No further comment required 😏

The Missouri goes up in smoke, this was a seriously depressing moment for the American commanders.

But, in a late comeback, the Americans took out the big ass Kongo – what a glorious site!

And then the Mogami got torpedoed. It’s getting better and better!

It was a hard fought engagement and when time was called at the prescribed point the Americans had rallied and won a major victory which they sure as hell didn’t look anywhere near to doing for a good half of the game.

We returned to skirmish gaming for our next effort, Blue and Red teams from the SAS infiltrating a Taliban compound to capture a senior leader – the emphasis being on capture.

All proceeded well for the first few turns, entry into the town was made undetected and overwatch positions were set up. The clever bit would be finding which building the target was in.

Sooner or later someone is going to spot something not quite right and this guy did. Que gunfire.

Taliban start charging out of buildings – might be a good indicator of which buildings might house our man.

Grenades are your friend 😊

In these games (Spectre Operations V2) the advantage definitely sit with the elite tier troops – more accurate rates of fire, better resilience, but they can still die.

With bullets flying and his men dying the target made a break for it with his bodyguards.

Sometimes there are just too many of them – ultimately the SAS teams suffered 50% losses.

The target looks like he’s getting away. Can they cripple the vehicle and not the man?

Nope. The hail of bullets that bought the vehicle to a halt caught the target and he died as the SAS reached the crash site. Technically a failed mission particularly given the SAS casualties but there was a lot of dead Taliban and we did have a great game.

Our final game was our first game with our newly done 6mm Cold War Gone Hot collection again using Cold War Commander. The forces were an understrength Bundeswehr panzer brigade v a Soviet tank regiment.

We got so involved in this that the time just whizzed by and not enough photos were take, better luck next time.

Essentially the Bundeswehr were defending a main road route over a river and the bridge was the critical objective but in accordance with their historical tactical the Germans decided to attack and blunt the Soviet advance.

Soviet mechanised infantry on the move.

Soviet air cover was largely ineffective much to the relief of the dangerously exposed Leopards.

The Leopards were very effective against their Soviet counterparts and importantly could shrug off most damage.

Soviet T80’s taking some pressure – we ran out of suppression markers 😂

For reasons I cannot explain a whole load of photos of a Hind getting serious with ATGM’s have gone missing 😥 but suffice to say they were very effective.

This played as a very different game to the Iran Iraq affairs despite being the same rule set. First off the smaller scale means more stuff can deploy on the same square footage but move and shoot at the same ranges which has both it’s positives and it’s negatives. Secondly the kit is a lot better (and I mean a LOT better) despite the same time frame and that offers a real challenge to both sides. Thirdly terrain is key, we already knew this from Iran Iraq but here it is really important and we need to do some work both in terms of quantity and quality.

Anyway that’s it for the month, I leave you with a random battle painting from my holiday in Spain. See you next month.

June 2024 Report

A bit of a thin month, holidays and shift patterns rather curtailing our activities, but hey, there are plenty of people out there who dream of having idle time on their hands to indulge their hobbies 😟

Our first foray was the ever growing and ever popular 10mm Iran Iraq project. For this one we had an Iranian town seized by a heli borne Iraqi commando force and reinforcements on their way – all controlled by the Umpire. The players were commanders in the 37th Armoured brigade scrambling forces together to re-take the town so they were given a list of force & points values from which each could assemble his battlegroup to a capped points total – this was all CWC and each battlegroup was 2000 points.

The Iranians chose a tank battalion each (of course!) and then one added a mechanised infantry battalion and the other an armoured artillery battalion – M109’s. Both deployed on their table edge and we set too.

The game was fast and furious with the Iraqis throwing their reinforcements in as soon as they arrived which meant their mechanised infantry were taking on tanks!

In a game that featured SU22’s missing their target, Hinds brewing up tanks, BMP1’s being on the wrong side of a tank duel and an Iranian command element being eliminated – really, really lucky dice 🤣 we had an exciting see saw game that finally ended with the Iraqi command failing its break point roll and retiring from the table.

This went well and the idea of giving the players a limited roster to choose from gave them more of a sense of ownership, definitely going to try this idea again although of course I now need to paint more stuff to offer more choice 🤣

Our next outing was the equally popular Successors project, this time Royal Ptolemaic v Imperial Seleucid so scythed chariots, elephants, wild Galatians, Thracians, camels and of course pikes.

The armies were pre chosen and the terrain laid out – we actually had terrain! The Ptolemaic commander deployed all his foot on the left extending in an unbroken line up to the centre, his cavalry he split into two commands, one led by the army general in column on a road heading toward the Seleucid left via a ford with the intent of turning the Seleucid flank and the other, comprising the settler cavalry, deployed slightly back and facing forward which would join up with the infantry line as it advanced – none of this worked 😥 The Seleucids deployed more traditionally with the pikes in the centre flanked by the Thracians and Galatians and two cavalry commands on each far flank.

Early moves favoured the Ptolemaics, their advance to the ford went well, the infantry advance proceeded as planned. The Seleucids were caught on the hop a bit by the rush for the ford so had to redeploy their cavalry command to counter it but their other cavalry command sensed opportunity as the Ptolemaic infantry had no cavalry to protect the infantry line.

On the Seleucid right the commander launched his elephants and chariots into the attack dreaming of spoils and booty. However, just like history, the chariots were bloody useless 🤣 but they were certainly pretty and absolutely a pain in the arse when they crashed and created an obstacle. The elephants however fared better seeing off the opposing elephant and pinning one of the pike which effectively broke up the Ptolemaic line.

Back at the ford all kinds of fun was had as both sides threw troops into the fray “and the water ran red with the blood of the slain”. Eventually the Seleucids pushed the Ptolemaics back towards their camp but the victory would be decided elsewhere.

It was the centre infantry clash that decided the day. Despite being outnumbered in pikes the Seleucids gained a crushing victory; in part this was due to one of the Ptolemaic pike battalions getting distracted by elephants and in part due to the settler cavalry getting tangled up with the Thracians and so unable to help, but the real fun was the Galatians being able to charge just at the right moment onto already engaged pikes tumbling them into rout.

It really was a crushing Seleucid victory and a fine game.

Final effort was a WWII skirmish on our Dave Marshall cityscape which hasn’t seen the light of day for over a year.

American GI’s tasked with clearing the last vestiges of resistance from the next city on the way to Berlin.

Grenades were thrown, snipers open fire, lmg’s rattled from windows, resistance was tough.

Grit and determination saw the GI’s through and the allied advance continued.

The only painting completed was another battalion of Iranian infantry for the 10mm project – more choice for the next game 😉

So that’s it. Keep well and see you in July.

April 2024 Report

Flow interrupted by hospital shenanigans but still managed to a variety of games in, so without further ado….

First up was what has now become our monthly foray into the Pacific for a WWII fleet action.

This time we took a scenario from the book and diced for upgrades and deployment positions which decidedly favoured the US side – all their planes were in the air at the beginning of the game.

Mass dive bombing saw an early sinking of a Japanese heavy cruiser – “remember Pearl Harbour!”

The Japanese were revenged with the sinking of the Portland and the Indianapolis.

Ultimately it was a points victory to the US by quite a large margin.

Next up was a Timurid v Mamluk game using our adaptations to the Hussaria rules. This collection doesn’t get much of an outing but this was a cracking game, so much so I’m finally finishing the units that never quite got done 😂

The largely open plain was broken up by randomly placed wadis which ended up congregating in the middle of the playing area. The Timurids deployed their White Sheep Turks in the centre facing the wadis and then the much heavier Timurid horse screened by rubbish skirmish foot and not so rubbish Jagatai skirmish horse on the wings, the left being weighted for a mighty attack. The Mamluks had their Black Sheep Turks out on the right wing and then 3 divisions of heavy horse spread evenly across the rest of the battlefield each screened by militia skirmishers.

The early action was on the Timurid left where their Jagatai horse were driven off by the Turkomen.

Then it got even more messy when the Turcomen Askari saw off the first line of Timurid cavalry. Could this be an early tea?

Nah. The second line armoured Timurids stabilised the front and the first line rallied. The tide was turning.

Both sides soon became fully committed and arrows darkened the skies. The elephants were largely ornamental very much like their historical prototypes.

Much blood was spilt but neither side could make decisive headway – the Timurids had the class & the armour the mamluks had the numbers. Unusually for us we had to call it a draw.

Our next foray was the ever popular Iran Iraq period. In this game the Iraqi 15th Mechanised and 26th Armoured were tasked with seizing a strategic rail head (seizing meaning they couldn’t just blow it up 😏) within 8 game turns. The Iraqis had scheduled artillery they had to assign prior to the game start. The unknown Iranian defenders were the 92nd Armoured, largely obscured by the terrain at the start of the game.

The Iraqis advanced on a broad front keeping their inferior armour back hoping to tempt the Iranians to reveal themselves and placing faith in their scheduled artillery strikes.

The Iranians did reveal themselves and the feared Chieftains wreaked havoc on the Iraqi armour effectively rendering it useless.

The Iraqi infantry wisely debussed and slogged their way forward taking one of the outlying villages.

The Iraqi armour bravely firing away.

Chieftains start to take losses.

Ultimately the 26th Armoured failed its morale (although it did hang on longer than expected) and retreated which left the 15th Mechanised high and dry at Turn 8 with the rail head firmly in Iranian hands.

The game was the Assault scenario from the CWC book which gives the attacker 50% more points but even so it’s a tough scenario to get a win from.

Next up was a game from the bunker being Sikh Wars, British attacking a defended Sikh village.

The British were in two commands, a right command of 3 brigades of foot supported by a brigade of cavalry tasked with taking the village and a left command of 2 brigades of horse supported by 2 brigades of sepoys tasked with keeping the large force of Sikh irregular cavalry at bay.

The stars of the show! Usually the camel gunners are a bit of a nuisance and then they die but due to over confidence by the British cavalry commander (thinking they’d just melt away) and judicious use of the camels mobility by the Sikh player they inflicted significant casualties.

Once the allied cavalry got stuck in the Sikh irregulars collapsed in the time honoured tradition and 3 brigades either died or fled the field; the allies were however severely mauled by the fighting and the camel gunners potting away and were of no further use.

The British & EIC marched through shot and shell and despite a few pauses finally stormed the village.

“At them with the bayonet!”

The village is taken. God save the Queen!

Our next foray was the first outing for the new project, El Cid. This was the first of what will probably be a series of trial runs with the sets of rules we think might do the job and if they don’t then it’s down to writing our own but that would be a last resort.

Our final game for the month was an Italian Wars clash at the bunker, French v Milanese.

The Milanese were on the defensive having a town to defend and so kept their decent cavalry back for as long as they could.

In the town the rot started early with one unit abandoning it’s position after some early artillery fire. This was the shape of things to come and once the Swiss loomed closer it was all over.

The fun part of a French Italian Wars army is of course the gendarmes and despite their small unit sizes (much as history) and casualty accumulation they just kept on coming.

Gendarmes love charging pikes 🙄😃

Swiss smash Milanese pikes.

“Be off with you!”

And with the Swiss bulldozing their way into the town our last game of the month was over.

In other news half a dozen or so more 10mm desert buildings were completed – I think that’s enough now 😁

I also got some FAO & FAC bases done for CWC.

Also got the chance to see Martin Bourboulon’s two part adaptation of The Three Musketeers; serious, gritty, plot deviations that worked (or at least weren’t stupid), worth a look.

And with that we bid farewell to April and hope that May brings some decent weather!

November 2023 Report

Some of you may have noticed there was no October report, this was mainly due to me being away in Japan for two weeks and the rest of the gang not bothering to organise anything for the month 🙄 Fear not though we are back on track with a fairly busy month of gaming.

First up was a 28mm Ardennes game using Dave’s recently completed set up – the coldness of the shed rather matched the setting 😂🥶

In this scenario a Ranger squad plus a HQ element were defending a crossroads against some previously rebuffed Germans now coming on at two entry points from across a deep stream.

The German squad advancing over the sole bridge took casualties from the Rangers holed up in a ruined building but managed to take them down and move on.

The cost of doing business.

“Hold your position!”

Ultimately the Rangers were reduced to only 3 effectives and the crossroads was lost but it was a bitter victory for the Germans.

Next up was the ongoing learning curve of our Iran Iraq adventure. Some more terrain for this one which made it a bit more difficult to get a bead on those vulnerable T54’s & T55’s 😁

Much fun was had at the beginning of the game with the Iranians struggling to get the correct die score to deploy which allowed the Iraqis to advance .

Of course once the Iranians got their act together the Iraqis started to suffer.

Unfortunately this was one of those games where players had to be elsewhere after only a couple of hours of play so we called it with the Iraqis having a lot of burning tanks on the table. 😏

Next up was something new for us, one of the guys has recently got into Victory at Sea from Warlord so he bought his stuff over and we played an introductory game with his Pacific forces.

I’m not sure any of us really knew what we were doing so there was a fair bit of stop start as we checked the rules but that is inevitable and like all naval games the ships got far closer to each other than reality.

Ultimately we had a good little game, certainly enough to play again soon, and in fact more ships have been bought and painted up!

Another outing for the Ardennes was next and the last for this year in the arctic shed 😂

This time both sides had off table mortar support randomly generated – the Germans did better from this and certainly made life difficult for the Americans.

Despite an heroic defence the Americans were overrun again – “I think I need to get some weapons support for the Yanks” So looks like the small and contained project is going to grow a bit 😂🤣

Next was an away game featuring galactic monks, armoured robots and some very pretty scenery.

Personally I had no idea what was going on but dice were rolled, figures fell and we had a laugh so no bad thing really.

Returning to more mainstream gaming our next effort was the Successors, later Ptolemaic v later Seleucid.

The main reason for playing was to try out some additions to the collection as seen above 😀

The Ptolemaic army was the most standardised, featuring 4 battalions of Kleruchoi pike on the right centre screened by Rhodians & Cretans and a unit of Thureophoroi and Agema pike on the left centre, both were flanked by formed cavalry with the better horse on the left screened by Bedouin camelry, a solitary elephant squadron took the centre.

The Seleucids were an eclectic bunch. Their left centre comprised two units of Galatians and one of Thracians screened by three elephant squadrons with scythed chariots and veteran cavalry on the wing, the right centre comprised the Silver Shields (the later incarnation) and another battalion of pike screened by some levied psiloi while their flank cavalry comprised Galatians, Bedouin and a single unit of elites.

The battle took some twists and turns. As usual the cavalry actions started and finished first; on the Seleucid right the Bedouin cancelled each other out, the Galatians were destroyed and eventually the victorious Ptolemaic cavalry were on their way to the enemy camp. On the Seleucid left a hard fought affair saw the Ptolemaics seen off and the chariots performed well but not in a way to seem anachronistic.

In the centre much fun was had with rampaging elephants and their ultimate deaths 😄 which broke up the nice neat lines of both sides. The Galatians & Thracians did better against the pikes than anticipated at first but once the pikes started grinding on it wasn’t so good 😮 The good quality pikes cancelled each other out and an inconclusive pushing match was all that was going to happen there but the Thureophoroi performed badly and fled.

Ultimately the Ptolemaics shaded it but it had been a close run thing and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

Our next foray was another Iran Iraq effort this time with more terrain to break up lines of sight – and it worked!

On this occasion the Iraqis, comprising a reinforced mechanised infantry brigade, were tasked with seizing a section of railway and the adjoining settlements and had the early advantage of being screened by a large hill for their left flank force and a dried river bed for the right.

The Iranians deployed their tank forces to defend the railway line and settlements and the infantry to hold their end of the river bed. They also had an FAO although the artillery had limited ammunition.

On the Iranian left, despite a gallant defence and the off table artillery, the aggressive Iraqi attack with the better tanks forced the position and by the end of the game the Iranians were totally destroyed. From a rules mechanism point of view (CWC) everything worked fine and as realistically as one can expect which was a positive thing as we progress with the project.

On the Iranian right the two tank battalions took the fight to the Iraqis and we had the comedy show of the T54’s & T55’s boldly advancing from around the hill and almost immediately falling back as the opposition opened fire 😃

Ultimately the Iranians bit off more than they could chew as once they crested the hill the Iraqi infantry swarmed them and made them pay the price for being un protected. Again the rules mechanisms worked well.

Bruised but not yet out of it the Iranians fell back to the rail line to carry on the fight but now their reduced numbers gave the Iraqi armour more of a chance and the losses mounted.

With our physical gaming time drawing to a close we belated consulted the rules about army break points and realised the Iranians were over it so diced and the Iranians beat an immediate retreat. Complete Iraqi victory and a project proceeding in the right direction.

Final game of the month was a western gunfight from our loosely connected campaign set in the fictional Dardanell County.

Bounty hunters came looking for an easy score.

Bounty hunters died 😂🤣

In terms of work completed some additions were made to the Successors project.

The ill fated Thureophoroi

And stuff is going on to EBay in a bid to clear the storage.

So until December, enjoy your gaming and be a good person. Cheers!

September 2023 Report

A month bracketed by outings.

On one of the hottest days of the year I motored down to Newbury racecourse for Colours 2023 and sweltered amongst the crowds – do they have air conditioning or was it just a cunning plan to get more of us to the bar?

The ground floor was the usual array of traders so I got through that as quickly as possible – the benefit of actually pre-ordering was worth it this time. Some very nice display games on the 1st & 2nd floors and access to the outside for some air and shade 😀. All told a good day and a well done to the organisers.

First game of the month was a Soviet Afghan game using Spectre Operations V2 with the mujahedeen attacking a Soviet outpost.

The game played well. One mujahedeen group decided ‘to hell with cover’ and went full on martyr, attacking over open ground, not surprisingly they died.

The second group went all tactical and used a dried up river bed to sneak up on the Soviets, they had far more success 🤣

Next up was a Successors game, Antipater v Perdiccas, using our new elephants amongst other things. After the ill tempered last outing this was played in a far better spirit and much fun was had with stampeding elephants, dying elephants and pushes of pike.

In terms of losses the Perdiccans most definitely lost the most troops, including all their elephants, however, amongst the Antipatrid losses were two commanders, effectively paralysing the army.

In the middle of the month I took a drive up to Stone in Staffordshire to participate in a 6mm Cold War game organised by the Cold War Commanders Facebook group.

This was a bit of a leap of faith as I hadn’t met any of these guys before and had never played 6mm before but the Cold War Commander rule set is the one I’ve gone for to do my Iran Iraq project so best to learn from those who know what they are doing I thought 🤨

First off I had a fine time with some friendly guys and got a weekend of gaming in, which I haven’t done for a long time, and secondly I learnt a good deal more about the rules so win, win 😊

Back home and the group played out a TYW scenario, refighting Lutzen.

This was a gruelling fight (in a good way) which saw the Swedes take considerable losses (much like the real thing) but were unable to force the Imperialists out of their positions.

On a positive note, Gustavus survived 😁

Our final game of the month was an Italian wars affair, Milanese v French.

The Milanese largely stood firm behind a stream and let the French come on, hoping to wear them down with crossbow fire – actually the Milanese player couldn’t get his troops to move anyway! 🤣😂

It took some time and the loss of a great number of French nobles but eventually the French forced the stream and when the ponderous Swiss smashed through the Milanese left it was over for the Duchy 😥

Game wise that was it for the month, a respectable few games and the ‘new normal’ for us now, gone are the days of two games a week, but hey, at least we’re still gaming.

On the project front the Iran Iraq 10mm continues with another Chieftain tank battalion done (above) and a T72 battalion done (below)

Well that’s it I guess, more to follow next week after a holiday break, so adios until then. 🙂

August 2023 Report

Well the summer’s nearly over (did it start?) and August’s gaming is done.

First up was a LRDG landing somewhere in North Africa to reek havoc on an Italian airstrip.

The LRDG landed at two points, one north near the actual airfield and one south near the barracks and stores so the one game effectively became two.

‘Oop north’ the squad sneaked through the wire as dawn broke (visibility down to weapons close range) and took out the comms building first with a couple of grenades and then quickly moved on to the MMG pit next door to take that out too. Guess what? The alarm was sounded 😂

The rest of the game for this section was spent going from aircraft to aircraft setting charges while exchanging shots with the dazed and confused airfield sentries – the Italians didn’t have a chance here and although a lot of fun was had it really wasn’t much of a game for the Italian player.

To the south it was more of a challenge for the LRDG, most of the Italians were asleep in commandeered buildings and patrols roamed the streets so that when the alarm was sounded Italians started to spill out of the buildings before the LRDG could set all their charges.

The Italians were hampered by having to try and exit from doors whilst being fired on by the British but the odds turned when a randomly diced for patrol of colonial troops (two squads) roared into town on trucks to add their weight to the firefight.

Although not the greatest of shots the Eritrean squads were throwing plenty of lead around and some of it even found its mark! The explosion of the charges that had been set were a bit of a disaster, two of the LRDG section had fallen back to where the charges were set (the player just plain forgot) were caught in the blast and died from their wounds and a further two were captured in the confusion; only the lmg team got out alive and moved north along the beach to join their comrades and exit.

Totalling up at the end the northern section had destroyed, 3 aircraft, 3 tanks, 3 trucks and 2 workshops with stores without loss to themselves; the southern section had destroyed, 2 tanks and several ammunition dumps but 6 men were MIA. Italian losses were significant, 2 full squads killed or wounded plus a squads worth of Eritreans dead or wounded.

As a game it was quite exciting, the early moves were done in limited visibility which was a severe handicap for the reacting Italians which contributed to their poor showing at the airfield. The up close and personal action in the town gave the Italians more of a chance but the force multiplier was the Eritreans. Fun was had though 😁

Our next action was a more traditional ‘big game’ featuring the Carlist Wars collection. The Carlists were defending a large hill and adjacent village against an attack by government troops. Numbers were about equal (4 foot brigades & 1 horse) but the government had the edge in class.

The opening moves saw a general advance by the government troops on the hill and village while their cavalry tried to work round the hill from their left.

The cavalry action favoured the government but that was it because although they saw off their opponents they could make no headway against the reserve infantry.

In the battle for the village the government troops were mainly 2nd Class Line and so although they had the numbers they didn’t have the staying power, they did however manage to shoot a Carlist general off his horse 😏 By the end of the game the village was still in Carlist hands (just) and the government troops were all played out.

The hill was were the government threw it’s best troops, a brigade of Guards supported by a brigade of 1st Class Line and it was a most bloody affair (one general on each side was killed rallying troops) but despite gaining a toehold on the summit both brigades were too battered to continue.

The game ended as a tactical loss for the government, the village and the hill were still held, albeit in reduced strength, and they had suffered significant losses. Reflecting on the game, we certainly enjoyed ourselves but the government side perhaps had too much to do in an even numbers game.

Back to skirmishing for our next game, this time, Western Gunfight, with two Mexican clans (the Jarvos hombres & the hombres from Mochila) with a grudge shooting it out in our loosely connected campaign.

Each clan was split into two, so four players each had two figures and a fifth player controlled the game and the law. The law would only activate from the sheriffs office once any shooting started and the start points for the four players were randomly generated.

The boys from Mochila clan emerged from two separate cantinas and spotted the Reyes, father & son, at the livery, there then ensued a long running gun battle which featured backshooting, falling over when sneaking through the blacksmiths cluttered building and throat cutting to finish off the unlucky Reyes pair 😱

At the other end of the street the other Jarvos pair (da Salvo & Julia) were sneaking down the street when the firing started at the blacksmiths, the law Sheriff Morgan & Deputy Matthews) duly came out onto the porch and demanded guns be thrown down. In a gunfight? No way! Lots of shots were fired and I mean lots, Julia, with the Winchester, had emptied his weapon by game end and both lawmen had reloaded before they finally went down.

At game end the Reyes pair were dead (very dead), Sheriff Morgan was dead and two Mexicans were bleeding in the street, there’s got to be a follow up game of bounty hunters after the killer of Sheriff Morgan 😏 As always in these games there was lots of banter and fun was most definitely had.

Our next effort was French Wars of Religion, with Huguenots defending the high ground with levied foot, massed reiters on the right and cuirassiers on the left. The catholic royal army deployed it’s Spanish & Swiss in the centre, it’s lancers on the right and it’s own reiters on the left.

As is almost always the way the initial fighting was between the cavalry wings; on the catholic right the fight between lance and sword & pistol came out in favour of the cuirassier with Nemours being killed with the wreck of his gendarmes.

The initial success of the Huguenot cavalry gave them all the impetus they needed and they crashed into the second line of catholic cavalry and sent them on their way despite a desperate attempt at rallying by Montpensier who was killed in the rout. The catholic right wing now no longer existed.

On the other wing both sides reiters got into action after some cautious manoeuvring and then proceeded to shoot the shit out of each other! Several colonels were killed on both sides but ultimately the catholic reiters ceded the field, not due to any particular differences it just wasn’t their day.

From an infantry point of view it was all a bit of a damp squib, the Swiss & Spanish were at the foot of the hill and despite some casualties from fire were pretty much odds on to beat the levies, however their cavalry wings were gone so time to ground pikes. Game over.

Our next effort was an away game of ‘What A Tanker’. I really don’t get what the deal is about this set of rules and the whole Lardy cult thing but hey other peoples house other peoples rules.

Anyway, a KV1 and a T34 went hunting a Tiger. The Tiger lost. Game end.

Our final game of the month was classic SYW, Prussian v Austrian. The Austrians had fallen back over a pontoon bridge leaving a light brigade disputing the far end with an advance guard of numerically superior Prussian lights. The Austrians were deployed in four small brigades beyond the river awaiting cavalry support and were tasked with retaining control of the pontoon and the road leading back into their positions.

The Prussians were tasked with seizing the pontoon and clearing the road from it into Austrian territory, a tough task but their full force ( two strong brigades of infantry and two strong brigades of cavalry) was available for immediate deployment at the players discretion.

The Prussians made really hard work of the ‘petite guerre’, their jaegers were better shots and the infantry were backed by two regiments of cavalry but ultimately they did get onto the pontoon.

On the Prussian right the dragoon brigade was ordered to keep pace with the infantry brigade that was heading toward the Austrians behind the river and on top of the hill. This was a classic case of being transfixed by something that is nothing to do with the objective and the Prussians paid dearly for it, ultimately (at the end of a very long game) the Austrian cavalry that deployed to face them were driven off but the hill and the village on top of it remained in Austrian hands and the attacking Prussian brigade was knackered.

On the Prussian left the three regiment strong cuirassier brigade held its position opposite an undefended ford for most of the game until the Austrian cavalry brigade opposite marched on, negotiated its way through the villages on the Austrian side, reorganised and attacked across the ford against the stationary Prussians. Inevitably the Prussians broke but by sheer good fortune were not pursued and so were able to rally and come back to dispute the crossing with the Austrians as night drew in but it was way too late.

The second Prussian brigade made good progress in the face of heavy fire from Austrian guns on the hill and then musketry fire from Austrian infantry coming off the hill to dispute the crossing but ultimately fell back with heavy casualties.

At the end of a very long days gaming we called it and reviewed where we were. The pontoon had briefly been in Prussian hands but the rump of their light brigade had been driven off by a dispatched Austrian brigade and so the road and pontoon were securely held by the Austrians.

In our usual review of the game the Prussian commander claimed he couldn’t win and this is always worth looking at. The Prussian team definitely had it all to do but they had all their troops on table at the beginning of the game and had two powerful brigades of cavalry which in a straight up fight would make mincemeat of their opposite numbers but having one keep pace with an infantry brigade and the other hold when there was nothing in front of them was a terrible mistake particularly from an experienced player. At the end of the game I totalled up the number of order change chits issued by the Prussian commander, ten! Oh well 🤨

In other news, reinforcements were added to the Successors collection, 4 more elephants and some Persian levied bowmen.

The Iran Iraq project got some more Iranian infantry done, regulars and pasdaran.

Air support for the Iran Iraq project also got itself completed.

Well I guess that’s it for this month, see you next month and play nice 😀

June 2023 Report

Well the month started with Games Expo, about which I have already blogged so nothing more to say other than give it a go next year 😀

Our first game of the month was a Dark Age brawl featuring the forces of Uriens and Morcant Bulc. Three leaders died in a tough battle which could have gone either way but ultimately Uriens was forced to retreat.

Next was a large GNW game featuring our recently finished Danes – many thanks to Neil for his dedication with the paintbrush 😁

Just because we could we had all the Danes on the field facing off to the old enemy, the Swedes.

We fought an encounter style battle across a plain field interspersed with marshes which gave both sides a bit of a challenge.

Both sides deployed in a fairly traditional way, infantry to the centre cavalry on the wings, the only difference was that the Danes deployed their Guards brigade on the right behind the cavalry rather than in the more traditional centre, partly due to terrain but also to act as a right hook once the more numerous Danish cavalry had neutralised their opponents.

The bulk of the game was taken up by the cavalry wings; we had plenty of units on the table (around 20 regiments) so there was plenty of back and forth.

On the Swedish right the cavalry melee’s occupied most of the day as units attacked, retreated, rallied and returned to the fray but ultimately the day belonged to the Swedes although the battle decision was made elsewhere.

On the Danish right their horse made some headway against their opponents but their flank was turned and the Swedish horse crashed into the Guards brigade, who were in some disarray from retreating horse, and after a brief and bloody clash the bulk of the brigade routed, seriously affecting the neighbouring infantry.

The decisive decision was in the centre where, after a long walk, the two opposing infantry divisions clashed, volleys erupted all along the line and then the Swedes got stuck in.

It wasn’t pretty and the Danes routed – not all of them but enough for the constituent brigades to fail their morale checks and leave the field. A hard fought Swedish victory.

Next was another Successors game, this time Macedonian civil war, Polypercon v Cassander.

This was not one of our better games; one of the players came with his ‘spoiler head’ on and the game was played in what could best be described as a ‘niggly’ spirit. Unusual for our group and hopefully not to be repeated, best forgotten.

Final game of the month was a Wars of Religion affair, Dutch v Spanish.

A strong Dutch force held a ridge of high ground with cavalry on the left plus an English contingent holding a village on the right flank. The Spanish were deployed all along the front with the Tercio’s in the centre and cavalry on either wing.

The Spanish had a tough job on their hands; the English were well positioned in the village, the Dutch foot were on the ridge line protected by walls and hedges at the foot of the ridge and beyond that a marshy stream, the best option was to neutralise the Dutch cavalry facing the Spanish right and then swing in.

The cavalry action dominated the early part of the game with both sides throwing horse regiments into the action. The early engagements favoured the Dutch and at one point it seemed the Spanish would be swept aside but the death of several Dutch cavalry colonels slowed the advance and the Spanish were able to regain the initiative.

The English contingent fared quite well to start with, exchanging shots with the advancing Walloons and Germans, but once the Spanish had got their Reiters up close and personal the weight of fire drove the front units back into the village streets and the Walloons and Germans were able to occupy the buildings and fire out into the street. Ultimately the English abandoned the village and march off the field.

In the centre the Spanish slogged their way across the ground, taking a steady casualty toll, but finally carried the hedge line forcing the defending Dutch back.

By now it was late afternoon and there wasn’t much left in the game so we called it. Although the morale of the Spanish had kept them going over the hedge line and through the first line of defenders it was debatable how much further they could go. Elsewhere the Dutch were done, the village was lost and Spanish cavalry were now cantering down it’s streets while the Dutch cavalry out on the left were exhausted. Agreed result was that the Dutch would cede the field but the Spanish were in no state to do anything other than recover.

It had been a tough and long game but played in a good spirit and thoroughly enjoyable.

That was it for the month really. A slightly shorter schedule due to me being away in Venice, hopefully July will feature a few more game and some more 10mm will get completed; in the meantime, play nice and we’ll see you next month.

May 2023 Report

First out of the gate was a return to our occasional modern day Syrian/Lebanon skirmish campaign. This time the Overwatch team has been sent to rescue a captured diplomat from an oil rich country that keeps interfering in the region who is being held for ransom.

The game played well (Spectre V2) with one half of the team taking up roof top positions for fire support while the second team breached the compound.

All went well in the early turns with insurgents dropping to targeted fire.

Fighting intensified once the operators were inside the compound and the fire support operators ran out of targets. Things got messy, operators died and the insurgents bundled the hostage out of the main building.

Insurgents (or what was left of them!) roared out of the compound to disappear into the anonymity of the town. Looks like we’ve got another scenario ahead of us 😁

Next up, Successors, this time Seleucids v Ptolemaics.

The usual see saw battle which favoured the Seleucid cavalry on both flanks especially when one of the Ptolemaic Commanders bit the dust.

The main event in the centre, the big pike bash, was tense with both sides losing battalions but the real killer was the death of the Ptolemaic General which sealed the game for the Seleucids.

Next on the table was our first proper game of Cold War Commander with the fledgling 10mm Iran Iraq collection – must do a post about this journey 😀

What did we learn? Well, Iranian Chieftains outrange and blow serious holes in Iraqi T54/55’s 🤣 Think we need to read up the smoke rules!

Comedy moment aside, we liked the rules and more models will be hitting the table top in due course while I get to grips with the nuances of play.

May 21st was of course Partizan which we’ve already blogged about, suffice to say an enjoyable but tiring day was had by the team.

Back on home turf we eased ourselves into our occasional western gunfight campaign set in fictitious Dardenell County where Mexican bandidos had their stage coach robbing day spoilt by bounty hunters.

A nice little evenings game using old school rules, no “friction” for us 😂

Next was the 100 Years War away day game with Gareth. I remain unconvinced by Hail Caesar but we had a splendid day and a result was most definitely recorded.

Modesty prevents me from saying who won but…..

Our final game was a ‘big battle’ Carlist War bash featuring the full team plus new addition Gerard who we met at Partizan.

Basic scenario was an inferior (in numbers and quality) Carlist force hold an important crossroads from which the Liberals must oust them.

The opening rounds were all about the cavalry as the Liberal infantry mass lumbered forward. The left wing Liberal cavalry were weakened by some cleverly sited Carlist skirmishers and artillery and then destroyed by the charge of the small Carlist cavalry reserve, led by their General. The right wing Liberal cavalry was just the British Legion lancers who valiantly charged forward but were obliterated by opposing infantry fire.

The infantry action took a while to take place but it was violent and bloody when it got going. On the right centre of the Carlist line the protective cover of the walls allowed the poorer quality line to withstand the opening volleys of the attacking Guards and inflict back heavy casualties in return. When it came to crossing bayonets the first line of the Carlists gave way but the untouched second line were able to send the weakened Guards retreating back across the field – oh what a glorious sight 😄

The Carlists on the left centre didn’t have such a glorious day of it as they battled it out with the British Legion but by the end of the day the the Legion’s morale had collapsed enough for them to retreat leaving behind some very battered Carlists.

We hadn’t played this period for well over a year so it was good to get the collection out again and relearn our own rules 😂🤣 Much fun was had in an all day of intense gaming.

Away from the actual gaming progress has been made on basing up some more future wars figures which will bring this background project to a close soon.

The main progress however has been on the 10mm Iran Iraq project which is coming along nicely and has actually been enjoyable to do.

So that’s it for this month, off to GamesExpo in a couple of days so I’ll share a post about that in a week or so.

There’ll Be A Welcome In The Hillsides

Also known as an away day with our Welsh wizard, speed painter, big game impresario and all round good guy, Gareth Lane.

As Gareth was hosting he got to choose the game and this time it was a Hundred Years War outing, specifically the English besieging a Scottish castle are confronted by a Scottish relief force at the castle and a French force landing on the beach.

As the guest I got to choose sides and went for the English – of course!

Although I was deployed nice and safely behind stakes and all that it struck me that the English could soon become the meat between an Franco Scottish sandwich so all out attack became the order of the day.

The centre battle of men at arms headed for the schiltron facing them, the left of solely longbow advanced to give fire support and the right pivoted to face the French.

It was a tough fight. In the centre, one of the men at arms units slowly ground down the opposing pike and eventually saw it retreat off table, the other men at arms didn’t fare so well and fled the scene. This left two uncommitted Scottish units, one men at arms and one pike, the English just had the one men at arms but they did have the longbows!

The uncommitted schiltron and the men at arms made slow progress over the fields to their front and so became a nice juicy target for the massed longbows who simply shot holes in first, the men at arms forcing them to retreat and then the schiltron it forcing it also to leave the table. This ward was now shattered and the lone victorious schiltron began its slow retreat.

Out where the French landed the English right flank force held them at bay for a while in order for their sole mounted men at arms unit to make a charge but things didn’t go quite according to plan.

The English horse got themselves into all kinds of bother and that they were able to survive at all was pure luck and the death of Robert the Bruce in the melee. However once they had fallen back it was time for the longbowmen to open up on the now weakened French & Scottish knights and the French division was soon heading for the boats.

A splendid English victory, proving the old adage of “the best form of defence is attack” 😁

The important thing of course was that we had a good day and we certainly did, Gareth is a great host and a top bloke and I’m pleased to call him my friend.

Eumenes & Antigonus Go To Partizan

So, another Partizan has rolled around and we took along our two year Successors project to do a display game of Paraitacene 317BC where the forces of Antigonus Monophthalmus and Eumenes of Cardia met in the first of their duels for Alexander’s empire.

Before we review the game however, what about the show?

First take was, busy 😀 But not in a bad way, even at the peak show point (between 11.00am and 1.00pm) the numbers weren’t so overwhelming that you couldn’t move and looking out from our pitch you could see that the punters were moving about freely. I couldn’t comment on how well the traders did as we were tied to our spot but there looked to be decent numbers around most stalls.

Next take was the vibe, and that is always a good one. For me the show has always exuded friendliness and good humour which is the principal reason for us attending as demonstrators and this one was no exception. We had many positive comments on the game, some great chats with people we’d never met before and renewal of contact with folk we hadn’t seen since the last show. Also the hooking up with some of our followers on Twitter which I just love, so good to put a face to the profile 😃

Of course Partizan sells itself on the quality of the games on display and this year was no different with many fine games available to feast the eye upon.

As is always the case for ourselves being tied to the game there is very little time to really look at the other games and this one proved no exception – I think we got half an hour each to whizz round, pick up a couple of pre ordered things and have a quick look at what was going on.

For me, the preferred games are the the ones that look like an extension of what a club or group of mates is capable of and by inference what a newcomer or player of only a few years experience could aspire to within their circle of gamers. These games will feature well painted mini’s, based up consistently, deployed over some decent terrain which isn’t beyond the skills of most gamers.

I completely appreciate the enormous amount of modelling skill, time, effort and expense that some of the demonstration boards have had poured into them but I do ask myself, what happens to all this gorgeous stuff a year later?

What of our efforts?

With only two of us moving the figures around and an awful lot of chatting 😂 it was slow going but hey so what, people seemed to like it and we had a good day.

For the record, Eumenes crushed the Antigonid left flank and at end of play had his veteran cavalry sweeping behind the Antigonid lines, similarly on the other flank, a rather more tough fight did finally see the Antigonid cavalry defeated also. In the all important centre we had elephants panicking and getting in the way and a couple of support infantry clashes which saw both sides losing their mercenary hoplites, alas no push of pike 😥 we were just too busy talking!😂🤣

All in all though a great day. Many thanks to the organisers for another flawless show and much love to all those that stopped by and commented.