Northern Conspiracy September 2015 Game Night

Last Friday evening I attended our club's September game night. I played in Charlie's 28mm Napoleon's Rules of War game for the battle of Abensburg - April 20th 1809. I commanded the Bavarian right wing with Randy commanding the Left wing. Opposite us were John and Bob commanding the Austrians.

The scenario had the Austrians defending a hill spanned by two woods trying to protect two roads exiting off their central rear table edge. Randy and I came up with a simple plan, 'Hey diddle diddle, straight up the middle'. We hit the Austrians hard and fast in the center while delaying on our flanks.

The bum rush tactic worked like a charm early, but the Austrians, having central lines, stabilized the situation by stuffing an entire reserve brigade into the center as the first line failed. This worked nicely. In the woods to my right, Bob's Jagers and fresh infantry halted my attack there.

As we called the game it was still up in the air. This game could easily have serviced 8-10 people, so it took the four of us a while to get all our troops in action. Charlie has been continuing to improve his rules. Most of his recent changes were nice improvements. I look forward to the next game.

Other games offered that I didn't play in were Phil's 1941 Pacific WWII air game, and Ed's Skirmish Napoleonic game using his house-modified Brother against Brother rules. Sorry I didn't get more photos of these since I was so busy pushing all that fine Bavarian lead in Charlie's game.

28mm British WWII Tommies

These are twenty WWII "Tommies" - late war British infantry that I've recently finished painting up. The figures are from West Wind's 'Berlin or Bust' range purchased through Old Glory using my discount card. As such they were quite a good value for the money. The figures are nicely sculpted and seem accurately equipped. The twenty figures will make up two ten-man squads, each with an NCO with an SMG (Thompson or Sten), a Bren gunner and 8 riflemen. Below are close-up photos of all of the figures in each squad.

 I've put white rocks on the base of each Bren gunner and red rocks on the base of each NCO with SMG. This is for easier tabletop identification for those with questionable close-up eyesight.

Here are some close ups of the backs of several of the figures in various kit.

EB AWI at The 6th Annual Hobby Bunker Game Day

This past Saturday I ran my Electronic Brigadier Freemen's Farm scenario at the Hobby Bunker's 6th annual game day. The game day was held in the Hobby Bunker's gaming area which contained six separate gaming tables. The Hobby Bunker is appropriately named. Being in a basement retail space, my cell phone WiFi hotspot didn't have a solid signal. The Hobby Bunker's house WiFi worked fairly well sometimes, but had occasional 'hiccups' which caused the tablets fits. The players were all very understanding, and considering the networking issues, we still managed to play 20 turns and play the game to a firm conclusion.

This battle was a case of two 18th century armies deploying at different rates. The Americans got their lines set up quickly, the crown forces came in a bit more piecemeal. The Americans got a lot of early two on one firefights which they took well advantage of. Casualties early in the game were three for two in favor of the rebels. By the time the British pressed the issue withe the bayonet the damage was done. Victimized were the British 20th and 9th foot plus the British and Hessian grenadiers. The cost for the Americans, the 2nd and 4th New York with the 2nd New Hampshire in reserve in bad shape but remaining on the battlefield under the watchful eye of General Poor. The final statistics are shown below:

British Forces Army cohesion: 82.1% Total Casualties: 418 / 3709 (11.3%) 4 units dispersed 1 shaken units

American Forces Army cohesion: 84.1% Total Casualties: 269 / 3740 (7.2%) 2 units dispersed 1 shaken units

Thanks to all the players for hanging in there with the network problems. I had a great time running the game, and from the smiles in the photos it looks like everyone had fun playing despite the slight technical issues.

Adam has a write up of the game on his Fencing Frog blog with more photos.

The state of the battlefield at the end of the game with all the gaming materials cleared:

The Last of the Veteran Carthaginian Hoplites

I've been saying I'm finished with my Carthaginian army for about six months now. I guess this is one of those armies that will never be completely finished. In this case I can say with reasonable certainty  that these are the last veteran hoplites that I'll be painting for the army. These figures, are converted from Roman triarii figures from the Old Glory Republican Roman line. I've snipped off the plumes and of course painted the shields appropriately. The white unit has a combination of homemade decals I had left over and hand-painted shields. The red shields are left plain to match the rest of the units in the red wing. This brings each of my veteran hoplite wings up to the full strength of four stands.

The painting on the chain mail is dry brushing over black primer. The rest of the figures are block painted and washed with my homemade magic wash. 

Next up on the painting table some late war WWII British infantry a.k.a. 'Tommies'. I'm going to mix in some WWII here and there to add some variety and keep me motivated to paint. These two units lingered on the table quite a while. Partially this was due to ancients burn-out and partially due to personal/household reasons. Either way I'm back at the table!

Moderns with MarkD

Last Saturday my friend MarkD, from MarkD's Gaming Site had a few of us to his gaming bunker to play some moderns using his Bolt Action modern modifications. The game was a play test of his game for our club's upcoming game night. The mission, a UN force has to escort a VIP from a Serbian-held area. Ralph, Ed and I were the UN forces. Ralph was the UN Canadians, Ed the French and I was the Belgians and French armor. Charlie and Mike were the Serbian insurgents.

Charlie and Mike deployed in a blocking position behind a river and quickly collapsed on the Canadians defending the town. Ralph defended the first wave attack on the town slaughtering an entire squad of Charlie's Serbians. From there it turned pear shaped for the UN forces as Charlie and Mike quickly picked them apart while Ed and I tried to catch up with them across the river. My armored car crew was drunk, they had to be. They missed every shot with their huge main gun, even when shooting at one of the Serbian-held buildings in the town. Yes, they couldn't even hit the broad side of a house!

Little by little the Serbians whittled the Canadians down to just the VIP bodyguard and finally the Serbian sniper took her out - bang! right between the eyes. Fun game, good scenario, and the UN vehicles are just WAY too cool looking. Thanks for the fun day Mark.

Northern Conspiracy August 2015 Game Night

Last Friday I hosted another game of AWI Electronic Brigadier at our club's August game night. The battle was something I've always wanted to do - an alternate history game using AWI troops but for a Napoleonic battle. The battle was Quatre Bras. The Americans took the British role and the British the French role. I superimposed the battle into the 1777 Saratoga campaign with some fiddling to make things work.

The Americans had to defend 'the crossroads' which were where Quatre Bras was in the Napoleonic battle. The British needed to capture the crossroads, pushing through the defending Americans.  Photoed below are the Americans, Greg, Ralph and Dick.

I was pressed into service as a British wing commander along with CinC Bob and wing commander Rob. Early on the stream caused the British, myself especially, trouble and it took a while to get our troops on line. Dick got some early two on one volleys against my approaching red coats. Once on line I was able to return the two on one volleys in kind along with help down the line from Rob. On the left flank Bob beat up on the Connecticut militia with his Hessians. Eventually Rob and I were able to wear down Dick's command of Poor's brigade, routing one NH and one NY continental unit. In the center the British lights wavered but were hanging on by a thread. The British grenadiers also took a thrashing but were holding firm when we called the game.

In the end it was the British quality that decided the battle. Although both armies suffered similar casualties, the Americans had more units dispersed or in poor morale at the end of the game. The post game statistics were as follows:

British Forces Army cohesion: 77.0% Total Casualties: 309 / 3909 (7.9%) 0 units dispersed 2 shaken units

American Forces Army cohesion: 83.6% Total Casualties: 313 / 3740 (8.4%) 3 units dispersed 3 shaken units

The other two games were Michael's WWII air combat Aldertag (Eagle Day) August 1940 Battle of Britain (Axis & Allies Angels 20) game and Phil's 15mm Regimental Fire & Fury Sabine Crossroads game. I apologize to both Michael and Phil for not getting many photos. Having to GM and play in my game I didn't even really have time to take decent photos of my own game.

(Not) Brother Against Brother Napoleonic Skirmish Game #2

Last Friday my friend Ed had Byron, Charlie, Mike, George and I over for another go at his Brother Against Brother Napoleonic house rules. This time George and I were the French and Byron, Charlie and Mike were the Prussians. Like the first go around, the Prussians got a good jump on the half-timber barn and commanded that flank from it. George and I pushed into the park with our forces. George had about the same luck pressing the Prussian left as the first playing of the scenario (none at all). Pressed from the hard cover of the barn, I eventually also withered. The Prussians handled the French roughly and won the scenario by a good margin. Well played to them.

This is a good scenario and a second play reinforced the fact that Ed's house rules are all good steps forward in an already good game system. I'm looking forward to more games using Ed's modifications.