Tonight, I played my first game of The Men Who Would be Kings (TMWWK) using their solo game rules, "Playing against Mr. Babbage" and the optional rule of Skirmish Kings a.k.a. half sized units. Sergeant Spurgeon Burress was ordered to take a squad of men and patrol the area to the south of the main camp. Sergeant Burress has the reputation of being somewhat aggressive in his tactics often throwing his men out of perfectly good defensive positions and assaulting the enemy in hand to hand (I rolled a result of up & at em for the good Sergeant's personality which means given the opportunity he will always charge the enemy.)

"My God it's a barren wasteland here private."

Imad Majid was not known for his tactical skills or leadership but had never been so much as scratched in the many battles in which he had fought.(I rolled a result of Bulletproof Bumbler) With a viscous cry the tribesmen rise from cover nearly upon the patrol. (Arrived within one (1) native move range)

"Steady fire boys!"

Sergeant Burress orders his men to fire inflicting two (2) casualties on the enemy, one by Burress himself, pinning the enemy. Imad tries to rally his men but his men begin to retreat. The patrol continues firing with little effect but it is enough to drive the enemy away. 

The Enemy retire from the field. 

 Having driven off the tribesmen, Sergeant Burress orders his men to begin the march back to camp. Little do they know that the enemy had worked its way around and cut off the way back to camp. A new group of tribesmen led by the marksman, Tut Obeid, arrive in the flank at short range.

"Enemy to the rear Sergeant."

The patrol pours fire into this new threat, killing Tut in the process. The men rally seeking revenge for their fallen leader. The patrol fires again inflicting two (2) more casualties, again Sergeant Burress hits his target. However, another group of tribesmen arrives to the front within charge range.

"More enemy close, Sergeant!"

 The patrol pours fire into this new threat, killing Tut in the process. The men rally seeking revenge for their fallen leader. The patrol fires again inflicting two (2) more casualties, again Sergeant Burress hits his target. However, another group of tribesmen arrives to the front within charge range. The patrol fires on the new threat to no effect and the tribesmen attempt to charge. 

This is his opportunity, This is his destiny. Sergeant Burress orders his men to charge the enemy not noticing that more tribesmen have arrived behind the patrol. The men obey his orders but their spirit is not in the fight. Burress underestimated the fighting ability of these tribesmen as half of his patrol is cut down. The remainder of the patrol is forced back but are now aware of the fresh unit of tribesmen barreling towards their rear. 

More tribesmen advance on the patrol. 

Burress and his men fight for their lives and drive off the depleted native unit each side receiving one more casualty. 

The patrol prepares for another assault.

As the enemy close the final meters, Burress turned to the only soldier left, he did not even know his name and uttered, "Hubris! my boy! Hubris!" The two soldiers brace for the impact but due to the heat and their exhaustion meet a quick end. 

"Hubris! my boy! Hubris!"

The end of Sergeant Burress.

 Miraculously, Private Elvin Ming survived crawling back to the camp and reporting the fate of his patrol and Sergeant Burress' final words. 

This was a fun game. Initially the British did quite well firing into the tribesmen and pinning them repeatedly, however one (1) turn of not pinning the enemy combined with Burress personal trait spelled doom for the patrol. 

Figures are Hat Industries from Michigan Toy Soldier Company. Looking forward to getting them painted up and trying the rules again. 

THW Colonial Adventures - playtest

Score: 8 out of 10

Over the holiday I play-tested Two Hour Wargames Colonial Adventures rules. First impressions is that this game has some real promise. The rules are written for solo or multi player gaming, the game can be played with miniatures of any scale or alternatively you can play the rules without any miniatures just paper, pencil and dice.

After Thanksgiving dinner I set up a small patrol scenario and played a game in about 45 minutes, the game probably would have taken less time but I had to look through the rule book several times as this was my first game. Before I get into the battle report I will give a brief overview of the rules.

The rule book is laid out as follows: Introduction,

Getting Started (stuff you need to play), Game Basics (discussion on how to determine troop characteristics),

Armies (divided into European and native, also there are additional army lists on-line at their yahoo group), Rules (Turn Sequence, Actions, Movement, Melee, etc.) and Scenarios (set-up, scenario specific rules). The rules are well written and organized. The scale is one (1) base equals approximately five (5) men so a standard platoon is 20 stands, although they do have rules to modify this down to 10 stands per platoon.

The main mechanic of the game is taking a series of "Crisis Tests" against the value of your units and/or leader's "Reputation". The more successful you are at passing the tests, (better rolls) the better the outcome and more options allowed. Example if your Ansar swordsmen want to charge a British Square, you must take a Crisis Test, if you pass you charge. Since the British are being charged they must take a Crisis Test, if they pass they do an action, (fire, stand, etc.) When the British fire at the Ansar, the Ansar must take a Crisis Test to see what happens when they are fired at. If you don't like rolling dice, you will not like this game. The game is played exclusively with six-sided dice so the variance in units is somewhat limited, however the mechanic is simple and elegant.

Players roll dice to determine which side goes first and based on the die roll for each side which reputation troops may activate. Each side complete all of their actions prior to the second side activating. However, Crisis Test will effect the ebb and flow of the turn. The ranged combat and melee are based upon unit reputation as well ,with some situational variables, (high ground, ferocious troops, etc.)

The game plays quickly, is simple and the solo version had just the right amount of tension and desperation. A few draw-backs, there were no drawings showing combat situations only text descriptions and a couple of the rules could have been fleshed out a bit more rather than left up to the discretion of the player. I will post my questions on the yahoo group and report on the level of assistance I receive. All in all a very fun first game, I look forward to trying the rules out with friends.

Battle report:

Set up: I selected the Patrol scenario. I played a company of Egyptian infantry sent out from their garrison to search for Mahdist troops and survey the surrounding lands. I rolled for terrain and below is a map of the area with hills, one clump of wooded area (oasis) in the middle and stick men (Possible Enemy Forces - PEF) where Mahdist troops might be. The Egyptian forces are given a Reputation of three (3), nothing to write home about. I rolled for my leader's reputation and ugh, a two (2) reputation, he would be no help at all, however as is usual in legend the NCO was reputation five (5). I imagined a young upstart Mulazim Tani (2nd Lietenant) leaning on the experience of his Sargent. My platoon consisted of 100 men (20 stands). The Mulazim ordered his men into line at the base of a hill and sent 15 men (3 stands) to scout the near hill and the wooded area. The scouts observed no movement along the ridge and slowly moved toward the oasis. Upon cresting the hill the scouts had direct line of sight to two (2) of the possible areas of Mahdi activity. The tension builds, no troops are to be seen, that means troops must be in area 2.

The rules dictate that when a unit moves into the center of a grid that the unit check for the enemy even if there are no PEF figures there. My Egyptian troops slowly marched over the hill and down into area four (4), the line of Egyptians inch forward when two (2) bands of ferocious Ansar spring up in the middle of area four (4). The Egyptians are outnumbered 150 to 85 and the Ansar are exceptional hand-to-hand fighters (I rolled really well for them).

At the top of the next turn the Egyptians and Mahdist roll the same activation number, in the scenario this could trigger possible re-enforcements and sure enough two (2) more PEFs popped up on the board.

While the Mulzim fumbles at his sword while the Egyptian NCO barks out the command to fire at the smaller Ansar unit in front of them (Crisis Test passed), the Egyptian line erupts in Volley Fire and causes 10 Ansar (2 stands) to fall. The Ansar seem inspired by the death of their comrades (Crisis test passed) and charge. The Egyptian NCO orders the troops to reload and fire just prior to the Ansar piling into the line (Crisis test result from charge) and the Egyptians once again unload their carbines, five (5) more Ansar fall (one stand).

Screams and curses are heard over the pitch of battle as hand-to-hand fighting erupts along the line. The Ansar inflict heavy casualties on the Egyptians (20 men, 4 stands) while another 20 men run for their lives (Crisis test Egyptians pass). The Lt. is nearly killed in the action (leader killed on 11-12, I rolled a 10). At the darkest moment the Ansar pause allowing the Sargent to call a fighting retreat and the line is reformed at the top of the hill.(Egyptians rolled higher on activation roll and broke from melee). The scouts are running to the sound of small arms fire but may arrive too late.

With the line depleted the Egyptians manage a smaller volley and inflict more casualties on the smaller Ansar band (5 men, 1 stand), 10 Ansar have enough and flee (2 stands). The Ansar mob ascends the hill (Crisis test to charge past), the Egyptians fire at will but have depleted most of their ammunition (low ammo roll). The Ansar mob crashes into the remaining Egyptians do not have much fight left in them and scatter toward their garrison, the Mulazim and Sargent with a small contingent of troops fight their way out. the scouts can see the Mahdi's men celebrating on the hill and do not dare to approach.

The Yuzbashi at the garrison waits for his report. The young Mulazim Tani arrives at his door. "Your report!", the Yuzbashi's voice is hard and short. "The enemy is in numbers to our east Effendi and my patrol barely escaped, I am sad to report 28 wounded and approximately 30 killed. Had it not been for the Sargent a fear it would have been worse." Just as the Yuzbashi was about to start his lecture on leadership and responsibility, a fellah burst into the room. "Effendi, we have spotted many men moving to the east and west, flying the green banner!" The Yuzbashi reached for his fez, "Mulazim prepare to redeem yourself ." "I will try my best, Effendi!"

The next scenario in the book is a raid by the winning force of the Patrol scenario. I will play this scenario with friends and report later. In summary Colonial Adventures is a fast, simple and good set of rules. I will report later and continue exploring other rules as well. On a crafting note I had a bit of time to work on my terrain table last night, I hope to post pictures soon.

The Battle of El-Teb

Last Friday 11-06-09 I played my first Sudan Campaign game using Too Fat Lardies' http://toofatlardies.co.uk/ Sudan rules They Don't Like it Up Em! These rules are available in their December 2008 Festive Feast special.

First impressions of the rules, short (10 pages), random card driven turn (not all units will activate each turn), funny (humorous card effects), ambiguous.

I have not played Too Fat Lardies' rule system before so those who have may have an easier time interpreting the flavor of the rules. The main driver of the rules is the action deck and blinds. The action deck is built by making a card for each large unit, most officers, some special event cards and one (1) end of turn card. During each turn cards are drawn and each card activates its' unit. The other major component of the rules is utilizing paper "blinds" for each native unit, I used 5X3 inch index cards face down. These are deployed by the native player for intial set-up, additionally the native players received blank "blinds" which would help hide the location fo their troops even more. The British officers and units can attempt to "spot" the enemy blinds (reveal if they are actually troops or not). The combination of the random end of turn and inability to see your enemy at the beginning are both interesting concepts.

The scenario started out with the Mahdi's forces (natives) occupying a couple of hills flanked by rough terrain (pictured left) and the British entering the board from the lower corner.

The British player began advancing and attempting to spot the Mahdi's forces with his cavalry and got a bit overextended on the left flank. The Mahdi's forces stayed undetected with little movement the first turn. However, the Native artillary started to fire at the British advance triggering the British player to fire his artillary and jamming his Gardner machine gun, which never unjammed the entire game.

Pictured left are the King's Royal Rifles and Yorks and Lancs advancing with their supply camels. While drawing cards we noticed a trend, the native player had many more units, i.e. his cards were being drawn quite a bit more often than the British, the British player did not even get his artillary card drawn to almost the end of the game. We had some issues with the rules as they seemed incomplete at points, sometimes not fully developing the rule before moving on. As these rules are based on the Lardies' system the gaps in the rules may be easily interpreted by players of other games within the system, however having never played them before we had to make some gentlemanly decisions on how we would treat the unknown.

Example: When the card "Blinds Move" is drawn the native player may move all of his blinds and wanted to charge all of his sub-units within the blind into the British, this was not covered in the rules. The rules said how to "shoot" from a blind but not how to move the sub-units within the blind into combat. We decided to have each sub-unit within the blind move and fight individually, ther was not rules for several units engaging one British unit, flanking etc. each combat was fought one at a time ala Kung-fu style, allowing the British to repulse each attack prior to the next.

Overall our gaming group gave the rules a C+ allowing a little room for our first Sudan rules test and we did have a fun time with quite a few laugh out loud moments as the native players became obsessed with trying to capture one of the British Camels and failing the entire game. The final outcome of the battle was a win for the natives who gave the British a bloody nose inflicting quite a few casualties, however a combination of horrible dice rolls, inability to draw more than one British unit card and no rules for passage of lines may have been a disadvantage for the Brits.

Will we play these rules again, probably with some house rules thrown in and several postings to the Lardies' Yahoo group. I would say if you have played other Lardies' titles you would probably have no issues with the game. It is a beer and pretzels game and I am not sure it is what we are looking for but it was an enjoyable evening and that is what is important. Finally for the record paper troops are not nearly as enjoyable as lead. Coming up Piquet Field of Battle, Two hour Wargames Colonial Adventures and The Sword and the Flame. I have been working on a steamer ship model and will post about that next week.