Angus Konstam's Edinburgh Wargames
Colonial
Mr. Kipling's Favourite
Although I'd dabbled with colonial gaming in the past, I never found it that satisfying. It always seemed something of a turkey shoot where "whatever happens we have got, the Maxim gun, and they have not" seemed to sum the whole thing up.
However, I've come to revisit it in the past year or two, mainly because I was suckered into it. The first mistake was to start re-reading the Flashman books. That put me in the mood. Next, I built up a small army for WW1 in East Africa. It involved tribal allies, so I found myself buying a whole army of Foundry He-He tribesmen... and Germans for them to fight. Well, other guys was doing the same with the Masai, so it seemed like the thing to do.
Next came "The Back of Beyond" campaign, set in Central Asia in the 1920's. I have the Turks, so it seemed only natural to buy some irregular tribesmen to back them up. Inevitably this meant Foundry NW Frontier Pathans - which was a terrible mistake. It coincided with me reading Saul Davis's book The Indian Mutiny, and before you could say "Pandy" I had a big plastic bag of mutinous sepoys and an empty wallet.
Colin Jack and Dave O'Brien at the Edinburgh Club play Colonial games from time to time, and the Mutiny pictures are from a game they laid on at a recent wargame show. I've only just started painting my mutineers, after they languished in the lead pile for the best part of 18 months. However, my He He are done, and they've made it to the tabletop. For rules we use Chris Peers' Heart of Africa set, which if you haven't tried it is great fun. Colin and Dave have also modified the system for the Indian Mutiny, which is an alternative to my idea, which was to use the same modified Chris Peer's rules Ever Victorious Armies which I use for the American Civil War. I call the Mutiny version In the Heart of India, and you can download a playsheet by clicking the link below.
My African figures are mostly foundry with a few lovely Copplestone Ngoni tribesmen thrown in, while the Indian Mutineers are mainly Old Glory (whose Colonial range is very good), with a few Foundry and Dixon figures. Actually, all my Indian cavalry are Foundry, whose Indian range includes the ever so important elephant limbers and maharaja command elephants! Of course the only way the Indians and Africans ever win seems to be by outnumbering their European opponents, so there's still loads to paint. I've also been painting up an Afghan army, which (with some modifications) can be used for either the 2nd Afghan War (1878-81), the Third Afghan War (1918-19), or as auxilliaries for our Russian Civil War "Back of Beyond" campaign.
For more information: Darkest Africa The Mutiny The Afghan War (this one is under construction)
Downloadable playsheets: In the Heart of Africa In the Heart of India (both are Word files)
For examples of Indian Mutiny Games, see Journal 8 & Journal 12
for Darkest Africa games see Journal 7 & Journal 12
For other colonial games, see Journal 21
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Colonial The Great War Second World War Vietnam