Edinburgh Wargames
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The Edinburgh Wargames Journal
Issue 60 - July 2011
Periods featured in this issue: Modern (Borneo & Malaya), The American War of Independence, The Napoleonic War (all 28mm)
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Modern : A Borneo (1965) and a Malaya (1950) skirmish (Force on Force) 28mm
The original plan was to play a 15mm Second World War game set in Burma, but drinking got in the way. Instead, Chris Brown, medieval historian and core member of the Shetland Wargame Club let us use the same terrain for a couple of skirmish games using Force on Force, using my figures. The first game was set during the Borneo Confrontation - an "Operation Claret" raid on an Indonesian-held kampong (village) on the Indonesian side of the border. Although the buildings were a tad small for 28mm figures, they served our purpose very well, and besides, they looked really good! The Indonesians were placed in several of the buildings, and two squads of Gurkhas deployed on two sides of the settlement. The game began with the alarm being raised by a sentry, and as the Indonesian soldiers started tumbling out of the buildings the Gurkhas opened fire.
What followed can best be described as a turkey shoot. The hapless Indonesians never really stood much of a chance. One fire team after another was eliminated in the crossfire, leaving heaps of seriously wounded or dead men littering the perimiter of the village. Only two of the six teams in the village managed to escape the ambush, and even they were badly knocked around. The end result was about a dozen Indonesians killed, the same number seriously wounded. They along with a handful of others were captured, all for the loss of one seriously wounded Gurkha. All in all it was a good day for the British Commowealth.
The second game was set during the Malayan Emergency, and involved a Commonwealth sweep through jungle known to contain CTs (Communist Terrorists). Two small Gurkha squads (6 figures apiece) were joined by a five man squad of Malay police, and led by an Iban tracker. Things got off to a good start when the tracker spotted CTs in the jungle ahead of them, who had been lurking in ambush. A firefight followed in which the CTs had the worse of the exchange. The Communist player sent another team to tend to his wounded, and merged the two units to create a large, powerful squad. It then spent the game on "Overwatch", shooting at and Gurkhas who tried to move forward.
Gurkhas and CTs
While all this was taking place two other CT units revealed themselves by opening up on the police, and effectively knocking the squad out of the game by killing two of them, and seriously wounding four more. The Gurkhas now found themselves outnumbered, and pinned down by a heavy volume of fire. On the Commonwealth right flank two small Gurkha fire teams used fire and movement tactics to outflank the large squad of CTs, and began to whittle them down. However, on the left flank things weren't going so well, as first one fire team then the other were silenced by the crossfire of the remaining CTs. The game ended when the Commonwealth players elected to withdraw, while there were still Gurkhas left standing to haul away the wounded.
So, in two lively and fun skirmishes the Commonwealth won one game, and lost the other. All four of the Shetland players hadn't played Force on Force before, and were well pleased with the rules, and planned to use them for their own modern games - Cold War, Vietnam and Borneo Confrontation clashes using 20mm figures. For my part I was delighted to give my figures an outing, particularly my latest batch of CTs and police from the old Britannia Miniatures stable, now sold by Grubby Tanks.
Malay Police
Modern Brushfire Wars page Malaya & Borneo page Force on Force review
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The American War of Independence: Battle of Guilford Courthouse, 1781 (Black Powder) 28mm
I jumped at the chance when the Shetland Wargames Club asked if I wanted to game with them. Shetland is a barren thin streak of an island, some 60 miles north of the fair green isles of Orkney. The club there consists of a half dozen or so historical gamers, plus a couple of dozen spotty oiks who play fantasy games. Fortunately for this game the teenagers stayed at home, leaving the rest of us to refight Guilford Courthouse using my figures and their terrain. The guys had commandeered a school hall for the occasion, and so there was plenty of space. Regular readers of this site will remember that almost a year ago I refought the battle using British Grenadier rules, while Bill Gillchrist did the same using Black Powder (see Journal 49). On both occasions the Americans won. Would the bad guys make it three wins in a row?
We refought this using the same figures and figure scale as the Black Powder game. That meant a figure ratio of 1=20, and a dozen or so units a side. As in the real battle, the Americans deployed in three lines, with the North Carolina militia up front, the Virginia militia behind them, and four regiments of Continentals in reserve. a road which led straight up the middle of the table to Guilford Courthouse. The defences spanned The British attacked on the left with the 23rd and 33rd Foot, on the right with the 71st Highlanders and von Bose's Hessians, while the Guards and the British Legion formed the reserve, supported by a pair of 3-pounders. At first the American line did well, hammering away at the oncoming troops with muskets and a single 6-pounder. They even scored an early success when the Hessians were repulsed when they tried to charge across the split-rail fence in front of the American line. Then though, it all started to go wrong.
On the American right the militia were forced to retire when faced with a bayonet charge by the 33rd. They crossed the fence, and supported the 23rd in their assault, which soon had the Americans on the right of the road heading for the rear, or dissolving. That allowed the 23rd to wheel to the right in support of the other British brigade, which now faced a combined militia force, as the Virginia militia there had moved forward to support the Carolinians. An almighty melee followed, but the colonial militia were outclassed and outmanoeuvred. The crunch came when the British Legion cavalry charged and broke Lee's Legion, and then wheeled to threaten the America left flank. Within a turn the militia had broken, and the survivors were fleeing back through the woods.
While the British consolidated and moved forward into the woods, the Americans took stock of what was left of their defences. On the left of the road there was nothing between the British and Guilford Courthouse, while on the right the Americans still had a small Brigade of Virginia militia, supported by the regulars. The Americans decided to bring the regulars forward, to form a strong defensive line in the woods, with one brigade of regulars on each side of the road, bolstered by the Virginia militia and whatever smaller skirmish units still remained. The British came on in fine style, and smashed into the American line on both sides of the road. On the right the British Legion cavalry charged but were repulsed by the Virginia continentals, while on the left the 23rd and 33rd pushed back the American militia, until they finally broke and ran. The only bright spot on the part of the Americans was the breaking of von Bose's Hessian regiment, who failed a break test after being pummelled by musketry and canister.
That though, wasn't enough to save the day. The British regrouped and charged in again, and then, in a single turn, the American regulars dissolved, with three of their four regiments failing break tests in a single turn. They fled the field, forcing the American commander to roll for his army morale. The result was inevitable - the survivors fled the field, and the British were duly handed the laurels of victory. In the real battle Cornwallis's little army was badly battered, and the same held true here. The result was therefore a pretty historic conclusion, with the Americans dissolving and ceding the field to the Brits.
It was a hard-fought but enjoyable game, and the rules worked a treat. The best thing about the game was the way the five Shetland players picked up Black Powder, despite never having playing it before. Better still they all declared the rules were just what they'd been looking for, and they plan to adopt them for all their horse and musket games. That alone made it all worth while.
American War of Independence page Black Powder review
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The Napoleonic War: Peninsular Clash at Botchas Jobus, 1809 (Black Powder) 28mm
With Angus still up in Orkney this game report comes to you second-hand - the result of a description over the phone by the victorious French commander Dougie Trail. The game was a Peninsular clash. fought between "Don" John Glass' Spaniards and Dougie's French. Both commanders had deputies - Brian Phillips for the French (see his painting website in the links page), and British sub-commander "JP", who did little during the game but turn up! The Spanish were defending again, and Don John was hoping to break his run of defeats by holding a nice-looking hilltop position. Read on to find how it all panned out.
The French decided to launch the bulk of their force in a flank attack. This game was loosely based on the scenario by Charles S. Grant in his Scenarios for Wargamers (1983), an old classic based on Leuthen (1757) that we play about once a year. Brian commanded the flanking force, but in the first couple of turns he rolled terrible dice. Not only did his flankers not turn up, but the troops on the table supporting them performed a "blunder", and promptly retired from the field for several turns! Meanwhile the Spanish commander realised he was outnumbered and exposed, and called on the support of a British brigade that was in the vicinity. The British commander duly appeared, then for reasons known only to himself "JP" formed a defensive line on the edge of the table. He placed it as far away from the French flank attack as possible. No doubt he had secret orders from Wellington to preserve his men for a "real battle", but it didn't do the Spanish much good. Effectively they were left to fight the French on their own.
All of a sudden Brian's luck turned. His French flanking force flooded onto the table, and the French infantry columns advanced on the Spanish-held ridge. Meanwhile a French cavalry brigade supported the left flank of the advance, but after coming under fire from the Spanish guns one of the two regiments - the Chasseurs a Cheval - broke and ran. That left the now rather battered 2nd Hussars to face the Spanish cavalry, who had worked their way into a position to charge. This was the clash that would decide the fate of the exposed Spanish flank. In previous encounters the brown-coated Hussars have always emerged victorious. This time though, they were disordered by artillery fire, had taken casualties, and were outnumbered two to one. Would this be Don John's lucky day?
Apparently not. Against all the odds the 2nd Hussars broke and routed first one Spanish unit (known as the "downhill dragoons" 'cause of their unusual basing), and then the lance-armed picadores. While the French cavalry were left to mop up the artillery on the Spanish right flank, the infantry columns reached the ridge, and piled into the hapless Spaniards. I say hapless because the dice were not in John's favour that day, as one unit after the other broke under the pressure, and fled the field. Just like the Prussians at Leuthen, the French were able to concentrate their attack against one flank of the Spanish line, then work their way along the ridge, overwhelming Spanish battalions as they went. Eventually the Spanish commander ordered a general retreat, and the survivors fled the field, while the British marched off in good order, having barely fired a shot in anger all evening.
As the British commander, "JP" complained he hadn't really had much to do in the game - hardly surprising when he deployed on the unthreatened flank of his Spanish allies. While the Spanish player was unlucky, full kudos goes to the French players, who took full advantage of their flank attack to wreak havoc on the enemy. As usual with a Black Powder game the whole thing flowed quickly and smoothly, and took less than two hours to play from start to finish, despite the large quantity of lead on the table. Even my own preferred set General de Brigade would be hard-pressed to match that speed of resolution.
Napoleonic War page Age of Bonaparte page Black Powder review Black Powder amendments
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