Edinburgh Wargames Journal

Issue 3  - June to July  2006

Periods featured in this Issue: English Civil War (28mm), The Great War (28mm), East Africa),

The "Back of Beyond" (28mm) & Second World War (15mm)

While May might have been a slow gaming month with work, house guests and other commitments getting in the way of painting or moving lead, things are hotting up at last.

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First World War - East Africa (In the Heart of Africa / In the Heart of East Africa)     28mm

Colin Jack and Bill Gilchrist of the SESWC laid on a great WW1 game, set in East Africa.

For this theatre we usually use Chris Peers' Heart of East Africa amendments to the Heart of Africa rules, but because this was a particularly large game we reverted to the slightly less complicated Contemptible Little Armies system. We certainly seemed to have a lot of lead on the table! My poor Germans were beset on three sides by Allied columns - the Belgians arrived by river, while the Nigerians & South Africans arrived on one long table edge while the British arrived from the other one, supported by a warband of Masai Warriors! In effect it was the trapping pincer movement the Allies always wanted to pull off in East Africa, but never managed. 

 The German High Command

The German command was quickly chopped in two - my rearguard around the village picked on the Belgians, in the vain hope of wiping them out then escaping the trap by seizing their river steamers. The Germans were supported by a "Konigsberg" gun which fought and eventually won a due with a Belgian gunboat. Unfortunately for the rash "boat siezing" plan I ran out of Schutztruppe before the Belgians ran out of Askaris...! 

The bearers trying to pick their way through the mayhem, and my German sailors manning a Maxim

On the far side of the table Colin Jack conducted a spirited defence, cutting down a Masai charge, seeing off the Sikhs and clearing a path for the German bearers to make their way to safety. It was all good fun, even though  nobody seemed to be following much of a plan, and as you can see, the 6x8 foot table and the terrain seemed to swallow up the figures in a fairly realistic way. We should really play more of these WW1 games... Colin Jack supplied the British and half the Germans, while my Schutztruppe and Sailors made up the rest of the force.

The South Africans closing for the kill...

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Second World War - Ardennes, 1944 (Battlegroup Panzer Grenadier)  15mm

From the savannah of Africa to the snow-covered hills of the Ardennes. The next game was a 15mm Second World War game between my Americans and my wargaming pal Kevan's Germans. Although I rarely play with 15mm figures these days, I've kept a few just to take part in the odd club game. I was also persuaded to give 'em the winter treatment. However, the prize of the day went to Kevan for his snow terrain, which looked superb. See for yourself;

The plan called for an American company to hold a small village, and to deny access to the important road junction just beyond it. the Germans came on with two reinforced companies, supported by a brace of Jagpanthers. The American reinforcements consisted of two Shermans and an M-10. Now, whenever I'm faced with large pieces of German armour I always reach for the radio and call in some air support. Unfortunately this time nobody was listening - we needed to roll a 5-6 on a D6 for the mission, and for seven turns we failed the roll! the result was that the two German monsters trundled through the town without stopping! By the end of the game the two surviving American tanks had bugged out, most of the infantry company was killed or routed, and the Germans were the undisputed masters of the village. The only consolation for the American players was that we'd inflicted heavy casualties on the German infantry in the process. As usual the rules we used were Battlegroup Panzer Grenadier.

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Back of Beyond Campaign -Central Asia, 1918-22 (Contemptible Little Armies / Back of Beyond) 28mm

In Edinburgh a group of us have been running a "Back of Beyond" campaign for some years using 25mm figures. Actually I'm something of a latecomer to this, and just about the only army which hadn't been taken was the Turks. It just so happened that I'd already started building up a WW1 Turkish army, so before you knew it Gus Pasha was champing at the bit ready to invade Central Asia. In the last few months of campaigning the Turks captured Baku on the Caspian Sea,  then in Journal 1 I reported how my Turks successfully stormed ashore at Krasnovodsk, and so gained a foothold in Central Asia. Well, the next place down the railway line heading east was Ashkhabad, where a Red garrison was being besieged by the Whites - and had been for about a year. Of course when the Turks showed up it was game over. Having failed to reach an agreement with the Bolshevik commander I laid plans to assault the town in conjunction with a White attack.

We both used screens of Turkoman allies - wild tribesmen whose great saving grace was that they were cheap in points, and seemed willing to act as a "human shield" to protect the Turkish infantry as they advanced. The Turkomans were borrowed from the collection of Colin Jack  - also the photographer and the White commander. Supported by an armoured car the Turks silenced the defender's guns, then breached the city defences - one step ahead of the Whites who were doing the same thing on the far side of town. As the game ended the Turks were dealing with the Cheka who were making a last stand, while the rest of the Turkish army was busy occupying as much of the town as it could before their White "allies" arrived. It was a fun game (although the red commander might disagree), and like all these "Back of Beyond" games it gave us the chance to field some unusual troops and put them in an even stranger situation. As always the rules were Chris Peers' "Contemptible Little Armies".

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English Civil War  - Refight of Powick Bridge, 1642 (Very Civile Actions)   28mm

Next came an English Civil War game. Dougie Trail and I wanted to try out the Very Civile Actions from the Perfect Captain before we played a larger game the following week. the result was a small skirmish involving horse and foot on both sides, where my Parliamentarians most assuredly came off worst. By the end of the game I was hiding behind hedges in an attempt to avoid his cavalry, which seemed to be sweeping all before it - save a hardly pike block which stood its ground. What was great about this was the figure scale - with each figure representing about 12 troops. This meant that I got the chance to field an infantry regiment of 48 figures, not counting the officers, drummers and ensigns out the front!

Unfortunately our regular camera wasn't working properly, but fortunately Derek Hodge was on hand to fire off these two shots - one of dragoons and the other of the Parliamentarian general trying to figure out where he is.

The big English Civil War battle took place the following week - a refight of Powick bridge (September 1642). In it a column of Parliamentarian cavalry supported by dragoons were advancing on Worcester from the south when they ran into Prince Rupert and his men, who were picnicking in fields just beyond Powick Bridge. A furious cavalry battle followed, which lasted all of 15 minutes. by that time Rupert had swept the Parliamentarians from the field, so winning the opening skirmish of the war. Of course, in the refight things didn't go according to plan - for either side!

First the Parliamentarians succeeded in attacking and routing a Royalist unit, only to have their unit routed the following turn. By that time the Parliamentarians had crossed the bridge, and the first wave of Royalist attacks against them were repulsed. The dragoons had even been brought up to defend the Parliamentary flank, and all seemed to be going well. Then Prince Maurice and Prince Rupert charged again- smashing through the defences, and allowing Maurice  to capture the bridge.  Meanwhile Rupert was forced to head into a field beside the bridge in an attempt to thwart a Parliamentarian counter-attack, launched across the river. It took time but by the last turn almost all the Parliamentarian units were in flight, and the Royalists were able to resume their picnic...

The figures shown here are from my collection, plus those of Phil Olley (Maurice), Dougie Trail (Rupert) and Dave O'Brien (Col. Sands), all of whom took part in the game.  The rules were Very Civil Actions, available as a freebie download from the Perfect Captain website (which is listed amongst my links).

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