SAGA Night-Seljuks vs Normans

 

Sponsored by SAGA Montreal

We had our monthly SAGA meet-up last night at the Abyss, I believe there 3 games with 6 players. I played against Michel for the first time. We decided to play the Desacralisation scenario from the SAGA Tournament handbook. This was practice for the Grand Melee which is scheduled for next Saturday. Michel played his Normans and I played the Seljuks.

Normans (6 SAGA Dice)

3 units of Mounted Hearthguards in 2 groups

2 units of Levy Bowmen

1 unit of Mounted Warriors with Javelins

Seljuks (7 SAGA Dice)

2 units of Mounted Composite Bow Warriors

1 unit of Levy Bowman

3 unit of Foot Warriors in 3 groups

Game

Of course I forgot to take photos until the end. We both played quite aggressively so by the end of the game there were very few troops on either side. The scenario required that we place 3 markers each and by taking our opponent's markers we could restrict the number of survival points that each player would get at the end of the game. I was able to capture 2 markers while Michel got one. This restricted myself to a maximum of 24 points while Michel had 16. When we totalled up the survival points, I had a slight edge of 22 to 20 which would have meant a draw, but because of the markers I won by 22 to 16. Certainly a novel mechanism. I should say both of us had several shots at taking out the markers and they were difficult to capture.

Turn 5 was the last, as you can see not much left.

Norman Levy Bowmen

The Seljuk Warriors charging the Norman Levy

I just could not beat these Norman Javelins

It was a fun game and I did learn a few things, this was the 3rd outing for my Seljuks and they finally won.

Belov's Breakin-A CoC Virtual Encounter

MORE TO COME! 

Last week I had my first Virtual Wargaming experience for quite sometime. 

Patrol Phase

Final Positions

Thanks Tom, for inviting me to this game.

Showdown at Los Nachos-Game 2

A couple of weeks ago we got together at PY's to play game 2 in the Los Nachos campaign. This was turn 4 in our campaign. If you remember the Makinens won the first game and captured the Tainted Desert. Subsequently the Makinens were able to take the Rusty River without a fight. They took the next turn to lay some Barbed Wire. So on to Turn 4, the Taverniers have finally seized the initiative and have decided to attack the Rusty River. The Rusty River was placed in a verdant valley. We played the Vendetta scenario. I should note with their increased income the Makinens were able to arm up, while PY had to generate a new character to join the Taverniers......Rusty Nutslinger.......I will live that there.

The Players

Makinens

Matt Makinen-Gunslinger

Justin Makinen-Greenhorn

Bubba Carlsberg-Shootist

Hector el Borracho-Greenhorn

Tuco-Shootist

1 Group of Sheep Farmers

Taverniers

George Marrison-Shootist

Justin MaBoots-Shootist

Billy Bob Jackson-Gunslinger

Rusty Nutslinger-Geenhorn

4 Groups of Cowhands

Game Photos

The Rusty River Valley, as you can see there were lots of sheep. The Taverniers were attacking from the far ground with the Makinens in the near ground.

Half of the Makinens headed in this direction to protect their right flank but trying to remain in cover.

The Taverniers attack on our right flank, while their main characters moved to the centre.

You can see the bosses cowering in the rear!

On our left flank they sent in several more cowhands with their characters hanging out in the middle, they did give us a lot of jip on this flank and it too sustained gunfire to hold them off.

Somewhere along the way one of the Makinen Brothers was able to get a lucky shot off and killed Billy-Bob. The Tavernier attack was crumbling.

The Taverniers had terrible dice in this game and we slowly took out all their henchmen and then we were lucky enough to kill Billy Bob Jackson, the second character we have taken out in our 2 games. Justin Makinen was also taken out but was able to recover. The Taverniers decided to pack it in and ride back to their ranch. Another Makinen victory. 

There might be a bit of a hiatus before our next game as I cannot be in Montreal until the middle of November at the earliest. 

Burma 1943: Chindits at Nankin Station-A Far East Chain of Command Campaign

  

My friend Pierre-Yves is in the process of writing a pint sized campaign set in Burma with the Chindits facing the Japanese. The campaign is set in Burma in March 1943, during Operation Longcloth, Major Calvert's Chindits execute daring raids behind Japanese lines. The campaign focuses on the sabotage of the railway at Nankan Station and the subsequent Japanese counterattacks. 

I am going to leave the rest of the details to PY, as it is his campaign but will document each game we play, also please understand this is the first game we are playing using the new rules as laid out in the Far East handbook. I am playing the Japanese. I should also note that these are one off platoons for the first game, they do not feature in any further games, they will however affect the CO, MO and Platoon Leader's Outlook for the campaign.

Scenario 1: Initial Reconnaissance (The Patrol)

Japanese (FM 10)

1943 Infantry Platoon

Supports

Red Dice 

Chindits (FM 9)

1943 Chindit Platoon

Supports

Sniper

Patrol Phase

I got flummoxed in the Patrol Phase, with most of my JOP's in a tight small area, while PY got a fairly wide deployment.

Game

I am not sure why this happened but all our sections were deployed in a small area on the Japanese right flank. I had several double phases so I was able to get my sections down on overwatch. I found the movement rules in the Jungle a little difficult to appreciate first. You lose dice pips unless you move in single file through the Jungle, I did figure it out after awhile.

The Chindits deploy to counter the Japanese

Japanese fireing line

I used one of my sections to attempt to capture the Chindits JOP on my left flank, this was stupid as I could easily of sent off a Scout Team! 

Summary

Well it was an interesting game but not that exciting in respect to the play. I believe we got the new Jungle Rules down quite quickly, it is too bad that the game quickly degenerated into a long firefight with several sections being firing range but with no tactical movement aside from the Japanese play to capture the isolated Chindits JOP.  We essentially just pulverised each other until the Chindits FM dropped to 0, while the Japanese maintained their's at 4. A Japanese Victory. I did get a lot of double phases while I do not believe PY got any. But my Command Dice were abysmal, I got multiple 4's when both my SLs were out of commission. 

Butcher's Bill

Japanese

CO

MO

Outlook

Chindits

CO

MO

Outlook

SAGA Night-Seljuks vs JomsVikings

On our last club SAGA Night I played against Helge's Jomsvikings. We used the chaos method to set up and Helge was the active player. He placed just 2 forests on the table an left it at that. I am unsure of the rest of the game criteria. We played a 6 point game. Only 1 photo I am afraid.

Jomsvikings

Warlord

6 units of Hearthguard

Seljuks

Warlord

2 units of composite bow mounted Warriors

3 units of foot Warriors

1 unit of bow armed Levy

Well it was not much of a game, I really played quite poorly making a very poor move in my first turn, which essentially wiped out my 2 mounted units as an effective force. The next 3 turns witnessed a painful  and rapid decline in my forces. The game ended in the 4th turn with my Warlord being killed.

I do not believe I have ever played such a poor game, I am not really sure what happened. Helge, I should note played quite well. I was a bit surprised with an all Hearthguard warband, maybe even a little intimidated. The Seljuks are a new warband to me with this being only the 2nd time I have played them. However, their Battleboard really is not complicated. We will just have to see how it goes with them. Maybe a good explanation might be that I fielded a partially painted unit of horsemen. I have never done this in the past and maybe the SAGA gods were punishing me for this!

1940 German attack on French Village-CoC

I got together with my friend Iannick for a Chain of Command game. He had recently painted an Early War German platoon for Chain of Command and also got a friend of ours, Graham, to paint a French Platoon. He used Crusader Miniatures for the figures and they were really very nice indeed. He had put together the basic platoons with some supports.

We decided to play the Probe Scenario from the main rulebook but used the 1940 source book to play. The Germans were the attacker of course and Iannick decided to play them. He rolled a 2 for support.

Germans FM 10

Shutzen Platoon-Panzer Division A

Sniper

French FM 11

Infantry Platoon

Entrenchment 

Patrol Phase

The Game

I decided to deploy early with a group de combat on each flank with my grenadiers in an entrenchment. I usually do not like to do this but the path of the German attack was clear.

and here they come initially on my right.

The group de combats are quite large and maybe unwieldy

Another Geran Squad makes an appearance 

Getting down to the end now, the Germans make a rapid advance to my left flank, the French have a slight advantage.......

.......and do win but it is quite costly.

A badly malled German squad make a run for the edge.

The Germans are inches away from victory but their FM drops to zero. A French Victory!

It was a fun game and it was nice to get Iannick's troops out. It was quite close and a swing of the dice would have given the game to the Germans.

 

Quatre Bras!

This past weekend I finally got to play the Battle of Quatre Bras on the Table Top. I have had this in the planning for at least five years and collected the complete set of figures for Perponcher's Brigade as well as the Brunswickers. I had to use some substitutes for the French and the British but otherwise all was good.

Our wargaming club in Montreal has about 10 members interested in Napoleonic Wargaming and 6 of us gathered at Graham's House in Beaconsfield for the planned 2 day event. We were joined by Steve from Ottawa for the first day, unfortunately Iannick had to drop out for Sunday. I decided to be the games master for day 1, so this left 2 brigades at least for each player on Saturday. On Sunday the French  players had 3-4 brigades each.

I took the Order of Battle from the Hundred Days source book for GdA1 but converted the ADC's and added the CiC's to work with GdA2. We decided to play on an 8x5' terrain and adjusted the layout to mirror the schematic in the source book. Graham did a great job on the terrain as you can see below with all the hills in lace. I did the 3D modelling of the two farms and painted them. I was really pleased with how the terrain looked. Myself and Iannick carried out the pregame several days before including the Scouting Phase and Attacker's deployment. When the players arrived Saturday morning all the units that were deploying on the first turn were already on the table. The final OB is below, as you can see I used all the original rating and colour coded everything including the Brigadier status on an excel sheet. At the end of this post you will see the system that I used to identify each unit on the table. It worked very well!

The French had identified the position of both Sax-Weimar and Bylandt during the Scouting phase, thus gained a 20cm advance beyond their deployment line of 12" (I had given them a bonus 4" because of the depth of the table). 

We used the Victory Conditions in the source book (capture the Quatre Bras Farm) or on Victory points from the GdA2 rulebook.

I set the original terrain in the source book to a 8x5' grid. This placed Gémniocourt Farm a little too forward but it was still within the Allied Deployment space. Otherwise the terrain was accurate to the book. The deployment markers for each are the dotted yellow lines, the dotted light blue line was the advanced position allowed by the Good Scouting result for one French brigade. The numbers on the allied line are the possible placement of the Allied Brigades, 7 of which were dummies. Iannick found both deployed Allied Brigades, Sax-Weimar at 2 and Bylandt at 4! The initial placement of the French Brigades is in White, if you click on the map you should be able to see them. Thus the Battle Lines were set. 

I did take quite a few photos which are below and I will try to summarise the action every 4 turns. 

Turn 4 (Saturday Morning)

The French had placed their most powerful brigade with their Bold Brigadier, Prince Jerome Bonaparte in an advance position to take on the Nassau Brigade who had started the game on the Allied right flank. Bylandt with his Dutch-Belgians had the centre right and had placed the Orange Nassau in Gémniocourt Farm. Campi advanced his brigade on the French right to the woodland in an attempt to outflank the Nassau. Bachleu advanced his entire brigade against the Gémniocourt farm in order to take this strongpoint. Wathiez's Cavalry held back waiting to see if a weak spot would appear in the Allied right flank. Soye and Huber advanced on the French right in an attempt to outflank the Allied left. Butlar's Brunswick arrived on Turn 2 to plug the centre-right. Pack arrived on Turn 3 and advanced to protect the Allied left. Sprect with a 2nd unit of Brunswickers arrived on Turn 4. 

End of Turn 4, French advance to the right of the photo.

Turn 8 (Saturday Afternoon)

These are photos taken at the end of day Saturday. Most of the action continued on the Allied right. The Nassau took a lot of casualties but held the hill. They kept Campi at bay despite multiple attempts to attack. The Brunswick brigade kept the right of the farm from being flanked but Bachleu after several attempts was able to take the farm. A cavalry battle ensued on the Allied left with French Chasseurs and  Merlen's Brigade of Light Cavalry. By now Cramm with the Brunswick Cavalry had arrived to assist the Dutch-Belgians. Bylandt's Dutch-Belgians had now started to break and had to be withdrawn from the front line with the Brunswick Brigade moving into its position. Now Kempt was also advancing to support his fellow British Brigade on the left. Musket battles ensued between the British and the French. 

We called it a day, it was felt that the initial French advance was weakening and the Allie may have the battle, but much more fight to come!

End of Turn 8, all troops are on the table.

Turn 12 (Sunday)

Sunday, we played 4 more turns with a break for lunch. By now it was obvious that Jerome's brigade was quite battered and really becoming less of an effective fighting force. The French on their right and left flanks were being held back by the Brits on the Allied left and by a combination of the Nassau and Brunswickers on their right. Campi and Soye were also getting battered and their advance stalled. The Brunswickers were able to take back the Gémniocourt Farm. Multiple attacks by the French Cuirassiers failed to break the line. The French cavalry were destroyed. The writing was on the wall.....history had repeated itself. Allies 9 VP and French 4. 

The table at the end of the battle.

The Players

Saturday: Iannick and David, with me at the head of the table trying to keep order. Keeping order required a bit of effort on my behalf for the first few turns!

Sunday: From L-R Helge and Dan for the Allies. David and Graham for the French. I played with the Allies. Steve and Iannick played for the French, I do not seem to have a photo of Steve.

I felt this 2 day GdA event went very well as I hope all the players felt the same. 

Markers

I really have to thank Julian, one of our club members for his help with these markers, I just could not get a good result using resin and my FDM printer was not tuned well enough to do the name tags. He is quite a printing expert and has one of those Bambu Labs printers which seem to work very very well, so well in fact, that 2 other club members have just bought one!

I attached one marker to each command stand, and although it is not obvious here each marker is in 2 pieces, the base and the name tag. The name tags are snapped into place and can be easily removed allowing the base itself to be used again for another battle, by just changing out the name tag. Each name tag is coloured according to the grade of the unit. Above you can see from L-R; Grenadier, Reservist, Line and Veteran ratings. This is duplicated on the OB spread sheet that each player had. This really worked.

All my Napoleonic figures are on 25mm square bases, but more importantly they are metal. As you can see a small 5x1mm round magnet was position to insure excellent attachment. The recess on the marker is 25mm square and are 1mm thick aside from the 4mm addition at the bottom to accommodate the 21x1mm name tag, the print was raised a further 1.5mm. This was all done on TinkerCad.