Battling Batavians.....

The muswell Militia tried out the Hail Caesar Rules again last night with a rough and ready battle between the might of Rome and the Batavian revolters! We were testing out both the rules and the units for a more 'organised' game scenario next week.

Given we didnt really give much thought to the initial unit positions the game was fun and pretty exciting - with mixed results for each side all down the line. The Romans probably edged the game at the end of the night. Ian took on the Roman, Simon took on the Batavian regulars and I took charge of the hariy barbaric german hordes. I'll leave you to peruse the pretty pictures of the action.....

The Roman right wing advances under the noses of the watchtower garrison (Simon's Romans)

       Opposite the Roman right, the German cavalry and warbands mass (my germans in the foreground)

                          A shot from behind the Batavian Left Wing

                Batavian Legionnaries watch the advance of the Roman Auxillia (Simon's figs)

Some snarly germans ready themselves (my figures)

                 German skirmishers watch the Romans Advance (Simons Figures)

              On the other wing cavalry battle cavalry! (Simons lovely cavalry units)

                        Things heat up and body's pile up in the centre of the battle

      German warbands crash into the Roman lines (they were actually quite effective in this game)

      The German left wing at the end of the battle (the Germans had annihilated one Roman cohort, shaken  another and had one warband become shaken by a third Roman cohort (bottom right).

Battle for San Pedro Junction

The Muswell Militia mustered its largest gathering last night (six players) for a French Intervention game using the black powder rules. The figures were from my own 28mm collection (which i am just finishing off basing) and from variety of manufacturers (Foundry, 1st Corps, Renegade, Helion etc). The game was based around the French/Imperialist trying to send supplies via the railway and the Republicans trying to stop them!

The Imperialist supply train is stopped by disrupted tracks at the small town of San Pedro. Mexican light troops try to clear the way before the Republicans arrive!

The Belgian Imperialist commander waits nervously by the supply train as his men work desperately to clear the tracks.

To the north of the town dustclouds announce the arrival of a Republican cavalry force - several units of irregular lancers and a unit of state line cavaly.

To the dismay of the Imperialist supply train commander the republican cavalry are supported by infantry and a few artillery pieces. This could get nasty! Where is the relief coumn? The two republican infantry commanders wasted no time and pressed their attacks on the train defenders and the town of San Pedro. Artillery fire managed to disrupt several of the Imperialist units gaurding the train - much to the annoyance of the Belgian Commander Major Hayeoux.

The north side of the battle field - the Republican troops (several units of state militia - yes with confgederate volunteers! and a unit of irregulars) press home their attacks under their Commander Major Lynnz and manage to take the northern part of the town. Their cavalry support (led by their commander Major Milla) is to their right - attempting to block any Imperialist relief force arriving from the west. The Imperialist forces have yet to repair the tracks!

But wait....whats this in the distance? more Republican troops? No its General Nottereaux leading a flying relief column of French and Imperial Mexican Cavalry. But will they make it in time? Where is the occompanying French Infantry led by their commander Moraitis ? Having failed three turns of leadership it has failed to appear as yet!

Meanwhile the Republican Infantry push further forwards and now threaten the Imperialist train. The train escourt try desperately to contain the situation in the hope that their cavalry (seen in the background) can regain the advantage and scatter the Republican rabble. The Imperialist skirmishers flee from a massed charge - leaving the way open for an exchange of musket fire!

....but hold on to your hats...General Nottereaux personally leads the Imperialist cavalry (a unit of Austrain 'red' hussars and an Imperial Mexican Lancer unit) into the fray - will it be enough! After a tense melee the Austrian cavalry break 'my' unit the 'white' republican militia unit but are themselves broken! In the confusion General Nottereaux is swept away by the fleeing cavaly! The Mexican lancers do some damage but with a lucky morale roll the second republican militia unit stands its ground!

At this point we had to call it a night. But it was an enjoyable game (even though George didnt manage to do much as a result of failing his command in the first three turns). It was nice to get all my toys out on a lovely looking table. Over the next few months, all the bases will be finished and unit identification given. I will be making some casualty markers and be producing my own lists for The French Intervention for the Black Powder rules!

Thanks for looking

Simon

Its been too long.....

Unfortunately various events have conspired against my time to post over the last few months - but with gritted determination i am making some time to add to the blog once again! Apologies for the absence.

                               French in Mexico
First up we have a game of the French Intervention in Mexico, played at the Muswell Hill Militia (home of my fellow gamer Simon AKA big red bat (http://bigredbat.blogspot.com/). We used Simon's terrain boards (some of you might recognise from our ZAMA salute game from 2010), a mix of mine and his terrain and my figures (28mm from a whole host of companies) and the Black Powder Rules. We've played four games using these rules now and we are slowly getting to grips with them. There were four of us for this battle. We decided to play out a republican raid on an Imperial Ammo dump. Simon and myself were to play the brave Republicans, while Ian and Matthew were given the cruel oppressive French backed Imperialist troops.

The republicans were divided into two columns - one led by simon (see his blog for more details (http://myveryownspanishulcer.blogspot.com/) which was charged with taking the supply dump (consisting of some irregular lancers, 2 battalions of militia and an artillery piece) and the other led by yours truly (made up of some line cavalry, some skirmishers, 2 battalions of state militia and a band of irregulars) to try and act as a blocking force to stop any relief forces.  Watching over the supply dump was Matthew's Mexican general with some skirmishers, an artillery piece and some loyal local indians - all supported by a battalion of French Turcos. Ian commanded the French flying column sent out to protect the vital supplies - Ian's French commander had a squadron of Mexican lancers, 2 battalions of French Infantry and a unit of Foreign Legion. He also had soem dreaded 'bluecoats' or  Chasseurs d'Afrique.

My Republican column enters the scene - the Imperial Supply Dump can be seen in the background.

My general coaxing his troops into action.

My troops deployed to screen Simon's column as they assaulted the village. My plan was for Simon to seize the supplies before the French had time to punch through my positions. I sent out my skirmishers way ahead of my main force in an attempt to disrupt Ian's french advance. The plan worked better than i thought as a tentative charge by the French Chassuers was driven back by accurate skirmisher fire - hurrah!

    My bold skirmishers - revelling in the fact that the 'bluecoats' turned on their tailcoats.

Behind me things were not going so well - Simon's irregular lancers failed to show the Imperialist allied Indians the error of their ways - in fact it was the lancers who pulled back against heavy melee fighting. Meanwhile the Imperial artillery was keping the heads of the republican militia down and they were making slow progress.

                            The Imperialist Supply Dump

My general gritted his teeth as the French units entered the table - then watched in amazement as they stopped. Whether the French commander was assessing the battlefield or emptying his confiscated cognac collection his troops failed to advance. My skirmishers continued to put on a good show and i advanced a unit of militia to support them.

                                Hold on were coming boys!

More disaster behind me - Simons lancers retreated off the table (whether due to the embaressment of their efforts or the advance of the enemy is still being debated). The imperialist skirmishers were adding insult to injury to their artillery fire and it was taking longer than we had hoped to launch an attack on the enemy positions. When it finally came off - while the skirmishers were defeated - but the enemy artillery and the French Turcos resisted efforts to wrestle the supplies away. Not even a 'follow me boys' from the Republican commander had any effect. To add further insult the allied Indians took up a position to pour fire into Simons flank. It didnt look good.

Simons troops stopped in their tracks......they can smell the supplies.....

Back in my sector, the French came to life (obviously the alcohol had run dry) and Ian ordered his infantry to form line. My heroic skirmishers took some withering fire - but by some miracle stood their ground still! The militia sent up to support them also caught some lead and wouldnt advance any further.

                             The French advance!

Simon's remaining Republican troops were now a mixture of shaken and disorded due to the fire they were taking and just wouldnt advance any further. The French were now moving and looking to swat my holding force aside with European distaste.

      Imperial Mexican line lancers support the French advance!

At this juncture we called it a night - an Imperialist win it was. Boo hiss! Another fun game - we quite like Black Powder - or we are getting more used to it. We are finding it a little frustrating flicking backwards and forwards through the pages to find stuff as the rules could probably be better presented from a reference point of view. But they offer a fairly realistic run of events. We will play another game next tuesday.

Tunisian Skirmish

On tuesday night we took a well overdue rest from Ancients and time travelled forwards to the 20th Century.

We did wonder what other uses we could put Simon's terrain boards to.  One of the other Muswell Miltiamen had recently acquired a copy of Tide of Iron. We have played Memoir '44 with 15mm figures in the past but all three of us thought the rules a tad simple for capturingthe essence of a more complex but equally fun and fast WW2 game.

So last weekend I dug out my (growing) 28mm WW2 Western Desert forces and added them to Simons hex boards using the Tide of Iron rules.

You can see the British and New Zealander forces deploying in a small village. They had 10 infantry squads, a couple of mortars and two HMG's, an anti tank section and a Sherman along for support. They were commanded to hold the village but also try and acquire the ruins to their front.

The germans at the other end of the board were tasked with taking the village. The forces were not that different - the germans had 13 infantry squads, a mortar. a flamethrower section and two HMG's. For support they also had a Panzer III and a Panzer IV and a truck.

It didnt take too long to grasp the rules -I think it was just after the british had effectively used concentrated mortar fire to obliterate 2 german sections! The germans advanced and caused some minor casualties - but the British threw caution to the wind and sent three section of infantry sprinting out of the village in a bid to snatch the ruins from under the germans noses! The situation got worse for the germans when the British then won the initiative and were able to entrench themselves in the forementioned ruins - causing a real thawn in the Axis plans. British Mortar fire continued to be effective. It took 3 german assualts (and casualties!) to storm the first of the ruined buildings. On their right flank the British had advanced their armour and caused havoc on the german armour opposing it - significant damage slowed the Axis armour on that flank. Some minor skirmishing then developed. We had to call it a night at that point. Both sides had the same Victory points (3 each) - but the British claimed a winning draw due to the sheer carnage they inflicted on Rommels already stretched forces. It was an enjoyable game and Simon, Ian and myself felt it lended itself brilliantly to 28mm WW2 gaming. We are now planning a Tunisian Campaign with this rule system. So watch this space!

Carthaginians muster for 2 Zama's....

Well here they are at last - one part of the Carthaginian army to re-fight Zama at Bletchley and Salute.

The force includes light numidian cavalry, infantry, elephants and Carthaginian noble cavalry and veteran infantry. Figures are a mix of Crusader, Foundry and Gripping Beast. They look rather splendid massed up like this - cant wait to see all the figures for the games - sadly, while my figures will be in action at Bletchley I wont be. However - I will be at Salute. I'll stop rambling now and let you enjoy the pics.

Last of the dead elephants.....

I just finished the last dead elephant casualty figure for the big ZAMA game at Salute this year. I received him from Simon on Friday, based and primed him up yesterday and completed the job tonight.

Most of the other elephant casualty stands have the dead beasts amongst various living and dead humans - so to make mine different I decided to add more beasts! I thought some wild dogs would look good but then thought they probably wouldnt be anywhere near a raging battlefield. So instead I decided upon the feathered variety of opportunists - ones that would be very tempted to land and pick - even with all the activity around them.

So here they - some north african buzzards who cant believe their luck! The camera makes them look rather more faded than they really are - but for a couple of  hours work it seems to work and will add some interest to the gaming table!

The Carthaginian 7th cavalry....

....come thundering over the North African hills....bugles blaring....but have they arrived too late to save the day.......?    ok well maybe not bugles blaring - but these are a welcome addition to the Salute Zama project.

Crusader miniatures cavalry painted by my friend Roger - all ready for basing. The first unit of 3-4 ! ........