Tel El Kebiresque Battle

This weekend it's the turn of the colonial forces to get a game. Another Portable Wargame scenario that Bob has posted (see HERE) is the Battle of Tel El Kebir. This looked like a nice game for my Imagination forces. In the real battle there is a canal defining one side of the battlefield; in this game there is a large river (not shown). 

The new king of Uqbalistan has made another incursion into Albionian Uqbal. The last time he did this, his force suffered defeat (see HERE). Will he be more successful this time? 

The Uqbali force sent into Albionian territory was small. Its Commanding Officer, an experienced soldier, knew he was going to face a strong retaliation from the enemy so ordered his men to build earthwork defences at the first settlement they found, and await the inevitable onslaught.

General Carbuncle Wolsley-Hornet (Albionian Commanding Officer) has recently arrived from Indra with some of his own personnel guard. Taking immediate command of a force of Albionia's large military presence, that includes elite infantry from the Hibernian and Caledonian regiments, the General has marched through the night. Arriving in column just before dawn, the Albionians form ranks and move towards the Uqbali defences.

(Game mechanic - The Uqbal side was to throw a dice each turn for the first 3 turns to determine whether or not the oncoming enemy were spotted as it was still dark - a 6 was required on turn 1, 5 or 6 on turn 2 and 4,5 or 6 on turn 3.)

Turn 1

Turn 4 and the defenders finally realise they are under attack

Wolsley-Hornet encourages his men to get stuck in with a bayonet

Turn 9 and the defenders reach Exhaustion point

The Uqbali guns are over-run

The end is near but the defenders bravely fight on 

The Uqbali General surrenders to save what's left of his men

Outnumbered and out classed, the defence was in doubt from the start (and the attackers didn't even have the machine gun called for in the Order of Battle), though the earthworks helped the Uqbali Army keep fighting until Turn 14 when it seemed only kind to stop.

The Battle for Two Hills Farm

Back in February of this year, Bob posted a scenario for The Portable Wargame (see HERE) that I've played a couple of times, though not reported. Here's another attempt.

A quick apology for being absent without comments; I have been reading many splendid blog posts but have been suffering from 2021 and found it hard to get my words together!

 In my game Army Grey is led by General Moturez and Army Blue by General Fiasco. Otherwise the Order of Battle is as Bob describes. The Elite unit on each side is marked with a token (Tiddlywink). I surmised that both sides would sent their cavalry on first to scout ahead - after that a unit arrives on each turn 2-6 in a random order.

The Battlefield

Blue and Grey Horse spot each other 

Both forces are arriving and the battle is underway

Grey holds the objective. General Fiasco leads the Elite Blue Guard South looking to punch through the enemy line at its furthest point

Disaster!! General Fiasco falls and Army Blue reaches Exhaustion Point

Two turns later, and Grey has also reached EP but still holds the objective.

This is a well balanced scenario that could swing either way and would make a nice starting point to a Mini-Campaign. 

Ghosts of Projects Past #3

 One month into this year 2021 and nothing really to show for it, though I am slowly clearing a few bits off the painting table, those figures that have been hanging around for months (years?), gathering dust.. As such, I thought I'd unearth something from the past to fill a bit of space on the blog.

I've recently been reading a tome entitled Hawk and Moor. It's a rather entertaining read about the appearance of Dungeons and Dragons (the beast that spawned a thousand RPGs); this reminded me that a while back (2019, remember, a time before the pox...?) I had thrown together, and was experimenting with, a little skirmish game using the D&D combat method. Gary Gygax, co-creator of D&D, had himself been interested in representing a single figure as one person in tabletop wargames and had featured such combat in Chainmail, the medieval rules co-authored with Jeff Perren. I wanted something a bit simpler that could be on just a single page. Gygax et al had played their medieval games using Elastolin figures, so my first try was with larger figures too.

A pair of Russian made (?) "Knights" fought a couple of Orcs (played by Dark Alliance Trolls) in the initial trial. The pics aren't great as it was a bit of a dark day.

One of the ideas I wanted to use was to have character figures (Heros) who would have better statistics than the average chap and who could gain "experience" in an RPG kind of way, improving their performance perhaps...

As the rules were based on D&D they do call for multi-sided (funny) dice, though I guess most people have some of these. I called my rules Chainmailesque as I liked the name but it doesn't really reflect the Chainmail rules. The game is on a grid (needless to say) but could easily be played using normal measurements. I never got any further with it than the following. Perhaps I'll have another go at some point...

The Illustration was "borrowed" from the 3rd edition of Chainmail that included the Fantasy supplement which in turn led to Dave Arneson and Gary Gygax penning D&D.

Incidentally, I named these two Keeper Bernard and Keeper Simeon, though I'm not sure what they kept; certainly not the Peace by the look of them.

Lazy Saturday Afternoon

 After a beautiful morning walk under a very blue sky, your humble author has had a lazy afternoon watching the snow filled clouds roll in. No battles have been fought, however, as a wise man said, "A little exercise on the parade square is the next best thing to a game."

  

General Chatter oversees the Parade.

The band leading the Airfix Guardsmen are actually some late 1960s Hong Kong "replicas". Hugh Walter discusses them in detail HERE so I won't say more than I rather like them. They remind me of the sort of bright plastic things that a child might have received from a Department Store Father Christmas (Santa Claus) back in the 60s, Though cheap and tacky they were probably played with a great deal more than the more expensive stuff! 

There will hopefully be more of these chaps on parade in the future as Army Blue want a band as well now.

As always, please excuse the terrible painting/photography.

Stay safe everyone!

New Year's Message

 

A quick message to wish everyone a (belated) Happy New Year. Thanks very much for the comments during a very trying 2020. Lets hope things improve in the not too dim and distant future.

In case you think I'm resting, there are a couple of posts over on my One Hour Wargames blog (HERE) that you may not have seen (or have chosen to ignore!)

Best Wishes

More from General Chatter

Little activity at the front

General Chatter consults the Campaign map

Another month with little hobby activity to report; a few photos of recently painted figures follow.

 A copse* of Ents (and other treeoids)

(* I suspect the collective noun for Ents ought to be a Moot)

Minifigs ME37 Large Ent circa 1973

Minifigs VFW24 Tree with arms and face circa 1978

Games Workshop Ent - can't remember when I acquired this!

More Elhiem Figures

A few more of Elhiem's 20mm fantasy figures came too close to my paint brush.

I have a lot of time for the Druidic Wizard type (furthest to the right) and the Female Elf warrior (2nd from the left) is rather good too.

New board

Finally, a new board for 2mm Portable War games was painted on Christmas Eve. I hope to play a game on it before this year is finished (though as it's 2020, who knows what will happen next). The inspiration for this board was Martin Smith's painted chess board that was featured on Bob Cordery's post HERE.

Stay Safe and Well! 

General Chatter

 

General Chatter's "Despatches from the Rear"

(General Chatter is residing in a comfy, requisitioned Mansion, half a day's ride from the action.)

There is very little to report on the Hobby Front. Since the end of the last Campaign there has been a severe lack of gaming, due mainly to tedious work related matters, and the continuing over-crowding here at Chez Maudlin (caused by the return of my son due to all things Covid).

I attach a couple of items that may be of interest:

A 50+ Year Old Misconception

It was quite rightly pointed out to me some months ago that I have been using the Airfix ACW running figure incorrectly. For the last  fifty something years, I have assumed that the running figure in both the Union and Confederate sets was an ordinary soldier who, due to a whim of the sculptor, was waving his hand in the air. The misconception was made clear when I was advised that this figure represented a Sergeant as he had a sword.

Looking more closely at the figures it's true that, what I took to be an over long bayonet is a sword! Suddenly the arm waving makes sense; "Follow me men!" Once this had been made apparent, my units of running men seemed to lack something. Fortunately, Jacklex figures come to the rescue with the running infantry men from Jack Alexander's wonderful 20mm ACW range. Please try to ignore the terrible painting / photography!

See the sword? I didn't try to paint stripes on his tunic for obvious reasons.

Some Adventurous Types

Elhiem Figures have started producing a range of Fantasy figures in 20mm. Yes! 20mm, my favourite figure size. I have started daubing paint on some of them as can be seen in the following picture which includes an old Revell 1/72nd figure and a Valdemar figure for size comparison. The idea is to possibly play some skirmish type games with these.

From Left to right we have, Colm the Conqueror (Barbarian Hero), Geoffrey the Green (Wizard), Nobby "Two Knives" Longleaf (Halfling Assassin) all from Elhiem, then Wayland the Wanderer (Ne'r-do-well and teller of tall tales) from Valdemar, and finally Vincent the Valiant (Pantomime Hero) Revell Normans set. Again, please excuse the painting. More to follow in this line, eventually!

End of Communication. Stay safe everyone! 

Links: Jacklex ACW figures, Elhiem Figures