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 The Salarin Caliphate's reply to the Vard Invasion appeared with the arrival of Army Two in Marhacan Province. By then, Legion I had been reinforced and resupplied and was prepared to defend the newly acquired territory. 

Situation Turn 1 Salarin move.

The Second Battle of Marhacan

Emboldened by his previous success, the Vard General set out aggressively, personally leading the early moves...

The Armies face each other

The Vard General rushed forward but was quickly in trouble

The Vard Cavalry charged the enemy archers
In the Centre the Infantry was reinforced but still struggling

All troops from both sides were soon engaged 

The Vard Infantry were pushed back at last,
but now their flank was no longer exposed

The Vard Cavalry reformed for another charge 

Having swept the Salarin Archers from the field,
The Vard Cavalry smashed into the rear of the enemy infantry

After a very shaky start, Legion I was again victorious

Situation at the end of Turn 1

Next!

Having read and enjoyed Martin Rapier's recent post (see here) where he played Mark Cordone's Hoplite! game, I thought I'd have a go too. Not having a sufficient number of Ancient Greek types to play the Peloponesian Wars, I thought I'd create a couple of ImagiNations and play a Campaign (slightly adjusted for context) with them.

Campaign Setting

A few centuries after the expansion of the Vard Republic (see here) absorbed its nearest neighbours (barbarians all), the old elected Tyrants have been replaced by a tyrannical Emperor and the border of the Empire has reached the Northern most extent of the Salarin Caliphate. 

Campaign Rules

This is the first draft of my version of Mark C's original which can be found somewhere on the Facebook PW page. Battles will be fought using the 3x3 Portable Wargame variant. 3x3 grids will be diced for using a d20 and the following (top left is 1 read left to right, brown square is a hill, green a forest and grey a settlement)

First Campaign Move and battle

Starting position of the Armies

The Vard won the initiative roll and Legion I attacked Marhacan. Legion III moved into Salanthi province.

The Vardian Empire's first moves

First battle of Marhacan (apologies for the poor lighting)

Salarin cavalry attack the Vard left flank

The Salarin in full attack! The Vard begin to take hits

Mid point of the battle - the Salarin's 3rd rush at the hill

The Vard's reserves are all now committed 

The Salarin begin to falter

The remnants of the two armies fight to the finish

The first victory goes to the Vardian Empire

The first battle demonstrated that the Vard have found a worthy foe in the Salarin. The next battle will feature the response of the Salarin Caliphate to the Vardian invasion. 

Massacre!

 

Play testing the 3x3 PW game in a Wee Matchbox  produced a surprising result, so that ticks a box (pun unintended).

Before reporting the game I want to point you in the direction of Roger's Matchbox game which is a really very brilliant Cowboy shoot-out, featuring thematic dice!! Please visit here.

The Game (see the last blog post for the rules)

The grid squares were shuffled (blank side up) and 9 picked and placed between the Reserve Areas

The two sides diced for ends. Red scored highest and chose North.

Army Red looked smugly at a very defend-able town between two woods (the Lake is impassable too).

Initial positions - Red had 4 Infantry and 1 Artillery, Blue 3 Infantry, 1 Cavalry and 1 Artillery (positioned on the hill to get a bonus).

Simultaneous Artillery fire saw red lose an infantry unit on the first throw!

Army Blue attacked the town and moved up a unit from the Reserve Area. Army Red replaced his lost Infantry unit with a reserve.

Turn 2 saw another Red Infantry unit destroyed by Artillery fire!

Blue's attack on the town continued without success. Red brought his final reserves into action (not illustrated)

Blue's Artillery fumbled on Turn 3 allowing Red to rush out of the woods and attack them. The attack on the town saw a Blue success with a natural 6 rolled - Red were now down to two units!

Blue moved up more forces on Turn 4. Red was now attacking both the town and the hill, desperate to damage Blue somewhere!

Disaster for Red! Turn 5 saw the Red Army reduced to one unit which was looking likely to get surrounded!

The horror show was completed on Turn 7 - a complete massacre of Red's Army and a resounding success for Blue. Not at all as I expected things, mainly due to the powerful (rather too powerful) artillery that wiped out two units of Infantry at the beginning of the battle blunting Red's defence.

The playing pieces, in case anyone wants to have a go...

Distracted

 December is always a bit of strange month at work, completing projects that "have to be done before Christmas", and finishing processes that work on a Calendar Month rotation. As a creative distraction yesterday I invested an hour making a 3x3 Portable game that would fit in a Wee Matchbox. Apart from the challenge of fitting a complete game in a matchbox, I also decided it had to be made from things I already had, or had free access to and should provide a game which required no record keeping. The latter meant a game that saw units that were"hit" being destroyed / removed at once. In terms of game period, I chose a Roman Civil War theme as I'm really enjoying Archduke Piccolo's latest campaign.

Here then is Civil War! in a Wee Matchbox.

Art credit: www.symbolikon.com

The Matchbox - the grid on the cutting mat is 1cm

The Rules (unfolded and legible with good eyesight)

12 grid square options and 2 Reserve Areas - printer friendly card used 

Unit tokens - 4 Infantry, 2 Cavalry, 1 Artillery
Art Credit: www.juniorgeneral.org

The Wee Matchbox packed - with room for an Expansion Pack

Digital Play Test in MS Excel

Downloadable version of the Rules

In the next post I hope to demonstrate that one could actually play the game using the components created... (I hope).