War of the broken Wills: turn 1-3

During the weekend I found some time to start the campaign. So I played the first 3 campaign turns. Next step are two battles, to end turn 3.

Start of the campaign. Two armies are marching from the South in the west. And the other three in the middle south

Above you can see the start of the campaign. Red pawns are my armies, black pawns are Potential Enemy Forces, turning into a yellow pawn, when resolved to be an enemy army.

My plan is to march with two different groups, as quickly as possible to the capital. Due to the rivers and roads, these two entry point would be the quickest.

End of turn 1 (blue D20 as turn marker in bottom right)

After turn one, marching up along the roads. Enemy movement was not that much, which is quite logical as they will try to defend.

End of turn 2, Slowly marching forward

Closing in on the first bigger towns, enemy forces, will try to block the road.

Battle time turn 3

In the West, I tried to sneak past the enemy, but their scouts got news of our troops, and did catch the second army by surprise. In the East, they just blocked the road and hope to stop us as soon as possible, by moving forward one of their armies. I don’t know what they have in reserve.

On both fronts it turns into a battle. I still have to roll for the scenarios, and find my troops. I have found a solution for the playing area. A printed grid, with some fields from google earth in the background.

I didn’t have time to play the first game, but looking forward to them. Until now, it was just half an hour, including setup and finding nice pawns. Up to the battle next.

campaign: War of the broken Wills

The only army which is in a reasonable state to play some games, is the 2mm Napoleonic armies. I want to play some more games this years, and play also some solo. Therefore I have ventured into the realms om Imagination.

The basic idea is, to have a simple campaign system, without a lot of bookkeeping. Playing multiple battles in an evening or Sunday afternoon. I have created some backstory. Probably not the best. But a reason to move some troops and play games.

The campaign system is created by myself, simple moving some armies from area to area, to secure the capital, and destroy the enemy army. Enemy movement is mostly based on the chainreaction system from two hour wargames.

The battle which will happen when two armies will occupy one area, will be played out with the Simplicity in Hexes rules, which I found on the blog of Jay Ward, with again some enemy behaviour based on the chainreation system of THW. Scenarios will be coming from the One Hour wargames book of Neil Thomas. The terrain will be a hex landscape, slightly larger as in the rules, for visual reasons.

Below I will tell the background story, and show the map. The map has been created with the help of the fantasy map generator on the web. (see link below) the data has been exported to QGis, a map making tool. Playing around, some visual formatting was done. If you like the map, you can download it for your own projects, and also the more detailed rules for the campaign in the links provided at the bottom.

The land of Ukkhinbar. The capital is the largest city in the land (denoted by the square)

Background story

The year is 1785, 7 years after Marcus Fontusius Rethida and his sister Cillia Rethida were forced to leave their beloved country Ukkhinbar. They had grown up as prince and princes at the royal court in the Capital Wawic. But had to flee south during the coup. Their own nephew had murdered their father and crowned himself emperor.
Now it was the time to march back to their hometown. Five large armies listened to their command. When they had left, they had been young. Heading south they found rest in Segifell. A rough city, were you’re live was most precious. They had met an old man, which had taken them into house. The 17 year old twins, had been weeping and sleeping for a week, they had lost everything. Only the ring, received from their father was still on their finger. The man tried to comfort them, and learned them a riddle: “Bait with smelt to catch a cod”
The first year they worked here and there. Creating more and more connections, and growing a larger network. Both on the legal side as on the dark side of the world. After three years, Marcus and Cillia started to think about revenge on their Nephew. They started to employ people for their cause. Now after the 7 years, they have amassed 5 armies. Built from mercenaries, pirates and adventurers. But very loyal, as long as they paid regularly.
They had only a limited amount of money, so they had to do a quick campaign. Moving as swiftly as possible, to liberate the capital. After that they would deal with the rest of the country, but would have access to the treasure of the crown to pay the armies. Spies are reporting multiple armies which are defending the capital and surrounding lands. The only way to their home, is forward.

Deployment

  • Enemy start with 9 PEF Armies
  • You start with 5 armies, two under command of Marcus and three under command of Cillia.
  • Each army is 6 units. Scenario determines how many units are involved in each battle. Following OHW scenarios
Scouts have reported nine possible enemy forces (PEF), you will enter the lands from the south.
  • You start on southern edge, with 5 armies, deploy as you wish.
  • Enemy start northern cities with 9 PEFs. 1 PEF start at other side of water to the right.
  • each campaign turn is 1 day.
  • Capital must be reached within 30 days, to ensure you can pay the armies to complete the campaign.

Plan

I hope to start the campaign next weekend, most of the things are ready.

  • rules
  • armies
  • dice
  • terrain pieces

Only the hex grid for the scenarios I have to arrange. I have the possibility to print on white paper. The files are ready, but I am thinking in a little more pleasing solution, with more eye candy. I don’t have a solution yet.

This is just my first try, to play a campaign, have a backstory. I don’t know how it will turn out. And probably adapt the rules on the fly. Hope it will make some fun.

Sources

  • One-Hour Wargames: Neil Thomas, Pen and Sword 2014
  • Morale Napoleon, grand tactical rules for the Napoleonic wars: Two Hour Wargames

Document links

Battle prep: The Battle of Three Roads

Recently I was searching for a follow-up on the Battle of Cinq Bras. I just searched for wargame scenarios in google, and stumbled upon the deepfriedhappymice website.

They do have a nice collection on Napoleonic wargame scenarios for Grande Armee. One of the scenarios is appealing, and hope I can convert it to the 2-by-2 wargame rules we are using. The Scenario is called The Battle of Three Roads, and is a hypothetical alternative history, were Napoleon did not attack Wellington at Waterloo, but started a maneuvering war threatening the supply line and the left flank. Trying to defeat the enemy in detail. (Original scenario)

It is not possible to use all the terrain rules and reinforcement rules as written, but the map and the forces are possible to use. I have colored the map, and made it square, to fit my purposes. And also added some towns, to complete the terrain.

For the forces, I have to look on what I have available. I do have some pontoon bridging models in my stack, so probably need to finish them quickly, as engineering platoon. For the rest I need to check the available forces, and find some way to create labels.

Hopefully we can play this scenario at the end of July.

Small scene from “Battle of Mont Saint-Jean or the Battle of Waterloo” colored litho by Antoine Charles Horace Vernet (called Carle Vernet)(1758 – 1836) and Jacques François Swebach (1769-1823)
(Source: Wikipedia)

Battle of Cinq Bras

Battle of Cinq Bras – [23.04.1815]

Last Tuesday evening, the first 2mm Napoleonic battle took place. This is a short battle report. My father was the opponent, playing the British (red) force and I was playing the France (blue) force. When I explained the rules and used a real life example of Quatre Bras, my wife, passing by, noted that on this battle field it are 5 roads. Therefore the battle took place at the fictional place of Cinq Bras. For the rules we used the 2-by-2 Napoleonic rules of Rodvik. Only the the area was actually 60cm by 60cm (sorry I do like metrics better)


Map of the Cinq Bras area where battle took place

As this is the first play of the rules, we just opted for the example forces as described in the rules.


British XXX Corps

  • 1 Corps HQ
  • 10 Line Infantry Regiments
  • 2 light Cavalry Regiments
  • 1 Heavy Cavalry Regiments
  • 2 Foot Artillery Batteries

French VII Armeé

  • 1 Corps HQ
  • 10 Line Infantry Regiments
  • 2 light Cavalry Regiments
  • 1 Heavy Cavalry Regiments
  • 2 Foot Artillery Batteries

The rules put a large incentive on “flow of battle”, which means that over time the different units will arrive onto the battlefield. As result at the beginning of the battle you do not have control of your full force, and you hope the reinforcements arrive on time. Which was also seen in a lot of historical battles.

The first reinforcements arrives, the French have formed a defensive line and British are advancing.
The situation just before the action. A and B are the reinforcement points. In the North the skirmish between the two regiments. In the middle, north of Cinq Bras, the French line. And British advancing from the South and the West.

As result the first few turns did not have a lot of actions, but a lot of movement and shuffling into position, to gain some advantage. The action finally started with a short skirmish of some reinforcement regiments which met each other. The Bristish troops were disrupted and routed to the Riquevalle farm, and stayed there the rest of the game. And the French regiment kept shooting from a distance, and was pinned for the rest of the game.

The first encounter, two infantry regiments meet, both on its way as reinforcements
With some help of some light cavalry, the British are routed, and seek shelter at the farm. The French Regiment was pinned and kept firing from long range. The cavalry followed the river in a try to get some flank attack on the British.

Then the tension rose at the center of the field, as the lines closed near Cinq Bras. Who would be the first to break. The British tried to use the village as vantage point and the French kept a line up to the nearby forest. The French saw the British walking in the village, and before they could a solid position, a bayonet attack was called. Also the two other regiments stormed forward attacking the British at the farm and in the grain fields.

The French have reached the British regiments. In defense the British fired some volleys of musket fire, disrupting one of the regiments. In the rear you can see new British reinforcements arriving.

The French should have hold on longer, and two regiments were quickly defeated, but Cinq Bras village was secured and a position was taken at town center. The gap in the line was put tight with the artillery positioned at the North-East road.

The French lost two regiments in the west, with the melee combat. But secured the town. The artillery had now a free line of sight (bottom of the picture) and was bombing the British line. holding the cavalry which was arriving to sweep the field.

At the other side of the forest (West), some back and forth fighting took place between a couple of infantry and cavalry regiments. And especially the British reinforcements started to dripping in. The cavalry tried to desperately force its way through the lines, to lighten the threat on Cinq Bras village. But did not succeed.

Two French infantry regiments attack, supported by two light Cavalry units. But in the end it was a lost cause.

And with five regiments lost for the French and only two for the British, the British did have a mayor victory, capturing the town, and securing a Bridge head French side of the river.

The French did still have planned to get some reinforcements, but already lost too many troops. They had to surrender. Battle lost.

Conclusion

The game was a good starter game. And both did have a good lot of frustration as troops were not possible to do exactly as you wanted. Especially if they start firing or get disrupted, and how to reorganize them.

For this first time a lot of luck was involved, as we still need to get some feeling, on when to use the different units and if it is better to wait or attack. hopefully a next game in a couple of weeks.