Battle at the ford, Dux Bellorum AAR

As my friend Jonas have painted some realy lovely Welsh minis and they haden´t got a game yet we decided to run a Dux Bellorum game. It was indeed a long time as we played Dux Bellorum, we have almost forgoten the rules...

We played the "River Battle" Scenario on a 120x120cm table with quite little terrain just to get going.

OOB(as I remeber it...)

Welsh
1x Foot Companions with leader @ 5 points
4x Foot Warriors @ 3 points each
2x Noble Riders @ 5 points each
1x Mounted Skirmisher @ 2 points
2x Foot Skirmishers @ 1 point each
1 Extra Leadership Point @ 2 points

Total @ 32 Points

Romano-British
1x Mounted Companions with leader @ 5 points
2x Noble Riders @ 5 points each
3x Ordinary Shieldwall @ 3 points each
2x Ordinary Warriors @ 3 points each (Saxon Mercenarys)
1 Extra Leadership Point @ 2 points

Total @ 32 Points

Here follows some pictures from the game and a few comments about the action:)

We decided to have 2 fords along the river, the main one by the road and one further up the river about where the sheeps flook are. All the river could be forded at all it´s lenght but the 2 fords made it all much easier.

Welsh warriors lined up to deffend the fors, the Leaders and his Companions have hiden behind the levys...

The second part of the Welsh force had lined up near the other ford, this contingent was made up of the Welsh Noble Riders an all the skirmishers.

The Romano-British force had gathered all there soldiers along the road to the ford, the Warlord let the Saxon mercenarys lead the attack...

It all broke loose with a race for the fords...

The Welsh sent their Mounted Skirmishers away to the main ford ar the Noble Raiders and Foot skirmishers hurried for the secondary ford.

The British comander sent just one group of Noble Raiders against the secondary ford to protect it and stop the Welsh force to cross it to easy...  the rest of the British soldiers ruched to the main ford just to arrive as the Welsh men did...

Note: the read shield markers we used as Leadership Points.

Stalemate ar the ford...

The Welsh Warriors chose to cross the river and attack the less numerous Saxon Mercenarys as the British shieldwall cheer...

By the secondary fort the British have reinforece with a second group of Noble Raiders...

The Welsh skirmishers start to work there way around the british flank...

By the main fort the battle continues and raiging forward and back... to support the Saxon Mercenary one British shieldwall unit have also joined the fight...

Attrition start to build up...  Which unit will breake first and give way for the enemys...

The Welsh center warrior unit have had enought and loose their heart, leaving the Welsh battle line very vulnerable...

The British don´t manage to exploit the weaknes in the Welsh battle line, instead they send in reinforcements from the reserve, but still sits the Welsh warlord back and let his followers do the fighting...

It have been a long fight and one after another the initial Welsh warrior units have had enought and flees the river, the Saxon mercenarys have well earned their pay...

Now the welsh leader with his companions stumble in to the river to join the fight and turn the tide...

The Welsh leader with the last of the Welsh warriors manage to get rid of one of the Saxon unist as well as the British shieldwall unit...

Even so the Welsh leader choose to retreate with his remaining forces to fight another day...

...might be that Jonas are of another opinion;)

We had a nice time playing Bux Bellorum again, unfortunally we had forgot lots of rules, so it was quite some looking up in the rulebook. 

We liked the game so much that we decided to play this small scenario using the same forces BUT using the Hail Caesar rules and also once using the  Dux Britanniarun rules to see how the different game systems difference in game outcome.

15mm Bolshevik Russian Civil War Army

Here comes some pictures of my 15mm Bolshevik army for the Russian Civil War that have been stored away for some time now...

Red Sailor Infantry

So as i´m more of a 28mm man nowardays they was sold to a wargamer in Australia

The minis are 15mm from Peter Pig and are based on 3x3cm plastic bases with magnet bottom.

The army are composed of:

1x Command stand (3minis)
7x Red flag men (7 foot + 1 mounted)
1x Mortar with 2 crew
3x Masim HMG with 3 crew
1x Field gun with 4 crew
1x Limber for Field gun (2 men and 2 horses)
1x Tchanka with 3 crew, 1 Maxim HMG and 4 horses
4x Red cavalry, 2 minis on horse on each base (8 minis)
16x Red infantry, 3 minis on each base, (48 minis)
6x Red Sailor infantry, 3 minis on each base (18 minis)
4x Partisans, 2 minis on each base (7 minis and 1 wolfhound)
1x Airplane with magneted airbase

As a extra Bonus I added a unpainted White Russian Civil War army for free, that army are composed of 30 cavalry minis, 80 infantry minis, 3 Maxim HMG, 1 Mortar, 1 Field Gun, enought minis to build a similar size army as the Bolsheviks, see the last picture below.

Bolshevik army

Bolshevik army from the White air surveillance;)

Red Infantry

Red Cavalry and partisans

Commander, Maxims and Mortar

Tchanka, Field Gun and Airplane

White army for free

A Very Moderate Swedish Conflict - AAR #1

On the last club meet we had a firts test game for our "A Very Moderate Swedish Conflict" project. The first rules to be tried out was the "Tragedy & Triumph".

As I didn´t realy like the card activation system in the rules I used the one from Muskets and Tomahawks that have proven to work well in multiplayer games, and we where 10 players the other night...

The game was played on a 180x120cm board, all terrain was made by me and all minis was painted and provided by my friend Björn. Please also visit Björns blog and take a chanse to order some inter war Swedish Soldier:)

First we have some scenario notes.

Background 
During the autumn of 1931 the different fractions in Sweden tried to gather resources for the up-coming struggle of power. One of the main issues was to get the hands on a fuel resources, as a response to the increased amount of fuel thefts the Swedish army posted troops as almost every petrol station to protect them and their black gold. But it was a difficult task as so many of the militia and semi military movements wanted to get their hands on the goodies…

Scenario 
This scenario will represent one of several dawn raids to gather resources. This time there is a contry side Petrole station guarded by a section of Swedish regulars that will be assaulted by a unholy alliance between a group of Socialist Youth Movement and a Communist Movement group.

OOB 

Swedish Army 
2xCommanders (Löjtnant Jansson och Fänrik Stål)
4x6 Infantry sections with rifles and bayonets and one section with a BAR.
1x Strv m/21 with one HMG (Light Tank)

Young Eagles (Swedish Socialist Youth Movement)
1xCommander with one (1) grenade (Section leader Tage Erlandsson)
2x6 Eagles with rifles
1x Sniper with "big-game rifle"

Red Action (Swedish Communist Movement)
1xCommander with one (1) grenade (Commissar Hugo Sillén)
2x6 Comrades with rifles

Set-up 
The Swedish Army has 2 infantry sections and one Officer at the filling station in the middle of the gaming area. The rest of the Swedish Army troops and the Tank will enter as reinforcements during the game. The troops at the filling station have to send runners to get the reinforcement, that arrived the activation after the runner has left the gaming board by the friendly short edge.

The Sniper may be deployed as per the Sniper rules.

Objectives 
The winner is the fraction that after the game ended have a unpinned unit within the premises of the petrol station. (The sniper or the light tank can´t be used to claim victory) If there is a draw, count the number of minis in the claiming units, most soldiers left are the winner.

Game Length 
We use random game length. At the end of turn 3 roll 1D3 and play that number of turns and then the game ends, i.e in total 4 to 6 turns.

Second a short AAR of our game:

The Army soldiers guarding the Filling station suspect that something is going to happen and the Second Lieutenant decid to send for some reinforcements...

Private 87 Axelsson where ordered to run for reinforcements...taking his time...

The suspicion was right as several groups of bolsheviks emerge from the forest, seems like reinforcements will be well needed. Just as private 87 Axelsson have left the filling station he is shoot at by a sniper, but as it was at a long range the shoot misses but it get the Private to run faster:)

The red forces advance throught the idyllic Swedish contry side... The Swedish offices at the Filling station tries in wain to get them to stop and retreat, not even warning shoots helps...

The Swedish soldiers open fire with devastating effect amongst the bolsheviks.

Several of the red insurgents fell behind the round pole fence and their comrade tried to respond to the fire from the Swedish soldiers...

Things got worse for the bolsheviks as the army reinforcements arrived with a Tank !

The slow moving tank advanced along the road to the filling station with close support of a squad of Swedish soldiers...

The 2 squads of reinforcing infantry moved out on the flanks to support the deffender of the filling station as the Tank slogged along the road...

The bolsheviks managed to get their grips together and managed to put at least one of the squads at the filling station out of action...HURRRAYYY !!!

The arrogant tank comander was comanding his tank from the open turret hatch to get a better view ordered his tank of the road and in to the front yard of the small homestead in his hunt for insurgents...

As the tank entered the frontyard the Socialist Youth Movement Leader Tage Erlandsson took the chanse to throw his grenad at the tank and especially the comander in teh open hatch. The tanks movement come to an abrupt end in the potato field....

The last Socialist Youth Movement squad gathered enought courage to charge the damaged tank, the dazed crew surrender right away...

Even with the victory over the tank the red side by now had taken to severe losses to be able to put up a fight about the filling station, so they decided to withdraw and analyze what to do different next time...

...as the umpire and scenarion maker I can right away say I need to give them more troops about 3x8 to them each...

Even a bit unbalanced I think all participants had a good and entertaining game. T&T worked ok, some small things that that I have to think about, to use the M&T activation system was step in the right direction and turned out realy well.

More "A Very Moderate Swedish Conflict" to come but next time we might be trying out the TFL rules "Through the Mud and the Blood"...

1930´s Filling Station "Nafta"

For our swedish inter war gaming I have painted a Filling Station, not truly 1930´s era but god enought for me. The Filling station was donated by my friend Oskar that had planed to use it for he´s russian zombie project some years ago, but now it ended up in our "A Very Moderate Swedish Conflict" setting instead:)

The station name will be "Nafta" that was oil company founded by the Swedish Nobel brothers during the later part of the 19th century to produce oil in Russia, and it was for a time the world's second largest oil company, after Standard Oil.

Subsidiary Nafta Syndicate Ltd, which imported its petrol from Russia, had a number of petrol stations in Sweden. After the Russian Revolution it became increasingly controlled imports and Nafta was forced in 1937 to sell off its Swedish brand to Gulf. By its american competitors on the Swedish market it was called "Bolsjevikpetrol"

Here some pictures of the Filling Station, a good objective to start a civil war conflict for...

The Bolsjevikpetrol station advert for Imperialistic drinks:)

News bills telling about the Ådalen shooting in 1931

Swedish soldiers have a shoot out with some petrol thiefs...

We will run the first test game for our  "A Very Moderate Swedish Conflict" setting tonight at the club meet, the rules for the first game will be the "Triumph & Tragedy" rules with a small twist for the activation system.

The first game will focus on a dawn raid on a filling station (no guess...), guarded by Swedish Regulars, by a unholy allianse of different Socialist and Communist movement groups....

Idyllic Swedish homestead...

Swedish contryside road during the early part of the 1930´s

I hope to have an AAR in a week or so...

Tunga Stycken

Tunga Stycken i.e. Heavy Gun... After the 1st of the light guns I thought I needed a real seige gun for the Danes, the Swedes probably never had any... this bombard I have had in my bit box for several years, so I´m not sure of the manufacturer of it.

Inspired by the Perry bombard I added a bit of loggs the back of the gun and some extra crew members and a lod man that "know best". Now I just have to order me a Perry one to...