Attended MillenniumCon 2022

Now that I am retired, I can finally travel without feeling like I have to rush. Well, at least the reason for rushing has changed. It used to be that I needed to get back to work and now it is that my wife needs to get back to work! Equality, baby!

The original goal was to go to Fall-In 2022 in Lancaster, PA – a mere 2,200 miles/32 hour trip, each way – and make it a road trip across the U.S. but too many things fell through. I was going to combine the trip with a visit to my father, who was 94 at the time, but he passed right after I got out of the hospital. So we decided to wander around the West before heading to MillenniumCon 2022 in Round Rock, TX.

We started from home in Huachuca City, AZ and headed for the Apache National Forest to stay in Alpine, AZ, making it in after dark. From there we stopped at Chaco Culture National Historical Park where they have a number of cliff dwellings of the Pueblo people. When you think of American Indians (Native Americans, if you prefer) you tend to think of Hollywood's depiction in Westerns, but Chaco dates from AD 900 through 1150, well before what we think of as American Indians after the American expansion.

We did not stay there – there is really nowhere to stay as it is in the middle of nowhere – as we were on the way to Durango, CO. We had a timeshare unit there so it was really comfortable, but we were there for the Durango Train. Unfortunately the trains do not run for the first two weeks in November as they switch from the Fall to Winter theme and do maintenance on the trains. Guess when we arrived! Not only that, the museum is closed too!

To make up for that we decided to take a side trip to Mesa Verde National Park. This is another Pueblo culture site, dating from AD 600 to 1300. It was a beautiful drive and when we got to the top we found the museum … closed for renovation! I was feeling irritated by that until I heard another guy remark that this was his fourth time to Mesa Verde and every time he was there it had been closed for one reason or another, so I did not feel quite as bad.

My wife wanted to see Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, NM so we headed there next. Basically it is an interactive, experimental art project that you walk through with room after room of different themes.

My wife has also wanted to take me to Carlsbad Caverns National Park in NM and we finally went. Unfortunately, the bats were already gone for the season so we did not see them. But trust me, after walking 1 ½ miles in a cave more than 750' underground in a very humid 57º, the last thing I wanted to do was come back and watch bats in low light (as the come out/come back from hunting).

With those adventures under our belt we were getting close to the start of the gaming convention, so we made a dash for Austin, TX, which is a short drive from where the convention was being held. We stayed at a Wyndham timeshare downtown, was held hostage by salespeople, and eventually given a $150 gift card and promptly spent it on a very nice dinner at a posh place.

With my wallet screaming Uncle after buying yet more timeshare points it was off to Round Rock, TX for MillenniumCon 2022. We stayed there through the weekend then headed back home, stopping only to sleep in Van Horn, TX. Whew!

MillenniumCon 2022

This is definitely a smaller convention, as far as U.S. gaming conventions go. There were about 1-2 dozen games going on at once. What I had not realized is that there was a section to sign up for games before the convention started. When I got there and saw all of the sign-up sheets, they had all of the player slots full, some even with the stand-by slots full! I basically could not sign up for a game and be assured of a spot unless it was in one of my gaming buddy's games. (Not because his games were not popular, but rather because he would make a spot for me.)

My buddy is a real fan of Two Hour Wargames (THW) rules and he has been trying to refine Morale Napoleon (MR) and All Things Zombie (ATZ) for some time now. I think ATZ is in a good place now – it feels very episodic – but MR is closer to THW's old school 'wargame' designs rather than the newer RPG-lite designs. I promised him I would help him playtest any ideas he had and we played about six games of it. I think it is a better design now, by far, but think it still has some testing necessary, by people other than us.

A game of Morale Napoleon in progress.

One of the games of Morale Napoleon that I did not participate in.

One game that I did play in that was a standout was Raid on Downly Green put on by Faron Bell and his son, using the rules A Fistful of Lead (FoL) and the supplement Might and Melee, both of which I have been experimenting with of late. The scenario takes place in late 9th Century Britain and raiders are attacking a village to steal their treasure and capture their Witcher woman. I was on the raiding team – in fact I was playing the raid leader – and we ended up slaughtering the defenders. We did not get the treasure, but we did get the Witcher woman, in addition to wiping out ⅔rds of their force, by the time the game was called.

Why this game was a standout was definitely because FoL is a great set of rules for convention games (easy to teach, element of suspense) and because the figures and terrain used was outstanding. It almost made me buy 28mm terrain at the vendor booths!

My leader drags the Witcher woman away to the longships.

Speaking of vendor booths I tried to limit my purchases to terrain, rules, and scenario materials, but failed in some instances. I did not find any rules whatsoever that interested me – I was hoping for an old cardboard box filled with old rules – but I got one very interesting book filled with scenarios on the War of 1812 between Great Britain and Canada and the U.S. I look forward to converting them to other rules, probably Tin Soldiers in Action and One-Hour Wargames for mass battles and Fistful of Lead and One-Hour Skirmish Wargames for skirmishes. Unfortunately, there was little terrain for 15mm other than Battlefront terrain for Flames of War, which I have plenty of. There was a lot of laser cut MDF terrain, but all of it was 28-32mm. I talked to the guy about that and he told me that he used to make models for 15mm, but they just did not sell. Further, he does not sell the digital files so you can cut your own. So all I walked away with were three books, one paint set, and some miniatures I regret buying and will probably end up selling.

I also got two more games of Tin Soldiers in Action (TSIA) in, playing the classic scenario Hook's Farm (from H.G. Wells' rule book Little Wars). The first game I was attacking and was absolutely slaughtered, so no pictures of that! The second scenario, however, I was defending and it turned out quite different.

Justo delayed coming onto the hill until turn two. This allowed me to press forward with my infantry and defend in depth.

You can see Justo's cavalry in the lower right corner. He snuck around the flank, but lost the draw of the cards and my cavalry switched to counter his move and I decided to pull my artillery out of the line and canister his cavalry.

This next picture shows Justo's beaten cavalry turns later. My cavalry charged him and forced him to rout. It then turned around and made a desperate charge at his artillery (with supporting infantry no less) and ended up overrunning them against all odds.

When the sun went down I was still in possession of Hook's Farm with units that had been severely mauled by his infantry and artillery fire. Again, this was a very different game from all of the others I have played with artillery chasing cavalry to canister them and light cavalry charging artillery and actually pulling it off.

One of the reasons for the renewed interest in TSIA is that I have been corresponding with the author, Rüdi, and he has new rules to cover from ancients to modern era (and beyond?) and he wanted us to reacquaint ourselves with the rules before attempting his Hastings scenario. More on that later.

Ironically, I took a few pictures at the convention, but it was mostly of the terrain boards and not of the games in progress. Also interesting is when people come up to a game in progress and look, but rarely ask questions, even when you attempt to engage them. The one exception, for me, was when Justo and I were playing TSIA with these handmade wooden figures. People did not care about the rules or the scenarios, but the miniatures. They are such a curiosity these days, especially when people are now 3D printing whole beautiful armies and here I am gluing beads together and painting them. I have never had anyone criticize them either, and you know how some people can be, pointing out that "…you have only painted five buttons when the 1812 uniform had six!" The 'harshest' comment I have ever gotten was 'it seems like it would take so much time to make them' or 'I could not paint something that small'. No one has ever refused to game with them nor made fun of the cartoonish terrain I use (which is strangely appropriate for the figures). (By the way, I used my laser cutter to cut out those board and score the grid on them.)

I have long realized that this, wargaming, is not a single hobby, but multiple ones. For me, I continue to like to make my own minimalist figures with large heads and small bodies.

A Fistful of Lead (Reloaded)

 Fistful of Lead (Reloaded)

A gaming buddy in Tucson, Bill Bushong (YouTube channel), invited me to a game today. Given that his schedule and mine rarely meshed, it has been a while since I have gamed with Bill as his terrain is always outstanding (as you will see). Now that I am retired and healed, I was able to synch with his schedule and we met up to play an Old West scenario using the rules Fistful of Lead (Reloaded) (FoLR). As I had never played these rules – although I watched The Joy of Wargaming YouTube channel use them – I went ahead and bought them thinking that this was Bill's Old West go-to rules.

I read through the rules portion (skipping the scenarios, campaign material, and such) and realized that somebody I had been watching plays them "wrong". (Actually, I think it would be more accurate to say he intentionally plays a specific game mechanic wrong in order to facilitate decision making while gaming solo.) These rules are pretty simple and clean. Only two things came up where we played it wrong and only one thing was not spelled out sufficiently where it required we come to an agreement, during the middle of a game, on how to interpret it. Bill being the easy-going guy that he is decided to go with my interpretation, as it would affect us equally in a positive way.

Turn Sequence

FoLR uses cards to handle activation and sequencing. Each player is dealt one card per model. The player takes those cards into a hand and plays them during the turn. The cards are called out from King down to Deuce in turn and if a player has one of those cards he activates one of his figures that have not yet been activated and takes two actions. (Aces and Jokers are wild, meaning you can assign them a value of any other card.) Some cards have special effects, such as allowing a player to reload without having to take an action, add +1 to shooting, or heal 1 wound. Once all cards are played by both sides, the cards are shuffled and the next turn started.

It is interesting to note that Bill and I did not shuffle the deck until it was exhausted, rather than shuffling at the start of each turn. I actually preferred this method because once the special cards are played, you know they won't come up again until the deck is reshuffled. So the odds are not constant from turn-to-turn and card counting actually has a use.

Actions

The basic actions a figure can take are move, shoot, aim, reload, climb, jump, etc. Because you have two actions you can mix and match them in the order you want (move then shoot, shoot then move, etc.), allowing a player to use micro-tactics. There is no holding of actions (i.e. overwatch), so no complicated rules regarding that. Simple, like I like it.

Shooting

Basically you have a target number for short range firing and another for long range firing. If you moved, or the enemy moved this turn, that gives a -1 penalty (each). Each wound taken also grants a -1 penalty. Finally soft and hard cover grant a -1 and -2 penalty, respectively. That is pretty much it. There are a few other special case modifiers (card special effects, being pinned, etc.), but it is all very easy to keep in your head. A '1' is out of ammo and a '10' is always a hit.

If you roll the target number or higher on a 1D10 (1D12 for a crack shot; 1D8 with a green horn) you have hit your target. You then roll a 1D10 to wound the target. (This may also be modified by a weapon, such as a shotgun at close range.) The wounds can be Pin (go to ground), Wounded (three wounds = dead), and Dead.

Close Combat

This is an opposed 1D10 die roll (with a few modifiers) between the two sides. The highest roller wins. For every point of difference between the two modified rolls 1D10 is rolled to wound. All of the effects rolled are applied. (Close combat is deadly!) The worst effect rolled is applied.

Wounding

As stated previously, each figure has three wounds. In addition, two Pin results in a Wound. Wounds affect movement, shooting accuracy, and close combat. Wounds and Pins force a player to recover at the start of the next turn, which has a 50/50 chance. If you recover, you get one action; if you don't you can't do anything but crawl away.

That's pretty much it. A very simple, clean system. Their activation system will appease those that hate activation systems because everyone will eventually activate, while those that love them will lie this because it still creates the chaos/fog of war/friction that they always rave about.

Gunfight at the Lazy Corral

View from the South Side of Town

When I saw this layout it was just "Wow!". Bill puts on a good table. The figures were all well painted too.

View from the East Side of Town

This scenario finds the rowdy Stinky Pete Gang drunk at the Lazy Corral. The Marshal has been looking for Stinky Pete 'dead or alive' so a townsman alerts the Marshal and his posse of 5 to their presence. Meanwhile another townsman alerts Stinky Pete and his 5 gang members that the Marshal is coming for them.

The Marshal and his group start on the north side of town, west of the church. Stinky Pete and his gang all start within the corral. Two major modifiers from what looks like an even scenario:

• Each gang member must roll to see if they are drunk at the start of the game. (50/50 chance) Being drunk counts as being wounded once. (Half of my gang, including Stinky Pete, were drunk.)
• Figures were WYSIWYG, so the Marshal's posse all had pistols, save for one shotgun. The gang all started with pistols and two additionally had carbines.

I personally thought the scenario was lopsided agains the gang. I still think it is, despite the results.

Stinky Pete is a known gunfighter and thus rolls a 1D12 when shooting (rather than 1D10). He has one green horn who rolls 1D8 though. The Marshal was also supposed to be a gunfighter.

Please note that I forgot to take photos in the beginning, but that did not matter as it was mostly moving into 12" pistol range and early long range shots missed.

1 - The Left Flank
Gang Member with Carbine kills Deputy

Please note that a red chip represents one wound; yellow the unit is pinned; blue that the figure has an unloaded weapon; and white that the unit has activated this turn. (As this is the end of a turn, no white chips should be showing, but …)

1 - The Center
Stinky Pete and the posse member with the shotgun trade shots, resulting in the latter being pinned.

Note that the Marshal's side did not notice the gang member sneaking up from the rear (upper right corner by the yellow '!'). This becomes critical next turn.

1 - The Right Flank
The green horn climbs up to the roof of the building and trades shots with a deputy below. Another gang member fires with his carbine around the corner and pins the deputy in the open.

Note that both sides have one figure that was not shown in these pictures. They are getting ready to face off outside the fence of the Lazy Corral.

2 - The Left Flank
The gang continues to trade fire with the deputy, pinning him.

2 - Left Center
Sneaky Pete smacks the Deputy from behind, wounding him and knocking him down.

2 - Right Center
Deputy 'Sundance' Butch charges 'Two Pistol' Pete who guns him down.

One of the special effects in the game is that if a Deuce is played, each Shooting action allows two shots. You still run out of ammo at the same rate, but you definitely increase the change of wounding the enemy.

2 - The Right Flank
The gang members again exchange fire with the Marshal and his Deputy. The Deputy gets wounded and pinned. The Marshal and the gang member with the carbine both run end unloaded.

3 - The Left Flank
Both sides continue to blaze away, with the Deputy getting wounded.

3 - Center
Sneaky Pete finished off the Deputy with the shotgun. (He did not really stand a chance.)

3 - The Right Flank
Another Deputy goes down, this time at the hands of the green horn gang member.

At this point law enforcement is down to the Marshal and one Deputy, but still they press on.

6 - The Left Flank
Stinky Pete finishes off the last Deputy with his shotgun.

6 - The Right Flank
The Marshal gets caught in a crossfire and gets taken down.

Scenario Summary

I really thought, and still think, that the gang is at a disadvantage. So why did they win so thoroughly, taking no casualties while killing all of the enemy?

• The gang having two long arms while law enforcement had none was a significant advantage. There were numerous times when I was shooting at short range and the return fire was at long range. The difference in range is a -30% penalty to hit.
• The Jokers produce a random event. Two of those random events caused one of the gang members a -1 penalty for one turn each. Fortunately, they happened when those figures were out of combat, so had no effect on play. The other random event was a figure found a shotgun and shells. That figure was Stinky Pete. Because he rolled 1D12 to hit, that made the shotgun deadly.
• The law was much more aggressive than the gang. Because the latter had long arms they were able to plink away at their enemies while the ones packing pistols maneuvered in close. Too many times the law ran out into the open, hoping for a lucky shot at a gang member in cover. (Essentially they were looking for a '10'.)
• At the end of turn 2 the law was down, 4 to 6. By the end of turn 3 it was 2 to 6. I can understand them taking a chance of coming back on turn 3 as this game has a reputation for see-sawing back and forth quickly, but after turn 3, the odds were too great. They should have voluntarily retreated.

Game Summary

I like these rules. I would definitely like to get another supplement, say for WW II or modern, to see how they handle weapons with a higher rate of fire. I don't have a good set of skirmish rules for these periods. (For horse & musket and pre-gunpowder periods I am good with One-Hour Skirmish Wargames (OHSW). I will have to try those rules with WW II again someday.)

I like the semi-random activation order that FoLR uses (the same as both Bolt Action and The Sword and the Flame does) much better than the random order that specifies the side and unit activation order that Tin Soldiers in Action uses, or the random roll to see whether the unit activates, and the order stop if you fail (Warmaster, Black Powder, all of the ~ Rampant series, etc.). In the end I prefer rules that allow every unit to act each turn. IGO-UGO turn sequences where the entire side goes are simpler, but leads to all kinds of issues – the Alpha Strike being the primary one – unless it is specifically controlled for.

The simplicity of the combat system is nice. Die roll modifiers are a tried and true mechanism and works well as long as the list of modifiers do not get out of hand. If you can easily keep them in mind (with a 60 year-old brain), then that is about right.

The only morale, per se, is if a figure is pinned and then, when they attempt to recover, they roll a '1', the figure routs off of the board. Otherwise no rolls are made when wounded or you see someone die. In this regard, I like the fact that OHSW has a mechanism for determining if your force gives up the fight.

UPDATE: there were so many errors played in this game, it is not funny. I had watched these rules played on YouTube (several channels) and so I only skimmed the rules before playing. There were some differences I spotted, but there was a lot wrong. (I no longer rely on YouTube videos to 'teach' me how to play a game. Unless it is Rodney Smith on the Watch it Played channel, I just don't trust that they are going to get it all correct.)

Because of all of the errors in this game I am glad I did not formally review the rules.

Map Campaign Part 5

Wow, even though I only fought two battles on April 14th, it feels like a lot has happened. Certainly in terms of scenario and rules development it has.

Campaign Update

The Second Battle of Firnskuppe did not produce any casualties, but it should have. (I am still experimenting with a campaign casualty system and both sides got off lightly in this battle and the first.) The Ambush on the Forest Road, however, was a bloody affair as the Battle Frenzy Twist card came up, allowing units to fight in circumstances where they normally would not be able to fight at all (but at reduced effect). The downside, however, was that it increased casualties.

One of the things that this last battle has helped me to develop is the backstory of this campaign. You would have thought I would have worked all of that out, but I sort of go with the idea that you don't try and figure out details until they become necessary. Granted, this makes the backstory fit the narrative after the fact, but I am okay with that.

The Ambush on the Forest Road felt very much like playing out Braddock's Defeat (a.k.a. The Battle of the Monongahela), which I would never have even considered gaming out normally. (Okay, that is a lie, I did try it out in a game of Clash for a Continent by Worthington Games. I have also played The Battle of Oriskany, another bloody ambush. But generally I avoid them, and have never played them with an opponent.

This campaign was ostensibly between two neighboring countries – Westonian to the West and Eastonia to the East – and was developed by my (long-distance) gaming buddy Justo. He saw the campaigns on the Joy of Wargaming YouTube channel (hosted by Jon Mollison) and he decided to create his own version of The First Elopean War, but he never completed it. When I suggested a campaign based on another campaign from that channel – which was a skirmish campaign, not a "two nations at war" campaign – and it fell through, Justo convinced me to try his campaign.

Basically the campaign takes elements straight from The Solo Wargaming Guide (TSWG) – which Jon uses quite heavily in his own campaigns – one of which is force generation. Each village, town, and city produces a certain number of troops and garrisons for the campaign, which is the currency that the player has for the campaign. Basically A- and B-class cities produce regiments and C-, D-, and E-class towns and villages produce companies. Normally, a regiment consists of five companies.

Here is where something interesting took place. Justo wrote up his troop muster and orders (for Westonia) separate from me, while I wrote it up for Eastonia. I wrote up some campaign rules to fill in the gaps that TSWG left and one area that I touched upon was what to do with these independent companies. I allowed players to convert a certain number of independent companies to Artillery companies for one thing, but I also had conversion rules for turning them into light infantry and light cavalry. I used those light troop rules, but Justo did not. Justo wanted all of his independent companies not designated as artillery to muster and consolidate into line troops – both infantry and cavalry. Essentially Westonia was a nation with no light troops while a considerable portion of the Eastonian troops – about ⅓ of them – were.

Westonia was Great Britain in North America before it realized that it needed to develop light troop capability and Eastonia were the French and their Indian allies.

The Ambush on the Forest Road was not The Battle of Monongahela, but The Battle of Bushy Run! The "Battle Frenzy" that the Westonians displayed were the Highland troops. The only problem was that the Westonians took far more damage.

So, I am left with a campaign where one side has no light troops and the other side does. That may definitely be an advantage to the Westonians on the set piece battlefield, but as you can see, they have 15 miles of woods to travel through, and hard-riding skirmishing cavalry caught them on the march. Worse still, light infantry and more light cavalry are only 1 ¼ day behind. Even if the next battle on the forest road is not an ambush, I fear it will me much worse for the Westonians if they try and push through to Tierwalt (the destination town they have orders to capture).

Even worse, even though Westonian troops have captured Firnskuppe with a surprise attack (Eastonia was hit here first), the troops are stuck when it comes to advancing on Erlenloch (the east road route from Firnskuppe) as it goes through heavily forested roads.

The route southward is even worse.

This makes for a very interesting problem for Justo. (I have lit up the Justo Signal and have asked him how he wants to proceed.) As Eastonian forces converge on the Westonian troops in the forests, I think the latter are going to get torn up while they are in march columns. As for the Eastonians, they may be able to push the Westonians back, but can they take the eastern Westonian villages and keep them? (My objective for the campaign was to only occupy Nuevo, the first village on the southern road (see the second image above), and sue for peace, gaining some advantage in the ensuing peace negotiations.

Campaign Casualties

I tried to get slick with my previous campaign casualties rules, but they simply do not work. I am not going to go back and alter the casualties for The First Battle of Firnskuppe, as those troops have already been used in a second battle, but I am going to alter the casualties from that second action.

When a unit is eliminated, it takes 33% permanent casualties if it was eliminated by musketry, 50% if by artillery fire or close combat with foot troops, and 67% if by close combat with mounted troops. This is the "killing blow"; you do not have to mark hits by type and figure things out proportionally. For units not eliminated the casualty rate is 25%. All hits lost round up. These losses are permanent for the duration of the campaign although we can look at replacements if this campaign runs long enough.

First Battle of  Firnskuppe: no casualties.

Second Battle of  Firnskuppe: one Eastonian Skirmisher unit was eliminated by musketry so it drops from 12 health to 8. One Westonian Infantry unit lost 14 hits so it drops from 15 health to 11.

Ambush on the Forest Road: one Westonian Infantry unit was eliminated by musketry, so it drops from 15 health to 10. Another Westonian Infantry unit was reduce lost 14 hits so it drops from 15 health to 11. The Eastonian Hussars lost 2 hits so they drop from 18 hits to 17.

One thing I have realized is that casualty rates will determine how decisive each battle is, and how short your campaign will be.

Map Campaign Part 2

For those that have not been following I decided to try my hand at a map campaign using the tables and ideas in The Solo Wargaming Guide (TSWG). Part one of the campaign laid out the basics, then another post spoke about how I was going to convert from Regiments and Companies that TSWG uses, to the units and hits that Neil Thomas' One-Hour Wargames (OHW) uses so that I could use the latter to play out the tactical battles. I played out the first 'battle' – The Battle of Firnskuppe – on the Solo Battles blog. There I showed how TSWG creates terrain layouts for the tabletop and puts some of the factors in TSWG – like the Commander Competency Rating (CCR) assigned to each Brigadier General and force commander – into play.

The basic scenario for the first battle was that the vanguard of the northern Westonian forces – a Regiment of Infantry and a Regiment of Cavalry – sprung to the attack while the Eastonian forces were still mustering. All that was there to defend the Eastonian frontier town of Firnskuppe was an understrength Mounted Skirmisher Regiment. (Note that Mounted Skirmisher is a new unit type for OHW. It is basically a Skirmisher unit that moves 12" as it is mounted on horses.)

I used some old Kings of War Battlefield Cards to determine the battlefield condition both sides had to deal with, the objectives for each side, and the stratagems they had available to them. Looking over the condition cards (there are 14 of them), five are normal conditions, six had easily interpretable conditions, one useless condition, and two hard to interpret conditions (they were written for the Kings of War game system). I think in the future I would prefer to produce my own table of conditions, and increase the odds that the conditions are normal. That said the Reduced Visibility condition had a very good feel to it – the Westonians had surprised the Eastonians and attacked first and although the latter knew the former were across the border, the Westonians had decided to attack early one foggy morning in an attempt to achieve surprise…

One thing of interest that I noted after the battle is how easy it is to become invested in one side or another. There are lots of ways to play solo, but generally you are either playing one side and trying to program the other, non-player side, or you are trying to program both sides. I told myself I was doing the latter, but the reality is that I did the former. I was more emotionally invested with the underdog Eastonians (who I had generated the campaign orders for both Justo and I), so when the Westonian Cavalry flanked the town by moving into the fields at B4, I immediately bugged out.

The whole point of the campaign is to provide interesting scenarios, especially ones you might not normally want to play out on a game night with a face-to-face gaming buddy. The Battle of Firnskuppe (BoF) was just such a scenario. First, it featured two units versus one in a game where it is normally six units versus six. Second, the one unit was the weakest unit in those rules versus the stronger units. So why play it, other than "because you need to know the results"? Well, for one thing, I did not know what the result would be, in terms of campaign impact. BoF was very terrain dense for a OHW game. I added a new Mounted Skirmisher unit type that had all of the weaknesses of the Skirmisher unit type, was more restrictive regarding terrain, and had only a marginally better movement rate of 12" rather than 9". (In hindsight I think it should probably be 15", but that is another discussion.) When we play games unlinked to campaigns, we tend not to think of battlefield casualties – or we minimize the impact – but only of victory conditions. Did we win the battle?

In OHW terms one side took six hits while the other took two, resulting in no lost units. One side 'won' because they achieved more victory points than the other. There wasn't even an obvious reason why the Eastonians retreated because they were giving better than they got.

The Eastonians were firing with 1D6-2 each turn (1.67 hits per turn), while the Westonians were firing 1D6-2 but would have to halve the hits (1 hit per turn) due to the cover the Eastonians were in. If the Westonian Cavalry charged they would hit with 1d6+2 hits (5.5 hits per turn). The Eastonians firing at the Westonian Cavalry would have had 1D6-2 with ½ casualties (1 hit per turn) so once the Westonian Cavalry got into position it should have immediately charged, dispersing the Mounted Skirmishers.

So, why did it play out the way it did? Clearly my own personal bias crept into the stupid play of the Westonians. The Westonian Cavalry could have hit on turn 2, effectively ending the battle with much higher losses to the Eastonians. Or maybe I am just not as analytical 'in the moment' as I like to think.

Even though I am declaring myself a cheat I am going to let the results stand. So how does this affect the campaign?

Converting from Tabletop Back to Campaign

TSWG offers a simple method for adjudicating casualties for the victor: ½ of the total casualties are killed; ¼ are severely wounded; and ¼ are lightly wounded. Killed casualties are replaced after one month; severely wounded casualties are replaced after two weeks; and lightly wounded casualties are replaced after one week. For the defeated the breakdown is the same, but the wounded will be captured – meaning they will not be replaced unless there is a prison exchange – if the victory was decisive.

This begs the question, however: how do you determine total casualties? Let's start by looking at Neil Thomas' notes in OHW:

"My combat rules work on the principle of having units acquire hits throughout the game, to be eliminated after garnering 15. They retain their full fighting ability until destroyed; this reflects a model whereby real casualties are at a fairly low level, but that the sustained experience of combat will steadily degrade a unit’s morale, at which point it routs. This is both simple and historically accurate: most casualties in any ancient battle (and those of most other periods too) were inflicted when the enemy fled, rather than the initial clash of arms. Essentially, loss of morale is reflected in elimination, rather than having to make frequent checks on a unit’s status, which tends to be a feature of complex wargames rules."

With this it is obvious that the six hits sustained by the Infantry Regiment do not reflect a loss of two companies of men, but that morale of the Regiment was down 40% because of ammunition depletion, fatigue, the morale effect of a few men being killed or wounded, and unwounded men leaving the firing line to resupply ammunition, help the wounded to the rear, or simply being ineffective out of fear. he unit did not have two of five companies become casualties.

If the emphasis on unit loss and not hit loss then it is better to come up with a table reflecting casualty effects of a unit loss.

OHW Combat Result	TSWG Campaign Effect
4-9 hits remaining on Infantry or Cavalry	Lose one company on '1' with 1D6
1-3 hits remaining on Infantry or Cavalry	Lose two companies on a '1', one company on a '2' with 1D6
Infantry or Cavalry removed by musketry	Lose two companies on a '1' or '2', one company on a '3' or '4' with 1D6
Infantry or Cavalry removed by Artillery	Lose three companies on a '1', two companies on a '2' or '3', and one company on a '4' or '5' with 1D6
Infantry removed by close combat	Lose five companies on a '1', four companies on a '2', three companies on a '3' or '4', two companies on a '5', and one company on a '6' with 1D6.
Cavalry removed by close combat	Lose four companies on a '1', three companies on a '2' or '3', two companies on a '4' or '5', and one company on a '6' with 1D6.
1-6 hits remaining on any Skirmisher	Lose one company on '1' with 1D6
Any Skirmisher removed by musketry	Lose one company on a '1', '2', or '3' with 1D6
Any Skirmisher removed by Artillery	Lose two companies on a '1', one company on a '2', '3', or '4' with 1D6
Any Skirmisher removed by close combat	Lose three companies on a '1' or '2', two companies on a '3' or '4', and one company on a '5' or '6' with 1D6

I have no idea if these numbers are any good, but I need to try somewhere. Note that the table determines total casualties, so ½ of the companies are replaced after one month, ¼ are replaced after two weeks, and ¼ are replaced after one week. How do we deal with fractional companies? Roll dice to see if you round up or down.

You might question how realistic this table is. What does it mean by "removed", for example? (It means the unit or combat type that rolled the die that caused the unit to be removed, by the way.) What if the unit removing your only inflicted one hit? Won't this lead to unrealistic play like trying to use Cavalry to run down your unit in close combat in order to get a deadlier result? Well, yes, but I don't see it as being 'unrealistic'. If you were routed by Cavalry, for example, they probably ran you down, rather than you outrunning them. Artillery fire was particularly deadlier than musketry, so their casualties tend to 'stick'.

So, how do the casualties play out from BoF?

Westonian Infantry: 9 hits remaining, so it loses one company on a '1'. If it does, that is ½ company killed (50% chance), ¼ company severely wounded (25% chance), and ¼ company lightly wounded (25% chance). So roll a D100 and 1-50 counts as killed; 51-75 counts as severely wounded; and 76-100 counts as lightly wounded.

I rolled a '5', so no company was lost.

Eastonian Mounted Skirmishers: 10 hits remaining, so no losses.

Rest and Recuperation

TSWG is silent (as far as I could tell), on the need for rest and recuperation after a battle, although The Joy of Wargaming hinted at it being otherwise. I noticed that he indicated that it took a day for rest and recuperation after a battle, but he took note, for example, whether light cavalry was uncommitted at the end of the battle. Those troops could be used in pursuit of defeated enemy forces.

The Westonian Infantry spent the remaining day and the next day resting and bringing the town of Firnskuppe under control. Meanwhile the Westonian Cavalry patrol around the town: two squadrons down the road towards Erlenloch, where the Eastonian Cavalry retreated; two squadrons down the road towards Grimme Hutte; and one squadron into the woods north of Firnskuppe.

This leaves a possibility of a skirmish between two squadrons of the Westonian Cavalry and the two squadrons of the Eastonian Cavalry that headed down the road to Erlenloch. But first I need to think about how to handle some of these tactical decisions – such as what to do when you are pushed out of your muster point – better. So that's it on the campaign front for now.

In Other News

So, not that I am looking to garner any sympathy, but more to explain delays in this campaign and other blogging activity I thought I would let everyone know what is going on with me.

About two years ago I was formally diagnosed with high blood pressure and diabetes (type 2). Part of my general problem was that I had hallux rigidus, a degenerative arthritis of the big toe, in both feet. The result is that I would get bloody sores on my big toes, making it difficult to walk as well as spreading blood all over the carpet, which really upset the wife. After months of treatment I decided to have surgery to correct the problem. In October 2020 I had my first surgery and they removed the defective left toe joint and replaced it. That surgery went as well as could be expected, so I decided to follow it up and replace the right toe joint in October of 2021.

Before any surgery you doctor has to clear you. Well the second checkup was worse than they first in that my diabetes was worse than previously. How much worse? Truth be told I was borderline acceptable. A score on my A1C of 9.0 was considered a fail and I was at 8.9. But I think I browbeat my doctor into clearing me anyway – I just wanted to get back to 'normal' and be able to fully walk again – so I went ahead with the second surgery.

The first sign of a problem was when I woke from anesthesia. I was flopping around like a fish out of water. Despite having been under anesthesia twice before in my life (all after the age of 50), I had never had a bad reaction nor found that I was allergic to any medication. This time I apparently had.

After getting home I did not strictly follow the recovery regime of icing and elevating my foot that I had the previous year. That plus the stress I had put on my stitches after the surgery caused my stitches to pop open, introducing an infection to the metallic implant. I did not even know an implant could get an 'infection', but apparently it can and it is bad if it does. Antibiotics cannot really work on digging out an infection from an implant. So after three months I was back on the table and they were removing my implant.

The doctor took no chances and essentially removed the implant and would not put a replacement in. Ironically, by the time of the second surgery on the right toe I had radically altered my diet and brought my diabetes almost under control. Basically an A1C reading of 6.5% means you are diabetic, while 5.7% to 6.4%is pre-diabetic. I had brought it down from 8.9% to 6.2%. Although it would not matter with regards to getting a replacement implant, it has mattered tremendously in healing after the second surgery.

The wound to extract is much larger than the wound when the implant went it. I am pretty sure she took more than the implant; what they call the 'grandma method', which is to basically fill it up with flexible cement. I would still be able to walk, but I would not have as much strength in the foot to push off, so no more hiking and mountain climbing for me. (I never did those things anyway.)

Because the wound was much larger it was going to take longer to heal than the last one (and that had been three months), so they were really worried about it getting infected. The first therapy they wanted to try was a wound vacuum, which is to seal the wound in a vacuum, 24 hours a day. The negative pressure not only stimulates the cells to heal faster, but it helps keep infections out. The downside is that you have to wear a purse-sized pump that sucks the air out of the wound. As the wound was on my bog toe, that meant an air hose ran from the dressing on the wound up through my pants leg, out of the top into the vacuum pump unit at my waist. Thank goodness I work from home. I suddenly discovered the benefits of old-timey nightshirts! It allowed me to look like I had a t-shirt on while attending Zoom conference calls.

So, three times a week I had to change the dressing on the wound. Once per week I went into the doctor's office so she could inspect the wound and measure progress. Well, it turned out that I was healing very well, but the special adhesive they use on the wound dressing is something I was allergic to, as I was breaking out in a very bad rash wherever the adhesive was put, which was largely around the wound. So after about a month the doctor called an end to that given that my rash was just getting so bad. But the wound was healing nicely. New cell growth.

The other issue is that because the wound was so large, and the risk of infection was so high, I was on very strong antibiotics. These were so strong apparently that the doctor had never prescribed them before. My wife is a nurse and she looked them up and this is sort of an antibiotic of the last resort. She was surprised it had been prescribed and that I had been on it so long. Well these antibiotics have a lot of side effects, one of which is killing your gut biome very effectively (the natural result of which is always having diarrhea) and that you can break out in a rash. So not only did I have a rash about the wound from the allergic reaction to the adhesive, I had a rash breaking out all over my body.

When the doctor took me off of the wound vacuum she also took me off the antibiotics; I had simply been on them too long. I was fine with that because it caused a lot of nausea, so my quality of life was down pretty badly. Mind you, I was still wargaming face-to-face with people during this period, but I was always dragging. To counter the antibiotics she told me to get some probiotics to help repopulate my gut biome and bring my gastrointestinal issues to heel. So I did.

Well, it turns out that some people can be affected by heavy probiotic usage and it comes in the form of acne. I would like to think that once upon a time I would not have been one of those people, but after all of this heavy pharmaceutical usage and sickness I should not be surprised that I am one. I broke out in pimples all over the body. Seriously, I thought that somehow bedbugs had gotten into the house and they were bug bites because I would have more red spots every morning. Finally they formed the heads and I looked at the side effects of the probiotics.

One of those pimples turned out to be a monster though. It was on my shoulder, very painful, and I finally had the wife attend to it as I had recently lost an entire weekend to fever. My guess was that it was from all of the inflammation from the acne and rashes, but it had apparently come almost completely from this one pimple/cyst?/whatever. My wife used about a dozen medical sponge gauzes to drain the pus and blood from it that night. We patched it up and I had a fever spike, but the fever broke that night and I felt a lot better the next day. But my weekend was lost.

I would like to say that the campaign has been trudging along because of all of this, but that would not be strictly true. First off, the wound is healing really well. I have moved on to silicon skin graft every week now to higher grade skin grafts every other week. The wound continues to get smaller and not show any complications. So my mobility is up, especially now that I don't have a pump to deal with and dressings to change every day. No the campaign is slow because map campaigns are a lot of work. Plus, the people I game with face-to-face are all climbing out of their lockdown routines and becoming more active and social again, so I have more (welcome) distractions. I need to get out more. No, I chose the wrong time to start a solo campaign; I should have started it months ago.

So bear with me as I intersperse writing up about this campaign with other topics. The latest craze has been playing the cooperative superhero game Marvel United. I like the chibi style of the figures and the comic style that I am painting them. Here are two of the latest supervillains that I have painted.

These should be two tough supervillains to take down.

Campaign to Battlefield and Back Again

 Last week I finally got enough of the preliminary work done on the Map Campaign – refer back to that post if you have not read it already – that I was ready to game out the first tactical battle. Unfortunately, because Westonia caught Eastonia flat-footed, it is not going to be much of a battle, given it is ten companies versus two. Nonetheless, one goal of this campaign was to create scenarios that I would not normally concoct when playing face-to-face, such as uneven battles and, well, this was about as uneven as it was going to get. Nonetheless, I did not want to throw troops away. So I needed a way to fairly deal with a situation where troops might want to voluntarily retreat from engagement.

In the campaign played on They Joy of Wargaming (TJOW) YouTube channel, he generated the tactical map of the tabletop – influenced by the terrain on the larger map where the engagement took place – then used each side's Commander's Competency Rating (CCR) to determine who had the tactical advantage, and thus could pick their baseline (with their opponent generally getting the opposite side). From there I would play the battle, but if a side wanted to voluntarily retreat because of their position being untenable, if they could roll their CCR or less on a D6 (rolling every turn), they would have the option to retreat off of the board.

As I indicated last time, I was still trying to figure out how to move from the campaign map to the tabletop and back again. Primarily, because I could be dealing with very few troops, which rules would I use that could deal with something as small as ten companies versus two, to 5-10 Regiments per side? Playing One-Hour Wargames (OHW) was pretty much what I decided upon, but how to scale up and down.

Modeling Campaign Units in OHW

The Solo Wargaming Guide (TSWG) uses Regiments of five companies, so I decided to equate that to one full-strength (15 hit) unit in OHW. Initially I was going to allow the use of independent companies on the battlefield, but decided against that, as it is against the spirit of the OHW rules, in my opinion. All companies of the same type must be consolidated into Regiments. Regiments not at full strength will have fewer than 15 hits. That said, not all unit types are created equally in OHW.

In the Horse & Musket period rules there are four unit types: Artillery, Infantry, Skirmishers, and Cavalry. Two of the four unit types – Infantry and Cavalry – equate to the Regiments of Line Infantry and Regiments of Line Cavalry, respectively, that are listed in the campaign's force rosters. An Artillery unit equates to an Artillery Battery in the campaign. This only leaves the companies of Light Infantry and squadrons of Light Cavalry to model.

In OHW the Skirmisher unit type is pretty weak. It has 15 hits, has cover benefits when in terrain, and moves faster as it represents unformed infantry not constrained by formation and 'dressing the line'. One important note that Neil Thomas makes is "Units of Skirmishers are only half the size of close order foot, and their musketry is correspondingly less effective." An OHW Skirmisher unit is thus 2 ½ companies in size, not five companies. So now, this give me a tactical choice: I can either run five companies of Light Infantry as a Regiment, which in OHW is an Infantry unit of 15 hits, or as two Skirmisher units, each of 15 hits. (The extra hits reflect the inherently lower casualties that skirmishers take due to their dispersed formation and the ability to use lesser cover not typically reflected on the tabletop.)

So, the Light Infantry is now modeled, what about the Light Cavalry? I decided to allow the same sort of options: they could either form up into five squadron-strong Regiments of Cavalry or 2 ½ squadron-strong Skirmisher units. Yes, I am going to allow a mounted Skirmisher unit. It will fight exactly like a normal Skirmisher unit – including the ability to fire (while mounted) – but will have a 12" move as Cavalry units do. Does that make them better than normal Skirmishers? Yes. The reason I will not downgrade them in some way is because I do not want to add any additional rules, and because their numbers are constrained by the campaign itself.

Conversion to OHW Units

As stated above, Regiments of Infantry and Cavalry consist of five companies/squadrons, which nets them 15 hits in OHW. For every company or squadron short the unit loses three hits in OHW.

For Skirmishers, however only 2 ½ companies/squadrons are required. Given that everything in the campaign is modeled as whole companies, how do I model the ½ companies? I don't. If a Skirmisher unit only has two companies (80% of 2 ½), it will be a Skirmish unit with 12 hits (80% of 15 hits); a one company Skirmisher unit will have 6 hits.

Conversion Back to Campaign Units

With 15-hit Infantry and Cavalry units, for every three whole hits lost – whether permanently from deaths or temporarily from wounds – the unit will lose one company/squadron from the campaign. With Skirmisher units, they lose one company/squadron for every six whole hits lost.

For units that have fractional company/squadron losses, I will use dice to determine if the company/squadron is lost, e.g. an Infantry unit lost five hits, resulting in the loss of one company (3 hits) and a fractional loss of another company (2 hits). I roll a die for the fractional loss and on a 1-4 (D6) the company is lost while on a 5-6 it is not. This should help alleviate some bookkeeping, requiring only the tracking of companies and types and not of men.

What do you think?

Please note that I have started using Amazon affiliate links for any Amazon product I feature in my blog posts. You don't have to use them, of course, but anything Amazon gives me does not affect the price you pay, so using it contributes to my caffeine-fueled blog posts' funding.

First Attempt at a Map Campaign

One of the hardest goals I have ever tried to achieve is to add context my games. There are plenty of ways to try and achieve that, but I think the one most gamers go for is to play scenarios in the context of a larger campaign game. Hopefully, the larger campaign provides you the forces for each side, a location to be fought over, and both previous and subsequent battles will be affected by the results of the battle you are about to fight.

So what is a "campaign"? Essentially it is a larger game intended to consist of a series of smaller games, linked together over a span of time and distance. Sounds simple on face value, but it requires the gamer to consider many factors that they normally abstract away from normal, tactical play, such as supply and logistics, marching rates (outside of the battlefield), and thinking about multiple objectives spread across distances. With campaigns you have to figure out if you want to continue to abstract many of those factors away.

Rather than talk about the different types of campaigns, this post is going to focus on a map campaign that I started with gaming buddy Justo (in Texas). It started with watching YouTuber The Joy of Wargaming's series Five Villages (which starts here), which was a map campaign he played using the rules The Chosen Men (so it was a skirmish campaign). I decided to play that same campaign after watching the first four episodes. (I should have watched the fifth episode before starting the campaign, by the way.) I drew up my own version of the map (putting it on hexes), created the opposing forces, and developed some rules (largely taken from the original campaign). The next problem to solve was: what strategic orders do I give each side?

Because my intent was to play the battles out solo – the objective of the campaign was simply to produce scenarios for battles to be played out on the tabletop, especially unbalanced and unlikely scenarios you would not play face-to-face with an opponent – I decided to enlist my gaming buddies to provide me the basic strategies for the two sides and then I, as umpire, would execute the orders for both sides and resolve the resulting conflicts.

I enlisted gaming buddies Justo and Chris (from Ohio) for the two sides, but it turned out that I did not convey the requirements adequately and it fell through in about a week. That said, Justo had a map campaign in his tool box – also based on a The Joy of Wargaming (TJoW) video series, in this case an Imagi-Nation map campaign (which starts here) – and he suggested that I give the orders to one side, he does it for the other, and we each play out our own campaign separately. Rather than use this plan for my original campaign, I decided to go ahead and try this one.

Initially Justo provided two map drawings, but eventually I ended up converting these to hexes.

Westonia

Eastonia

As with the video series, Justo and I decided to use the system provided in The Solo Wargaming Guide (TSWG) by William Silvester for conducting map movement, dealing with supply and logistics, weather, mobilization, and determining the number of initial forces. (Because the campaign is measured in days and not weeks or months, recruitment is not an issue.) Now, my opinion of this book has been pretty low since purchase. When it comes to solo wargaming, I really don't want to lean on random tables and this book does that heavily (as does Featherstone's). But as I looked through all the variables you have to contend with, it seems like this is a good way to start until you sort out your own rules with fewer fully random tables.

Justo had created the maps, set the city sizes, drew in the terrain and roads, and stopped sort of determining the force composition and location. That is where our campaign started.

I saw that the map favored Westonia, as it had more lesser villages (class C, D, and E urban areas), and thus would have a smaller army, so I chose Eastonia as my side figuring it would likely be the defender. Here is the full process that we used for our campaign:

1. Select campaign map ✅
2. Select which side you represent ✅
3. Roll your side’s forces
1. Roll total forces for each city
2. Divide Regiments into Line Infantry and Line Cavalry
3. Subtract the number of Line Cavalry from individual Companies; that is the number of Artillery Batteries
4. Divide remaining individual Companies into Light Infantry and Light Cavalry
5. Assign Regiments and individual Companies to cities
6. Name Regiments and Companies
4. Divide forces into Brigades
1. Define Brigades (which Regiments and Companies, from where)
2. Roll Brigadier Generals’ Commander Competency Rating (CCR)
1. No more than three Brigadier Generals per side
2. Any additional Commanders will automatically have a CCR of ‘3’.
3. Assign Brigadier Generals to each Brigades
4. Name Brigadier Generals
5. Make a Muster Plan
1. Define the Muster Rating of each city.
2. Identify Muster Point for each Brigade.
3. Define travel from origin Cities to Muster Point.
6. Define an Action Plan
1. Identify starting time for each Brigade
2. Identify general orders (attack, defense, delay, etc.)
3. Identify route of march
4. Identify goal of campaign

Step 3, roll your side's forces, comes straight from TSWG, which is as follows: Class A gets 2-5 Regiments (each of 5 Companies); B gets 1-5 Regiments; C gets 4 Companies; D gets 3 Companies; and E gets 2 Companies. Given that both sides started with one A and three B class cities, both sides would start with relatively the same number of Regiments. Note that 3.2 and 3.4 above defines what class of troops come from these sources, Line Infantry and Line Cavalry only come from Regiments, and thus only class A and B cities produce those troops. The class C, D, and E towns only produce Artillery (in limited amounts), Light Infantry, and Light Cavalry. So my feeling was that the extra towns of Westonia would not produce a significant advantage in troops, but enough to justify me being the defender.

As with TJoW, we decided to have one Line Cavalry Regiment for every five Line Infantry Regiments raised, rounding fractions up. I rolled up fifteen Regiments, so that gave me three Line Cavalry Regiments and twelve Line Infantry Regiments.

With three Line Cavalry Regiments, you are allowed three Artillery Batteries, subtracted from your total number of Companies (28) raised from your C, D, and E towns. In hindsight I think that may be a little too few batteries, but we press onward.

Of the remaining Companies (25) we decided to have one Light Cavalry Squadron for every three Light Infantry Company, rounding fractions up. That gives me seven Light Cavalry Squadrons and eighteen Light Infantry Companies. Along with our three Brigadier Generals, this is my total force disposition.

I am not going to bore you with the nitty gritty details of where the units ended up, but my basic plan was to pool my Light Cavalry in certain towns so those forces could muster and move faster to engage the enemy while the rest of the units muster for defense. My sole goal was to attack on the south road, taking the first C class town on that road, and attempt to hold on to that until the cessation of hostilities, hoping I could win that in subsequent peace negotiations or at least use it as a bargaining chip in the event I lose any towns or cities.

By the way, given that we are not using any siege artillery and the class A and B cities are fortified, there is essentially no way to capture the enemy's cities; only the towns are vulnerable.

The first wrench in the campaign was that Justo did not want to determine, at the start, which side was the attacker and which was the defender. Rather he wanted to have each side write attack orders without knowing who was attacking. I thought that was a little strange, but agreed to it. After all, we would each be playing our own campaign so whoever ended up attacker in one campaign might well be the defender in the other's, so I guess it made sense and was easier than writing one set of orders if you are the attacker and another if you are the defender.

My Version of the First Elope-an War Campaign

I will be reporting on my campaign here and on my Solo Battles blog, given that the tactical play will likely be solo (though not necessarily, if I enlist the aid of local or virtual players).

The Westonian Duke, after sending his daughter ahead to Eastonia to eventually be married to the Prince of Eastonia, and subsequently finding out that the Prince had absconded (eloped) with his daughter to another country, decided this was the final straw. After decades of attempts to make peace with the Eastonians, by tying their families through marriage, this was too much! With the loss of his daughter there was no treaty between the two, especially as the Count of Eastonia was claiming it was their strumpet of a daughter that lured his son and heir away! This means war!

Westonian ended up as the attacker so I have to determine how long it takes Eastonia to react to the news and send out their mobilization orders. Looking at the Mobilization table in TSWG, the Eastonian's mobilize five days after the Westonian's do. Clearly the Count did not figure the Duke would react so poorly to the news.

Diary

April 3, 1750

Light Rain (6) greets the Westonians as they start to muster. Each city has a Muster Rating to determine how long it takes the news to get to that city, and how long it takes the local garrison commanders to get their troops mustered locally.

April 4, 1750

A light rain continues. Troops in Tresvoces, Siayfin, Avrafin, and Vacaque have completed their muster.

April 5, 1750

The rain has stopped (7). The troops above are moving to their Brigade Muster Point while the remaining troops complete their muster in their respective cities and towns. (I did not roll a single Westonian city with a Muster Rating of '1', which is the slowest Muster Rating. They have clearly been contemplating this action and have been drilling.)

April 6-8, 1750

The Vanguard of the Brigade SLT completes its muster in Astaelfin and prepares to move on towards Firnskuppe.

April 8, 1750

Mobilization orders are sent out to all Eastonian units. Units will muster in their cities and towns on the 9th through 11th, depending upon their Muster Rating.

April 10, 1750

The Vanguard of the 1st Westonian Brigade arrives in Firnskuppe, just as the Firnskuppian Husaren (two independent light cavalry squadrons) complete their muster. One Light Infantry Regiment and one Light Cavalry Regiment versus these two Husaren squadrons… Not quite your normal matchup to play on game night!

Fighting Tactical Battles

The next question is how to fight tactical battles, going from the campaign map to the tabletop and back. In this regard Justo and I have again decided to take our own routes. We can use whatever rules we like to fight out the battles, but they need to be able to map to our unit structures.

One-Hour Wargames

I am considering using Neil Thomas' One-Hour Wargames (OHW), especially for the simpler battles. I like the basic mechanics of either moving or firing, which feels right for this period. The issue is how to represent the units?

The basic unit in the campaign is the company. Towns and cities provide a certain number of companies to the army. Cities provide the line units, and thus are organized in units (regiments) of five companies each. Towns can either combine their companies into consolidated regiments (again, of five companies each) or use them as independent companies. Given that an OHW unit is 15 hits, that can easily be translated as 3 hits per company in a five company regiment. That would make independent companies and squadrons as 3 hit units. Any permanent losses in hits from the unit can likewise be reflected back to the campaign by removing a company for each 3 hit loss.

The problem with this, however, is that a unit maintains its firepower/melee power regardless of the number of hits remaining, so five 3-hit units are far stronger offensively, than one 15-hit unit. The former would be throwing 5D6 in combat while the latter would only be throwing one. How to resolve that?

Another method would be for one OHW unit to equal a company, but force the companies in regiments to operate together (in formation). That might be interesting. Basically it would be scaling OHW up (tremendously), as this first battle would be 10 units versus 2.

Finally, I can just see forcing all independent companies to consolidate into units of five companies, with the fractional unit having three hits per company.

2x2 Napoleonics

Justo will be using 2x2 Napoleonics by Rod Humble, which was also used in the original TJOW campaign. Although I enjoyed those rules immensely back in the day – it was one of the first rule sets that Justo and I played almost 20 years ago when we first met – I have to say that I have outgrown them a bit. Roll a D6, add modifiers from a table, and compare the result to a chart (which is fairly easy to remember). Very 1970s-80s.

One-Hour Skirmish Wargames

Interestingly, Justo and I discussed these rules on our last call. The idea was to convert the rule mechanics – using a standard deck of cards as the sole chance element – to mass combat. As I pondered the idea more I liked what I was coming up with, but I don't want to hold up the battles as I try and sort it all out. So maybe later in the campaign or another one.

Well, that's the start. I have a butt stomp to play out. I'll let you know how it goes in the next post.