The Battle Of McDowell

As promised we played a McDowell scenario on Thursday night, using Black Powder and Ralph's Epic ACW figures (or whatever Warlord call their little plastic figures).

Here's the main focus of the action - Sitlington's Hill. I was a little late turning up, owing to a cat emergency, and missed the first turn, so I'm not sure what the initial starting positions were, but you can see roughly a brigade each fighting it out over the crest of the hill here. In the centre was an objective marker.

The scenario was designed so that the first half of the action would be fought over the hill and then, as the numbers of arriving Confederates steadily increased, the Union would fall back and contest some roads in their rear. The Union had two smallish brigades (which counted as one for break purposes, but not command), whilst the Confederates had (I think) three - one attacking the hill and two arriving by road from the first turn. Here's the bigger picture, with the Confederates arriving in the distance, and a couple of Union regiments on the road opposing them.

A close-up of the two Union regiments on the road.

The Confederates were marching in nice vulnerable columns, and as they came up took a few hits from the Union artillery that I realise that I didn't get a single picture of.

Confederate numbers build up. 

The Union actually did a great job of holding them off. Deciding that the objectives to the rear were too far back to reach within the time-limit, they simply sat tight. They lost the objective on the hill, but did then break the Confederate brigade contesting it (despite the Confederates getting all kinds of rerolls for 'Stonewall' Jackson being there, as well as for simply being Confederate).

The units on the road came close to breaking the first wave of Confederates attacking them. But not quite.

And, as we reached the time-limit, the Union brigade reached its break-point. In terms of VPs for the game, this gave the Confederates two (breaking a Union brigade, and winning one objective) and the Union one (breaking a single Confederate brigade). But it was a close game.

The scores are important because this was a the first in a series of three Jackson In The Valley games, and the VPs for each scenario will be accumulated to give an overall winner. The plan is for one game at the end of a month, but then next two months are basically holidays at that point, so the next one won't be until February.

And this is my first game of Black Powder this year, so ... 52 Games!

52 Games - Game 65

McDowell 1862 With Battle Cry

On our club night this week we're going to be trying a refight of the 1862 Battle of McDowell. We've been giving some pre-game reading, but I thought I'd brush up on the battle the fun way by playing it out with Battle Cry since (i) the game is on my table and (ii) there's a scenario in the rules.

The McDowell scenario has a relatively low unit count and is almost entirely infantry; nine Confederate vs seven Union. The Union have one general and an artillery, and the Confederates three generals. The Union have more command cards though. The terrain is scattered woods and hills, with Sitlington's Hill as a central feature. Here's the setup:

The Union started with a bold advance on their right flank, using the hills there as cover.

They quickly dealt with the two Confederate units on that flank, and turned on Sitlington's Hill. The Confederates were bringing up reinforcements to cover the hill.

The Union pressed a series of attacks against the left of the position on the hill, and got quite badly cut up. But they were inflicting decent losses on the Confederates too.

Union troops began to move up in the centre to provide limited support.

And that was enough. Although a lot of teh Union units were heavily depleted, they were still fighting, whilst with the shooting of General Johnston on the hill the Confederates had suffered the necessary losses to give the Union a 5-2 win.

I set it up and played it again. This time the main Union attack came in the centre, with their left coming up in support. One unit pushed up onto Sitlington's hill and into the Confederate rear. But Taliaferro's Confederates moved in from the Confederate rear, and their counter-attack clinched a narrow 5-4 win for the boys in grey.

The final position. With five medals needed to victory the losing side will be looking very thin on the ground by the end.

Anyway, I'm all set for Thursday now.

More Battle Cry

I notice that I haven't posted in a week, which is pretty bad for me.

The truth is that I haven't really done very much gaming-related stuff in the past week. A lot of time has either been spent catching up with friends, celebrating family birthdays and (the majority) preparing for and performing in burlesque shows covering two consecutive nights. And work, naturally, squeezed in wherever there was time.

I did manage to fit in a few more games of Battle Cry though. This time I played the Ox Hill scenario, and found it to be nicely balanced. Here's a couple of pictures of the setup.

Actually one peripherally game-related thing we've been doing recently is going to a local weekly trivia night. Given that our team consists of myself and Mrs Kobold we've done surprisingly well, finishing in the top three (out of ten to twelve teams) each time we've been. The small prizes we've picked up pay for the food and drink the next time we go.

Anyway, now the burlesque stuff has calmed down until the new year I'll have more time to devote to games I hope.

Battle Cry - Antietam

Having fought the American Civil War twice using 'A House Divided' to give me the bigger picture, I went back to a more focused approach and played some more Battle Cry during the week. 

I set up the Antietam scenario, partially because it's a battle I'd just got to in my reread of Shelby Foote, but mostly because it's a favourite battle of mine. Many, many years ago I spent a ton of time reading up on it in order to put together a Fire & Fury scenario for it (this was before Great Eastern Battles was published), and I still find it one of the more fascinating larger battles.

The game sets it up as you'd expect, as three fights, one in each sector. The numbers of units are actually fairly similar, but this kind of gives the right effect; the Union have enough troops to push the Confederates facing them to the edge but maybe not quite enough oomph to finish them. The Union have fewer command cards than the Confederates. The Confederates start with terrain advantages too. It's a tough one for the Union.

Here's the start. As you can see I added a few bits of terrain.

The Union attack on the cornfield went as well as you'd expect.

Burnside got his troops together to cross the stone bridge. This is an odd part of the scenario, since Burnside acts as the same time as the rest of the Union army, but in fact this flank is so isolated from the rest of the fight that it's almost a game on its own, so could (in theory) be assumed to be happening later.

A.P. Hill's troops came up and stopped the advance over the creek fairly quickly. In the centre the Union went for the sunken road. 

They even occupied the road.

Burnside was shot trying to escape back across the bridge.

And the Confederates turned the sunken road into a killing-ground, in a reversal of history.

That ended the battle; the Confederates won 7-3.

I set it up and played it again. The Union put in a pretty good attack on the cornfield this time, although Stuart's cavalry hit them hard.

Burnside got his troops over the bridge again. The Union were doing OK so far.

The Union troops in the cornfield were decimated by shooting from the Confederates around the church and supporting artillery from near the sunken road.

And, omce again, Hill's troops came up quickly to threaten the Union position by the bridge.

Burnside escaped being shot this time, though.

And Hooker got lucky too. His troops? Less so.

And that was it. The scenario is unforgiving when it comes to casualties and the destruction on the flanks was enough for another Confederate win: 6-2 this time.

I've played the Belmont scenario through a few times since I took these pictures as well, but didn't photograph it. It gives a surprisingly fun and frustrating game, featuring as it does infantry that retreat two spaces instead of one. The Confederates have numbers, but also have terrible command cards, so struggle to bring them to bear. Honours are about even so far.

A House Divided

Whilst I was away I started rereading Shelby Foote's 'The Civil War: A Narrative', which is a thoroughly sensible book to pack when you have airline weight limits to consider. To be fair I only took the first volume; I reasoned that I wouldn't finish it before we came .

Anyway, it gave me a bit of an urge to do some ACW gaming when I got home. But rather than individual battles I fancied something with a broader sweep, so I got out my copy of GDW's 'A House Divided' to see if I could remember how to play it.

I worked my way slowly through a game during the course of Saturday, and gradually picked up the rules again. They aren't too complicated, although the game plays best with at least some of the optional and advanced rules applied (I'd marked the ones I'd used in the past with a pencil tick, so that was helpful - thanks Past Me). Here's the setup:

I wish I'd taken notes rather than just photos though, as I now have a collection of pictures of the board and only a dim memory of the course of events.

Here's the Union making a descent of the Mississippi River.

And the first battle of the game, fought in the Fort Donelson/Henry box.

In the east the Confederates attacked Harpers Ferry and were defeated.

The Union seized the initiative, and landed on the Peninsula.

The Confederates fell back to cover Richmond and Petersburg, but a furious assault in late 1861 saw both places fall.

Surprisingly despite this grievous loss so early in the game the Confederacy rallied, and led the Union a merry dance around Kentucky.

In the east the Union pushed into the Carolinas. There was much fighting around Wilmington and Charleston, with the Union making use of naval movement to give them an edge, but after over-stretching their lines the Confederacy rallied and drove them back. 

The west was, quite simply, a mess, with armies marching around each other and grabbing what prizes they could. This was partially due to bad command rolls for both sides which saw most of the limited actions available being used in the Carolinas.

I abandoned the game midway through 1863. The Union had had a bit of a surge and captured a number of key cities, leaving the Confederates with just New Orleans, Memphis and Charleston as I recall. I decided that whilst a long delaying action could still give them a win it was unlikely and would just take time; I'd been playing for several hours already and my brain was tired.

As it was I found out afterwards I'd missed a key rule that allows units to participate in two moves per turn, which would have affected everything from the start. So the game was fun, but maybe would have played out a lot differently.

I have set up another game, which I am playing more slowly over several days. I have reached mid-1863. Richmond is under pressure from all sides, but holding, but obviously both sides have a lot of resources committed to the area. The Confederates came within a hairsbreadth of a win in 1862 when they pushed an elite cavalry unit into the north-east and threatened New York City itself. The plan was to grab a few resource centres in the west to even up the relative supply values, then grab New York with the cavalry to give the Confederacy a win by having their supply total exceed that of the Union's. It was foiled by the Union holding Memphis against all-comers, and eventually cornering and eliminating the rogue cavalry unit, but it was a tense few months. Elsewhere there is a lot of fighting in Kentucky, and up and down the Mississippi, but the Union have now gained an edge after taking Mobile and using it as a base from which to launch a massed cavalry sortie into Alabama and Mississippi, cutting supply lines and preparing for a second invasion of infantry to consolidate their gains. So a Confederate collapse might yet come.

'A House Divided' is a great game - very simple to play, but tactically quite complicated if you use the supply rules, as both sides are constantly forced to consolidate and protect their gains whilst hoping their opponent doesn't get time to build up strength to take them away. It certainly captures the feel of the conflict as I understand it. It's one downside is that it takes forever to play.

52 Games - Game 64

Frocktober 2022 - Part 3

I wasn't going to let the small detail of being on holiday stop me from completing Frocktober this year, so I packed all of the necessaries and did what I could.

Frock Nine was this light summery number I wore in the tropical heat of Darwin. A note to aspiring crossdressers who may be reading this; do not crossdress in Darwin in later October. You will melt.

Anyway, we managed a visit to the botanic gardens, and here I am on the back lawn of the Northern Territory Parliament building. This has a very nice, air-conditioned, library in which we spent a relaxing afternoon.

I had considered leaving my Frocktober there, and stopping at nine frocks. It's not an easy thing to do on a camping holiday when you're living out of a van in various caravan parks. But when we finally got to Uluru - our destination - on the last day of October I decided that I'd squeeze in that tenth frock. And here it is; my cute constellation print dress. 

We visited the beautiful Kata Tjuta ...

... walked a couple of the gorges ...

 

... and did Uluru itself.

A perfect end to this year's Frocktober!

(I actually fitted in one more frock the next day, but that was outside of Frocktober. However we were in Alice Springs and visited one of the locations from 'Priscilla, Queen of the Desert' and it would have been rude not to have dressed up for it).

You can still donate - for the next week or so I think - here: IT HAS POCKETS