First Raid convention

This past weekend I was at the First Raid convention in Alameda, Ca. Although attendance was not crowded, there were a number of very good games and people had a good time. I enjoyed it and would definitely attend again. Thanks, Dan for putting on a very good gathering. The event was held at the Naval Air Museum in Alameda with all entry fees ($800) going to support the Museum.

The first photo is of Ed Texeira of Two Hour Wargames on the left, myself, Rob Schmidt, and Dan Rygasewicz, organizer of the convention. The second one is of Dana Lombardy giving his seminar. The others are from the Saturday games. In order they are Stalingrad, Battle Cry ACW, Rorkes Drift, Tsushima, PanzerKorps attack on Peleliu Island. One game I failed to take a photo of was the Fire and Fury ACW game fought on a 5 foot by 18 foot table.

After finishing the ancients tournament I participated in the PanzerKorps game as the Japanese commander. By the time the game ended the US Marines were in a precarious position. In the third photo only four companies were still on the beach head with the two at the top and one at the bottom of the photo in serious trouble. The Japanese had a company with tank support in reserve that was about to advance and fire on the two companies at the top, which Manny determined would cause them to be lost. This was my first time playing Manny Granillo's rules and they very good and fun to play.

The final set of photos are of the Lost Battles Ancients tournament. There were only two participants, Tom McThorn commanding the Romans and Rob Schmidt commanding the barbarians. Since both were fairly new to the game system the battle of Bibracte was chosen for the game as it had armies matching their choices. Per the tournament rules Rob's army was adjusted to a fighting value of 73 by adding an Inspiring commander and an average commander.
The battle lasted four turns and ended with the last of the Helveti routing from the battle. Rob had managed to destroy the Roman cavalry on his right and had moved his cavalry into the Roman rear using his average commander. His left wing cavalry had also shattered the one reserve veteran legion that it faced. Although one other Roman veteran legion had been shattered in the center, Roman morale had held throughout the battle. Tom had captured both of the Helveti flanking center zones. Almost all Roman units were spent, but by the end of the game Tom had shattered nine units of Helveti warriors, and all the other Helveti were spent. Final score was 118 to 69 with the Romans winning. None of the generals were lost during rally attempts. Thanks to both for participating.

Roman Civil War

From the histories of Servius:

"The city of Rome was in turmoil. Caesar had crossed the Rubicon, bringing his legions with him in defiance of the Senate. Seeking to halt him, the senate sought Pompey the Great and begged him to lead an army against Caesar. Acceding to their request Pompey gathered an army and marched forth to engage Caesar. On an empty plain near some ruins the two armies faced each other and prepared to engage in a battle that would decide the fate of Rome......"

Our most recent club game was a Roman Civil War battle. Harold Wendell provided the figures and we used his Warfare in the Ancient World rules. Harold provided two similar armies for the battle. Both had two 96 figure legions. One army had slightly more auxiliary infantry while the other had a three figure advantage in cavalry. The battlefield was an open plain with some ruins on one flank. Though we had hoped to have more members present, various commitments resulted in only Ray Jackson, my daughter Brooke, and myself being present as players with Harold acting as umpire.

Both sides deployed their cavalry on the flank without the ruins as only the auxiliaries could enter them without being disordered. This was my right and Ray's left. Since the ruins were closer to Ray's side of the table, I decided to emulate Alexander the Greats tactics at Arbella. Both sides deployed their infantry in the standard Roman fashion with the legions forming the center of the battle line and the auxiliaries on the flanks. Ray placed the artillery from his legions on the outer flank of their respective legions and his deployment was only slightly offset to his right due to his cavalry being on his left. My deployment had all my artillery concentrated between my left legion and the auxiliaries to its left. I also had shifted my infantry more to the right so that my left legion was opposite Ray's left legion.

My plan was to hold in place with the auxiliaries on the left, advance the left legion in an oblique formation that would form a connection between the left auxilia and the right legion. The intention was for the right legion to engage Ray's left auxiliaries, destroy it then turn on the left flank of Ray's legions. My cavalry was to advance towards their opposites with the support of missile fire from the right flank auxiliaries. Since I had an extra mounted officer, I had formed my cavalry into two 9 figure units and planned to position them with the auxiliaries between the two groups. My intention was to position the two cavalry groups in such a manner that if Ray attacked one the other would be able to attack the flank of Ray's cavalry.

Unfortunately the batteries in my camera were low and I was unable to take any pictures. Instead I have posted some drawings of the battle. Ray's forces are in purple at the top. The forces in red are Brooke's and mine.

Ray won the die roll for initiative and elected to move first. He immediately advanced his cavalry as far as it would go and moved his infantry and artillery forward in a single line. Our response was to advance the cavalry move the right wing infantry up behind them. Our right legion did a maximum move forward and the left legion advanced its cohorts forward at different rates to maintain the connection between the left flank which only advanced a short distance and the right legion.

We won the initiative for the second turn and elected to have Ray move first again. Ray again advanced his cavalry as far forward as he could, occupied the ruins with his right flank infantry and maintained a continuous battle line with his infantry.
We positioned our two cavalry groups so that they were on the flanks of the right wing infantry and could get a flank attack on Ray's cavalry if he attacked the infantry and one of the cavalry groups. This turn both sides were within artillery range and our right wing infantry was within missile range of his cavalry. Our missile fire was ineffective, but Ray managed cause some damage with his artillery.

Ray won the initiative for the third turn and charged his cavalry into the infantry and our right cavalry group. Fortunately our infantry passed its morale test and did not flee. Ray continued to advance his infantry in a continuous line and his right wing advanced forward from the ruins. Our move for the turn saw our left cavalry group fall upon the flank and rear of Ray's cavalry. Our right legion made a full advance shifting slightly to the right and the left legion stretched further. Ray's missile fire was once again more effective than ours with his artillery causing quite a bit more damage and his left wing auxiliaries causing a few casualties to our right legion. Then it was time to resolve the melee. Ray's cavalry had twice the armor value of our infantry, but we had an advantage in the number of figures engaged in combat plus the flank attack bonus for part of our cavalry. Though Ray did cause quite a bit of damage to our infantry and killed a few cavalry, our response was deadly. We eliminated the three stands of three figures on the right end of Ray's battle line and inflicted casualties on some of the other stands. The commander of our right cavalry group was killed, but the horse passed its morale. One of our infantry stands failed its morale and fled. On the other flank another infantry stand also failed its morale test for casualties caused by the enemy artillery. One of the sub-ordinate commanders was able to rally it later.

We won the initiative for the fourth turn and surrounded the remaining four stands of Ray's cavalry. This time we also had some infantry who were able to gain the flank attack bonus. Since we did not need all the auxiliaries to engage the opposing cavalry we advanced about half of them towards their opposite numbers. Our right legion advanced and was now within contact distance of Ray's left wing auxiliaries. On the previous turn our left legion had moved to a position where it was offset from the left end of the opposing legion. Now it attacked the left cohort of Ray's legion with its first and second cohorts and an 8 to 3 advantage in numbers. Harold's legions are organized into three stand cohorts and usually are formed three stands deep. The first cohort has 15 figures and the rest have 9. At a ratio of fifty men per figure each cohort is slightly understrength. After movement was finished it was time to resolve missile fire. This time our missile fire was devastating. Brooke eliminated several enemy stands with the right wing auxiliaries and our artillery fire finally had some effect. Melee saw Ray's cavalry reduced to four figures from its original 21 and the tenth cohort of his left legion was completely destroyed.
The question now was "Who would win the initiative for the fifth turn. If we won we would be able to gain a flank attack on part of Ray's left legion. Our right legion would be able to engage the artillery and a good portion of the auxiliaries facing them. Whether we won the initiative or not we would also be able to free up part of our cavalry so that it could start a sweep around the left flank of Ray's army and move towards the rear of Ray's legions. If Ray won the initiative he would be able to keep his legion from being flanked and back his auxiliaries away from our right legion before it could move to engage them. Before we rolled for initiative Ray elected to concede the game as it was unlikely that his cavalry would survive past the fifth turn, our right wing would have an overwhelming advantage against his left wing, while his right legion and auxiliaries would not be able to be in position to engage our forces for a couple of turns

From the histories of Servius:
"......With the battle lost Caesar fell on his sword. Pompey was given a triumph and his family's prestige was greatly enhanced. An assassination attempt by Octavian and Mark Antony the following year was thwarted and the plotters were crucified. Pompey lived a full life and passed away in his sleep. His eldest son became Imperator of Rome."

Battle of Hydaspes using Lost Battles

My friend, Steve, who is a high school teacher, asked me to put on a game for the schools wargame club. I chose the Battle of Hydaspes as it involves most of the different Lost Battles troop types. Steve took the part of Porus, while three of the club members took the parts of Alexander, Coenus, and an unnamed Indian subordinate.

The figures for the Indian army are a mix of Baccus and H&R infantry, Irregular and H&R cavalry, H&R chariots, and elephants from H&R, Baccus, and Irregular.

The Macedonian phalanx are from Rapier. The light infantry are H&R. The light cavalry are H&R and Rapier. The Companions are Baccus and H$R.

first turn
The Indians moved their units in the rear and wing zones to form a solid battle line ending their first turn. The Macedonians advanced their units to their forward zones and elected to use all their extra command points to provide a bonus to all their units attacking from their right center. However, they were only able to reduce one of the opposing elephant units to spent.

Second Turn
At the start of the second turn, the Macedonians decided to reverse the turn order and move first. Taking advantage of their command exemptions they attacked with their cavalry on both flanks and the infantry in their center zone, but were only able to reduce a few of the chariots and cavalry to spent. alexander had elected not to lead the charge on the right flank. The Indians then counter-attacked and the elephants battered the Macedonian light infantry. The Indians also advanced from their right center into the Macedonian left center, threatening the flank of the phalanx.

Third turn.
Alexander now boldly led the attacks for turn three. One Indian chariot unit was shattered and one Indian Elephant unit in the center was also shattered. The remaining Indian mounted forces also became spent. The Indians passed their morale tests and retaliated causing some damage to the Macedonians. All the phalanx units became spent and Alexanders bodyguards received two hits. Luck was with Alexander as he removed both hits.

End of turn four.
Turn four was a disaster for the Macedonians. Although they shattered some more Indian units and Coenus drove off all the opposing forces and advanced into the Indian right flank zone, the Indian army remained steadfast. Their attacks were devastating. Alexander received another hit, but was able to remove it. The Macedonian Phalanx did not fair as well as three of the veteran units and one of the average units were shattered. Even with almost all their infantry gone the Macedonian morale held as they rolled another six. During the battle almost every die roll for morale tests was a five or better with a couple of fours. However, this was not to last. On turn five Alexander again led the attack. Scoring only a die roll equal to the number required, Alexander elected to make an all out attack shattering the opposing cavalry. This caused another morale test for the Indians. This time their die roll was only a one and with that all of their remaining units except those in the Macedonian left center zone fled from the field.

Due to time constraints the game was called at the end of turn five. The points for units spent, shattered, etc for both sides were almost equal, but the bonus for the initial points differential resulted in a clear victory for the Indians.

Warbands

In addition to re-basing my Lace Wars figures, I also finished painting my vikings and saxons. Along with them I have also added the Celtic warriors and the Spanish infantry from my Carthagenian army. The Saxons and Vikings are all from Heroics and Ros. The Celts are from Irregular and the Spanish are a mix of Irregular and H&R.

Clove-Hamhock Cuirassiers

I decided that I wanted to re-base most of my lace wars figures so that I could use them for other rule sets in addition to Volley and Bayonet after our club fought a game using Koenigs Krieg.  While doing this I also set up two opposing battalions engaging each other at a distance of fifty yards.  The figure ratio is about 1:4.  The figures are all Heroics and Ros 1:300 scale figures.  At this scale 1mm is about 1 foot.  The two lines are separated by about 160mm.  I still have quite a few more infantry to finish re-basing along with the Dragoons and Hussars.

Cuirassiers

Two views of infantry battalions about 50 scale yards apart.  160 miniatures per battalion on a scale frontage of 131 yards.