Yesterday evening, Andy Mac and I reconvened at the club for another play test game of TMWWBK. This time, I had elected to carefully shape the forces to fit the NW Frontier - this is a feature of Dan's rules. He is keen for players to interact with rules and forces in this way. I therefore downgrade Pathan shooting to represent the lower rate of fire they managed but kept one unit at its normal ability to represent sharpshooters and gave them a house rule allowing them to kill a British leader on any double, not just the double 1 in the rules.
I also tweaked the rules for Ghazi fanatics, allowing them 'move and 'attack' as their 'free' activations (normally it's 'stand to' and 'move', but I felt that fanatics wouldn't just 'stand to'...they'd want to get in and kick ass! We also agreed that if the Ghazis
could charge, they had to!!
Andy took the Pathans and I took the British. the scenario was that the British were defending a waterhole. One unit (the redoubtable Sikhs) was defending it and the rest were rushing to their aid. Who would get there first? The relief column or the pesky tribal horde??
We both rolled pretty well for leadership, except that my Gurkha leader was a drunkard so his leadership would vary from turn to turn. This would have dire consequences later in the game...
This is the table at set-up. The Sikhs are in the centre, gathered round the waterhole...
The tribesmen used the hills to screen their deployment, their swordsmen massed opposite the British right, with riflemen cunningly placed to snipe at the Sikhs from the cover of the hills. The British and Gurkha forces elected to enter on the right...
Despite good leadership, the tribesmen struggled to make early headway, as Andy tried to 'double-move' them and promptly failed leadership tests so they did nothing! This allowed the British force to make considerably better headway than they might otherwise have managed.
The Pathans started sniping at the Sikhs, which began a gradual whittling away of those brave fellows, while Andy tried to get his swordsmen and jezzail-armed warriors into place.
The British forces moved quickly to try to form a decent firing line, as my plan was simple....shoot the bejeezus out of anything that moved and keep it at a distance!! Luckily, this included the Sikhs killing the leader of the Pathan riflemen directly opposite their position, forcing this unit out of the game - a severe handicap to Andy's plan!!
In the event, 'shooting the bejeezus and keeping the enemy at a distance' was largely what happened. Andy's snipers proved devastating against the Sikhs and, latterly, against the Gurkhas. However, he shot his bolt too quickly with the swordsmen and Ghazis, failing to co-ordinate their attacks which were shot down piecemeal. This demonstrated a neat mechanism in the rules whereby troops have firing priority, i.e. if they can be charged by a unit next turn, they
have to shoot them. However, in this particular turn, I needed to use my British troops, with their Lee Metford magazine rifles (simulated by the 'marksman' special rule giving them +1 to hit) to devastate the Ghazis who were about to overrun the pinned remnant of the Sikhs. By shooting the swordsmen with the Gurkhas, I was able to pin them, thereby allowing the British to shift fire to the Ghazis. Nice!!!!
This meant that the Ghazis ended up shot to pieces and thereby unable to press an attack on the weakened Sikhs, who were then shot to pieces by the jezzails who had gotten into their rear. The brave leader being the last to fall doing his duty for the Empire!
However, the Gurkhas then attracted the attention of the sharpshooting Pathans, who took them down to 1 man before the British volleys finally destroyed the last of the Pathans who were about to overrun the waterhole.
Game to the British! First victory for the sons of Empire in 4 games!!
Once again, the rules played out really well. The result was in doubt for a long time. Historically, it worked. Pathan sniping from the hills was dangerous enough. The swordsmen were destroyed if they attacked over too much open ground in unco-ordinated assaults.
I have almost finished painting the British Screw Gun and more Ghazis, so there'll be reinforcements next time...
22 January 2007, 07:04:51 PM