Back To The Punjab

Later in the year I will be putting on our demo game at T’Other Partizan so I have been thinking through what might work. 

After a chat we decided a Sikh Wars game would be ideal. 

I like the idea of something slightly different. 

Many Colonials Wars are challenging to game, often with hordes of natives armed with little more than sharpened Fruit being mown down by European firepower.

The Sikh Wars are one of a handful where that is not the case. The Sikh regular army was more than a match for East India company Sepoys and a real test for the Queens regiments too.

The first Anglo-Sikh War is perhaps the better known, but I prefer the lesser known conflicts and the second Anglo-Sikh War has a fair number of actions that very few people ever read about. The sieges of Multan provide us with a number of large actions and decent sized battles that most readers can be forgiven for never having heard of, they made little impression in the European papers at the time and even less in most British histories of the conflicts. 

One such is Suraj Khund.

To start with a large force of the "British" forces are not British or even East India Company troops at all. A significant proportion are allied native troops of the Dhowdpatra Raja of Bhahalwalpore alongside tribal irregulars from the various Pathan and Baluchi tribes of the region who had no reason to love their Sikh government.

Mainly matchlock armed, brave but undisciplined Warriors these are the irregulars we are used to seeing the British fighting against not alongside. And whilst the opposing Sikh forces had a significant irregular and tribal element too they also had a solid core of regulars, disciplined, well trained and well led troops. Trained by Europeans, mainly ex French and Italian Napoleonic officers, and very well motivated. 

This does mean we have the option for actions, like Suraj Khund, with much more evenly balanced forces giving a more interesting game to all players.

So whilst I will be trying to keep up to my Mexican project I do plan to get some more irregulars painted for the game at the end of the year.

To try finish a unit of Pathan Irregulars these 4 will bring me up to 20, the chap in white may not fit so well but the others are great, one plastic Perrys Afghan and 3 Empress irregulars.

I am starting to see some recovery in my gut injury so more figures coming off the workbench. This bunch adds some further flavour (Not the Galloglass at the back who will appear in a  different post)

These four Sikh Spearmen give me a push forward with my next unit of Sikh Irregulars. All Foundry.

This Noble leader is from Empress, a lovely figure, I am a little unsure about the stipe in his turban but other than that a nice addition for the Muslim troops.

I intend two more battalions of matchlock armed troops, the Wargames Foundry Muslim Matchlocks in blue will be multi use, the uniform is based on the Begum of Samru's troops from 30 odd years before so gives me plenty of options. The Sikh in red will be another battalion that can be multi use, in both cases the colours will be more a theme I intend to have a few shades mixed in so its slightly less regular.

Then two leader figures for the Sikh irregulars, plenty of colour here as they are no doubt a bit richer than the run of the mill. Boht Foundry, the flag from Virtual Armchair General.

Lastly four more rear rank irregulars, all 4 are different manufacturers, from left to right Foundry Sikh Wars, Empress Mutiny, Plastic Wargames Atlantic with Sikh head and Old Glory Sikh. These have come out OK but there are nicer figures so these will fill out the rear ranks I think. 

That gets me 2 extra units for the Sikh Wars games, another two of Matchlocks and some other additions should give me what I need for Partizan.

Thanks for stopping by.

Napoleonic Again with Rule updates

A third Napoleonic game to make sure the rules are where we want them. Me defending with the Russians against Steve with the French and Italians. The key to the game would be the three villages across the centre of the table initially held by the Russians. A good opportunity to test the house fighting rules.

Steve also has a game report from a different perspective on his blog here Nations In Arms I imagine the perspective will eb a bit different to mine.

Three Divisions of Russian foot each have a village to defend supported by a gun battery. on my right flank I have a brigade of cavalry and a horse battery and a further brigade of grenadiers are off table.

The French have 4 Divisions of foot with 5 batteries of guns and a brigade of cavalry in support.

As we will see much of the night became about holding or re-taking the villages so plenty of opportunity to push the rules and see if they broke. Spoiler alert they didn't.

We roll for Ammo randomly for each battery at the start of the game, the Russian Horse battery got a 6 so gets 12 rounds of ammo.

My Dragoons on the right flank are slightly better quality than the French lights so hopefully I can take advantage of that.

The massed French in the centre push forward "Vive La Emperor!"

We draw cards which we can play to enhance our own position of hinder the enemies, I play this one to slow the French advance in the centre as I have concentrated the bulk of my forces to hold the wings.

My artillery is busy also in the centre, the two batteries dont make up for the lack of infantry in depth but can thin the French out before they hit my centre. Three sixes, that will do. The two's both cost me a round of ammunition. 

Steves counter battery fire is devastating and my artillery is on the verge of breaking.

I push my Grenadiers forward on the right and play the Forward card to increase my movement by 50% they have a fair way to go to reinforce the villages.

Another three sixes, the dice are with me tonight....well lets see if it lasts.

As the French storm the right hand village I play my devastating fire card, this doubles my firing dice to 6 only needing 4's to hit.

Sometimes you already know how you are going to roll before the dice leave your hands, 6 misses!

Despite the poor firing dice the French bounce off in the assault phase and regroup.

A second assault takes the village and pushes the Russians back, I have enough troops to re-take it but the mauled ones are int he way of the fresh troops so will take me a couple of turns to re-organise and go again.

Fresh troops organised we go again and the village is retaken from the French.

On the left the French close with another village.

The dice desert me and the village is taken by the French.

On the right the French go in again against the village, neither side gains an advantage and the melee goes on with reinforcements thrown in.

The French take the right hand village, again, and the Russians re--organise to attempt to retake it....again!

At this point my camera ran out of battery so no more pictures.

However the right hand village changed hands 3 more times with the Russian Grenadiers putting some back bone into the Russians when they arrived. Something I often have read about in Napoleonic battles but rarely seen in games.

The centre village saw off an attack but then later I eventually lost the village whilst on the left the village having been lost early failed to be re-taken 3 times!

This all felt right, it made me think of Waterloo with the taking and re-taking of La Haye Sainte and the multiple assaults on Hougoumont. Cracking game the rules really feel like they are pretty much there now.

Overall another thoroughly enjoyable game.

Thanks for stopping by.

Zouaves and Mexican Militia

Almost there now with the Zouaves and Mexican Militia.

All Perrys but the Officer is Argentinian from the Triple Alliance range. Pretty pleased with these.

Last three painted, all Perry's the Standard bearer is from the Bombay Infantry in Victoria's little wars range. Can start thinking about basing these up now. Flag is from Flags of War.

Also this week the first of the 1898 miniatures via Empress.

These are Phillipine Militia figures, whilst the style is quite different and I dont think I quite got the best from them they should mix in quite well as part of a Militia command group.

Six more to complete command bases for Mexican Republicans.

The Officer is a Perry Egyptian with head swap and I particularly like him, 3d printed Wargames Atlantic trooper and Perry Triple Alliance Standard bearer.

Again here a 3d printed Wargames Atlantic musketeer supported by officer and standard bearer from Perry Triple Alliance range.

Last of the Militia with Firearms, a mix of 3d prints and metal Foundry Peons and a Sikh swordsman that was sat around waiting to be finished, just because.......

6 more with machete and all the irregular figures I have will be complete. Oddly that gives me 5 battalions and a base over with two battalions having no command bases so I may decide to add those command bases and a small number more peons to get to 6 battalions.

Lastly a bunch of 1898 miniatures, these are Phillipino insurgents but paint up nicely with the odd head swap as Peons.

That should get me finished with the first 5 units of Mexican Militia. I may stretch that to six lets see.

Thanks for stopping by.

The Dark Age Falais Gap

This is how the game was described to me, although I have to be honest I dont know the actual battle it was based on.

Chris had threated to put on a Barbarians vs Romans game for a little while so I was looking for to this. The game had been played just a few days before by a different larger group, so the terrain was the same but the forces slightly smaller.

Rich Croisdale and I would be Romans defending a gap in steep escarpment, Andy, Chris Charlton and Steve would be Barbarians trying to break through.

The escarpment could only be accessed by light troops so the main fighting would be in the relatively small gap, the Barbarians needed to break though our lines, we needed to stop them. Simples!

Chris's collection is fantastic and you can tell I enjoyed this by the lack of photos, I was too busy battling!

We deployed all our heavy and medium infantry in the middle with a smattering of medium cavalry on the edges and most of our skirmishers on each ridge to keep the sneaky barbarians off our flanks.

We were not keen to give the Barbarians all the advantages of deployment, so, although we deployed first, we kept a division of our best troops off table to try have a strategic reserve to deploy where it could do most damage.

Not surprisingly the Germans deployed their heavy stuff in the middle to try pucnh through our lines under Steve, Mike had their right with a mix of tribal infantry and light cavalry, whilst Any had a horde of light and medium cavalry on their left, with the lights on the extreme left where they could try and swarm my branch of the ridge and the mediums nearer the middle where they could cover his flank from my medium horse.

A sound strategy.

After a couple of moves we were soon to grips in the middle with blocks of spearmen pushing and stabbing at each other and honours fairly even.

However this is where our strategic reserve came in, pushing the medium and heavy cavalry out to attack Andy's lights and replacing them with our off table  good quality Cataphracts and horse archers allowed us to pick on inferior quality troops, a couple of bad movement throws by Andy allowed me to get my troops into position to both block the ridge from him and then launch charges into the light cavalry.

My heavy cavalry made short work of Andy's medium and lights to break through and start to roll up the flank of the Germanic horde.

My right flank mediums eventually destroyed Andys lights, helped by some particularly spectacular dice throwing, spectacularly bad from Andy and on occasion spectacularly good from me. Unusual and very welcome I have to say.

Steves heavy and medium cavalry in the centre gave Rich some real headaches and almost broke through but he was able to hold....just.

Andy mustered two units of medium cavalry to challenge my Cataphracts, it was not nearly enough and the mediums were brushed aside.

The centre had just about held and both flanks were secure, on our right flank my cavalry had all but destroyed Andy's and was now well into the flank and even the rear of the Germanic foot. The day had gone to the Romans.

A fabulous game perhaps enjoyed by Andy ever so slightly less than me, sorry Andy!

Thanks to our host Chris Flowers and the rest of the gamers, great day all around.