Bakumatsu - From Samurai to Soldier

This lovely book arrived yesterday. I saw it mentioned on Mark Copplestones instagram and couldn't resist. It's best described as a very chunky Osprey with lots and lots of period illustrations backed up by very nice modern artists impressions and photographs of locations, buildings and original items of equipment and reproductions.

The period in question, from the 1860's to the 1870's, was one of massive change in Japan. Tradition, Culture and everyday life were being met by Western ideas and goods. For the Samurai it was to be their final and fatal flourish where traditionalists with armour and sword faced down modern rifles and artillery. 

Or at least that's the simple summary - there's a lot more to it than that. 

Coupled with the Last Samurai Rebellion Supplement for The Men Who Would be Kings and perhaps Ronin there is a wealth of gaming to be explored. 

Figures are available from Bac Ninh miniatures specifically for the period for and by converting Warlords plastic samurai or not if your taste is more traditional. Likewise Perry miniatures have plenty figures useable and some of the Steel Fist Samurai commanders would be particularly good for leaders. 

This ticks both my 19thC and samurai boxes and also dovetails nicely with my interest in Japan at the start of the 20th century and the Russo-Japanese war, when Japan completed its transition from introverted isolationist state to regional and belligerent power.

Sikh War......coz I forgot the Figures!

 At Oldmeldrum Wargames Club we have lots of good terrain for games, which we keep at the club in the British Legion. However we don't have space to keep our figures which meant I had to humph mine down from my loft last night. It wasn't til I was laying out the figures for the next game in mini campaign that I realised I'd left a box at home.....the one with the mutineers in it 😫

Still I had the Sikhs instead so we improvised and the British found themselves facing down 2 units of Sikh regulars, a unit of Akali warriors and an artillery piece instead of the mutineers. What was going to make a bigger difference to this game, and the following one was that the Sikh players rolled decent stats for their officers, giving them a free re roll once per game and a free action for one of their units. All the British could muster was an inexperienced cavalry officer and a pleasant infantry commander for their BNC, BHA, HEIC Europeans and 2 units of BNI. 

Ross and Alastair commanded the British and started off in fine fettle moving across the table in fine form. The former taking the infantry down the right while the latter took the horse and gun down the left towards the Sikh held village, just over a river at the end of the table.  On they came in fine order, marching and trotting steadily, closing down the  distance to their objective...until the Sikh artillery, which had moved up to the rivers edge unlimbered and opened up on the Bengal native cavalry.  The first round of John's artillery crashed into them causing some fearful casualties and it went downhill from there. 

The 3 infantry moved up to the river and found the crossing contested by the 2 units of Sikhs commanded by Dave who had moved his men out of the village to oppose the British. The British took heavy fire as they approached, the pinning them  in place and it was the Sikhs who, making use of their free activation got the better of the firefight and crossed the river with bayonets fixed. They were supported by the Sikh artillery which has finished off the cavalry and were deprived of their own gun whose crew had been cut down by the rampaging Akali's. It was all over in an hour. John and Daves Sikhs had inflicted a heavy defeat on Ross and Alistair's British.

We still had time for another game from the campaign. So the table was swiftly rearranged and this time Alastair and Ross took command of a column of men marching across the table, British on the left under Ross and BNI and BNC on the right under Alistair, sandwiched between the two was their baggage and wounded. Their objective was to get off the table from the opposite end. Facing the, was an equal force of Sikhs. John had Akalis and Cavalry facing Alastair while Dave commanded his two Sikh regulars and an artillery piece against Ross's pleasantly led men. 

The second game was a close contest on the right. Alastairs men were able to see off the Sikhs and indeed were able to begin to sweep the cavalry round onto the opposite flank. General Smiley, aka Ross, wasn't having a good evening. Sikh musketry, bayonets and artillery had whittled away his force on the left and driven the remnant back on the baggage. Confusion reigned. Alastair's men moved through the train to try and stem the attack but it was to no avail and they too were hit hard. Dave seemed to have pleased the dice gods since last weeks poor showing. The Sikhs had won the day again, setting up the last game of the campaign.....a desperate last stand. But that will have to wait.

Figures from Foundry, camels from Empress. Wrong British used....compounding my earlier error I took my 1st Afghan War was stuff out of the box! A couple of topsy turvy games, but good ones😂

Another Mutiny Game

 I had the chance to play another Indian Mutiny game on Tuesday night at Oldmeldrum Wargames club. The Osprey blue books make for good off the cuff games and as my stuff was still sitting out of storage it was easy to put on a game. 

This time the defenders were the Mutineers and it looked like the British, were poised to roll them over from the very beginning. 

However Dave was able to get his men into cover and turn to face his attackers and it was then that both sides realised they had the same weapons and were facing soldiers as well trained as each other. Sending in the HEIC Europeans, whilst the Loyal Sepoys worked round the flank, Ross faced off a charge from some Badmashes and took casualties which whittled down his men.

Dave then launched his cavalry hoping to break the British line. Two charges were needed, but the aim was achieved and one of the European units was sent scurrying to the rear. However the cavalry were now themselves vulnerable and were charged by a unit of Loyal Horse and Ross was able to restore the situation. 

Ross's Sepoys seemed reluctant to advance against their former colleagues failing several activation dice and, now in musket range, the Europeans were suffering badly as their shots were unable to tell against the   Rebels. Taking another volley they were down to the last man. 

Whilst waiting for the loyal sepoys to come up, Ross had put his CO in with his cavalry and now sent them in against the Mutineers. It didn't go well and they were forced back, but worse still the officer was down and his force was now without a senior officer. 

By now both the Mutineers and the British had lost two units, the latter all of it's European men. The Mutineers were in good cover and I'm good order though slightly weaker than the Loyal Sepoys facing them as such they could probably hold their own and so with the darkness of the end of the game falling we decided to call it there and allow them to slip away into the night....

We really enjoyed this game, a more complex battle than initial deployments and points suggested it would be. TMWWBK has a way of not letting you get your own way and out games have always been fun. 

We don't have individual unit commanders as we tend to play with two or three aside and so allow for one officer with traits per player. To compensate we allow 7 to activate units. Another house rule is that a pinned unit can retire without having to make a rally check, if it has a clear path. This allows units to get back out of range and recover without always being whittled down on the spot. Of course if the unit is within range it can still be shot or attacked so it's no guarantee of safety! We also brought in the blunders table from Rebels and Patriots....because we miss it and with less characters on the table it's good to have those random factors without the hassle of remembering who has the best moustache or is the generals nephew! 

Indian Mutiny Game - TMWWBK

An Indian Mutiny today with John and Eric from Banchory. Nothing fancy about the scenario - a British column trying to break through mutineer lines to reach Delhi. 

The British had 2 units of HEIC Inf and a unit of Loyal Sikhs, supported by a gun faced down 4 units of Sepoys supported by their own artillery piece. This being an early period game, all the units were armed with muskets rather than the new Minie rifles. John led the mutineers while Eric took the company forces....it was going to be a long game with both sides ebbing back and forth. Both were reinforced by a unit of cavalry and further infantry...but neither side were really able to win the day. In the end, despite taking the hill before the town, Eric was forced back to his start line while John was unable to muster enough men in his remaining units to be able to press home an attack without destroying his forces. 

We decided to end the game "as dusk fell" - the British retiring to await further men and the Sepoys falling back on Delhi during the night, thinking their job done.

Figs are from Foundry mostly with a few Empress miniatures in there too. I've glued thin cardboard slips under the former's bases are enough to bring them up to the same height as the taller Paul Hicks sculpts but otherwise they mix really well. The Sikhs and British foot have Empress command. The skirmish bases are from Warbases.

1st Game of the Year - the End of the Glen Campaign

 Let off the lead today to play a game with Graham H.

We decided to finish off the intermittent Glen Campaign which we have been running. After several skirmishes the two sides faced off near Skene, the town sitting at the gap where the Glen turns into the Valley. Here the three Union commands faced down the two remaining Confederate commands which had taken up position in a sunken road just outside town. This provided a good deal of cover and Graham deployed most of his units along its length, but threw two out behind the cover of a small wheat field in order to blunt the Union advance. I had the advantage of numbers, but most of my command were green recruits, leavened with 3 veteran units and some sharp shooters. Not the 3:1 odds I needed to take a defended position, but I hoped to be able to soak us some damage by not getting into to many firefights....

Pickett's charge....union style! 

The Union Army begins its advance

The Confederates await. 

Action across the field. Union gain the upper hand on the left and right flanks but are driven back initially on the latter despite artillery reinforcement from the Rebels.

But breakthrough is achieved and the remaining men in grey and butternut are driven off the table. 

The game could have gone the other way, but my morale tests were good, even for the green units and casualties were spread over the whole command. Graham's men did benefit from cover but I went in with the bayonet which seemed to do the trick, although accurate fire from the Sharpshooters caused a lot of disorders. Graham's fire did have some effect - the central Union brigade was badly cut up, but held long enough to push through with the veterans on the left to win the day and end the campaign. 

A great way to kick the year off. Much plans for 2023 were made too - including hopefully putting on display games at Falkirk and Kirriemuir. 

19th Century....some Mutinous Chaps....and a familiar Character

I've finished basing my mutiny figures now. A mix of Iron Duke and Foundry - the latter on a cardboard shim to lift them just a little bit higher to match the slightly taller Hicks sculpted figs. 

These are a unit of the Iron Duke mutineers - with  flag I found online. They'll take the field on Tues evening at a club game.

I also came across a 19thC civilian who reminded me of a well known whisky logo.... Meet Sir James Walker, Her Majesty's Agent At Large and commander of the Moray Militia in the recent unpleasantries with Russia*. Also known as Johnny to his friends. 

*more of this to follow at a later date!

Sikh Wars - Follow up

 Thanks for the kind comments regarding my last post.

I tested positive for covid on Sunday but between sweats, sniffs, coughs and splutters I have managed to do a little bit of painting and basing.

First up were some old glory Sikh's. Not as nice as the Foundry figures, nor the Studio miniatures range, but the same height as the former and so able to fit in and flesh out my my army. I painted these almost exclusively with citadel contrast paints, (trousers and metalwork were normal acrylics). I think they've come out pretty nicely. 

OG Sikhs, with Foundry Officer

I also managed to do some baggage camels. These are Empress Miniatures and very nice indeed. They too were given the contrast paint treatment - aggaros dunes as the base, with iraqi sand from Vallejo to lighten them up. Baggage was a mix of contrasts and acrylics. This give me 8 elements of baggage in total for my NWF/Indian armies. I think I will add a buffalo cart and bheesties which will make it a fair size and appropriate for the location - trains were often as large or larger than the armies they accompanied and in several cases were not large enough even then to provide the food and fodder required. For this reason they are an essential feature of armies in these areas. 

Whist raking around for more bits to add, I came across a signed copy of Donald Featherstone's book - The First Sikh War - on evil bay, so that got snapped up. He responsible for me taking up wargaming as his book "Wargames" was in my local library as a kid. I've never looked back.  It's nice to have this connection.

I have started to paint some of the Empress/Iron Duke sepoys. This will give me a further unit in shakos and also a unit of deserters....or mutineers. Sepoy uniform didn't change at all from the 30's to the Mutiny and that means I have a ready made army to start cover the first outbreaks and battles around Delhi. For the British units in shell jacket and cap from Sikh war ranges are fine, but even that semi formal uniform quickly gave way to improvised affairs. The Mutiny seems another period crying out to be gamed using TMWWBK - so I will!

Size Comparison - LtoR - Perry Afghan, OG Sikh, Empress Sepoy, Foundry Sikh, Empress Nz War 

(Although the foundry figure is smallest, his base is very thin and with a shim underneath there is next to no difference between OG, Foundry and Empress) 

Sikh Wars Game

 An off the cuff colonial game at the Club last night as it was the first for a few weeks due to holidays. This gave me a chance to get my Sikh Wars figures out, although annoyingly I left the Akali at home!  I also got to put my rather nice village and hill fort on the table too which blended in very well with the mat and bases. 

We doubled up the sides, using two 24pt "brigades" each with their own commander per side. The Sikhs deployed first, occupying the fort and village and stretching across the table following the road.  A small number of Sikh regulars and guns were backed by tribal infantry and cavalry. The British were a fairly balanced force of European and Sepoy infantry and cavalry with a couple of guns. 

The game was fairly balanced, and at the mid point it could have gone either way, but with the failure of two units on the British right to activate the Sikhs were able to gain the upper hand and despite heavy casualties approaching 50%, were able to get a win.  A nice fun game! (Edit - The buildings are by the Colonial Steamboat Company and were an Xmas gift from my wife)

I think TMWWBK is a decent rule set, we missed the blunders and bonuses from Rebels and Patriots so may add them for future games. We also allow pinned units to retire a full move but retaining their pin instead of remaining in place - unless a unit is surrounded it does allow them to pull back this way and stay in the game. Finally we think artillery is just a little bit powerful and next time we'll reduce the dice from 4/8 to 3/6. 

Colonial Campaign - simple rules and mods.

Folks, for those interested you can download these simple campaign rules which we used for our colonial campaign at the club. 

They are set in the 1830's and 40's with lists for HEIC, Afghans and Sikhs. But you could use the basic flowchart for later campaigns too. 

Hope you enjoy!

A North West Frontier mini campaign

 Over the past few weeks I have been running and playing a loose North West Frontier mini campaign with the Oldmeldrum Wargames Club. This set around the time of the First Afghan War and is a series of linked games based on the advance to, and retreat from Kabul in 1830-42

Using The Men Who Would Be Kings, I've tweaked some of the stats for troop types, giving the British/HEIC troops muskets and allowing the Afghans to add some jezail armed snipers. I've classed the Sepoys as regulars, but made them unenthusiastic, so they lose the +1 discipline. We also used one or two leaders per side with a 4" command radius and lowered the activation score to 7 for units without leaders. We have a house rules that a pinned unit may withdraw rather than needing to reform. 

This made for some interesting and challenging games. Some where units frustratingly refused to do quite what was asked of them, other where units melted away when we needed them in place. Units cut down to the last man when ammo ran out and positions captured with the lightest of casualties....in short a series of decent, fun and fulfilling games. The British just scraped through with most victories but each battle and moments where things could have gone either way. 

The club can now put on large games using these rules with multi players per side for the NWF, Sudan and the Zulu War, so I can see similar sets of games in each location coming next year. I'll be sticking to India and in particular the campaigns up to and including the Mutiny....but not just in the 19th Century...