Cold Wars 2018 - Saturday & Sunday

After a very busy day at the show on Friday, I had intentionally planned a more relaxed day for us on Saturday. Wes and Codie were only able to attend the show for one day, so it would just be Chris and myself from the club and my dad, who was driving down for the day.

After meeting up and getting my dad registered, we did a quick passthrough of the dealer area and the morning flea market session. The only real noteworthy bit was that Chris and I stopped by the booth of The Wargaming Company. I had seen the company and its uniformed penguin logo at previous shows, but had never really explored their offerings before. The company's man product is a Napoleonic rules set titled Es Sans Résultat (or ESR, for short) and as I was really keen to start a large battle Napoleonic project, and the internet, surprisingly, did not have much to say about the current edition, I wanted to see what we could discover. On top of that, I had heard that they were no offering starter sets complete with 10mm figures, bases, and flags for the French, Austrian, and late-war Russian armies - a definite enticement to start a new project. Chris and I wound up spending about an hour with the proprietor and rules writer, David Esteness, who went over the basic concepts and ran through a game turn for us. In my experience with big battle Napoleonic games, anything more than a small subsection of a battle requires a huge table and/or the game bogs down to quickly because the player has too much to worry about at too many different levels of command - in a way, the game can have the player wearing the hats of the corps, division, and brigade commander simultaneously. Our initial impression of ESR was that it doesn't do this. It clearly places the player in the role of the commander of a small army or corps. He/she must provide orders for subordinate division (or sometimes independent brigade) commanders, but do not have to worry too much about how those orders are carried out - as David put it, "You hired people to do that for you." At this point, the composition of the formation and its level of fatigue help determine the results of comment. If things go bad, each formation has its own reformation area to which fleeing units retreat to hopefully be rallied for further fighting instead of immediately heading for the hills. We watched intently as David played out a few rounds of combat for us and were impressed enough by the mechanics that I was seriously considering buying the rules and some starter boxes.

We hung around the vendor area a bit longer, but then headed for our game at 11:00. My dad isn't much of a gamer, having only played a handful of participation games at the dozens of conventions we've been to together. One rules system that particularly stood out for him was the computer-driven Carnage & Glory (he likes not having to worry about a lot of tables and dice). He played an American Civil War game with it at a show years ago (I was probably off fighting some obscure Napoleonic battle) and liked it, so I figured we'd look for a game at the show. When I saw that noted GM (and author) David Bonk was running one of his American War of Independence games, in 40mm no less, I was sold!

The scenario had been advertised as the fighting at Chadds Ford during the battle of Brandywine, but upon arrival we were told we'd be refighting the 1777 Battle of Short Hills. Chris, my dad, and myself found ourselves on the British side, along with two other gamers. One requested the command of our Hessian brigade, Chris took Grant's brigade of British regulars, while we gave my dad the smallest command - the infantry and cavalry of the Queen's Rangers. The remaining brigade was a massive one, including a small group of dismounted light dragoons, two big battalions of light infantry, two of grenadiers, two of Foot Guards, and an artillery battery. I suggested splitting it with the other game - he took command of the combined flank companies, and I had the Guards, dragoons, and guns.

The battlefield consisted of two parallel ridges with some fenced fields in between and a dirt track running across the center. American skirmishers were deployed across the forward ridge and their main line of resistance was arrayed on the rearward one. We entered the table on the long table edge, but because of the limited space were unable to deploy our whole force until the American skirmishers were driven from the wooded rise.

The battlefield on our left

...and the right

We deployed the Hessian brigade (with their jaegers leading) on the left and the light infantry and grenadiers on the right to drive the American advance troops from the woods. The rebels hung on to their high ground longer than we anticipated, but eventually sheer numbers won out and we drove them back toward the main American line. Unfortunately, the pursuit of these retreating skirmishers was a slow one, as our light infantry commander was overly cautious when it came to moving out of the woods and across the fences and the Hessian advance was bogged down by their slower and shorter marching pace.

The colorful advance of the Hessian brigade

The Germans had not made enough space for Chris to deploy his British regulars, but I was able to bring up my units on the right of the flank companies. My dad's rangers and cavalry were ready to enter the field as soon as I moved up to keep the enemy cavalry (positioned across from our right flank) in check.

Our initial plan had been for the Guards and flank companies to advance together on the right of the field, but as my battalions neared the first fence line, I realized that the lights and grenadiers were lacking in aggression this day, and that my men would have to take matters into their own hands (** I should note that my dragoons - numbering only a few dozen - were only allowed to deploy dismounted and could not deploy in open order...both of which seemed very odd considering historical practices...and would not be much of a threat to the solid Continental units, so I kept them behind as a reserve). As the Hessians and flank companies plodded through the woods and across the fields and kept the American right and center occupied, I decided to rush my men across the field and charge the small American batteries and the two smaller state line units guarding them. To cover my right flank from the lurking Yankee cavalry, I ask my dad to deploy the Queen's Rangers cavalry and have them attack the enemy horsemen, while his massive infantry battalion could serve as my reserve. The nimble horseman rode onto the table and quickly moved up in parallel with my infantry.

My battalions (masquerading as the Volunteers of Ireland and fusiliers) advance

The troops of the Frantz boys surge forward

With his squadron of dragoons in the lead and hussars in support, my dad pushed his troopers across the table and charge into combat. The American commanders decided to turn one of the batteries to fire (rather ineffectively) against the oncoming cavalry, which was fine by me, since it saved one of my advancing battalions from coming under fire. The other battery opened up on my second battalion, but had little effect.

When my dad's dragoons charged the enemy horsemen, the Americans opted to countercharge and the two forces clashed sabers across a fence line. The computer did its calculations and determined the Loyalist horse got the better of the foe and sent the Americans packing. This same turn, I had my guardsmen go in toward the enemy guns, as the real-life Guards officer General Charles O'Hara once claimed, "with zeal and with bayonets only." Unfortunately the enemy generals had not positioned their supporting infantry in a way where they could engage in the melee or fire into the oncoming infantry (their line of sight was blocked by the artillery itself). My Guards, who had suffered very little in their advance, carried the position without difficulty, captured the guns and dispersed the crews. Things were going well on the right flank!

The Queen's Rangers cavalry and Foot Guards charge the Americans lines

By this point, there Hessians and Light Bobs were moving steadily across the field and starting to draw the American forces opposite them into the battle, and Chris's battalions were beginning to arrive on the field. All of this encouraged dad and I to build off our successes and push on, so the Provincial troopers charged into the second line of American cavalry and drove them off the field. My Guards, meanwhile, turned towards the two infantry units who had supported the batteries and charged again. Though enemy infantry was finally able to get off their first valley, but my redcoats were determined and stormed through the hail of lead. Though the rebels were relatively fresh, I had numbers and troop quality on my side, and both the state line units withdrew in disorder.

The green-clad troopers rush forward to their next melee

After clearing the enemy guns, the Guards advance towards their next targets; Queen's Rangers infantry arrives in support

With their left flank collapsing and a fresh British brigade threatening to slam into their center, the American commanders (wisely) decided to give ground and call the game. I'm usually not this aggressive in games, but it seemed to pay dividends in this engagement. My dad and Chris both needed to get home at a reasonable time, so we all went across the street for dinner and basked in the glow of our victory, marking the end of our day at the show.

Sunday saw me return to the show solo (since Chris, like my wife, is a pastor). For the second show in a row, I took advantage of the free tables in the Sunday morning flea market and was able to sell a bunch of hobby-related stuff that had just been collecting dust around my house. Armed with some extra cash, I went back to the vendor hall and picked up some basing accessories, and the ESR rulebook, 1812 campaign guide, and some starter boxes and formation boxes to get working on the French and Russian Napoleonic armies...but more on that later

All and all, another fun convention!

Cold Wars 2018 - Day One

I've been fortunate to have gotten a lot of gaming and hobby time in lately, so I'm hoping this is the first of several postings.

This past weekend saw the HMGS East faithful descend once more on the Lancaster Host for Cold Wars 2018. Though I always enjoy these shows, I was particularly excited for this one, since I was taking two of the guys from my gaming group, Codie and Wes, to their first wargaming convention. My dad, who missed Fall In! was coming down for Saturday, and my mate, Chris, was coming along both Friday and Saturday.

After fueling ourselves up for the morning with some Dunkin Donuts, we took made the one-hour trek to Lancaster, where me met with Codie (who lives closer and traveled on his own) and headed to registration. I should note, that while the convention remains at the much trouble Host, the show itself has a new planning staff and from the very beginning we were impressed. Instead of the usual table of volunteers filing through the name badges of pre-registered attendees, we found touchscreens attached to small printers. A quick entry of our last name and first initials resulted in the printing out of our name badges and game tickets and were soon handed a nice drawstring bag and dice cup. Three of us had been able to sign up for an afternoon game in our pre-registration, so our next stop was the games table to find something for the morning.

The only upcoming game that could accommodate us was a demonstration of the Shatterlands skirmish game - a fantasy light RPG-style skirmish game set in fictional conflict loosely based on the French and Indian War. I'd seen this game at numerous conventions and had heard a great deal about it, but had never had the opportunity to play. We were joined by 5 others and each given one character for the small learning game. Chris and I were playing the bow-armed Rupani, while Wes and Codie each had one of the firearm-wielding Dumah. Each player was given a  unique character sheet, which is really where the game gets creative. Nearly each trait (Aim, Melee, Shooting, etc.) is assigned a circle with a certain color which corresponds with the type of dice rolled for that kind of action. As hits are taken in certain parts of the body, players tick off circles with a dry erase marker. After a few of these are checked off, there are a several circles covered with the same scratch-off material one might find on a lottery ticket. When the trait is worn down to the scratch off circles, the player scrapes off the silvery material to reveal the new color level - sometimes causing no change, but other times causing a loss in quality. All in all, a rather novel system.

My Rupani warrior

The field of battle for our Shatterlands game (with my character in the lower right)

Shatterlands uses a card activation system, including a reshuffle, so we all didn't get an even number of activations, but the game moved along pretty quickly. Chris on our left flank moved from cover to cover and began taking shots at the enemy when he could. Wes, in the left center of the enemy was also taking potshots at the foe (including my character).

Characters belong to Codie and myself locked in one of our multiple melees

In the second melee, my only hope of success was rolling less than this on 4 dice

The most interesting storyline in our game, was the combat that ensued between Codie and I. Between our figures was a cluster of cover that I immediately rushed to, but Codie beat me to it. Undaunted, on my next activation, I decided to charge into combat. Codie's character got the better of my own, and caused my warrior to go off balance. When it came to my morale check, we found out that my character's courage score was very low and so he immediately fled. The actual result would have carried me off the table, but out benevolent gamemaster (who also happened to be the game designer) allowed me just to retreat to the edge of the table. After rallying myself, I decided to try a second melee. During my advance, Codie took a shot at me, but due to the fact that my character had gone to ground and he rolled poorly, the bullets whizzed by harmlessly. I charged again and suffered the same result. To defeat Codie, I had to roll less on four dice than he did on three. When his roll resulted in a '4', I knew I was toast, and my character fled once again (and once more was saved the indignation of routing off the field by our benevolent overlord. At this point, I stepped away to use the restroom and by the time I return, Chris's fire had incapacitated one of the enemy, a blow to their force from which they could not recover in an introductory scenario. As it was getting near the end of the game's allotted time we called it. Those on the victorious side got to make some improvements to our character cards and the defeated advanced their experience as well. As a thank you for playing, we all got to keep our character cards and could swing by the vendor's table in the dealer hall to pick up a free miniature representing our characters. A nice touch!

After finishing our round of Shatterlands we were looking for something to do before our other game started later in the afternoon, and as fate may have it, we saw that a two-hour demo game of Blood & Plunder had been added to the schedule and about to start. For those who may not know, Blood & Plunder by Firelock Games has been one of the most talked-about rules systems over the past two years. It is a skirmish level game set in the golden age of piracy (mid- to late-seventeenth century). It is a simple, but nuanced, rules system accompanied by a spectacular range of miniatures and model ships. It is most definitely not your typical pirate game, as the emphasis is put on historical tactics and abilities instead of Hollywood daring-do and hijinks. The game first began as a Kickstarter, which introduced the game along with the English, French, Spanish, and Unaligned factions- but I was late to the party. I was going to pull the trigger, but when I heard there was a second Kickstarter planned that would bring, among others, the Dutch into the mix, I was hooked (I should note that much of my research in grad school focused on the imperial rivalries between the British and Dutch in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries). I made my pledge last summer and had played a demo at Firelock's booth at Historicon, but the figures won't be shipped until later this spring so have been waiting patiently. In any case, I was eager for the guys to see how the game worked. Unfortunately, there was miscommunication between the gamemaster and the staff at the games table, and what was advertised as a game for six, was actually only set up for two. Having played before, I offered to sit on the sidelines. The GM spent sometime going over the background of the game, the forces involved in the demo, and the rules themselves.

Chris's French crew

The Spanish commanded by Wes and Codie

The demo pitched the Spanish against the French, with each side crewing a sloop. The game only lasted a few turns (but was long enough to give everyone a taste for the rules), so I don't have much to report. The first few turns saw the ships come ever closer to one another, exchanging a few shots, which resulted in a handful of casualties on each side (though more for the Spanish) and leaks in both ships. Ultimately, the Spanish brought the enemy ship in with grappling hooks and a series of melees began. The Spanish lanceros cleared some space on the French sloop, while the first French attacks caused considerable Spanish casualties. Our two-hour time slot was coming to an end, and though the losses from the melees were fairly even between the two sides, the Spanish had were having a hard time of the engagement as a whole - so we called it as a slim French victory. A fun, quick fight

After a quick jaunt to the vendor area, we headed to our last game for the day. This featured another ruleset I had previously played but was eager to show the lads - Sharp Practice. Our game was called "Race Across Carolina" and was set during the southern campaign of the American War for Independence. Wes and I were in command of the British forces, which included two units of grenadiers (one from the famed 23rd Fusiliers), three of Highlanders, and two groups of Hessian jaegers. Chris and another gamer had the Americans, comprised of three units of Continentals, two of state line, and two of riflemen. Codie had been unable to get a spot for the game, but opted just to observe.

My grenadiers advancing toward the bridge

The scenario was a classic bridge crossing situation, with the Americans playing the role of defenders and our valiant redcoats being ordered to get at least one unit across the creek at the table's center. As a veteran gamemaster, I appreciate giving a clear objective to my players in a convention game, but in this particularly set up, the object sort of turned into the game's undoing. In making the bridge the way across the creek, the game quickly devolved into a funneling of all troops into a close quarters scrum for one small point on the field - there was really no incentive for maneuver or nuance. To make matters worse, the gamemaster decided to explain the basics of the rules to the American and British players separately, which resulted in both sides learning the rules differently - the biggest impact this had was that for the first few turns, as my road column headed towards the bridge rolled one less die than it should have, meaning that the Americans got in position to cover the bridge with fire much sooner than our troops should have. To be fair, I was rolling pretty terribly for the first few rolls, but even a half dozen or so inches would have been a big help. Furthermore, while Wes and I had been told before the game that our Hessian jaegers were not armed with any melee weapons - even though they historically had short swords and the figures were appropriately armed - we were not informed until a few turns in that the GM insisted the jaegers be treated as line infantry, not as skirmishers and light infantry as we had (perhaps rightfully) assumed.

Our brave Highlanders advancing to provide covering fire for the advance to the bridge

The elite companies exchanging volleys with the Americans

After a long slog through the woods, my jaegers finally arrive on the scene

Oddities and miscommunications aside, we had a pretty good game. For a few turns our two sides exchanged volleys across the waterway, with varying degrees of success. Though our redcoats were taking casualties and picking up shock (one of our units of Highlanders was pushed back at a point), the Americans were definitely getting the worse end of it. After a number of volleys, we broke the riflemen and forced the state line to move to a quieter spot of the line, but the three units of Continentals were a behemoth that could not be bested, and took almost no casualties during the fight. As we neared our last turn, I figured only something heroic could break the stalemate, so in the last actions of the game, but grenadiers charged towards the bridge, into a hail of fire that caused at least 7 kills and harrowing amounts of shock.

This year's Cold Wars offered a Friday night flea market session,  which was going to start in an hour after our game finished up, so we all grabbed some dinner and a beer and debriefed from the days activity before heading to the bring n' buy. Codie bought a few books, and the rest of us opted to save up for later.

More on day two and three later!