The "Fab Four" were in Northern Italy last night,fighting Republican Romans against the might of Hannibal's Carthaginians.
Scenario and table before any movement-Graham commanded the Celtic Roman Allies,and I commanded the Legions,whilst Brian took charge of the Carthaginian Celts,and Paul was the Great man himself-Hannibal!!
Brian and Graham "kicked off" the game by moving towards the river with their Celtic contingents,whilst in the centre......................
A more sedate approach was adopted by Paul,who "peppered" the defending Hastati with his Spanish and Numidian skirmishers-those Elephants are getting too close for my liking!!!
On the left of the Roman line,Paul has put in a furious attack on the earthworks,putting me under pressure-the swine!!!!
Brian and Graham are still slogging it out over the river crossing-great stuff!!
A volley of Pila has seen off the Elephants,who have gone beserk and stampeded off towards the river-hurrah!!!-as long as Paul doesn't send his Spanish against the earthworks,I'll be ok!!!
Oh Hell,he did and I'm not!!!!-the Hastati broke and ran-decimation for you my fine little fellows!!!-My supporting Princepes fared no better against the Spanish,and things are not looking too good.
Everything has been put into the river melee,now,and Graham is losing!-to prevent his Celts from "retiring" he put his commander into the fray,only to get him killed!!!-the whole flank then collapsed-woe is us!!
On the other flank,Paul has managed to get his warbands over the defences,and I am now under a real threat of total collapse!!!-double woe is me!
One final shot showing the situation at the end of move number 13!!-unlucky for some!!!!
This was a good game,full of tense moments,and played in a grand spirit-well done lads.
Roll on next Sunday,probably 7YW 40mm.
Last night saw our latest "foray" into WW2-Graham was in charge of the German forces,whilst Brian and Paul were in command of the British-I sat this one out,as I thought up the scenario and a few "surprises" for the commanders,plus I am really not that interested in the period,although I do find it fascinating,with all the different kinds of tanks,weapons,tactics etc.!!!
This is the scenario,on the face of it it looks fairly straightforward,however on move number two,from the top left hand corner of the map,came two platoons of Para's who had landed by glider,and whose mission was to capture the southern hill and "blow" the bridge!
On the German side,two platoons of elite Panzer Grenadiers were travelling by train,to the town,to bolster the defence,and of course the British had no idea of this,nor of the Jagpanther tank hidden behind the Northern hill!!!
This shows the rather spectacular terrain,before any troops were put on the board,the hill in the foreground had a HMG in position to cover the bridge and ford,which as it turned out,did enormous damage to the attacking Para's,coming from the left of the photo!!
Brian is moving his Cromwell tanks against the ford,whilst masking his flank with a Sherman and a Firefly-Paul has moved up to the farm,and has sent a small out-flanking force against the left hand side of the town-all is looking good!
Graham's reaction was swift and decisive-he has sent a Mark 4 out of the town and a Panther towards the bridge,to try and stop the ford being used-will he succeed?
The Para's,and their jeep transport,have come under fire from the HMG on the southern hill-one jeep is knocked out and the platoon is taking casualties-plus Graham had sent some infantry from the town to support the Panther,and they too are giving the Para's hell!!!!
The Panzer Grenadiers have left the train and are moving to block Paul's out-flanking move,whilst the Mark4 and Shermans are battling it out on the right-we had all kinds of action,including Anti-tank guns,mortars,and infantry small arms firing-it all looked very good.
The "hidden" JagPanther has made an appearance,much to the dismay of the British commanders,and is giving the Shermans a right old kicking,backed up by the Mark4.
Brian has managed to get a Cromwell shot up,and has blocked the ford!!Meanwhile the attacking Para's are being shot to pieces-things are not looking good for the British!!
With some street fighting going on,and tanks blazing away at each other(going in favour of the Germans!) and the Para's being held up,and the ford blocked-the British "High Command" decided that they had failed in their mission,and the Germans were declared the winners!
This was a spectacular game to watch,and I'm sure that if the "boys" come up with future scenarios,this period will become a regular feature of our club games.
Last night saw Paul,Brian,Graham and I fighting a very colouful and exciting game using our 28mm 7YW figures..................
This shows the table at about move number 3-Paul and Brian are attacking the central town,held by the Prussians(commanded by Graham and myself),whilst messing us about on both flanks!!
Paul's attack on the town was very impressive,using a combination of volley fire,to pin the defenders,and a most audacious attack across the bridge!!
This shows the action all along the line-neither Brian or I wanted to commit our cavalry too soon,so held back for most of the game(which is very out of character for Brian!!)
On the right,Graham and Paul were having a "ding-dong" battle on the river bank-this was great to see and great wargaming too!
The "ding-dong" battle continues,but Paul's Austrians were getting the worse of it,as he tried to cross the river against Graham's "magic"(for a change) dice throwing-hurrah!!
The cavalry are still looking at each other-it will happen at some point,you know it will!!-but who will charge first???
I did!!!-my first line of "heavies" charge across the river,to be met by a counter-charge by Brian's-the melee was horrendous!!,with more and more squadrons being fed in where necessary-wonderful to see!
Paul's Austrians have stormed and captured the town-this wasn't meant to happen-however,Graham with wonderful foresight,saw what was about to happen,and sent two Prussian regiments to restore the Status Quo(whatever you want!)-this was edge of the seat wargaming!
Paul is being "sent packing" all along his front,and with the town now back in Prussian hands,Graham and I were declared the winners-of course Brian claimed that he would win the cavalry battle on his flank,and wanted a draw(again!!) but to loads of verbal abuse,he had to capitulate!!
Another great game,roll on next Sunday.
As a long time resident of Westerhope,I was made to feel proud when this commemorative seat was erected last week,in time for Remembrance Day-we will never forget!
A permanent reminder from a grateful nation.
Last night we had a 100% turnout for our second WW2 game using Brian's figures and Dave's rules.Paul and I were British and Dave and Graham were Germans.I had sent by "snailmail",information,scenario and objectives etc. to everybody,and they came armed with battle plans-so far,so good!!
Brian had volunteered to be referee,and had a few surprises up his sleeve-the cunning little fox!!!
The top photo is the scenario,the second is the map and the third is how the table looked before any movement/troops.
The first "nasty surprise" for the Germans!!-the bridge had collapsed during the night,rendering the German battle plan "kaput!!"-for that section of the table at least.
Now the German commanders had to think fast-and they did!!
This shows Dave's attack across the bridge,being led by a Puma,which was subjected to all kinds of fire and was eventually lost to our hidden Cromwell tank-hurrah!!-now Brian unleashed his second sneaky trick-the following tank had shed a track!!-blocking the infantry advance and holding up the German attack(you would almost think that Paul and I had bribed the ref.!)
This shows the moment the Puma was destroyed,Paul had hidden in the corner of the field,a Heavy Machine Gun unit,which proceeded to wreck the German infantry trapped on the bridge,much to the dismay of the German high command(ie a lot of swearing!!)
Although I didn't really know what I was doing,I managed to knock out most of Graham's tanks(including a Tiger!) that were attempting to cross the bridge,although he did manage to inflict casualties on my mortar and PIAT crews-but the flank was secured,leaving me room to manoeuver onto the German centre.
Dave,having regained his composure, has put in a magnificent attack on Paul's troops defending the village,so we are rushing as much armour etc. as possible over to the flank-however,Graham has deployed his infantry in the central woods,and is shooting the hell out of my infantry as they try to help Paul-this is serious stuff!!
By a combination of HE fire from tanks and small arms fire from infantry,a platoon of British infantry has been forced to abandon their position in the village-this is not looking good!!-however,Paul has positioned his Cromwells to enfilade any German tanks that try and force the position.
The village is all but abandoned in this shot,as the German infantry pile across the bridge and wade through the river-Paul put up a desperate defence,but the German tanks seemed impervious to his shots from the Cromwells!!- the referee looks pleased with himself!!
Oh dear,don't those Cromwells burn nicely?
This outflanking attempt was thwarted by HMG fire from Graham's troops in the woods,although the tank did continue,and put the German infantry under pressure.
It's all over!! Dave's command is in the village,and his tanks are massing to complete the victory,plus,the 27p we paid the referee obviously wasn't enough,and he declared the Germans the winners!!
This was,to me, an exciting but confusing game(because of my WW2 ignorance!) but alot of points were brought up during the game,and discussed,and the rules ammended,which is always good when preparing a new set of rules for any period-well done to Dave,and of course to the rest of the lads.
Roll on next Sunday,probably an Ancients.
