Milestone

With the completion of my last game I reached a bit of a personal milestone with
my 50th wargame using the Neil Thomas rules system.

Since May 2010 I've played 13 Ancients & Medieval, 5 Pike & Shot, 17 Horse &
Musket, 13 Modern and 2 Skirmish games.

All of these were a pleasure to play and I've thoroughly enjoyed developing all
the supplementary rule materials in tandem with the gameplay.

Now onto the next 50.

Battle of Holville Church 1863

I've just had another venture into the ACW using the rules from Introduction
with an encounter battle between an elite Confederate Army and a regular Union
force.

Both were fighting over a strategic bridge (Trent Bridge) and Holville Church,
towards the right flank of the Union advance.

Both sides started well with a rapid advance towards the strategic objectives.
The Confederates momentarily halted which gave the Union time to bring on
several reserve units but gradually the Rebels gained the required positions and
managed to exert a concerted fire along their right and centre where they had a
local superiority. Both sides were hampered by a table cluttered in terrain and
linear obstacles. Mobility and visibility was pretty restricted as a consequence
and this stoked up the sense of battlefield chaos.

Initially it looked favourable for the Union side with a numerical superiority,
however, the quality of the Rebel forces began to tell and some judicious use
of the rallying rules managed to get a couple of their battle weary units back
into action.

Meanwhile the Union was suffering along their whole line and the victorious
Confederate right flank commenced an encirclement which snuffed out the
remainder of the Union resistance.

A great game which lasted a couple of hours and was full of excitement right to
the end. The cavalry on both sides were hampered by terrain and couldn't use
mobility as effectively as I've seen in other games. The artillery was important
but the decider for me was the superior morale status of the Rebel forces which
helped them in morale checks and rallying.

Western Desert 1940

Here is a battle report of a recent game using the Second World War Rules from
Introduction with my supplementary overlays and solo Command & Control rules.

At last this was a chance to field my Italian Libyian Desert force and take on
an Eighth Army formation under the illustrious Brigadier McDonald.

The Italian commander General Alvintzi was set a defensive task of holding a
long line of hills which overlooked a key desert highway running North which the
British wished to secure and utilise to move their armoured units forward.

The British had nine units on table, albeit a fair distance from the Italian
positions. In contrast the Italians only fielded five units on table, the rest
held in Reserve and released piecemeal under the reserve rules. This was to
prove significant as an early deployment of reserves, particularly armour
support to counter the British would have been timely.

The British made steady progress, the Italians remaining concealed on the ridge
and adopting prone positions where possible. The first decisive engagement was
with the Italian AFVs and in a short time they had lost a Recon and Tank unit.
Despite holding up the British advance with heavy casualties on the carrier
unit, the British managed to exert increasing offensive pressure on the ridge
line finally forcing the Italians by turn six to move into highly defensive
positions and keep their heads down. It looked doomed to mass prisoner capture
but the Italian commander had a brief flash of brilliance and managed to
extricate a couple of units of infantry and a tank. This was played out through
my solo Command & Control rules which worked very well throughout, creating a
number of interesting and, actually, quite logical situations to develop.

Overall another superb game. The Italians were not outclassed but the overall
quality of the British seemed to manifest itself throughout. With German backing
the Italians should be good in the defensive in entrenched or covered positions.