THROUGH THE MUD AND BLOOD - A BIRTHDAY SOLO GAME

 This year's birthday game was to be a WW1 game but, with the German commander unavoidably detained in Cyprus, I had to resort to a solo game. Hence, I retrieved my trench terrain, from the depths of the garage, and set up a game of 'Through the Mud and Blood'.

As this was to be solo game, a trench raid with a pre-programmed opponent would be ideal. I've always wanted to try 'Winter Sports', the raiding system from the TooFatLardies Xmas 2010 special. [I printed off a copy, only to discover that I already had two copies filed away. Apparently, I was really keen to give this a go!]

The German lines

The view across No Man's Land.

I rolled for the mission and got the Recce mission.

My force would be 26 men, under an officer and 3 NCOs. I split these into 4 groups.

Lt. Jimmy Riddell would lead the raid with 6 bombers. 

Second in command would be Sgt Campbell Baxter (2 soups)
with 5 bombers and 2 trench cleaners.

The main attack would be made by Sgt. Shug McLaughlin. Shuggy leads a
group of 5 bombers and two trench cleaners. They also carry two trench brooms.

Coporal Jack Ford would provide cover fire from the rear.
He leads three rifle grenade teams.

The plan involved gapping the wire in three places - one gap either side of the blocked sap and one on the track leading to the ruined farm.

Corporal Ford would place his rifle bombers on our side of the wire, to provide cover support.

Shuggy McLaughlin would lead the assault, penetrating the enemy trenches via the sap. He would then bomb along the trench, exiting on the farm track and escaping through the gap in the wire.

Jimmy Riddell would follow Shug's party to coordinate the attack and block the junction with the communication trench.

Two soups would bring up the rear, acting as a rear-guard against any enemy counterattacks along the trench.

The plan - what could possibly go wrong.

The first two wire sections are successfully gapped.

A third gap is created but the Hun have festooned the wire with tin cans.
Have the sentries heard anything?

The scenario occurs at night but no blinds are used. The German sentries spot, as normal, but successful spots equate to fleeting glimpses etc. Each such spot accumulates whistle blowing points - as does any firing or combat. As the whistle blowing points accumulate, the German forces begin to activate, according to the following schedule.

In this case, the British started with 2 points due to the tin cans on the wire.

Shug makes it through the wire.

Jack Ford deploys his rifle bombers.

Shug penetrates the sap

Two Soups takes the over-ground route.

The alarm is raised and Fatty von Strucker emerges from the command dugout.

Two Soups team is the first into the trench. A sentry bolts down the trench......

.........only to be cut off by Shug emerging from the sap.

Shugs bombs the dug out. Strucker is cut off from the second dug out so goes over the top.

Gefreiter Max Eisenhardt, and his riflemen, begin to emerge from the second dug out.

Meanwhile, Two Soups has secured his objective but Riddell has been very slow and
is only now working his way along the sap.

The HMG team deploy in the farmhouse. It's going to be dangerous above ground now.

Eisenhardt rushes along the trench only to be met with a hail of bombs and shotgun pellets from Shug's team.

A very large group of Eingreiftruppen, under Gefreiter Schumaker, attack Two Soups
position. The figures are actually just off board, along the trench, but have been
placed on table for convenience.

A second large group of Eingreiftruppen, under Leutnant Fartgasse,
appear in the communication trench, at the rear of the position.

Meanwhile, Jack Ford's rifle bombers valiantly attempt to keep the
machine gunner's heads down but are taking casualties.

Fartgasse versus Riddell. It goes badly for the British with 4 men killed, including Riddell.

After an earlier repulse, Schumaker attacks again, killing four of Two Soups' team.

Shug makes a dash for home, after lobbing a few grenades at the HMG.

The remnants of Riddell's team retreat back down the sap. 

A great game and technically a win for the British - if a very bloody and Phyrric one.

The butcher's bill:

The British

Lt Jimmy Riddell KIA

Sgt. Campbell Baxter POW

15 men killed, 1 captured

The Germans

Feldwebel Erik Lehnsherr, Gefreiter Max Eisenhardt, Gefreiter Walter Jonas Kovacs KIA

20 men KIA plus 1 POW, plus an unknown number of men killed in the bombed dug out.

The man of the match has to be Shuggy, who successfully bombed down the trench, bombed a dug out, took out a whole group of enemy riflemen (including the German 2ic), and helped suppress the HMG before making it back to British lines with a prisoner.

An honourable mention goes to Jack Ford's rifle bombers who took on an unequal duel with the HMG but eventually prevailed.

The wooden spoon goes to Jimmy Riddell, who was just too slow in getting his men up, failed to coordinate the attack and got himself killed in the process.

A cracking game and one I want to revisit - there's another 5 missions after all.

GALLIPOLI TRENCHES

 For our third Square Bashing test, I thought we'd try the trench game. This time the British would attack against a Turkish trench system.

The centre of the Ottoman line, showing a MG bunker with the main trench
line behind. The wire represents areas of rough going.

Turks in the trenches.

The British poised to attack.

A mine is successfully blown in the centre of the Turkish trench.

A point barrage precedes the attack but does little damage.

The attack reaches the wire.

The Turks respond with their own point barrage which routs the British left.
Nevertheless, the centre and right push the attack behind a rolling barrage.

Despite being attacked from 3 sides the bunker position wins the fight.

The assault on the right also fails, although one battalion
makes it into an unoccupied part of the trench.

Further assaults also fail and a much depleted British force is thrown back to the start line.

We're only halfway through the battle countdown but we stop there. Ostensibly, to go to the pub but in reality the British have been comprehensively defeated.

Another great game, and I'm sure one that we will return to at some point/

GALLIPOLI SQUARED

 Once again it was back to Gallipoli with another Square Bashing playtest. This time I wanted the Turks to be the attackers, so we abandoned the pregame but substituted a quick start procedure, which I devised, so the outcomes part of the pregame was still used.

British depletions with the obligatory 1 in 3 battalions consigned to the reinforcement area.
Along with 2 machine gun companies and a 18pdr field gun battery.

The Turks also had 4 battalions consigned to the reinforcement area
 - as they didn't fit onto the table.

The attackers are confined to a deployment zone, which consists of a single row of squares. This results in the attacker being spread out in an extended line and in the case of large armies, like the Turks, units had to be left off table.

Turkish centre

The British left and centre were relatively heavily defended with buildings and hasty defences backed up with machine guns and guns.

British left

By contrast, the British centre right  was weakly held and an obvious target for the Ottoman assault. 

Weak British centre right

The British plan was to try and delay the Turkish attack, with a suppressing barrage, hopefully buying enough time to deploy hasty defences in the centre.

As I would be relying on my assets roll, I elected the Assets Stance for my Higher Command.

The Turks advanced across the board on a broad front and then rolled for
reinforcements - 6s needed. Oh dear, not a good start.

With Turkish reinforcements massing in the centre it was time to bring down
the suppressing barrage. Thankfully, it was successful and stopped the advance.

The Turks respond with a point barrage on my weak centre.

With the resumption of the Turkish advance, the British struggled to reinforce the centre. It was time to deploy the hasty defences but, despite having the 'asset' Higher Command stance, I failed the roll.

The Turks storm the hill, from front and flank, with the bayonet.
Throwing back the badly mauled defenders.

A nicely timed point barrage, by the British, shores up the crumbling defence.

The Turks retreat under fire from the British guns.

At this point, after two consecutive rolls of 6 for the countdown, the game came to an abrupt end.

A stalemate and a lucky outcome for the British

All in all this was an excellent and enjoyable game. I do have some reservations about whether or not this is a good representation of WW1 warfare, but I'll leave off commenting until later. First it's on to the trench game.....