The legacy of Alexander by A.B. Bosworth

Considering the vast popularity of both the Greek city states and Macedonian expansion in our hobby, it was a small surprise to me how little is written about the period after death of Alexander the Great. I know of a few publications by Montvert that are almost mystical because of their rarity and even the ubiquitous Osprey Publications hardly covers the period.

It was for that reason that I ordered ‘The Legacy of Alexander – Politics, Warfare and Propaganda under the Successors’ by A.B. Bosworth as soon as I discovered its existence. I bought it in hope that it would give me an overall coverage and detailed information about the military history of the period.

Sadly I must say that those hopes were grievously disappointed. ‘The Legacy of Alexander’ is a strictly academic book and its primary intended audience is clearly the historical academic community which already possesses previous knowledge of not only the primary sources, but also previously published articles and books that analyzed materials that survived to our times. I don’t shrink from plowing through detailed dissections of individual sentences in ancient scripts, but I consider myself an enthusiastic amateur in my studies of history. That is perhaps why I frequently found myself both overwhelmed and loosing interest in Mr. Bosworth’s musings regarding possible translations of ancient Greek or personal motives of ancient authors.

Topics covered by ‘Legacy of Alexander’ were also something of a letdown. Far from being encompassing history of the Successors, it is split in separate chapters that focus on few very significant events of that period. Two chapters are of direct interest to wargamers – first of them deals with Antigonus The One-Eyed Iranian campaign against Eumenes and the other tells the story of Seleucus and his struggle against hegemony of Antigonus. Both of those chapters contain very valuable information for campaign designers and for setups of battles of Paraetacene and Gabiene.

Another chapter deals with the Babylonian Settlement, which took place immediately after Alexander’s death and decided who would be primary actors of initial phases of the unfolding drama. A separate chapter is dedicated to a discussion regarding available Macedonian manpower during the reign of Alexander and that of Successors. Finally, A.B Bosworth discusses legitimacy of Macedonian dynasties that crystallized out of the Successor period and provides extremely detailed analysis regarding validity of texts written by Hieronymus, one of our principal sources for the period.

Chapters regarding Babylonian Settlement and Macedonian manpower resources are fascinating and contain both data that should be of interest to every campaign designer for this period. I also suspect that some of the conclusions of the author will wreak havoc with many army lists.

‘Legacy of Alexander’ was sadly not what I wanted it to be. That being said, it’s still a very valuable book, both for those interested in the period in general and also for wargamers. While it’s not the primer I was looking for, it should be picked up for deeper study of this fascinating period once such primer can be found.

Battle of belmont – take one

Couple of days ago I took opportunity of Christmas holiday and run Belmont scenario from Partizan Press scenario book that I reviewed some time ago. Results were interesting, although as it seems so often to be the case in games in which I participate, inconclusive. Nevertheless, here’s the after action report.

Pre-game considerations and setup

Since scenario booklets from Partizan are intended for ‘Guns of Gettysburg’, some modifications were required for me to be able to take advantage of special features of TCHAE. I didn’t make any changes to unit strengths, but did modify the characteristics of some leaders: based on scant reports of real battle and later careers of commanding officers, I made Grant both Gifted and Bold, while McLernand became a Political officer (his rather rotten career suggests he was completely useless). On Confederate side, Pillow’s rather unimpressive track record gave me enough reason for turning him into a Cautious officer. All those changes had significant impact on how the game developed and I have to say that I am more and more impressed by these nuances of TCHAE.

On paper, Belmont gives the impression of being a rather difficult game for the Union – they have inferior numbers and very tough victory conditions. Also, I am still experimenting with conversions of the table size and distances to 6mm and had no real grasp of how movement rates would influence tempo of the game. For that reason I decided to double the number of rounds before possible confederate reinforcements came onto the table. This turned out to be a sensible decision – from the events on the table I’m drawing the conclusion that throwing in another four confederate regiments at round 10 will turn this scenario into ‘mission impossible’ for the Union.

The game

This time I took upon myself to lead the Confederates, while L. tried his best to lead the Union forces to victory. Initial deployment was simple – I was allowed to deploy a small brigade of two regiments and only battery on the field in front of my camp. Rest of my units huddled behind the safety of makeshift camp fortifications. L. split his two brigades – one advanced against the rebels in the field and one moved directly toward the camp.

Situation at the start of the game

Walker’s brigade braces for McLernand’s advance

Union advance

Confederate camp

Bird eye view – Walker’s brigade falls back,
Dougherty prepares to charge

Those initial dispositions decided the event. Dougherty’s brigade reached my camp without any difficulties. His two regiments failed however to make any impression upon my regiments in the camp. A brave attack by one of his regiments resulted only in severe casualties and was repulsed with ease.

Dougherty’s failed assault

On the other flank, I realised rather quickly that it would be impossible for me to hold the field and I decided to slowly fall back. This task was eased by the fact that McLernand was pretty much useless in his attempts to coordinate movements of his brigade. Union overall commander tried his best to bring order into Union ranks and managed to bring couple of Union regiments into contact with Confederates. Grant’s efforts finally payed off when a bayonett charge by 31st Illionois succedded in throwing back 13th Arkansas at the extreme left of my line.

Grant leads the attack on Union right flank

However, even that success couldn’t hide the fact that any possibility of Union victory have by now disapeared. McLernand’s brigade was strung out and out of touch with Dougherty, who on his own was far to weak to break into the Confederate camp. To make things worse, Confederate reinforcements would enter onto the field of battle within next couple of rounds. All those facts made L. call it a day and retire his troops back to his exit area.

Situation at the end of the game

Musings after the battle

As I suspected, reaching historical results in this scenario (Grant managed to rout his opponent and burn the camp) is very difficult. Key problem was McLernand’s status as Political officer, which severly limited his usability and forced L. to use Grant to drive Union regiments toward the Confederate lines. However, I also have to say that L.’s decision to split his forces played large roll in indecisive result of the engagement.

Regardless of the end result, we had a lot of fun playing this scenario and having learned our lessons, we will run this game again in near future.

Couple of final words regarding TCHAE – I would recommend for players to take full advantage of the mechanics of the ruleset when adapting scenarios, but also during the game. Cautious and political officers can create a lot of mayhem and it’s a good thing. I’ve already covered McLernand’s impact on our game, but Pillow’s status as ‘cautious’ also created some difficulties – 13th Tennesse was supposed to enter the field on round 4, but unfortunate card sequence (Cautious/Political officer card came up before Pillow’s activation card) delayed their entry until turn 8. This delay was the result of my voluntary interpretation of the rules and did create some problems for me, but it was worth it. I guess what’ I’m trying to say is that TCHAE gives players the opportunity to mix things up a bit and that taking advantage if this feature makes a game that is more fun.

Overeager, overambitious and underprepared

So… more than a year after the decision to start our ‘Age of Arthur’-project, H. and I decided it was time to run our first trial game. The fact that H. had only three finished units against five of mine didn’t bother us – we wanted to get those miniatures out, give them a workout, roll some dices and have a few laughs.

Perhaps a little more serious problem was the fact that last time I had the opportunity to read the rules was… oh, a year ago or something like that. As for the army lists and pre-game preparation – since number of units was so uneven, neither of us bothered with those small details. That’s what the supplements are for!

It will come hardly as a suprise to most of you that our first game was something of a fiasco. Most of the time was spent on trying to find relevant rules, checking stats and similar ‘fun’ activities. By the time we had to start packing up (game took place at local game shop, after opening hours), we did manage to kill one skirmisher and have a successful Saxon cavalry charge, which ended in a draw. This “high watermark” was rather suitable finale of the game.

It has to be said, despite equal fumbling on both sides, we still somehow managed to have a blast. At the same time I think it will be best if we try to avoid games like that and for that reason I have this checklist to complete before next meeting.

• Read the rulebook
• Put together an army list
• Prepare movement trays
• Ensure that both players have their own set of rulesets for the game

On a side note, even the pictures from the game didn’t work out all that great (starting to be annoyed by my point and shoot, it’s time to get a simple DSL kit). Not that it’s stopping me from posting some pictures anyway. :-)

Saxons on the far edge, Romano-British on the near edge

Saxon army – two units of foot Duguth,
Duguth on ponies and some skirmishers

Anglo-British – two units of milites, one of pedes, mounted commitates
and small ‘special unit’ of foot comitates (Dervel’s Wolftails)

Milites brace for impact of Saxon cavalry

Commitates try a sneaky flank manover that led to nowhere

Saxons smash into milites and get stuck

DFF CON 2009

Over two weeks has passed since DFF CON 2009 and it’s about time for me to post couple of words about the show. Let me start with thanking the guys at Dansk Figurspilsforening for an excellent event. Even though I was one of those that arranged a game, my participation was minimal when compared with all the effort that went into all the background work. My participation in Saturday’s games was unfortunately limited to the game I was hosting. I run a slightly modified version of ‘Check Your Six’ scenario called ‘Jolly Good Show’, which I’ve already wrote about in one of my previous posts. The fun thing about this scenario is its replayability – this time around, British players, with help of proper tactics and a huge dose of luck, managed to down four bombers and damage another two for a loss of a single Hurricane. The amazing thing was that they managed to do all that in a single pass through the German formation.

What’s even more important, the scenario was played by a total of six players, five of which never played CY6 before. After three rounds they were ‘self-going’ and, if I am allowed to draw conclusions from the comments, had a really good time.

Hurricanes passing through
German bomber formation

On Sunday it was my turn to have some fun. First of all, I’ve managed to get my first taste of ‘Fields of Glory’… finally. Couple of the guys at the club are very active with the ruleset and put up a simple 600 points demonstration game with Republican Romans and Phyrric Greeks. Things went according to the plan – Phyrrus’ elephants created mayhem on one of my flanks, cavalry danced around on the other, and in the middle Roman legions gave the Greeks a bloody nose… or at least they were in process of, because we had to finish just as things got interesting (some blokes needed the table :-( ).

 Phyrrus elephants trample Spanish mercenaries

Roman legions clash with Greek phalanx

Even though my first game was untimely interrupted, the rules set gave me a very positive impression. It is rather complex and the game itself takes its time, but the game mechanics do look sound and I had fun while playing. This first impression was rather important to me, as I am in the middle of painting a rather large Greek army.

Next on the schedule was a naval action with ‘Fleet Action Imminent’. It was great game - two British battlecruisers exploded and another managed to get shot to pieces… unfortunately, I was on the British side, so I won’t write much more about that event. :-) However, despite bearing witness to a small British disaster, I have to say that ‘FAI’ is growing on me. Simple, quick to learn and yet manages to deliver realistic results – that’s the kind of ruleset that I like to play these days.

All in all, more than 10 hours gaming time over a weekend, it’s been a long time since the last time that happened. Already looking forward to DFF CON 2010.

Couple of snapshots of some of the other DFF CON 2010 games.

Start setup for an I Ain’t Been Shot Yet, Mom’ game.

Demonstration game of ‘From Valmy To Waterloo’…
WITH THE AUTHOR OF THE RULESET! :-)

‘Ambush Alley’ game.

Closeup of same game.

Colonial skirmish game… I think.

Back to Albert Canal

Call it for artistic drive or pure silliness on the part of the owner of this blog, but for quite long time I had a wish to write an after action report in narrative style, rather than a dry description of the moves, dice rolls and game mechanics. I finally did it in post “Battles over Albert Canal” and I have to say that I’m a little surprised over how hard it was. Still, some people enjoyed my first attempt at “writer’s career”, so I may do it again sometime.

However, for the sake of consistency, I do feel that I need to post a more traditional AAR of that game. So, what did really happened that day? Scenario for the game was taken from "Over The Channel - Battle of Britain" scenario book for Check Your Six. It’s called “Impossible Mission” and considering the real historical events it is based upon, it’s a very appropriate title. Six Fairey Battles escorted by two Vic- formations of Hurricanes attempt to bomb a bridge over Albert Canal. German side has six Me-109:s on patrol and the bridge itself is protected by light anti-aircraft artillery.

In our game, L. controlled German fighters, while F. and W. took control of escorting Hurricanes. I took charge of five apparently doomed Battles (we lost one in pre-game event check). At the start of the game, German fighters were spread over the table in three rote-formations, so British plan was to take advantage of that fact, get to the bridge as quickly as possible and then get out of Dodge.

Naturally, Battles were like the big magnet for Me-109, which started to close on them from three different directions. Hurricanes hastened to meet them and leader of W’s fighter formation managed to score hits on leader of one of German rotes in a head on attack. Unfortunately, the German pilot managed to return the favor – so one fighter on each side was out of the fight. Remaining fighters of those formations tangled with each other for the rest of the game, but none of the sides managed to score any hits.

Another German rote closed on the bombers from the opposite side, initially bypassing F’s Hurricanes. F. managed his planes in skillful manner and managed to place them in tailing position behind the Messerschmitts. L. disregarded the danger and pressed on his attack on the Battles. His effort was rewarded and one of Battles went down immediately, after a critical hit was scored by the leader of the German flight. His joy was however rather short-lived, since in subsequent turn his leader was shot down by the Hurricanes and wingman’s airplane suffered engine damage from a well-aimed burst from a Lewis machine-gun of leading Battle. He tried to escape, but was finished off by F’s Hurricanes in subsequent turn. Unfortunately, two of victorious British fighters expended their ammunition and were forced to head for home.

As the Battles got close to the bridge, last German rote caught up with them. Leader of this flight was the best pilot in the air that day and it showed – his opening salvo resulted in one Battle immediately shot down (once again, critical hits from the 20mm cannons), while a subsequent burst scored damaging hits on another Battle. Fortunately, he didn’t manage to do more damage before passing behind the British bombers and encountering remaining Hurricanes. Three surviving bombers reached the bridge and unaffected by ineffective AA fire, dropped their bomb load on the bridge. One of those was a direct hit, severely damaging the target.

Then “the freak event” of the day occurred – L. attempted to extract his fighters from the chaotic fighter furball behind the bombers (four planes in a single hex) and attempted an Immelman with two of his Me-109. Since both planes made same maneuver, they ended up yet another time in same hex and this time they collided with each other. Both planes managed to stay in the air, but with bombers reaching their target and only a single German plan in fighting condition we decided to call it a day.

End result was a brilliant British victory – bridge severly damaged, 2 German fighters shot down, while three other were damaged. Price for that victory was paid by two downed Battles. Point total for the scenario was 24 points for RAF and 8 points for Luftwaffe. Campaign total after the game is 54 points for RAF against 27 for Luftwaffe.

Historical background for this scenario can be found here.

Finally, a couple of words regariding the "Check Your Six" ruleset - to put it bluntly, it is without a doubt my current absolute favorite ruleset in all categories. It is easy to learn, very intuitive and immensly fun to play. However, there is an apparent upper limit of number of airplanes that a single player can handle. Two planes per player is perfect, six is an absolute maximium in my opinion. Also, once multiple airplanes get into same area, things can get rather complicated and tempo of the game slows down significantly. To counter possible confusion, I will in the future use color coding directly on the airplane bases for several aspects of the game.

DFFCon 2009 at Tøjhusmuseet will take place next weekend

Just a short notice about a historical wargames convention DFFCon 2009, that will take place on 24-25 October. This rather unique event for Scandinavia is arranged by Dansk Figurspilsforening at Tøjhusmuseet (Weapon Museum). Detailed information about the convention can be found here. Yours truly will be arranging a “Check Your Six” participation game on Saturday.

Wargamer's haven in Copenhagen

Considering the fact that this is probably the most significant wargaming event in recent years for me, I must say that this post is long overdue. OK, “most significant” may sound over-dramatic, but how else would you describe the fact that there is a very active historical wargaming club in the city where you are practically every day?

So what am I babbling about? Dansk Figurspilsforening in Copenhagen of course. The ironic thing is that I’ve known about their homepage for years, I even used some of their gorgeous flags for some of my ACW units, but the idea to visit the club never entered my head. Fortunately I came into contact with one of the members on TMP and the rest is history.

The club has activities every Wednesday from 1800 to late evening and the range of periods and rulesets that are used is quite mind-boggling. Larger games are also played on weekends, but those are one-offs events. There are two large tables available for games and complete sets of modular terrain available for the gaming pleasure of the members. In short, if you ever visit Copenhagen and are keen on a game, Dansk Figurspilsforening is the place to visit.