Tripod Terror

Time to wheel out the Martians for a couple of games of Tripods and Triplanes at the club as I teach the rules to some first-time players.

Mark the Martian versus Matt and Jim the Aviators.

Martians have Landed

Finally, after much delay, the Tripods and Triplanes Kickstarter has landed. This is a fun add-on for Wings of Glory (Wings of War as was). Unfortunately, a series of events kept delaying the release from Ares games, but it turned up on my doorstep last week (in the pouring rain as the despatch driver didn't put it in the 'safe place' I'd specified. Thankfully it was extremely well packaged inside so avoided rain damage.)

The base game, despite its name, does not actually include a Triplane but instead is a 1 on 1, Mk.1 Tripod vs Rocket-armed Nieuport N16, which was previously available years ago as part of the Balloon Buster set and which was at the time too pricey for me.

Wings of 100 Years

To celebrate 100 years of the RAF, founded on April Fools Day 1918, I organised a couple of games of Wings of War.

4 a side, with one plane each. Getting the players to choose their own planes was probably a bad idea as ended up with a mixed bag of performance types and many planes the RAF would never have flown!.

Belgium Spearhead

A game of 6mm Great War Spearhead as Dave M displays his new 6mm forces after selling off his 20mm plastics.

An early war encounter in Belgium as both French and German forces converged on a railway embankment.

World War of the Worlds.

A Wings of Glory Kickstarter with a difference, Tripods and Triplanes mixes genres up and brings the War of the Worlds to the trenches. Ironically there is currently no Triplane models available via the Kickstarter, but rocket firing Nieuport 16 comes with the basic kit. (edit - The Red Barons final Fokker Triplane is now a bonus item)

Have downloaded the Print and Play demo rules, and the main thing to note is these tripods are fast! This speed would render most ground based units useless as the ability to accurately target things travelling at this rate didn't exist at this time. Targeting would have to be close ranged and over the sights, So that nicely sets up the background.

Some are already claiming it's just a rip off of 'All Quite on the Martian Front'  , despite that games primary inspiration coming from a mockumentry and unofficial sequels to the H G Wells original plus a mix of World War 1 and 2 aesthetics for the Humans. Both games have spindly legged, almost insect like, Tripods.

Transplanting the War of the Worlds setting has always happened, whether it's Orson Wells, George Pal, or that film with the shrieking kid. The Furness Wargamers even did a 1920s based invasion of Great Britain.

On image that stuck in the mind was the cover from Challenge magazine depicting a German Tripod in a Steampunk 'Great War comes early' of Space1899. It's a shame the proposed Tripod on Tripod rules involves captured machines rather the Earth built responses, but it makes more sense in the setting, especially given the time frame and tech difference.
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The Price of Glory

Still gaming the Great War, but this time back to Europe and with a different rules set 'The Price of Glory' (or rather a Dave M variant of), which we have played in the past and is at a much larger scale to the previous weeks activity.

The Western Theatre

 It's Early War and the initial French push into Germany has come to a halt as the Germans outflank them via Belgium. The Germans are now launching the counter-attack to grab back their territories

Stuck Truck Ruck

Two more games of TMWWBK's, once again set in East Africa during the Great War, with the first scenario being very lopsided and over quickly, and the second lasting a bit longer and a very close finish.

The first game was already under way when I got to the Hall, A truck is stuck in the middle of the table and the two unit of British defenders have to wait for reinforcements to help them out as the enemy approaches.

Stuck in the Middle

Back to East Africa and another trial game of TMWWBK in the Great War. Set up by Dave M to test the artillery rules and to get a few more players involved.

A German led force is stuck between two British led groups ( Askari and Indian based respectively ). Naturally enough things didn't quite go as planned.

Would be African Kings

A game of The Men Who Would Be Kings, but transplanted from it's usual colonial period forward to East Africa during the Great War, an often forgotten about theatre of that war. Dave M supplied the rules and figures.

A scenario straight out of the book with two balanced forces, of British and German led troops, trying to make their way across the table and 'Just Passing By'.

A New Great War

A trial game, organised by Dave M, of a set of DBA derived rules for the Great War, and based on an existing one found online for the Chaco War, but tweaked for the earlier era.

Set in the Middle East, between the Ottomans, lead by Tel and Mark, and a force of Australians and Indians, lead by Matt and Jim. Ottomans are defending with a number of their starting AP's being randomly determined to be defensive positions, either dugouts or barbed wire.

From Furness Wargamers in Trenches

Trench Foot

A Trench Assault scenario, acting as another refresher of the Great War rules, prior to Dave M kicking off his campaign some time in the near future. Played along the length of a 6' by 4' area, the trenches were the standard simple ones and not the enhanced entrenchments as described in 'Over the Top'

From Furness Wargamers in Trenches

Tel and Matt, each playing a company of Valiant Russians with support from artillery, were attempting to remove Tony's company of Germans from their dug in positions.

Great Hex War

The homebrew hex based micro-scale rules, that are currently being bashed around by the historical gamers at the club, now take their turn at representing World War One.

The British Expeditionary force takes on the Germans in some Early War action. Each unit represented an Infantry Battalion or equivalent, with around 16 units in a division\force including cavalry and artillery. The sides consisted of 2 forces each.

The Germans edged the battle through casualties inflicted, but on the field the position was fairly static as the forces got pushed back and forth between defensive positions, with alternating periods of offence and defense.

I'm not sure that the decision to switch certain units, infantry in particular, to a 6 to hit, rather than the formally universal 5+ from the WW2 games, was a good idea. It makes things rather labourious to try damage the enemy sufficiently so that the free 'regroup' replacement per turn does not automatically bring them back to full strength. The fact that the 'regrouped' unit can be placed immediately in the front line and then moved freely makes the casulty taken redundant.

The lack of casualties also make difficult to change the tactical situation on the field, and apply localised pressure on positions. This might be appropriate for the static mid-war actions but not really for the earlier period.

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When doing photographs of Great War based games I tend to tweak them to a Sepia tone to give them a faux period feel; Here is a link to someone who's achieving a similar effect but by a radical different method. Great War Greyscale
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Germanic Link Up

More Great War activity as the newly arrived Austro-Hungarians (new figures of Dave M's, he has still got some heavy artillery to fix up along with some more Infantry) attempt to link up with their Germanic allies as the Russian grimly hold onto the road awaiting a special delivery.

From Furness Wargamers in Trenches

Dread Zeppelin

This week at the club saw the re-appearance of Dave S. after a long absence, plus Paul carrying a rather large box. This turned out to be a model of the L10 Zeppelin, famous for it's bombing raid on the North-East.

This game was last played at the club in 2002, with Graeme, a previous participant, telling people of the various disastrous antics of that time and not exactly giving the current participants a feeling of hope. The large number of charts that were handed to us was also a worry.

I ended up playing the Flight Engineer, responsible for the beast's four Maybach engines and the instruments. The Kaptain was Mark, Dave S was 1st Officer, Tony as Chief Gunner. Character Sheets and Skill Checks are loosely based on the Call of Cthulhu system.

From Furness Wargamers in the Air

Two Rivers - part 2

The mini campaign continues, and reaches its conclusion, as the opposing forces rush to the vital bridges.

Two crucial battles fought during the club night, both occurring in consecutive map turns and at opposite ends of the map.

From Furness Wargamers in Trenches

Two Rivers - part 1

A mini campaign using the Warhammer Great War rules to resolve combat, as Germany and Russia fight over Poland at the start of The Great War prior to things getting too bogged down in static positions.

Paul, Tel and Matt as the Honourable Prussians verses the Barbaric Russians of Mark and Tony.

The Germans have forced a river crossing and have piled troops across the river during the night to try and secure the area between the two rivers during the following day. (Exact mission details are currently classified as the campaign is still on going)

From Furness Wargamers in Trenches

In The Air

Played some games of Wings of War at the club as nothing else to do. Choose to play a basic free for all given the uneven numbers of players. Single seaters only, with free choice of planes. Managed to win the first two sorties but was first down in the third and final one.

Elsewhere Graeme was demoing the new Cutlass rules, from Black Scorpion, in another three way battle.
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Cross Road Blues

A bit early for Robert Johnson, as two early Great War forces clash. 1914 French and Germans close upon the ruins of a small hamlet based at the crossroads.

From Furness Wargamers in Trenches

Turkey Shoot

Russians vs Turks (and Germans in Fezes)

Scenario based loosely on the actions in the Black Sea of the Battle-cruiser Goeben and Light-cruiser Breslau, after their escape from the Mediterranean and transfer to the Ottoman Navy.

Turk reinforcements were restricted to only one side of the board and it was up to the two fugitive ships to make their way to safety.

If they had decided to sail straight across then they would probably have managed to get across the tables without coming to much harm, as the Russian big ships were just not fast enough to keep pace with the more advanced German designs.

Instead they decided to circle for a bit, possibly hoping that the remaining Turks could take some of the Russian ships out. After a tussle between the Russians and the Turks, the Germans finally make a break for it.

One final attempt By the Russians at slowing the ships down with a torpedo run from the destroyers failed, and the Germans were then too far away to catch in a chase.
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Beasts of the Air

A multi player game of Wings of War took place as I finally get to use the multi-engine Bombers from Flight of the Giants.

A simple warm up game with just fighters, to get a new player familiarised with the game, was followed by what the rulebook describes as a 'Stop Them' scenario.

From Furness Wargamers in the Air