Wargaming « Steven's Balagan

Category: Wargaming

Wargaming and Military History are the interests I pour most of my spare time into. This section concentrates on the wargaming rules I’m interested in. I’ve got quite a lot on running wargaming campaigns. I’ve also got sub-categories on: Crossfire, DBx (including DBA and HOTT), Twilight of the Sun King, Engle Matrix Games, Megablitz, Liberators QPR, Field of Glory. All other rules are lumped together.

Kiwis in Italy – Steven’s Wargaming Project

Kiwi Sherman from Cover of 4th New Zealand Armoured Brigade in Italy

They have been on my to do list for years – Kiwis in Italy or, more technically, 2 (NZ) Division in the Italian Campaign of 1943-45. I’m thinking a Crossfire Battalion of infantry and some armour to support them. Here are my overly extravagant Kiwi plans for 2020.

Steven’s Aspirational Order of Battle

Nothing like a bit of excess to start the year. So here is what I’m intending to collect

Steven’s Kiwi in Italy 4 NZ Armoured Brigade 20 Armoured Regiment Reconnaissance Troop, Regimental HQ, 20 Armoured Regiment [Mud-grey with Blue-black disruptive pattern] 3 x Stuart V 3

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2020 Confessions of a Megalomaniac Wargamer and Amateur Historian

2020. New year. New decade (depending on how you count these things). 2019 was a good year but I want 2020 to be even better. My crazy inner megalomaniac demands I monologue about my world conquering (i.e. overly ambitious) list of what I’d like to get done this year. Get ready for the ride …

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Small Lutzen – A Tillys Very Bad Day Battle Report 1

Tilly-926 Swedish Sandwich gets chewed up

Jamie and Chris play tested the pre-publication version my Small Lutzen – A Tilly’s Very Bad Day Scenario. This is a small game on a small table with small armies (in numbers of units), and only normal Pike+Shot not Large Pike+Shot.

Summary: Scenario needed tweaking before publication. Swedes couldn’t win.

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Small Lutzen – A Tilly’s Very Bad Day Scenario

Small Table - Lutzen - Tillys Very Bad Day

Tilly’s Very Bad Day has two game scales: Small Games and Big Games. I’ve already done the Big Lutzen Scenario and this is the Small Game scenario for the same battle: the Battle of Lutzen (16 November 1632) in the Thirty Years War. That means this scenario is for a small game on a small table with small armies (in numbers of units), and only normal Pike+Shot not Large Pike+Shot.

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2019 Reflections of a Megalomaniac Wargamer and Amateur Historian

Megalomaniac 2019

My Confessions of a Megalomaniac were my 2019 aspirations. How did I do?

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Musing on Cavalry Pursuit in Tilly’s Very Bad Day

Prince Rupert's cavalry at Edgehill

I asked whether I should introduce baggage camps to Tilly’s Very Bad Day. Opinions where mixed, of course, but for me the big take away was baggage camps were a red herring. The thing to simulate is cavalry pursuit. The questions is how? I’ve been mulling over pursuit in a couple of contexts. I thought I’d share and see what you think. These are not well formed thoughts. Just a bit a jumble to reflect the various considerations and possibilities.

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Big Lutzen – A Tilly’s Very Bad Day Battle Report 2

Tilly-679 Massed Swedes

Adam and Jamie played my big Lutzen scenario for Tilly’s Very Bad Day.

Summary: Good game. A better game than last time. Jamie (Imperialists) beat Adam (Swedes) on Game Turn 6.

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John Mumby replays Imperialist versus Swedes in Tilly’s Very Bad Day

Terrain Card Table 1 - Tillys Very Bad Day

John Mumby is one of my proof readers, and has also kindly sent through a short battle report. He replayed my Imperialists beat Swedes game of Tilly’s Very Bad Day

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Factions in a multi-player Thirty Years War Campaign

I keep thinking about a multi-player Campaign for the Thirty Years War. Two of the big questions is how many factions and what are they? I take a quick look at board games for inspiration before taking a view. There are quite a few board games for the Thirty Years War. Many focus on simulating the entire war so I thought I have a look at what factions they have.

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Big Lutzen – A Tilly’s Very Bad Day Battle Report 1

Tilly-574 Crossing the road under fire is not easy

Chris and Adam played a very raw version of my big Lutzen scenario for Tilly’s Very Bad Day.

Summary: Good game. Some debate about how to simulate the road and ditches. Adam (Imperialists) beat Chris (Swedes) on Game Turn 6. The scenario evolved after the game.

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Should I introduce baggage camps to Tilly’s Very Bad Day?

P1000834 Dutch Camp

Richard (doctorphalanx) has been encouraging me to introduce baggage camps into Tilly’s Very Bad Day. I like painting up camps for DBA and I already have a camp for my Dutch army of the Thirty years War. My question is, was looting the baggage train/camp a significant event in any battles of the Thirty years War or English Civil War?

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Big Lutzen – A Tilly’s Very Bad Day Scenario

Table - Lutzen - Tillys Very Bad Day

This is a big Tilly’s Very Bad Day scenario for the Battle of Lutzen (16 November 1632). An outnumbered Imperialist army must hold a strong defensive position until reinforcements arrive. Historically this battle is where King Gustavus died, so was a key moment in the Thirty Years War. In game terms this is a big game on a big table with big armies.

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Metal Measuring Sticks for Big Bases and Small

Sticks-02 40mm sticks used for Triumph during Punic Wars

I’ve been playing DBA for years, and all measurement is in multiples of 1 inch. However, many games are moving to base width as a measurement, which for most people are the 40mm wide DBx bases. But I’ve moved to Big Bases including for Big Base DBA. That means I need 2 inch measurements and 80mm measurements. Here is how I solved this problem.

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Imperialists beat Swedes – 2 Player Game of Tilly’s Very Bad Day

Tilly-105 Locked in melee

Adam and Chris played an Imperialist versus Swedish match up of Tilly’s Very Bad Day. Adam and Chris have a very different play style to Jamie and I so this game played out in an interesting way. Very gritty with one giant scrimmage forming. Eventually Adam’s Imperialists took the day. We were playing several draft rules for a major revision.

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Yahoo groups is dead. Long live groups.io for Crossfire Discussion

After 20 years the Yahoo group for Crossfire is closing. This is not by our choice, Yahoo is closing all groups.

Like many other distraught groups, we are moving to groups.io. With generous financial help from the fine chaps of the Crossfire community we managed to fund an expedited transfer from Yahoo to groups.io.

The new Crossfire forum on groups.io is up and running. With the transfer we got all members (with active emails), posts, files, photos, whatever.

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