Great Western Trails - Argentina

New game built on Great Western Trails which I had enjoyed playing last year.

Beautiful game and the introduction of farmers makes it different from its predecessor and although they present hazards, they can become very valuable works.  Also new are ships and ports which offer additional and alternative ways of obtaining VPs.

Pax Pamir

A post lost during the chaos of the festive season.

Very attractive name.  The key is remembering that you are playing for yourself (family or tribe) not the nation (Afghanistan) or foreign power (England or Russia).

Played with Richard, Russell and Stefan.

You need to keep nimble with your allegiances as once a player gets ahead it can be hard to catch up.

Nemesis

Perhaps more family friendly than Diplomacy, but not without its domestic challenges.  Karen and I played with our daughter and her boyfriend.  

Not sure this game is going to photograph well.

Play really tells a story and it will be hard to capture all the excitement.

There are fifteen turns in which to fulfil our individual objectives...

We awake and start exploring the ship.

I'm the captain (blue).

Karen is the mechanic (orange)

Zoe is the scout (purple)

Tom is the soldier (red)

I have gone off the check the engines are okay.

The others are searching rooms for gear and information as to function.

The supplied miniatures are exquisite, but crying out to be painted.

Four turns have now elapsed..

Fires have broken out in some rooms

and there is a lot of disturbing noise,

but no aliens.

The mechanic is keen to find where the ship is heading.  Earth, I hope.

All engines are functional.

But there are some extraterrestrial lifeforms in the hibernation chamber.

Nasty!

It's not easy to know what to do.

I'm just trying to keep my crew alive.

The aliens are attacking the crew in multiple locations

and fires are still out of control.

I've made it to the fire control room and trying to help the mechanic battle the alien

Time is running out.

At least the fires have been supressed.

The soldier should be able to deal with that alien in the door control room.

The soldier has trapped me in a room with an alien,

but karma sees an alien take a fancy to him.

The mechanic has been infected and is trying some self-medication

but is being hampered by another alien.

The scout is busy collecting samples.

In an exciting finish, the mechanic made it to hibernation.

The scout, after successfully researching some alien corpses (aided by the captain)

has also gone into hibernation.

The soldier tried to get to hibernation but triggered an alien.

The captain fought off the alien, but it was too late for them to go into hibernation.

So the captain and solider perished and the mechanic and scout escaped, but both had been infected.  In a dramatic bit of card drawing the infection proved to be nonfatal and they lived.

The ship returned to earth fulfilling the mechanic's objective.

The scout had researched the aliens thus fulfilling her objective.

In a Pyrrhic victory the soldier had made sure Player One did not survive.

And the poor old captain, me, Player One, died trying to save himself and at least one of his crew.

Lots of fun, which is important as it is a long game (took us six hours).

Each player starts with two possible objectives and has to choose one when the first alien appears.  I had a choice between eliminate Player 2 or save myself and at least one other crew member.  I went for the latter objective obviously as Karen was Player Two.  Tom on the other hand had a dilemma: eliminate Player One or Player Two.  He made the right move in selecting the former.  

Siege Rules

This was a project I set myself for 2025.  After playing the Pyrrhic campaign in 2024 (see posts under label "Pyrrhic Campaign") and also many DBA campaigns earlier this century the siege systems, often critical to the game, always seemed a bit simplistic, based on one or two die rolls.  After playing the boardgame Kingdom of Heaven I thought that it's siege mechanics could be easily adapted for Basic Impetus (or indeed many other rulesets I am sure).

The system worked well in the Kingdom of Heaven game and so I was sure it was sound.  I've run it through a number of recent Basic Impetus games with it as an adjunct, and it has provided varied and what I consider to be valid outcomes.  These games can be found in my recent posts that as also labelled "siege".

This is the link to the finished document:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1lIl_kb3wXAXZSGRk4kpnnvRNYJz0V2rc/view?usp=sharing

More Normans

I am continuing to work on a heap of mainly Tin Soldier Dark Ages figures that I've been gifted or rescued.  I have enough to keep me busy all next year.  They do paint up fairly easily though the challenge is getting enough variety.

First up five Norman Heavy Crossbowmen DNA3 (that's what the catalogue calls them).  I've done them as crossbow armed skirmishers that will suit a few Basic Impetus armies.

Next a figure I've always liked, these ones are Norman Unarmoured Infantry DNA4.  I've based them as generic Dark Age Light Foot (FLs in Basic Impetus parlance).

The Siege of Dien Bien Phu by Bernard B Fall

This book has the subtitle "Hell in a very small space" which is certainly a good description of the place under siege.

This book was published in 1966 and I wondered if the author had published an updated edition with the release of files etc since the conflict.  Nope. His entry in Wikipedia makes for interesting reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_B._Fall and also explains why there was no sequel.

The book has a lot of detail about French troop movements during the siege, almost down to the platoon level.  The Vietminh are more handled at the division and sometimes battalion level.  Lots of anecdotes and the author was well connected having been in Indochina during the 1950s and later, as well as having access to a range of people, including Ho Chi Minh.

What comes across in the book is the bravery of the combatants, as well as the ultimately pointless slaughter.

The politics are interesting as one forgets that people making decision in the 1950s have been shaped by events going back to the 1930s.

I'm glad I was too young (just) to avoid the wider conflict.

Burgundian Ordonnance versus New Kingdom Egyptian - The Final

The final miniatures game of the year and the final in the club's Basic Impetus competition, my Burgundians face Karl's New Kingdom Egyptians.  What could go wrong?

The Egyptians find themselves out scouted and defending a hill, 

with their left flank protected by a lake and a wood.

The Burgundians are very much a full-frontal army

and so the enemy's flanks are rarely worth trying to exploit.

Shooting commences.

Burgundian crossbowmen get ready.

The Egyptian chariots advance and deliver a devastating volley of missiles.

The Burgundian left flank withers.

Oh oh!

The Burgundian left flank dissolves.

The Burgundian pike advance, pushing back the enemy to their front.

The Burgundian longbow are successfully targeting the Egyptian infantry.

The Egyptian chariots commence to wheel round to rejoin to the fight.

The Burgundian pikes keep pushing

and the Burgundian knights get ready.

Will the Egyptian chariots return to the fray in time?

Almost, but not quite...

The Egyptian army moral breaks.

And now to test out the siege rules.

The Egyptians have 4 units, 7 steps/manpower and 16 combat factors.  The resistance factor of their stronghold was 5 (no port and they have lost their leader).

The Burgundians have 7 units, 12 steps/manpower and 30 combat factors.  More importantly they still have their commander who promptly demanded the Egyptians surrender.  They did not.  It would have  saved a lot of bloodshed as we shall see.

The Burgundians implement a blockade and set about besieging the Egyptian stronghold.

There are rats in the Egyptian's food supply (#43). RF drops to 3.

The Egyptians break the blockade (#20) inflicting 4 step losses on the Burgundians.

The Burgundians construct a siege tower (#32) but the Egyptians burn it down (#45).

The Burgundians start filling in the moat (#11) dropping the RF to 2.

Then they fill in the moat some more (#12) reducing the RF to 1.

Deploying ladders and mantlets (#15) they reduce the RF to 0 and assault.

However the Egyptians have secondary defences (#29) and raise the RF to 1.

With the RF shift the attackers and defenders are on the same column on the assault table.  The defenders have a plus 2, while the Burgundian leader gives them a plus 1.  Both sides throw a 6.  The Burgundians lose 6 steps, 75% of their force!  The Egyptians lose 5 steps and are wiped out.  A very bloody victory to the Burgundians.