TL:DR Ben needs an excuse to use his post apocalyptic terrain and play VSF battles.
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1st January 2500 and it is the dawn of a new century and Europe is starting to recover two centuries after the Third Apocalypse. To be fair it was not much of a apocalypse. Just a shadow of the first one and less than a quarter of the second one. The Third Apocalypse only had a gigaton of nukes and no chemical or biological weapons.
The First Apocalypse in the late 20th century pummelled Europe, Russia and North America with the rest of the world just getting a smattering of nukes plus a good dose of biological weapons.
The Second Apocalypse in the 21st century pummelled China, India and Japan with once again the rest of the world getting a few nukes here and there. The USA and Russia also got a good pasting again as scores were settled and just because.
The Third Apocalypse in the 23rd century mostly hit Africa and South America with 500 megatons of ICBMs each with a few hundred tactical nukes spread around the rest of the world for good measure - to make sure no one else got too far ahead in the subsequent recovery.
So the new setting for my wargames is a recovering France - still in battle with the English and three quarters of the way through their Thousand Year War.
A shattered Europe with ruined cities, mutants and monsters, wild gangs, forbidden zones, secret lairs, lost libraries and technology, strange tribes, potential allies and probable foes, and always the scheming English. All these have to be navigated by the fledgling French empire as it struggles towards the future - hopefully apocalypse free.
The first few battles will be against the hated English - who have once again invaded a peaceful France that only wishes for Liberty, Fraternity, Justice and the complete domination of Europe.
England Invades
Protagonists An invasion force from England consisting of five companies of infantry and four Gatling Guns.
A quick reaction defence force from France of three companies of infantry, three Gatling guns, two artillery pieces and a squadron of cavalry,
Situation A small coastal town in Brittany. The evil English have launched another invasion of peaceful France. What evil designs do the English have this time?
Toys Figures all from Pendraken. Ships are Bedford Whalers and a conversion for the gun ship. Fort is a DIY effort modelled on Fort Macquarie. Town and other buildings from Outland Models.
Rules Neil Thomas's One Hour Wargames. Impressed by Peter's work over at https://gridbasedwargaming.blogspot.com/ I thought I would purchase the rules and I am very happy. While simple, they still have a lot of flavour and can be easily adapted to different situations and genres. My first few games will play the rules as written (except see postscript) with the addition only of Gatling guns.
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| Opening situation. The evil English appearing out of the sea mist, have landed at the small port town and destroyed the defending fort, top left hand corner, and three companies are now moving to reinforce the defence against the French counter attack. From the bottom you can see the French forces. Three infantry companies with attached Gatling guns, a squadron of Cuirassiers and two artillery pieces. |
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| Turn two and the French start to deploy while the English reinforcements rush to assist. |
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| First blood is drawn as the French companies come under fire. |
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| The French deploy for their assault. The English continue to hammer the French infantry companies. |
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| The English on the hill have retreated due to the French cavalry attack and supporting infantry. One French company has reached its limits and is withdrawing. The English race to create a line. |
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| On the right the French artillery and Gatling guns are decimating the infantry in the building. However, on the left their attack is faltering against the English defence. Outnumbered it looks bad for them. |
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On the right one English company has had enough and withdraws. However another company arrives to fill the gap. On the left the French assault falters as a the cavalry retreat.
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| The French retreat. Out numbered and out gunned even the fabled French Elan cannot close the gap between the forces. Nonetheless they have given the English a bloody nose. |
Will the English be able to widen their beach head to land a force capable of defeating the French? Onto the next battle.
Postscript. Well the rules are simple but so am I so I forgot a few things. Like adding two to the hit roll for rifles, dividing hits by two for units in cover. But other than that it worked fine.
Anyway, I enjoyed myself and the game played very quickly over three nights. Much faster than the other rules I have used.
