“Not I”, says Dene after scoring 180 to win the Archery tournament.
Jason organised a ‘have-a-go’ evening at the Burton Bridge Archery club.
The attending BAD members showed that England would indeed be safe should the French try to invade!
Despite being July it was a bit chilly. But we should be thankful that we missed the torrential rain
Assemble brave Yeomen
Paul came back to the club and walked us through his version of Chain of Command, for the Spanish civil war. I played the Nationalists (with 2 sections of Guardia each with 3 teams) an HMG and an armoured car. Peter with his social predilection played the Republicans (which had 3 big blobs of militia, some barricades, an LMG and an armoured car.
As it was out first game the scenario was pretty simple, a basic ‘kill the opponent’ while not dying type affair. The initial phase is the scouting phase. While i understood the principal I couldn’t grasp the nuance to gain any advantage. Once the deployment drop off points were set the command dice determined the arrival of the off table troops.
Tactically it was pretty simple. The communist militia were pretty poorly led (and that wasn’t just Pete!) and didn’t have much in the flexibility and were deployed in static blogs in some defensible positions.
Initially the Fascists had some early success catching one section in a crossfire between the armoured car and one section of the Police. They took withering fire, but hung on. On the other flank the other Police were caught a little in the open by the opposing armoured car, but did manage to make it into the large central Taverna (where they would safely stay all game)
The game deterioted into a firefight. The Repubicans just hung on the left flank by pullling back the section that had soaked up th attention of the Nationalist A/C and HMG , just before it was breaking an putting a whole new section into the same place.
On the right shots were exchanged, and while it did look back for the Communists, the casualties were racking up for the Nationalist, and with there more granualted force lost a rifle team and also the HMG team. So by the time we called it the VP were in Petes favour, so a winning draw for the forces of Socialism
Lovely terrain and figures from the extensive collection on Paul Scrivens Smith, very enjoyable
Come back soon
Godendag is a competition that we have been competing in for over 20 years now. It started out as DBM , moving to FoG:AM and now FoG:R. It has become an annual ritual each January, with the weather often proving a trial for attendance. The event is run by Richard Bodley Scott, who is the author of the rules, and is set in rural Wales, just past the Wye Valley before you get to the south coast.
For the club is probably the only event that most people come to, so it is a good chance to take in a few board games, a leisurely pint or two and not forgetting the excitement of the competition.
This Year (2015), we has a winning team – which is a first
I’m looking for some willing participants to play in the second scenario from the Hail Caesar – Germania book
The valour of Lucius Caedicius, prefect of the camp, deserves praise, and of those who, pent up with him at Aliso, were besieged by an immense force of Germans. For, overcoming all their difficulties which want rendered unendurable and the forces of the enemy almost insurmountable, following a design that was carefully considered, and using a vigilance that was ever on the alert, they watched their chance, and with the sword won their way back to their friends.
[Velleius Paterculus, Roman History, 2.120.4;
tr. F.W. Shipley]
Dio tells the story in greater detail but does not mention the name of the fortress. It must have been a large stronghold (it had a prefect and is called a castra) in the valley of the Lippe. The name Aliso suggests that it is identical with the fortress that Drusus had built near the river Elison, Oberaden; but this had been evacuated in 8 BCE. On the other hand, Aliso is not the same as Elison, and perhaps we are allowed to identify the fortress with Haltern, which perfectly suits Dio’s and Paterculus’ words. It was hastily evacuated: in one of the potter’s pits, at least twenty-four soldiers were buried; weapons were stored away; coins were buried in hoards; much pottery survives intact.
We’ll play this game sing FOG, as I’m not sure everyone enjoyed Hail Caesar, and everyone is familiar with these rules.
Its a slightly smaller game than last time and can accommodate up to 6 players, but I can adjust if necessary.
I would look at Thurs 13th November to playthis.
Please let me know if you are interested.
With the club in its 30th year, we’ve been trying to lay on a few game involving most members. The battle of Teutoburger Wald was fought around mid September 9AD, so given the date of the 11th in the Osprey book this seemed a suitable subject for a club game being its 2005th Anniversary. As bit of background –
The name of the Teutoburg Forest in Germany will forever be connected to one of the most famous battles from ancient history,the defeat of the Roman general Varus. In September 9 CE, a coalition of Germanic tribes, led by a nobleman named Arminius, defeated the Seventeenth ,Eighteenth, and Nineteenth legions and forced their commander Publius Quintilius Varus to commit suicide. Not much is known on these legions, because of their destruction here, and they may have the surname of possibly Gallica or Germanica. The result of the battle was that Germania remained independent and was never included in the Roman empire
Varus’ forces included his three legions (Legio XVII, Legio XVIII, and Legio XIX), six cohorts of auxiliary troops (non-citizens or allied troops) and three squadrons of cavalry (alae). Most of these lacked combat experience, both with regards to Germanic fighters, and under the prevalent local conditions. The Roman forces were not marching in combat formation, and were interspersed with large numbers of camp followers. As they entered the forest northeast of Osnabrück, they found the track narrow and muddy. According to Dio Cassius a violent storm had also arisen. He also writes that Varus neglected to send out reconnaissance parties ahead of the main body of troops.
The line of march was now stretched out perilously long — between 15 and 20 kilometers. It was in this state when it came under attack by Germanic warriors. The attackers surrounded the entire Roman army, and rained down javelins on the intruders. Arminius, recalling his education in Rome, understood his enemies’ tactics, and was able to direct his troops to counter them effectively by using locally superior numbers against the dispersed Roman legions. The Romans managed to set up a fortified night camp, and the next morning broke out into the open country north of the Wiehen Hills, near the modern town of Ostercappeln. The break-out was accompanied by heavy losses to the Roman survivors, as was a further attempt to escape by marching through another forested area, as the torrential rains continued. The rain prevented them from using their bows because sinew strings become slack when wet, and rendered them virtually defenceless as their shields also became waterlogged.
Reconstruction of the improvised fortifications prepared by the Germanic tribes for the final phase of the Varus battle near Kalkriese
The Romans undertook a night march to escape, but marched into another trap that Arminius had set, at the foot of Kalkriese Hill. There, a sandy, open strip on which the Romans could march was constricted by the hill, so that there was a gap of only about 100 meters between the woods and the swampland at the edge of the Great Bog. The road was further blocked by a trench, and, towards the forest, an earthen wall had been built along the roadside, permitting the Germanic tribesmen to attack the Romans from cover. The Romans made a desperate attempt to storm the wall, but failed, and the highest-ranking officer next to Varus, Legatus Numonius Vala, abandoned the troops by riding off with the cavalry. His retreat was in vain, however, as he was overtaken by the Germanic cavalry and killed shortly thereafter, according to Velleius Paterculus. The Germanic warriors then stormed the field and slaughtered the disintegrating Roman forces. Varus committed suicide, and Velleius reports that one commander, Praefectus Ceionius, shamefully surrendered, then later took his own life, while his colleague Praefectus Eggius heroically died leading his doomed troops.
Our game was based on the 1st scenario from the Germanica book , by Warlord games, ‘Death in the Forest’. We scaled up the force lists, and there were roughly just over 20 units per side. The table was 20’ long by just over 3’ wide. The Roman deployment was random along the length of the road. The randomness dictating where the baggage (valuable objective) would be , and there were some ‘dummy’ locations to enforce the stretched out nature of the Romans march column.
Once the Romans had been deployed then the Germans were places randomly by section. The table edges broken down into 14 sections and the 7 divisions places upon a die roll.
The rules I selected were Hail Caesar. My own brief being that the game should be able support up to 16 participants (we had a few dropouts and had 9 or 10), and could be set up played to conclusion in a weekday game night (about 3 hours). Hail Caesar is a simple set and most players picked it up quickly without much prior experience.
The game itself played as expected. The first turn the Germans get a free ambush attack while the Romans are in column. This generally meant there was a fight where the Germans rolled 9 dice to the Romans 1! 
There was a special rule any Roman units that was broken as a result of this change wouldn’t be broken but would instead be reduced down to a ‘small’ unit for the remainder of the game. The net result of this was that of the 20 units only 1 Roman was broken in this way! It may be that we forgot the ‘wild fighters’ reroll for the Germans or the fact that the Romans had a 4,5,6 armour save!!
The second turn meant that the Romans could regroups as best they could and shake out into line (being drilled they always get a free move in the rules)., they could also remove any disorders they received in the prior turn. But still most the legions had taken several ‘hits’ as a result of the ambush charge. Most were well on the way to being at their 6 hits to become shaken (and then thing get bad!)
T
hinks weren’t all their way for the Germans. The head of the Romans column had done particularly well, this may be the fact that they had encountered most the German skirmishers, and had driven most off back into the woods
The game was brutal and soon degenerated into localised bloodbaths down the length of the table. The game was always going to be stacked in favour of the Germans and after 3 hours the Romans’ break point was reached. The scenario book did have a pointing system for the result based on unit destruction, capturing baggage and killing commanders.
The final score came in at 169 points to the Germans to 89 for the Romans. A solid German victory
I’m sure we got a lot of the rules wrong, but fun was had by most, and the game seemed to play out OK.
Notable Awards go to …
