The complex 17th Century

Helion, which publishes Peter Dennis' fantastic Paperboys of which I have far too many, has been inching towards making more of its material available as ebooks. They've finally got around to digitizing their own series of wargaming rules and guides, so I picked up a couple volumes that have interested me since their publication.

Reading ebooks is frustrating when you have a cat and a touchscreen.

Every Bullet Has Its Billet by Barry Hilton (author of Beneath the Lily Banners) is a short but punchy guide to wargaming the late 17th century, including an overview of many different conflicts. This is a period that I know almost nothing about, barring a bit about the Monmouth Rebellion, Glorious Revolution, and Irish-and-Scottish reactions to the latter. (An artifact of having read primarily British sources and listened to almost nothing but traditional folk music in childhood.

Notes and takeaways:

• Learned that the Cameronian regiment descended from Covenanters, and a bit more about their role. Would be a useful "extra" period to use my small ECW and '45 collection in.
• The Turkish-Christian conflict of the late 1600s (of which I only knew of the 1683 siege of Vienna) was one of the great upheavals of history.
• Many of the conflicts are described as "colorful," with a wide variety of antagonists and units even in fairly small conflicts, and diverse scenario opportunities. This is always useful in a setting.
• There was so much international "churn" among mercenaries that Hilton calls it an "ecosystem" of tactical innovation and experience. He seems keen to note that every rule and regulation had its exceptions in part because an officer who had fought the Ottomans might next find himself in Ireland. The same goes for the uniforms; while every veteran unit ends up with a motley of clothing, it sounds like there were fewer rules at this point, where the modern "regiment" was still coalescing. By the end of the period, the "traditional" look was there, but it took a long time.
• On the other hand, like the armies, that allows for plenty of variety in painting and modeling, too. As I use small-scale Paperboys, that may not be all that useful... the many different color schemes means that it's possible to rehome a regiment by simply switching out the command bases.
• The proportion of troop types (generally 3:1 or 4:1 Infantry:Cavalry) is important to get right. With too many infantry, the game is slow and dice-driven (by the infantry shooting), while with more cavalry the game is more fluid. (This might seem obvious, but the point he makes here is that players must watch their flank more when there is a possibility of it being ridden down!) Artillery has little combat effect, but much morale effect.
• The Danish army was incredibly varied in color, particularly the contingents sent to Ireland which had not switched to grey coats yet. I am reminded of Charles Grant Sr's famous Vereinigtestaadt army, composed of whatever colors he fancied, so this could be a fine basis for an Imaginations force.
• French elite troops saw more active service than those of other countries, and there were lots of them, so Guards regiments and the like can form a fair proportion of an army.

A few rules-neutral scenarios are provided; I like the Ride of the Kentish Knock, a small naval scenario from 1652 which I could probably recreate with Junior General Trafalgar rules, and The Bogside, a "stealing supplies" scenario which is presented for Donnybrook but I imagine could work for Sharp Practice or even The Sword and the Flame (hm, British trapped in an outpost and a herd of goats just standing there outside the gate?).

The book concludes with a handful of useful basing, painting and rules tips. Training was at such a low level that only the most basic infantry maneuvers were possible - another reason for having plenty of cavalry to add tactical interest. One curious element of Hilton's games (in particular because I keep a travel journal) is that he tracks every unit in his games, writing down their successes and failures for posterity. A charming addition normally reserved for campaigns, but I can agree that this sort of writing can bind up a lot of memories. Perhaps that's why I started this blog.

Interesting battles I haven't heard about: Bass Rock, Hudson's Bay

Games that sound interesting: Donnybrook, Mad For War, Beneath the Lily Banners (all by Barry Hilton), Free Fast Play Naval Rules for Anglo-Dutch Wars by legio-wargames.com, and Victory Without Quarter (also free) by Quindia Studios.

A fine overview, one that makes me fear getting dragged into another period. He writes, "A last word on collecting either land or naval forces, focus!"

Farewell to Monarchs

 First off, my tribute of sorts to current events:

Work was so busy today that this was literally relaxation.
And I only finished two of four Dragoon Guards and zero
of twelve Grenadier Guards - might co-opt the teens into helping
me finish them next week.

I also had three books for the display - one had been removed by
the time I took this picture, which I suppose is a good sign.

I've just (finally) finished The Last King of America: the Misunderstood Reign of George III (the American title; the original is George III: the Life and Reign of Britain's Most Misunderstood Monarch). And, timely, it gave me an insight into the latest Queen Regnant.

I feel the author's politics and obvious bias hurt it a little. OK, I expect anyone has to be obsessed with their subject to write a biography in the first place, but it turns out Andrew Roberts has, ahem, a reputation. I may be a touch biased myself what with two history degrees, but let's start with saying I don't think George III has quite as bad a reputation in the US as Roberts seems to think.

The heart of the book, I feel, is the depiction of George as a typical and actually rather quiet and unassuming Hanoverian king.

See, monarchs don't really DO anything substantial anymore.

I follow one particular liberal/skeptical/science blog, where the posters are pouring scorn on Liz for being the beneficiary of a (literally) rich heritage of colonial oppression, and for not just dissolving the useless monarchy. But honestly, I don't think she ever had a choice. She had no power. Giving royal assent doesn't mean quite as much when, if you don't give it, you cause a constitutional crisis. If she had declared publically that, say, Britain should leave Kenya, there'd probably have been a riot. And the crown jewels may technically belong to the monarchy, but there'd be a lot of diplomatic work before you could just carve off the Koh-i-noor Diamond and return it to the Punjab - which the monarch wouldn't have any part of. Just because something belongs to you doesn't make it easy to give away.

Society is entrenched, which is why there are still monarchs in the first place.

The thing about her reputation is that it's effectively built on air, because her constitutional duty was essentially to sit there.

And so was George's, for much of his reign.

It's easy to impute values to someone who, in a practical sense, cannot speak her true mind. (Did she have the right to vote?) The "fount of honour" is a symbolic thing - a fountain doesn't actually move or control the water that passes through it. There's also the meme, "be quiet and be thought wise, or open your mouth and remove all doubt." Some members of the royal family manage to keep to the former, others the latter. 

The conventional wisdom in popular media might be that George and Charles are similar - slightly flaky types without obvious substance; the truth is that George was more like Elizabeth in his rectitude (the only Hanoverian king not to cheat on his wife), his religious faith, his incredible sense of duty, and his general determination (despite later propaganda) to play a less, well, commanding role. He had the ability to choose and dismiss ministers (and had a talent for choosing reluctant ones), but like Liz he stuck to the letter of the law and generally let Parliament do its thing without hindrance. Perhaps Americans' attitudes about monarchy are rooted in misconceptions about how it works? ;)

Andrew Roberts' most telling counters to the claims of tyranny are the cases in which George had to accept governments and ministers he despised, or be libeled and satirized by a baying press. Heck, he went to bat for several attempted assassins, who ended up in asylums rather than on the scaffold. To me, this sounds a lot like Liz. (Not to mention just generally keeping one's cool when offered something surprising to eat, or being treated with disrespect by a foreign dignitary or even a civilian).

Some monarchs (and presidents) travel through life with absolute grace, which in context means being unruffled and invariably polite. (Though this is probably much easier when you have dozens of handlers and guards, and therein, perhaps, lies one of the roots of republicanism.)

Some are gaffe-prone or generally awkward or perhaps (like Lincoln) rough-hewn, but work hard and remain dedicated.

And some just don't care.

George drifted through all three of these in the course of his life (the final stage wasn't his fault). He did have enough influence to build up or tear down a couple governments, but generally let those governments do their thing once they were in place. He didn't, for example, lead during the Napoleonic Wars - but he became, at least for the first half, the rock around which the nation rallied. His son would have done far worse (and boy, are George IV's faults listed here). In fact, an incident is mentioned where George jr demanded a generalship and an army to command and had to be reminded that his place was near the King; his brothers got to command, but not him.

Society was entrenched for him, too, and (like Edward VIII) stepping out of control created enormous scandal.

Sometimes I think the discredited Great Man of History theory still has a point. It absolutely is the lower classes that do all the work, but there is still some value in looking at decision points. And who makes the decisions? So-called Great Men.

In the 18th century UK, prime ministers made those decisions. Kings didn't. 

George III was extremely serious about his oaths, which meant he knew and accepted that he was subordinate to Parliament. Americans, and some liberal politicians, thought otherwise, but they were wrong. (George wrote a LOT of letters for historians to pore over, excellent insight into his thinking.) Without acceptance of Parliament's role, his great-grandfather could not have come from Hanover. He owed his place to Parliament's toleration. 

A monarch is just a cypher. 

In more ways than one.

(Edit: I don't mean that in the sense of a rubber stamp; the monarch (and any head of state that isn't also head of government) can be a constitutional "backstop" of last resort. I'm thinking more in terms of a unifying symbol - as symbolized by the actual cypher, money, badges, etc - and also unknowable thoughts that make it easier to accept the symbol and accept its quiet influence.)

What she DOES or THINKS doesn't seem to have mattered quite as much as that she was THERE. She doesn't have to be anything else to be regarded as important or special. Conflicts can and have arisen that way, when others don't regard "sacred cows" or unquestioned truths the same way. The American colonists' dispute with George was partly a cultural misunderstanding, because the Americans were becoming increasingly far from the British mainstream. And many independent countries today have good reasons to reconsider the relevance of the Commonwealth that Elizabeth wasn't, but represented.

Today, Parliament is a different beast, less oligarchical; even the House of Lords has a smaller role. The US is the same way. Suffrage is far wider, so that ordinary people have a greater say in what happens. And since they do, they also have more say in what the monarchy's role should be. I'll be interested to see how attitudes change after this first outburst of national grief and pride...

Up the Whatsit Valley

 Having watched Sgt Guinness' campaign for a while, I'm seriously thinking about running one of my own set in the Northwest Frontier. Since I'll be doing it solo, my best bet is to use Charles S. Grant's classic Programmed Wargames Scenarios. The obvious scenarios are from the final chapter, Reconnaissance in Strength, in which a Blue "player" force marches upcountry against a programmed Red force. My first thought, given the Great-Game-gone-hot feel of my Wofun collection, was to have an Afghan force in the center of a valley, with Russians and British both coming at him from opposite ends. After they meet in the middle, having between them vanquished the locals, they would have one big fight to settle who holds the entire pass.

The catch is that Red force needs nine infantry units, four cavalry and two gun batteries, while Blue has five infantry, three cavalry and two batteries. The artillery provided in the "complete" set is actually very ample for all three, no problem there. But for the rest:

Afghans - four infantry units, one and a half cavalry units.

Indian Army - three infantry units, two cavalry units.

Russians - three infantry units, three and a half cavalry units.

These are on the order of 15-20 infantry or 8-10 cavalry apiece. To field the appropriate numbers, I'd need to break them down into half-units. Easy enough, and there are options for that in both The Sword and the Flame and The Men Who Would be Kings, but it might still seem a little small. Perhaps the scenarios can be modified. I also needn't stick quite to the suggested proportions - a Russian army with lots of cavalry seems appropriate! One issue is that Blue ends the series with not only his "standard" force, but the survivors from previous scenarios, thus having to be larger. Of course we could just have a standard campaign, with two of these allied against the other. Russians and their Afghan allies invading the Raj?

Another possibility is Bob Cordery's Bundock and Bayonet, in which companies are represented by five figures. That would work alright.

On the other hand, I'm reading the "Gordon Expedition" chapter of Mike Snook's Into the Jaws of Death right now, and I have plenty of River War minis... this "scenario-string" would work just fine for that, too, with some fiddling with the numbers since in TSATF the natives should always significantly outnumber the Europeans. Perhaps simply doubling Blue's assigned assets?

Thoughts and suggestions welcomed.

Visiting Fort Abercrombie

 No gaming this week because I spent it visiting Kodiak, Alaska, where my sister's working for the summer. (Well, there was a game store with 40K and RPGs, but I didn't get to visit for game night...) Saw lots of wildlife, including bears, salmon, eagles, kingfishers, etc. and some nice local museums, as well as walking, air and boat tours! (a busy week!) I'm posting here because there is a small but impressive little museum on Miller Point at the north end of Kodiak Island from the Aleutian Campaign of WWII.

Diorama of 8" gun emplacement.

The "Rufe" (floatplane Zero) is fanciful, as Kodiak
was never raided. Rumor has it that one attempt was
scrubbed by weather.

Electrical station (left) and searchlight shelter (right).

Some of the equipment and bunkers are still there, accessible via hiking trails:

8" gun barrel

Destroyed in situ.

Former emplacement.

Ready ammo bunker, now a museum.

Some of the models and displays inside the museum:

A Japanese fire hydrant

P-38 wing.

Working HAM Radio...

... and teletype.

Grenades made from pottery!

A few souvenirs from Iraq

My sister inside the generator room.

No idea what this is.

Searchlight shelter, with tracks to roll them out.

Last but not least, an ivory C130 at the Alutiiq (native) museum!
A tempting souvenir...

I did spend some time reading, mostly on the flights to and fro. Two Mike Snook histories which I'll probably have something to say about shortly. See you then!

Reading and Rambling

Haven't posted in awhile because I've done no gaming - work has been busy enough that I haven't felt like it when I get home, but not so busy that I absolutely have to kill something when I get home.

I've been reading a lot, though.

Still working on this one, mostly because I only read it in the bathroom. Up to about 1785. It's quite recent and very pro-Georgian (and very dismissive of the American viewpoint). The main takeaways are:

• that George III had very little at all to do with the American Revolution
• that George didn't suffer from porphyria, but was instead bipolar. While the author is very definite about this, from what I've read it is still a controversial claim. His 1765 attack is sympathetically described.

Two of his early prime ministers, Lord Bute and Lord North were close favorites (his teacher and childhood friend respectively) and neither was confident about their ability to be prime minister yet stayed because George practically begged them. This seems to be the real problem of the Revolutionary period - North was in office for twelve years and hated most of it, and the fact he was in debt to George made things worse. He kept trying to resign, but the only people available to replace him were practically pro-American, much less anti-government.

Roberts goes through every complaint against George III in the Declaration of Independence to demonstrate that all but one of them either weren't attributable to George (because Parliament was calling the shots and George knew it wasn't his job), or were put into place after the start of the war over a year before (thus not having been causes of the Revolution, but effects). It wasn't just at this point, and not just in America, but especially given that this was published just last year, there were terrifying antecedents to modern misinformation techniques at work. Hilariously, the Americans tried to convince Quebec to revolt with them, when they had stoked rage against Britain by invoking its toleration of its new Catholic French citizens as a sign of popery and incipient tyranny.

At more than one point during the war, elements of the government - and not just the opposition - were on the verge of offering the Americans practically everything they wanted. The entire theme of this section of the book is that George wasn't a tyrant, didn't want to be one, and wouldn't have been allowed by British law if he'd wanted to. He did, however, have a surprising amount of influence, and was instrumental in the rise to power of Pitt the Younger.

Also only partway through this, up to the point where the 24th discovered they were fucked. Good enough, though, that I have also borrowed Into the Jaws of Death and intend to read his other books. I've seen plenty of reviews on blogs and comments on the Colonial Wargaming Facebook group - particularly for his Go Strong Into the Desert - that I had to pick one, and the Kindle version was on sale.

I'm not very "up" on Isandlwana, though I've played Rorke's Drift several times with The Sword and the Flame rules (in 1:1!). Zulu Dawn is also a less regarded film than the classic Zulu. But it is of course the pivotal moment of the Zulu War, and Col. Snook's account is extremely detailed. The maps are useful, though in electronic form it's impossible to just switch back and forth when he goes on about specific dongas and kopjes. So I'm probably not getting everything possible out of this, but it remains a fascinating and tragic story. One thing I was unaware of was that the approaching Zulu army did not intend to attack that day; if not fired on they would have sent a delegation to politely demand of the British why they were invading. Things wouldn't have gone much better, I imagine! Another interesting note is that if the British had formed square, they might have survived; not only did they separate their forces in the face of the enemy (an obvious no-no), but contrary to depictions of close-set thin-red-lines, the infantry were spread out in open order.

Also, again contrary to received wisdom, although the 24th was still the 2nd Warwickshire at this time, it had been based at Brecon, Wales since 1873 and over half the 2nd Battalion were Welsh. So, yes, many of them would have known Men of Harlech.

A very interesting method of portable solo play. There have been many blogposts and reviews of this series lately. Haven't tried it yet; I ordered it because I have ECW Wofuns, but unfortunately the bases are 30mm and the hexes 25mm. Of course I could copy and resize them, but that would require splicing paper together or going to a shop to print on larger sheets. I will probably print some Junior General minis for the purpose, although I'm very tempted to buy some hex terrain - especially now with news that Heroscape may be republished!

I've finally got all five of this classic series. Sadly, two of them - this one and the American Civil War volume - have no rules, though both are fine beginner's guides to the period. Herbert's book does include reviews of rules from 1990, including The Sword and the Flame. He also has a few scenarios - I particularly like his suggestions for a 1:1 skirmish between Boers and Bushveldt Carbineers, the same one that led to the trial in the film Breaker Morant. (Morant was played by Edward Woodward, a gamer who headlined the first TV series about wargaming, Battleground.)

The reason I like this scenario is that it is clearly influenced by the RPG-forerunner skirmish games of the '70s. Names and character stats are even provided for the troops; though their meaning isn't stated I could probably use them with Free Kriegspiel techniques in a pinch. That's tempting. Though my local group are sometimes wary of new games, they have been remarkably tolerant of my efforts and interests. We'll see.

From the Sewers They Come

 Had another of my 1-hour semi-DnD sessions at work. For once, I had three players, but two of them were fellow staff. This was by design; the other adults are considering running games of their own, most likely as substitutes for mine. (I won't be at work next Thursday, for example.)

• Player 1: Student, playing a Level 3 druid with a chameleon familiar. (This is the same one who played the druid with a cat familiar in the displacer beast incident.) 
• Player 2: Fellow staff with an arcane magic-user, displaced from her own world. (From the Walking Library incident.)
• Player 3: Fellow staff with college-educated magic-user and a powerful magic staff. First game of XD20 for her, but an experienced RPG player and game-master.

When playing games like this, a group dynamic helps enormously, especially when the players know the basic mechanics - not of specific rules, but the social mechanics of working together, searching for clues, and bouncing ideas off each other. This is why I like to draw in adults when I can, even in sillier games like this one.

The party (nominally led by Player 1, who had received a promotion after a previous session in which she rescued a chocolatier held prisoner by brownies), was informed, "There's a giant crocodile coming out of the sewers between Main Street and Taverner's Row! Go handle it!"

They arrived to find milling and fleeing civilians, a giant crocodile clambering out of a pothole, and some nervous City Guard desperately hoping that our heroines would bail them out of this mess.

Fairly quickly, a divergence in method developed. Player 1, peaceful and with the natural world her responsibility, was pitted against Player 3, who defaulted to the usual violent methods inherent in your average DnD encounter. 

They discussed and explored the situation for a while. The Druid's familiar did its best to help sense the monster's mood (hungry), but she rolled badly on a communication attempt; the croc snapped at the poor lizard, whence it scampered back to its mistress and hid in her robes. Other spells the players tried included trapping it with vines (on a die roll we decided the nearby government buildings were covered with ivy) - they failed to hold it; and a cold spell to freeze the cold-blooded creature in its tracks - slowed it down but no more.

As they continued to discuss possibilities and the NPC guards started to panic, I suddenly demanded awareness and dodge checks. Something tentacled appeared out of the nearest manhole cover.

The situation at this point:
- center: giant croc in pit
- circles around croc: terrified guards
- top: tentacled horror
- "You": the players
- upper right: government building
- lower right: tavern

The guards scattered, most of them heading for a nicely fortified government building; they spent the rest of the session firing arrows at the croc.

Player 1 tried to distract the croc, successfully in the sense that it couldn't decide where to go or what to eat first.

Player 2 generally supported the others, helping lift things or adding power to spells, and also tried her best to stop the tentacled squid-thing from ripping apart a nearby tavern.

Player 3 asked if there was methane in the sewer (there was), then dashed into the bar across the street and negotiated for a barrel of ale. Fine Dragon's Brew XXX, to be precise.

Her aim was not precise (her intent was to drop it into the sewer under the still trundling croc), but a high roll for effect definitely scorched and knocked out the croc. It also stunned the squid.

Unfortunately, it also caused a fuel-air explosion underground. Several more manhole covers disappeared into orbit, and fire belched out of every latrine in the area to set the buildings on fire.

The druid, encouraged and assisted by the others, managed to draw rain from the clouds overhead to douse the flames. Amid a fuming haze and the sound of wailing hand-cranked sirens and protests of the citizenry, the drenched party hauled the monsters off to the zoo for disposal.

Still, mission accomplished, right?

Mini-INWarD

Had a fairly busy day at work, but got a little gaming in - a couple chess games in which I got badly trounced, and a quick solo round of Bob Cordery's Portable Naval Wargame - the old free version. Though hex-based, it wasn't hard to modify it for squares.

As today is the birthday of Fred T. Jane (International Naval Wargames Day), I was inspired by this:

Our system has most of the reprints from the '60s. I borrowed this for the original Jane rules in the back, but while they're too complex for my purposes the clean line drawings work great for hasty squadrons. I copied a couple Portuguese cruisers and Austrian torpedo boats at 50% and taped the side-ons to the top-downs. They turned out to be smaller than necessary:

Turn 2: The cruisers are still out of range, but the torpedo boats
launch ordnance at each other and hit. My opponent is sunk,
my own is damaged badly enough to retreat from the board.

The cruisers pound each other for a couple turns.
Here my opponent (left) is not in position to broadside,
so rolls half dice in exchange for my full four.

By the time I'd done four of six points damage to
my opponent, he'd done three to me. That forced
him off board, while my own miniscule paper ship
proudly sailed the seas...

It would have been more interesting had I built larger fleets, but I was in a hurry and also cutting very tiny silhouettes. I am tempted to purchase the Wofun Tsushima set, or 3D-print a fine Tsushima series from Thingiverse, but haven't gotten round to it yet. Whatever I use, the rules are simple enough for beginner's play. Still haven't had a chance to try DBN.

Happy INWarD!