Murder Mysteries of the Raj

Last week I discovered a period mystery series by author Barbara Cleverly (almost a spoonerism for Beverly Cleary...).

Simla being the winter capital of the Raj, this at once caught my eye. It's the second in a series about Scotland Yard detective Joe Sandilands, set in 1922 India. An unusual period for a colonial series, but it does inspire some ideas for games set in the Northwest Frontier or the "Back of Beyond."

According to the dedication in the third volume, the hero is named for Brigadier Harold Sandilands, DSO, GOC Peshawar District during the 1920s.

Some of the atmospheric military elements in the series:

• A brief combat scene between Afridis and Highlanders in 1910, in which one officer is captured and tortured, left for dead but another officer goes back for him.
• Guns hidden under a fortified hut, and a race to prevent them reaching a tribe before it revolts.
• A house burned by dacoits and the hot-trod "posse" of Indian cavalry that goes after them.
• Life on a military "station" - officers' wives, polo, clubs, a regimental tradition of riding in pajamas to commemorate a famous battle.
• Fictional units named the Bengal Greys and Slater's Horse.
• A handful of VIPs and tourists coming out to a fort to see the "real" frontier, to the chagrin of the Army who have to look after them.
• Two of them are kidnapped and brought to an Afghan fort, while a Bristol Fighter is sent out to look for them.
• And lots of references to Kipling, including a few elements of plot such as the Pathan orphan who is adopted by a British officer.

This description of Afghan cavalry would make for an interesting conversion:

"They seemed to be a regular army force down to the waist but irregular frontier raiders below that. Chestnut silk turbans, loose khaki tunics, patch pockets, cross belts and aigulettes with, below them, baggy trousers and tall boots. Many were armed with spears which, taken in conjunction with the fluttering flags, managed to give an air of a medieval force. All, Joe noticed, were equipped with bolt-action rifles as good as anything carried by the Scouts."

Only the first four books of the series, out of thirteen, are set in India; the rest are back in England. They are:

• The Last Kashmiri Rose
• Ragtime in Simla
• The Damascened Blade
• The Palace Tiger

Enjoyable reads, and worth it for the inspiration and characterful descriptions. Check them out.

Painting a 3rd Edition Ruin

 I picked up this Warhammer 40K relic at Recon, and have been slowly assembling and painting it.

Undercoat with Chaos Black spray:

Basecoat of Army Painter Castle Grey:

I bought a GW large base brush for this, then made the mistake of using it like a drybrush. All those windows, hard to get the brush into or on them. I'll probably do a second coat.

Added a second coat, this time with a large drybrush, but like the first coat more of a rough layer. The lighting on these photos is poor enough that it's probably not noticeable; I wonder how much a lightbox costs, because the one at work is impressively useful. I will, however, have to do something like wood for the slats in the second floor.

Next a rough and heavy wash of Agrax Earthshade, with inadvertent pooling. Using this paint type takes getting used to.

I left the wooden slats untouched at this point.

A cat investigates.

My next effort was done outside, in the natural light of a Sunday afternoon. I enjoyed it, despite the heat.

A layer of Ash Grey on the upper floor. Not always successful
at avoiding the crevices...

Selective layer of Ash Grey on details, and a bit of edge
highlighting on the columns.

While idly watching some Games Workshop painting videos, I actually learned a tip that I've never heard before - and am too late to use here. When you're laying down color, don't go back over wet paint, because it's partly dry by then and the mix of dry and wet layers will result in a poor finish. So not just thin coats, but wait for the first to dry! Interesting, and something I'll definitely take care over in future.

Final pictures in better light:

The final step was to paint the wooden slats with 
Hardened Leather Speedpaint.

And a video!

I think the contrast with the floor is too stark, but I'm happy with the window detailing - which was relaxing and enjoyable. I think this is the first piece of kit-built terrain I've ever painted; it was certainly worth the attempt. I may go back and edge-highlight the rest of the jutting wall bits and possibly the windows too.

Space Marine: The Board Game

I picked up Space Marine this week. Partly to see if there were any solo mechanics in it (given that one side is a single miniature) and partly because it was 20+ minis and a heavy card "gameboard" for forty bucks, which is surprisingly good when we're discussing Games Workshop. The boards themselves are two for sixty bucks...

I haven't played the videogame.

The packaging is surprisingly
enviro-friendly; the paper envelope
contains dice, for example, and plastic
is saved by leaving the bases loose.
(Don't let your cat in the box!)

Assembling the titular Space Marine.
A bit complex for such a small figure,
it's hard to close the space between
the push-fit components.

The finished figure.

Three Termagants, enough for the first scenario...

... which covers basic moving, shooting and armor saves.

The dark lines represent walls - blocking line of sight rather than providing cover, but they look just the right size to fit the card walls that came in the Warhammer Alliance set, which will be nice if I get around to running this at work.

The rules are abbreviated:

• Both move 6".
• Marine gets two shots, hitting on 3+.
• Nids get one shot apiece, hitting on 4+.
• No wound rolls.
• Nids get 5+ armor saves.
• Marine has a 3+ save and five wounds.

After the first moves and exchange of fire, the Nids miss every shot.

After three turns, the Marine killed all three Termagants but took two wounds to do it. I think I see how the seemingly asymmetric "armies" (twenty critters vs. one Marine) are not as badly matched as they appear.

The Termagants (twenty of them, from the new starter set) are far easier to build, with four parts apiece. I am thinking of building them all, prepping them for "slap-chop" painting and then using them for a paint program with Contrast. After that, maybe small games pitted against the Battle Sisters ... but that's for another day, or at the rate this is likely to go, another year... A productive day as is. See you next time.

Slow going

Work and home have taken up a lot of my time lately. A sudden parental visit coinciding with a week-off and some urgent tasks at work have led to not much time to game. A few things I'm desultorily working on:

I do witter on a lot about books on this blog, but I discovered something useful today. The popular ebook app Libby (until recently known as Overdrive) has free access to two well-known wargaming magazines:

Screenshot from my library's catalog.

Miniature Wargames and Wargames, Soldiers and Strategy are two journals I haven't seen much of because, unlike the other big sellers of the industry White Dwarf and Wargames Illustrated, they haven't much web presence. A few issues are available on the semi-legal Scribd, a handy place for finding some out-of-print stuff like Airfix magazines. My library (or perhaps the app) are limited to about a year's back issues, but that'll take me a while to get through and enjoy, and they can be checked out for three weeks. Hey, they're worth the few pennies of my local tax dollars that paid for them!

The other gaming thing I've done is start in to painting the classic 3rd Edition Warhammer 40K ruin I bought at Recon:

Thus far, I've undercoated it in Chaos Black and based it in Army Painter Castle Grey, damaging a large basecoating brush in the process while trying to get inside all the windows. I may do another thinner coat; then I intend to shade it with Agrax Earthshade and highlight with Ash Grey for an aged, stony look. I'm undecided whether to layer, edge or drybrush the highlight, though; any suggestions? Maybe layer, then edge with an even lighter color. I've also just noticed that there are wooden slats at the edge of the broken floor, which should probably be in some sort of brown... I've been watching too many Youtube painting videos.

Finally, I reread Return of the Twelves. I never get tired of that one.

Tactical Combat In Vietnam

This report took a while, and I may not post again for a week or more. Life is busy, work exhausting and I am taking a staycation to deal with some stuff. This means I missed a good round of interwar Tactical Combat last Saturday, because my work schedule is annoyingly wonky.

But the Saturday before that, I made it to Das Krieg Haus again for a game set in Vietnam; specifically Ben Het, 3 March 1969.

CIDG camp, with target objective (a 175mm gun) to left.

This was a night battle - primarily a to-hit modifier, as range for most weapons at this scale (1:1) is unlimited. Shooting in Tactical Combat is akin to The Sword and the Flame - roll-under on a D20, so we mostly required 5 or less to hit. Since most weapons have two or more shots, this isn't as bad as it looks, and even at 1:1, it was mostly an armor battle and there weren't, say, hundreds of infantry on the table. It's assumed this is a fraction of the larger combat.

This was also a rare tank-on-tank action - Two M48 Pattons and an M42 Duster vs. eight PT-76 light tanks and a BTR-50 tracked transport. This was a PAVN attempt to break into a Civilian Irregular Defense Group camp (backed up by the armor and a handful of US advisors and spec-forcers). So the rest of the units (some of them reserves) were:

US/SVN: One 60mm mortar, one 4.2" mortar, 27 CIDG with M16s, light machine guns, grenade launchers and light antitank weapons, eight American advisors with two Starlight scopes, two .50 cal machine guns (one of them in a jeep, two recoilless rifles (one of them in a jeep). Plus, for fun, a couple TV reporters who spent most of the game hiding behind the one hut on the battlefield.

PAVN: 25-man assault platoon with light mgs and RPG-7s, eight two-man wire-cutter teams, a Maxim machine gun and two 82mm mortars.

Everyone had illumination shells, although in practice brewed-up tanks shed far more light. The Americans also had a bunch of fortification elements - trenches, sandbags, four buried mines (which went under the road where it left the outer defenses near the enemy deployment zone), and four Claymores (two went near that exit, and two in front of the angle in the wire closest to our left flank).

I engaged in a bit of gamesmanship by claiming Jim Johnson as my partner, since my tactical ability (despite all that reading) is practically nil and he kicked my arse last time out. Since we were on defense we mostly just threw fire downrange, with only a little repositioning as reserves turned up, so it's not like the SEATO side really needed more than one player. 

But when I suggested I was mostly an observer here, the others pointed out my enthusiasm for blasting NVA infantry off the board. And two PT-76s.

Anyway...

The blameless defenders of democracy set up on the hills to the (effectively) south and center. The star denotes the objective, an M107 175mm gun. We were permitted to set up to a dozen troops on the central "ridge", which Jim placed in foxholes as a sacrificial "speed bump." The PAVN infantry could set up anywhere on the jungle edges outside the wire, and their armor had to come from the NW corner up the road.

Our "inner" deployment.

The objective was to kill or protect (depending on side) the M107 self-propelled gun at the center of the CIDG camp. It would not fire, but "accidental" scattering of missed mortar shells would not suffice to hit it either - the enemy would either have to get into line of sight to call down fire or hit it with a demo charge.

The secondary objectives were casualty ratio - a side that caused twice as many as it took would be deemed to have won, but retrieved casualties (dragged off table by the NVA, medevaced by the Americans) would not count against this. In practice, the NVA players decided that keeping an uninjured man on the firing line was preferable to using him to help a second man away, and for Jim and me it was somewhere between not remembering and fearing the helicopter would be shot down - especially once the camp was lit up.

Our assumption was that - while the NVA vehicles would have to come on via the road - their infantry would hit us elsewhere, and most likely from the eastern corner. They would try to swamp our right flank and pass through to the objective. This was why we placed the Duster there, so as to shoot up masses of infantry. As it turned out, they were more spread out, which left the Duster and all of my assets (I got the right flank while Jim took the center and left) in dead ground with fewer targets. This is due to the fact that, the NVA having reconnoitered the ground beforehand, they got to set up second.

Both sides launched illumination shells. The markers for these were ingenius; just teased-out strips of cotton painted acid green.

Light mortars 3" radius, 4.2" mortar 6". The bulk of NVA
assault troops are visible; the ones in the back are not on-table yet,
but illumination will force them into line of sight or farther south.

Another angle on the NVA.

Nearby, an NVA heavy-weapon team.

The outer checkpoint where the tanks will come in.
The forlorn hope position is to upper left.

Concentrating my fire, I killed
half the wirecutter teams on my side.

Jim's recoilless rifle brews up a PT-76; the radius of the
firelight is 12 inches!

The sacrificial hope, about to have fire rained on it.
Brown felt strips represent foxholes.

The hill is lit up and pounded; red paper squares indicate casualties.

Our pesky recoilless is now out of the game...

... after killing another tank. The NVA advance is developing.

A man with M79 "blooper" grenade launcher
is still out of range. Our rear entrenchments
also visible.

The Allied position is entirely lit up now, and we've lost
one M48. We got a second as reinforcement, though.

My two light machine guns, a handful of rifles and a cracking eight shots a turn from the M42 were at least hindering the attack to our northeast, if not stopping it. Jim's comment was: "Turn one: the attack is commanded by a regimental commander. Turn two, a battalion commander. Turn three, a platoon leader." As the NVA tanks broke through the outer checkpoint and their infantry followed, I shifted the Duster over the crest and down the hill where it could have more targets:

I targeted the enemy light tanks, and got two kills before the turret was hit and all the crew injured or killed. They piled into the nearby emplacements.

NVA armor is almost all gone...

... but the infantry are closing.

One of our grenadiers ran down to the wire to get into range for his M79, but was killed before he could use it. Later, Jim spent a couple more lives trying to recover it, to no effect.

Here's my surviving Duster crew, clustering around the medic,
who'd narrowly escaped the burning position next to the tank.
Bottom left is a reporter asking annoying questions of men
more concerned about pain than posterity.

We had two media guys on the board, but they weren't objectives - didn't need to protect them or get a report out. So in the last two turns, I had them randomly move around and get in the way, just for fun. One approached the wounded infantry for an interview, while the other moved into position for Pulitzer-winning photos. (If he's using my phone-camera, he ain't gettin' 'em.)

Nothing but fire and a looming opponent in sight.

In the end, the Allies lost two tank crew (ten men total), and all the infantry on the hill, which the NVA were now waving flags atop. The rest of our casualties brought it up to 32, but the NVA had 70+ casualties (including all their vehicles and nearly all wirecutter teams) and never got near the M107. Their infantry was through the wire, but was unlikely to make it across open and lit-up ground to a position where they could fire on or assault the objective. Indirect fire came first in the turn sequence, which means that once you've moved to where you'll use it from, the enemy has a turn to shoot at you before you can actually bring it down.

I'd only played these rules during "bolt-action" periods - WWII and interwar. Firepower a generation later was far more devastating, with two shots a turn from every rifleman, and more machine guns per unit too. And yes, using the Duster was a delight.

As usual with this system and GM, a fine game. You can find video reports of the rules on Jim's Youtube channel, though I expect this one won't be up for a couple months. He's just released a battle report for Op: Husky. Edit: Here's the Ben Het video.

Closeups of game assets:

M48 tank and M42 Duster AA vehicle.

106mm recoilless rifle. This really did a number on the NVA.

The objective, charmingly encircled by classic toy terrain
which fits in surprisingly well!

One of Jim's fine card buildings.

Some NVA armor - some PT76 light tanks and the related
BTR50 APC.

This attack UH1 variant proxied for a medevac.

A few unused US vehicles. I think Jim provided these.

Hill Line Defence

Finally playing a solo game of conventional scale! Drawn from Charles S. Grant's classic Programmed Wargames Scenarios. Let's see how it goes, shall we?

The rules are Stephen Simpson's from Wargames Illustrated #75. They are forerunners, I believe, of Beneath the Lily Banners, and I quite like them - short and simple. This is the first time I've had a table large enough to field units of the correct size (four bases) and to move them correctly (5-15").

One issue with the rules I'm using is that there are no rules for light infantry, unless you count Highlanders and Indians - which in these rules are more for assault than reconnaissance. There also aren't rules for different types of cavalry. I suppose I could use the rules for elite or green units (basically + or -1 to all rolls), but I'll leave that out for now. Given that light infantry, under programmed deployment, are often spread out across the deployment zone, that's probably fine, since usually you only get one or two regiments anyway.

That means the British defenders have six infantry regiments, one cavalry regiment and two guns. I formed them evenly, with the guns in the center, half the infantry to either side, and the cavalry forward on the left flank.

I rolled randomly for the opponent from seven choices, and the French get seven infantry, three cavalry and a gun. I roll for their deployment, and get "centre-right" - from left to right, a 2-4-4 distribution. That works for the regiments; I'll put the cavalry to the right, as part of the attack, and the gun to the left. There is a possibility that the left flank will act defensively, which will suit the gun.

The rules are modular, and have basic additions for command and control, but I'm leaving those out for this first runthrough.

Deployment from the Attackers' side. As it is July 4, there were
atmospheric sound effects to help set the scene...

I roll to determine what the French left flank will do, and it will be drawn into the attack. We're off!

Deployed infantry and guns move 5", deployed cavalry 10". If in column, they move a further five. Guns have unlimited range, but a bonus within 18". Musketry range is 10". Since they are aggressive today, the gun will move with the infantry, aiming to get close before pouring in fire. As you can see from the photo, I've kept things simple by starting everyone off deployed into line.

Turn One: The French (well, about half of them Irish or Scots) march towards the British and Hessians on the ridge. The gun will target its opposing numbers. The mechanism is very basic - D8-D6, plus or minus any factors such as, in this case, being under fire from artillery over 18" away. I rolled 2-6+1; the result is less than zero, so one of my guns takes a hit. Another and it is routed. With infantry, I'd remove a single base; with guns represented by a single base, I'll have to remember.

I'm not actually sure if guns can move and fire in this game - they can fire while deployed and they can move while deployed. Given the paucity of scale, I'm fine with it; each move can be assumed to be several minutes.

The cavalry sweeps round a putative Built-Up Area.

The French gunners "lay on."

In response, the British hold their ground and I fire both my guns at the Irish regiment opposite. They'll have a +1 for the long-range artillery, but this is balanced by a -1 for being under fire from more than one unit. Straight D8-D6: 4-5=-1. They lose a base. Simple, see?

Turn Two: More advancing.

As enemy cavalry gang up on mine, I realize I made the mistake
of not moving my grenadiers forward into 10" firing range;
they're still 12" away.

"Close up, close up!" cry the officers of the Irish Brigade.

The extreme left has some difficulty as it skirts the wood.

The guns fire on Dillon again, and with a bare success - 1 on the D8, 2 on the D6 - they take another hit and fall back, too worn to continue. That's only one of ten units eliminated, though, and the defenders are still outnumbered.

Turn Three: Time to charge. units must roll to attempt such actions, at 4+ on a D10. Remarkably, only one of the units passes. The British morale roll is at -1 for first round of melee, but +1 for being uphill. They pass. My left-flank infantry, in response, move forward, but don't quite have line of sight to the cavalry (the crown of the hill is in the way) or range to the infantry. The cavalry melee continues with no result, as does my cannonade.

I need to dress the enemy ranks here...!

Turn Four: Moved forward, and did dress ranks. Lots of firing now we're in range, but ineffective on both sides. A second cavalry unit managed to charge in, but the combat remains inconclusive, even when I charged my own left-hand infantry into it.

Round and round we go...

Turn Five: Ranks fully dressed now, but still mostly out of 

The battle looks more traditional now, but the dying light
is in the defenders' eyes...

... and they are taking casualties.

Turn Five: The lines are in musketry range, and platoon fire flickers up and down the rows of French and British.

"For what we are about to receive..."

One unit of French horse retreats, leaving the other open
to charge in ... and they fail the roll for a third time. Cowards!

The British cavalry unit is eliminated, but its opponents are still in contact with infantry as well. Musketry is again inconclusive.

Turn Six: The French are now at the foot of the slope, yet still both sides continue to load and fire again. Only on the right are the French moves starting to bear fruit, as the Hessian grenadiers hold fast against yet another charge of French horse, now lapping about them, and the flank battalions cross bayonets.

Push of pike.

Turn Seven: The charges - most of them - go in:

Most of the fighting is inconclusive, with the exception of the Hessian grenadiers, who are finally smothered. One French unit fails its charge attempt; it and the gun instead fire into a British unit and force them to rout. This means a check on the AI chart - "A Blue Force unit is broken or falls back creating a gap in the line." I rolled "Hesitate two moves then move into the gap if it remains."

The "Gap of Danger"

At this point, that may not matter much:

With the grenadiers gone, an ominous flanking movement begins.

The British all hold, though narrowly at times. With all in melee, none are free to act.

Turn Eight: The Brits hang on as the cavalry starts to roll up their line. They attempt to break away and refuse their left flank, but fail.

Turn Nine: The next left-flank battalion is destroyed by the swarming Horse, and others take casualties, though thet guns manage to take out the Ecossais.

Turn Ten: Another British (well, Hessian) unit routs, and others take casualties. I think it's over, and I'll halt here.

So I lost the game against the attacking AI, probably because I failed to react and relied too much on my firepower. It took longer than expected, but by the end I had holes in my lines and was badly flanked. With only one roll per turn per unit, the combat system is pretty swingy and it could (and probably should) have gone far worse for me once combat was joined. My left flank held out agains outnumbering cavalry far longer than I expected.

I might change up Simpson's rules slightly - command and control rules could have made a difference, though most likely just making it more chaotic as more units refuse to obey orders. This is the second time I've run the first scenario in the book, and it's a good one to start with, though perhaps the attacker should be the active player. (Most scenarios can be played from either side.) All in all, a good game and, I think, a fair result.

The game would be far quicker if I didn't keep pausing to write it up and take pictures. With the brevity of these rules (a three-page article, one page of basic rules and one page of extra "modules") I could easily have played it through in an hour, but that might not be as interesting to read.

Next time, Scenario Two: Broken Ground.