I ain’t dead… Monday, Feb 13 2012

…to quote Granny Weatherwax.

Between writing my ‘book’ (currently at 80,000+ words) and planning the Kriegspeil for this coming Saturday, I’ve been a bit busy, computer-wise.

The Kriegspiel is getting to be a bit big:  not only am I lead Umpire (PANIC), but it looks like 10+ attendees.  It’s different in concept to other K-S I’ve played/helped umpire: it’s all about the planning.  I joked that I’m looking forward to the 19th, as I get my inbox back!

Sunday I will (hopefully) publish an AAR, plus the rules I wrote, along with the counters etc.

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‘Market Garden’ scenario for Troops Weapons and Tactics. Sunday, Dec 4 2011

Originally entered in the Too Fat Lardie scenario writing competition (didn’t win!)

Based on an incident from the siege in Arnhem, and an attempt to write a multi player scenario for TW&T – not a game that normally lends its self to more than one player a side.

Bloody Berets

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Wargame figure calculator Wednesday, Sep 21 2011

A Excel spreadsheet to help you order figures when the figures come in multiple (eg 30 x 10mm figures in a bag, box of 10 Space Marines).  Break each unit down into its composition ‘types’ – adjust the ‘Ordered’ column until the ‘Total Units’ amount reads the same, then it calculates the cost.

Figurecalc

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Napoleonic Casualty Calculator Thursday, Sep 1 2011

Following a discussion of 2 line vs 3 line on TMP, I wrote a spreadsheet to calculate the difference.  You can set the number of men in each battalion, including the split between the front 2 firing ranks of a French battalion, and those in reserve who fill gaps, as well as the assumed accuracy that will cause a wound severe enough to put a man out of battle.

It is fairly crude on maths, as it makes a number of assumptions:

1. Kill rate as a % stays constant.
2. Those filling gaps do so before the next volley
3. A straight 1 on 1 firefight
4. Wounds are cause simultaneously – ie it calculates hits before subtracting wounds.  If you want one side to fire first, reduce the strength of the other to start.

The way it calculates the remaining men in the 3 rank bn is by applying all casualties to the 3rd rank (non firers).  When this reaches zero it subtract the overkill from the firing ranks (well it adds the negative number).

Casualty calculator

Excel 97 version

Excel 97 version

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War of Spanish Succession – Open Thread. Monday, Aug 15 2011

A poster going by the name of ‘Little Keithy’ expressed surprise at hitting the thread on the riots, when he came here looking for stuff about the War of Spanish Succession.  He was obviously not expecting the somewhat eclectic nature of my blog (read ‘any old rubbish that comes to mind’, refered to by my wife as spending half the night on the internet ranting at people).  Unlike many wargamers this isn’t a wargame only thing. (It originally started as I wanted to share some fiction I had written with bloggers from other sites I frequent, for their opinion).

He wrote

Anyway what I was going to ask: what’s the allure of the WSS? I like the SYW as there is a variety of troop types plus nice uniforms to paint (not that I ever get round to painting them).

The WSS appears to the uninitiated limited in troop types (in western europe), tactics and pretty uniforms (nice whigs though). Is it more a test of skill having limited opportunities for a coup de grace or clever manoeuvre?

Well, to tell the truth, I chose the period based on hats… (more after the break)

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French in the War of Spanish Succession – painting guide Saturday, May 21 2011

French painting guideI put together this basic painting guide for a friend. As we do 10mm only the major bits are identified – no lace etc.

The flags should print roughly the correct size for 10mm, I believe they are from the rather fine “Warflag” site.

French_Paint_Guide

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Random Platoon Generator for Troops, Weapons and Tactics Sunday, May 1 2011

This spreadsheet will generate a random (British) platoon for Troops, Weapons and Tactics/Platoon Forward. Of course it can be used for any other platoon level wargame (NUTS etc) though you will have course have to tweak the stats. For reference TI is Tactical initiative, and runs from 1 (plodder) to 4 (heroic). The Big Man Bonus is the extra added when a leader is directing fire (Typically 3d6-3 for rifles up to 4d6+4 for MG42, the results table maxing at 36). Making the Big Man drop down YES shows the values for that man (TW&T is not normally interested in non leaders). I have defaulted the Lance Corporals, who lead the Bren gun group to BM, as they may well be called on to replace a killed section leader during a battle.

I suggest that you put ‘Workbook Calculation’ (found under Options/Formulas) to Manual, otherwise everything changes each time you change a cell. F9 is the manual update. Use Copy then “Paste Special –>; Values” to put the results you want to keep onto a fresh spreadsheet (this pastes results, rather then the formulae, so won’t keep getting updated).

Note – this is a Excel 2007 spreadsheet, so has the extension .xlsx (see below for a possible earlier version)

Random lists

This is the version saved as compatable with Excel 1997-2003. I can not guarantee which bits (if any) will work. If anybody wants to do a rewrite I’d be happy to work with them on it.

Random lists excel 97

Rights/IP stuff. I’m providing this free for personal non-commercial use, the basic work remains mine. I haven’t put anything malicious into it, but I can provide no warrenty etc etc yadda yadda yadda. Feel free to edit the names/platoon layout for other nations – I’ll happily upload it here or provide a link to where ever you host it: My Gmail address is (unsurprisingly) Last.Hussar@…

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Black Powder – Broken Brigades Saturday, Mar 5 2011

The Broken Brigade rule in ‘Black Powder’ is considered overly harsh by many players.  These are the amended rules we play.

1) A brigade is broken when OVER half the units in it are shaken or destroyed.  i.e.  in a six unit brigade 4 units shaken/destroyed are required to break the brigade – not 3 as per the rules.

2) Units in a broken brigade can be rallied if the ‘break’ status is due to Shaken units, and disordered units may reform.  For the above  brigade with 6 units

- if 4 are destroyed, the Brigade is permanantly Broken

- If 3 are destroyed, and one Shaken, the Shaken unit may be rallied.  Once it is no longer Shaken, the brigade is no longer Broken.  Remember ‘Rally’ is the last order a commander may give. 

- if 2 are destroyed and 3 Shaken, then 2 must be rallied to 2 hits or less to ‘unbreak’ the brigade.

While a brigade is broken it must still retire on initiative so units are more than 12 away from the enemy.  As movement on initiative counts as an order, a further Rally order can not be given that turn.  This encourages the opponent to keep up pressure on Broken Brigades to stop them reforming, rather ignore broken brigades that are almost useless.

We feel this method is a fairer reflection.  It also means that cavalry, who are easy to shake due to their hand to hand role, act like historical accounts – they charge, become blown and spend some time reforming before rejoining the fight.

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“Black Powder” wargame rules – Moving in towns/villages. Monday, Feb 14 2011

Playing Black Powder the other night I left a town in the centre of our lines with no one in it: My brain said obsticle, though we had not designated it as such.  This was almost our undoing.  However built up areas – ven if just a collection of wattle and daub houses do obstruct an army.  What do people think of these compromise rules.  They are designed so you don’t have to represent individual houses and roads.

Represent the town with a template.  It can have buildings on but these are for show – move them around to allow the troops to move!  If a specific piece of open ground is desired  this can be marked – town rules do not apply for units on it.

Units can only enter a town/village in ‘Assault column’ (even if in a period where not normally used).  Rules for assault columns are used as normal.

No change to command rules except blunders happen on a 11 as well (in a village or town its easier to get disorientated, as you can’t see the rest of the battle field, so not appreicate that the road curves, or you take a wrong turning).

A unit can take up residence in buildings – place in a ‘square’ style formation to show this, the unit uses the rules in the book for buildings (not squares).

Maximum fire range in a town is 6″.

Units outside of buildings (ie in Column) do not get the benefit of cover if fired at by other units in the town.

A Line Infantry may deploy into line at the edge of a town.  It does NOT get cover unless the settlement has be designated as providing it on that edge before the game.  A unit may enter buildings at the edge of town, so it can fire out. Infantry in skirmish order DOES count cover.

Shooting into towns from outside has a maximum line of site of 3″ from the edge.  In this case columns DO get cover.

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War of Spanish Succession for ‘Black Powder’ Tuesday, Feb 1 2011

“… & Blenheim Palace” (Do you see what I did there?)

These are the playtested (and amended, and playtested again, and amended again) rules we use for War of Spanish Succession with Warlord’s “Black Powder” wargame rules.  These are independent of Warlord and the original writers.

Blenheim Palace v2.2  (PDF)

I know some will bring up specific situations where some of these will not be applicable, or counter to what happened at certain battles.  I think these sort of instances are better handled in scenario specific rules.

Please remember the aim of these are to add the flavour of the period, not an indepth study of early 18th century warfare, so while I’m happy to receive constructive comments, Black Powder remains at its heart a game for Gentlemen played with Toy Soldiers!  I wished to stop two identical armies being fielded, especially with the cavalry rules.  Here I wanted there to be an actual difference beween armies using the two doctrines.  More notes on page 8.

You actually only need pages 3-7.  The other pages are bells and whistles to make sure it prints correctly for double sided, as well as following the style of the ‘eye candy’ original rules.  Also 8 pages means it can be placed on A3 and make a booklet.

Click the Black Powder tag to the left for all BP related posts by me - there are a number, including a battle report, and my modification to the Broken Brigade rules. The tag at the top does all the BP entries across WordPress, so you’ll also find other people’s take on the rules (some contributed on my earlier WSS rules post – Thank you)

Play Nicely, and may all your dice be lucky.

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First battle for my War of Spanish Succession troops. Friday, Dec 10 2010

Last Tuesday Graham and I gave our newly painted War of Spanish Succession armies their first outing.  I used my Allied Imperial-Prussians (Austrians in grey in the diagrams, Prussians in blue), against his French (white).  The battlefield was fictional.  Rules are Black Powder, with modifications (as per other entries in the Barracks), figures are all Pendraken 10mm.

(Please- if you have any comments, please leave here, if you linked here from another thread not there.  I will be linking from a number of sites, and it would be nice if everyone could see all the comments, not just those from their boards)

INITIAL POSITION (Click to enlarge on new page)

The French drew up in two wings/brigades of 5 battalions, while I chose to have the two odd battalions as a reserve, under the direct command of the Commander in Chief, making each wing four.

Our first problem was who should move first.  Being Gentlemen of the Age of Reason, we both insisted we would be insulted if the other did not take this honour.  A duel (suggested by Graham’s wife) was impractical, so we agreed to settle as gentlemen in a fashionable club might, and rolled dice.  My 8, beating his 7, the Allied Armies moved first.  For convenience I will refer to the top as North, left of the table as West, an the end with the marsh as East.

(More after the break)

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Usable army! Wednesday, Nov 17 2010

Finally painted enough figures to have a gamable army for Black Powder “War of Spanish Succession”.  2 brigades of 4 infantry battalions, a couple of guns, and 2 regiments of donkey wallopers.

Click the photo to see the rest of the pictures

or here for the set

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Black Powder – British 5th Division at Salamanca Thursday, Oct 28 2010

I offered a  friend who is new to Black Powder a game with ‘all the options’, rather than the plain rules as he played on his first Napoleonic game.  Though the game will not be any specific battle, I am basing the forces on actual organisations.  I am publishing here for those who sometimes ask online what a good force for BP would look like to start with.

British 5th Div Salamanca

The Jagers are a company, hence Tiny.  I upped the stats slightly from the book to allow them to have an effect on the battlefield.  Feel free to drop ‘Shooting’ and ‘Stamina’ down to 1 if you feel they are overpowered.

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Prussians Wednesday, Sep 1 2010

10mm Prussians for thw War of Spanish Succession.  Excellent figures from Pendraken, painting that lets them down – mine.

These, and a few more, in the more freindly format of Flickr HERE

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The Prussians are coming, the Prussians are coming! Wednesday, May 19 2010

Choice of a new wargame period should probably have a better reason that “I want something with Tricornes” – however because of this mandate I have started War of Spanish Succession.

My first battalion, based for the ‘Black Powder’ ruleset, are done.

To see these brave lads being recruited see my flickr stream

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