Last night saw a remarkably bloody and decisive
run-out of Muskets and Tomahawks up at the East Kilbride club, fought between the
British, under my control, and the French and their Native allies, under John’s
command. Dave gained (suffered?) a field promotion to Umpire, and was given
command of the rulebook and activation cards.
In all the time we’ve been playing these rules, I’ve
yet to come across a result which has produced so decisive a result, so quickly
(our usual slug-fests normally last about 5 hours or so before we’re forced to
start tallying up victory points and likely conclusions), whereas this time round,
a clear victory was won by John in about two hours, amidst a flurry of
tomahawks, knives and war-whoops.
It all started ordinarily enough, with the French
on one side of a wooded ridgeline, and the British on t’other; the idea of the
game being that this would take the form of a meeting engagement between the
two sides, trying to wrest control of said ridgeline to secure victory.
However, I should probably have realised that it was all going to go horribly
wrong for me when John started individually briefing each figure on the part it
was expected to play in the coming battle…
With a few well timed activation cards (one day we
will get round to translating the word “shuffle” into Cumbrian for Card-Sharp
Stewart, who was obviously reliving his time spent on the river paddle steamers
on the Rio Solway…) , the French forces (or rather Native forces, as the actual
French units managed to avoid any sort of warlike enterprise in the course of
the entire game) surged forward and took an early lead onto the ridge. The Indians
showing their superiority in traversing the rough ground of the backwoods,
leaving the closest matched British unit, the Queen’s Rangers, toiling in their
wake…
The Rangers find themselves in a bit of a
predicament at the foot of the outcrop, with the Indians lurking at the top…
Meanwhile, the British found their right flank
being turned by another enterprising war-party, who quickly put the ever-shaky
Colonial Militia to rout, having forgone any attempts at a musketry duel, and
went straight forward to settle the matter in hand to hand combat. This was to
prove something of a theme for the evening…
The Word of God is read out, and the dice-bearing
Hand of Doom descends on the battlefield, as the Indians on the outcrop mimic
their fellows and charge down upon the unfortunate rangers at the foot of the
hill…
…The ensuing combat being brief and bloody. The
rangers are quickly put to flight by the Indians, who start eyeing up the
Cumbrians advancing towards them.
The Cumbrians of the 34th Foot were
next in line to feel the wrath of the Indians. Maddened with blood-lust, the
Indians managed to completely destroy the somewhat surprised redcoat regiment
in one short, brutal round of melee.
The remaining Rangers, completely over-awed by the
slaughter they’ve just witnessed, continue their dash to the board edge…
…whilst the 23rd Fusiliers, their
colours flapping in the wind and the solitary drummer desperately trying to
batter out “Men of Harlech” on his own, find themselves the only British unit
left in good order (and pretty much in existence, in fact). They take aim at the Indians moving through
the village, and prepare to sell their lives dearly.
The dead-box was not looking good for the British
at this point; having started with 5 units on the table, they’d now got 4 of
those units almost completely in the box.
“Steady boys, mark your targets…” the stalwart
Taffs now have three war-parties charging towards them, as well as the galling (if
ineffective) fire of some French sharpshooters lurking amongst the woods.
This has the predictable result of producing a
pile of dead redcoats, and a leaving a rather concerned subaltern on his
tod. This was entirely understandable,
given he had Indians to his rear (stop sniggering at the back, Stewart.)…
And more Indians behind them…
And yet more Indians behind them.
At this point it was plainly obvious that the British
had been roundly beaten, if not outright annihilated, and so matters were
brought to a close. A well fought and expertly conducted victory for John, and
once again the British (or at least what was left of them) were sent home with
their tails between their legs, whilst Skulking Badger’s jubilant braves
dragged the surviving officer off to set fire to him between two trees…
A clear lesson, then, in showing what the Indians can
achieve when let loose and got into melee as quickly as possible, rather than
getting bogged down into shooting matches with regulars. The melee system of Muskets & Tomahawks
works well, in allowing the players to resolve a combat in a considered manner,
using common sense conventions and reactions to conclude matters without them turning
into Pike Block Tetris, and certainly adds to the flow of the game. It certainly
shows how a well conducted charge could tip the scales in an engagement, as in
this one, the British line folded like a house of cards under the Natives’
furious onslaught. Certainly, such rushes are aided by sympathetic terrain
layout; it would probably tip the odds too far the other way to have the
Indians assault a formed British line in open country and come under a few
activations’ worth of volley fire; however, it would have been interesting to
see how matters panned out, had I not advanced the regulars so close up behind
the Rangers into the tree-line, but had held them back and kept some distance
between them and the Indians erupting from the ridge…
So, beyond sticking to open-field engagements, how
could we look at countering these tactics? The most obvious would be to give
the Brits some Indians of their own, and let them fight it out amongst
themselves. However, this could pose two problems; a) we forget whose Indians
are whose and b) the possibility of a sort of separate “battle within a battle”
arising, with the two opposing tribes simply engaging their own private
encounter, distinct from the battle as a whole. Whilst this would be perfectly
accurate and characterful, in the limited time we usually have available, it
may simply serve to just snarl up proceedings and drag the whole thing out. It does,
however, provide some interesting food for thought for bigger games, perhaps
combining more participants, and possibly a second deck of activation cards…
Beyond that then, other options are increasingly
sounding like introducing some home-grown savages into the mix, and unleashing
the Highlanders, or even giving the British a cannon. This brings with it its own issues; a cannon
ain’t exactly mobile, and may simply serve to tie the British line down, or
suffer the consequences of moving without it, and risking losing the
unsupported gun to a determined rush by the Indians. Possibilities,
possibilities…
All in all, another evening well spent with good
company, pushing lead about and binging on tea and biscuits! Looking forward to
hopefully getting the 15mm ancients out next week, and seeing what that brings...
Cheers
Iain
