The Latest in a Never-Ending Series of "Hey, I'm Still Here!" Posts

 So, 2024 is here, another year begun and none of my projects finished.

But what's the answer to that? New projects!

I've been playing a lot of Triumph with local folks; fortunately for me, the Washington Grand Company doesn't refer to Washington State. Most of the Triumph authors live in the area, and I get to play with them from time to time, which means lots of good games and also lots of good insights into the rules. I'll have another post on Triumph later, but just to say it's one of the two prongs of my gaming strategy for the new year.

I've mentioned Rally The Troops in the past as well, and that's been another good prong. I haven't diversified much on RTT yet, but I do have one (disastrous) game of Wilderness War under my belt there, two of Nevsky, and eight (8) games of Pax Pamir, played in the league organized through the RTT server. A ninth game is underway e'en now.

A third string is weekly Euro gaming with friends on Sunday nights. I have been less successful in getting to the Wednesday Night Wargaming group in Virginia or to any of the DC Conscripts ASL meet-ups, but hope springs eternal.

I have not gotten many games in with my friends the Kensington Palace Guard. Eric, the moving force in that group, has been working severe hours for a long time now, and it's hard to winkle some of the other members out of their shells if both he and I aren't there. We had some games of Cover Your Six and a Black Powder game in late December, and a game of Black Powder with Marc and Matt before that, but gaming has been a bit thin on the ground with my usual comrades.

I've also been getting less and less interested in modern (20th and 21st century) wargaming of late and more interested in the early modern period (17th, 18th, and early 19th centuries), especially in Europe.

So I've decided to start exploring on my own. And I've picked a series that I've toyed with a number of times but never fully committed to, the La Bataille series of tactical Napoleonic games. It's had titles published by many different publishers over the years, including quite a lot of web-published modules made just for the love of the game. Currently, Marshal Enterprises are publishing new titles, as is Against All Odds, while Clash of Arms has for the last few years been publishing new editions of older titles. There's an active group discussing the series on both Facebook and Consim World Forum, so I think I can count on experienced advice.

I'm starting off with an opening scenario from the battle of Ligny, "Girard's Assault," in which a French infantry division ties up parts of three Prussian infantry brigades (division-sized units). The scenario lasts for thirteen turns. By the end of the scenario, the French must have captured five of the eight hexes of the town of St Amand La Haye if they are to win. They don't want to hurry too fast, though; most of one of the Prussian brigades is lurking on the east side of the map, and they are released to pile into the French only *when* Baron Girard has secured his five hexes. Below, you'll see an overview of the scenario map.

The French (circled in red) are down in the bottom left corner. Four different blocks of Prussian troops are vaguely marked in yellow on the right, holding the three villages of St Amand Le Hameau, St Amand La Haye (the French objective), and St Amand Le Chateau (presumably the high-rent district). All of them are currently stacked, waiting for setup. So my first decision will be where to spread them out, within the parameters allowed. 

Most of the Prussians must be in the villages or the "cultivated" hexes directly adjoining them, and most are under strict instructions to hold their positions. 

The French must set up no closer than six hexes and no more than ten from St Amand Le Hameau. So they can conceivably be knocking on the doors of La Haye within an hour of less of the scenario's commencing. But they have three hours before their deadline, and sprinting forward from the start may just bring Pirch and the Second Brigade in sooner. 

Stay tuned to see what happens!

Rally the Troops

So, the latest bright and shiny thing to catch my eye has been the website Rally The Troops (RTT), a great gift to the boardgaming community by Swedish game aficionado and software developer Tor Andersson.

On RTT, you can play any of the featured games, for free, without having to download any software or suffer through advertising. The games are all implemented completely; in other words, you move the pieces and play the cards just as you would at the table, and the software not only reflects your moves on the board, but it keeps track of all the administrative details (moves the turn marker, records your victory points) and enforces the rules of the game. 

Many other online gaming tools for board wargamers (like VASSAL or Cyberboard) act as a toolbox, so you have a map and pieces and you can move them around as you like, but they don't know the rules of the game and leave it up to you to observe them properly. Other game sites, like Boardgame Arena, do what RTT does, but they feature mostly euro games--fun, but not the history-themed, crunchy games that we wargamers like best. Other systems (like the Steam community) feature full-blown computer wargames, even including AI/bots to play against, but they are costly. 

Mr Andersson has gone out of his way to make sure the game implementations are correct down to the latest interpretation, contacting publishers and designers and even scouring sites like boardgamegeek to make sure he knows how every rule is supposed to work. He has also received permission to use the artwork of the games and to include the rules on his site for players to read, so the experience really is an all-access pass, as if you had bought the game in the shop and brought it home, except that this way you can play play it with your friends all over the world, either in real time or asynchronously (I make my move, the site records it; you log in the next time you can, see the new state of the board and make your move, etc.)

I own five of the ten games currently on the site, and I'm learning more of them thanks to RTT. I've also played one of them for the first time, thanks to RTT's ability to hot-seat or two-hand a game, meaning one person can sign up to play both sides in a game, switching back and forth. This is a great way to learn a game, especially with RTT enforcing the rules, but it's also just a fun way, in my opinion, to experience and play around with a game, trying out new tactics and strategies.

The game I'm trying out is Nevsky: Teutons and Rus in Collision 1240-1242, another game that has been lingering too long on my shelf. Another game from the hugely talented Volko Ruhnke (Wilderness War, Labyrinth, Andean Abyss, and from there father of the COIN series), this is the first in a series called Levy & Campaign (L&C), a systemic treatment of campaigning in the medieval era that has spawned two more published titles (Almoravid and Inferno) three more in production and development (Plantagenet, Henry, and Seljuk), and another half dozen to a dozen in design, development, or planning.

I spent last Saturday (my birthday) online from early morning to evening, attending a convention hosted by the San Diego Historical Games Convention group. They had participants from all over the US and Europe, and their offerings covered a wide range of gaming topics, including demos and walkthroughs of new games, conversations with designers about the industry, and presentations on historical and military topics. I took particular interest in the presentations on forthcoming L&C games and have since engaged with a number of presenters to offer whatever help I can in their moving forward with L&C games on the Hundred Years War, the Albigensian Crusade, and the Anarchy (the Anglo-Norman civil war between Stephen and Matilda).

Since then I've been trying to give myself a crash course on the L&C system. I've played two two-handed games of Nevsky, started two online Nevsky games with players in the UK, and read up a lot on Almoravid (the L&C game set in 11th century Spain) and begun reading up on Inferno (the most recent L&C title, set in 13th century Italy). I'm very excited for Plantagenet (L&C Wars of the Roses) and Henry (the Agincourt campaign, which I hope to get some of my local friends to playtest with me).

Levy & Campaign is a truly imaginative system, adding the crucial element of logistics to the glossy and idealized images of warfare in a time of knights and archers. It reminds players that armies march on their stomachs, no matter the era, and that when your army is built of feudal lords and their retinues, one contingent getting fed up (or underfed) and leaving can mean your whole force, and hence your whole campaign plan, can unravel because you didn't bring enough food (or enough money) or enough carts to carry it in. Nevsky adds the character of the Baltic's swampy terrain and unhelpful seasons, where what was a serviceable road can turn around and become a trackless marsh, while a river may freeze and become a handy highway for your sledges.

I'm enjoying the heck out of these games and looking forward to more!