A simplified set of rules for Modern Wargames

One of the nice things with writing this blog are all you people who reads it, and sometimes comments on my posts. Especially appreciated  are comments which points me into new rules or aspects of wargaming.

After writing a review on Donald Featherstone's 'Close Wars', John Yorio from the excellent blogg '54mm or Fight' suggested another Donald Featherstone's rules; 'War Games or Battles with Models Soldiers' as an alternative for simple rules in a more modern setting with heavier weapons. This was also encouraged by Mark from the excellent 'Man of Tin blog'. Links to both of these inspiring blogs are found in the bar to the right and below in the link-sections (and if you haven't been there yet, pay them a visit). John even provided me of a copy of the 3 short pages of Donald Feathersone's rules.  So I decided I had to try them out. Wow! What a society!!

I think it would be fair to play them with the same scenario as I've done with the other reviews of free wargame rules for army men and toy soldiers, and a scenario some of you will be familiar by now. I repeat the scenario here if it's your first time here and you haven't read it yet:

The scenario

I've placed this skirmish to the United Nations largest mission in both scale and operational scope during the Congo Crisis 1960-65, when UN troops 'peacekeeping' was more offensive 'peace enforcement' with force.

Situation:

This skirmish is finding place in fictional place of Lumbaya in the early January of 1963, when the UN during operation 'Grand Slam' are turning their attention to the remaining Katangese strongholds in Southern Katanga after after securing the Katangese capitol of Élisabethville.

Place:

Lumbaya is a very small village located 80km south west of Élisabethville, and are made into a stronghold by a small platoon of Katangese Gendarmes. The village is one of several strongholds in the area to trying to hold the UN off while trying to keep the self-proclaimed president Tshombe by power of the self-proclaimed Katanga state.

Forces:

• Katangese:
• 2 rifle-squads each of 10 soldiers, a LMG and and a bazooka/flame thrower. Each squad can operate as 2 fireteams independently. 
• 1 HMG-detachment of 3 soldiers
• 1 sniper
• HQ-section with platoon-leader and 2 medics
• After turn 12 if rules include vehicles or skilled troops: A QRF consisting of 1 truck with a HMG and a section of 10 'veterans' with a LMG and a bazooka arrives from the next village. Only if Lumbaya is still held by Katangese forces.

• UN:
• 1 Platoon of 3 rifle-squads each of 8 soldiers and a LMG. The squads can operate independently.
• 1 Light mortar-detachment of  2 soldiers and an observer
• 1 bazooka-detachment of 3 soldiers
• HQ-section with platoon-leader
• 1 Jeep with HMG and 2 soldiers.

Mission:

• Katangese: To hold the strongpoint of Lumbaya. Can request QRF-support as mentioned in the force-section from turn 12 if still holding whole or part of the strongpoint.
• UN: To take and hold the strongpoint of Lumbya, preferably within 12 turns, and take control on as many Katangese gendarms located there as possible.

AAR

Time:    1 hour and 30 minutes

Turns:   11

Result:  UN victory

The UN platoon made their advance towards Lumbaya, supported by both a Mortar team and a vehicle-mounted HMG.

Very early in the campaign the UN mortar made two successfully hits andt eliminated the Katangese HMG and support-base. This made the UN advancement much easier and quicker...

... and gave the UN the needed initiative in the battle.

When getting closer to the village the UN forces met more resistance and heavier fire, and their jeep and HMG were eventually taken out by a Katangese LMG, but not before...

...the UN support weapons made to tear up the Katangese line of defense completely...

...and the Katangese reserves didn't even make it to their defense line before they were under heavy fire and taken out by another successful UN-mortar grenade.

In turn 8 the first UN squads were entering the village. The Katangese had only one team and surprise left for the entering UN-troops, a 'secret weapon'. 

...Until it malfunctioned in the next turn (because you just don't miss with a weapon like this), and another UN squad came to the rescue. By this time there were only 2 unarmed Katangese medics left in the village, and an UN success with minimal losses (just a jeep and 4 plastic grunts).

Pros

• It's simple and can be played with easily available and cheap army men or toy soldiers from a lot of different (modern-) periods.
• Fast playing.

Cons

• These rules are really simple. Perhaps too simple. In only 3 small pages there are minimal information which may lead to misinterpretations.
• Even if the rules were short they were contradictory on the rifle ranges. One place it was written that the rifle range was 12", and on another thet you had to deduct '3' from your dice if firing rifles on ranges between 12"-24". I went for the long range alternative as I think the firing range for infantry weapons are a little too short.
• There were no clear turn sequence, so I decided to play is at 'I go, You go'.
• Even if it contains rules for a lots of special weapons, it doesn't have any rules for sniper rifles. It didn't matter much in my game anyway, because my 'sniper' (which I treated as a infantry man with long range) was only rolling '1's every time.
• In this game you don't roll a dice (or more) for each weapon. Infantry units fire 1 D6 for each volley of 5 men. - and deduct numbers from your dice depending on the range. The units under fire makes a roll for a save thou. So some calculation is needed when not operating 5-men teams or teams divisible by 5. It also makes it very difficult for smaller units to hit anything at all.

Conclusion

As the last time I played a game by Donald Featherstone, I had a good time. The game is easy and fast playing. I think it would work even better in a smaller scale such as 1:72 or similar. This game also shows that heavier weapons cause more damage and casualties, and that was exactly what I missed with Donald Featherstone's Close Wars. Thanks to John for the suggestion and the rules and Mark for the encouragement.

When writing this it seems like there has to be at least one more revisit to Lumbaya during 'Grand Slam'. Sign up on this blog if you haven't done so already, and stay tuned...

Close Wars

Close Wars

The rules

I wanted to try some really oldschool wargaming, and I think Donald Featherstone is considered to be one of the inventors of simple rules for wargaming with toy soldiers. On the excellent blog of 'The Man of Tinblog' I found a blogpost with a copy of Donald Featherstone's Close Wars. These rule are very simple and aren't exactly made for this size or modern battles, but I wanted to have a go at a 'classic' and see if it was playable with the scenario I've used in my recent games.

The scenario

I've placed this skirmish to the United Nations largest mission in both scale and operational scope during the Congo Crisis 1960-65, when UN troops 'peacekeeping' was more offensive 'peace enforcement' with force.

Situation:

This skirmish is finding place in fictional place of Lumbaya in the early January of 1963, when the UN during operation 'Grand Slam' are turning their attention to the remaining Katangese strongholds in Southern Katanga after after securing the Katangese capitol of Élisabethville.

Place:

Lumbaya is a very small village located 80km south west of Élisabethville, and are made into a stronghold by a small platoon of Katangese Gendarmes. The village is one of several strongholds in the area to trying to hold the UN off while trying to keep the self-proclaimed president Tshombe by power of the self-proclaimed Katanga state.

Forces:

• Katangese:
• 2 rifle-squads each of 10 soldiers, a LMG and and a bazooka/flame thrower. Each squad can operate as 2 fireteams independently. 
• 1 HMG-detachment of 3 soldiers
• 1 sniper
• HQ-section with platoon-leader and 2 medics
• After turn 12 if rules include vehicles or skilled troops: A QRF consisting of 1 truck with a HMG and a section of 10 'veterans' with a LMG and a bazooka arrives from the next village. Only if Lumbaya is still held by Katangese forces. Since these rules doesn't support vehicles, the QRF enters the village at foot.
• UN:
• 1 Platoon of 3 rifle-squads each of 8 soldiers and a LMG. The squads can operate independently.
• 1 Light mortar-detachment of  2 soldiers and an observer
• 1 bazooka-detachment of 3 soldiers
• HQ-section with platoon-leader
• 1 Jeep with HMG and 2 soldiers. Since these rules do not include vehicles, the Jeep stayed stationary with the HMG at the deployment-area acting a 1 unit, but due to short firing ranges never come close enough to enter combat.
• Since these rules doesn't include any heavy weapons, I just rolled a dice for any weapons and let all of them have the same range.

Mission:

• Katangese: To hold the strongpoint of Lumbaya. Can request QRF-support as mentioned in the force-section from turn 12 if still holding whole or part of the strongpoint.
• UN: To take and hold the strongpoint of Lumbya, preferably within 12 turns, and take control on as many Katangese gendarms located there as possible.

AAR

Time:    1 hour and 40 minutes

Turns:   18 (!)

Result:  UN defeat

Due to the short weapon ranges and not including any heavy weapons for support, this was a rush for the UN forces to get to a cover close enough for the their short weapon range:

The UN forces made initially some successful hits in the Katangese line of defence, and used the opportunity to try to brake into their defensive positions...

...and managed. But from this point on the Katangese Gendarmerie fought real well, and the UN didn't make any further advancement into the village.

This was the situation for so long time and so many turns, that the Katangese QRF arrived in turn 12:

This was finally what made the UN advancement come to an definite halt, and those few UN soldiers left who managed to enter the village was either killed or taken as prisoner of war after heroic street fighting. But they didn't give up very easy.

Impetus Bonus!!

Pros

• Impetus Bonus gives a +1 for surprising when emerging from cover and achieved an ambush
• It's simple and can be played with easily available and cheap army men or toy soldiers from a lot of different periods.
• Retreating forces (due to a moral check) have to dice to see if the're routing or can go back to battle.
• Really fast playing

Cons

• It's just too simple and doesn't divide weapons into groups by their damage potential.
• It doesn't include any vehicles.
• The turn sequence seems unclear. I played it I Go, You Go.
• What really happens to  wounded; hits that makes a save also seems unclear. I let them just fight on.

Conclusion

Due to lack of rules for different weapons with longer range and higher damage-potential, this was a very uncomplicated, interesting, intense and very fast playing game. With the limited weapon-ranges this is truly 'Close Wars'. As mentioned, I don't think these rules are made for modern battles or this scale, but I'm surprised how extremely well they worked for such after all. I would consider to play this in a smaller scale than I did (with my 54mm soldiers). Perhaps 20mm would be more suitable? And perhaps a period and units without a lot of hevy weapons. If you have only time for a quickie, consider this game.

Please follow this blog for some few more AAR on free wargame-rules to come...

Prelude to battle

The beginning

I've been into a lot of different modelling hobbies for a while, but tabletop wargaming was not one of them, until quite recently. Actually it was my very good, and late friend Morten who first gave me the idea and gave it a spark. Unfortunately we didn't get to game together...

Knowing about nothing about this hobby, I turned to the internet in my search for information and wargaming-rules. I was actually put off a little when I saw the complexity, thick books and price on some of the games and miniatures, but I also found some easier ones which could be downloaded and printed for free and played with ordinary affordable army men. 

Since I was new to this and didn't know if this was something for me, I didn't want to spend a lot of money or time reading thick rule-books. Therefore I decided to test-play some of the free rules I found on the internet, to see if I liked it, and what kind of rules I preferred. Fast, very simple, D6-mechanics, 1:1, skirmish, playable and fun rules seemed to be the thing for me. The very first game I ever played was Pete Kautz' '1 Brain Cell Wargame', just using what I had to hand in the household, nothing fancy:

This is where it all started with my very first game; unpainted army men, Momin's house from my kids' old toys, folding ruler, tape-measure, books and magazines making up the terrain and scenery

Where to find them

After I while I found many different free rules on the internet that I could play with easily available and cheap Army men. My favorite sources for free wargame rules are:

• The late Thor Sheil's Army men homepage where there are sections for wargaming and a lot of Thor's own rules.
• Free Wargamesrules Wiki
• Miniature Wargaming
• FUBAR wargames

Actually I found more rules on these pages that I'll have ever time to play them all. While trying to obtain even more information and others experience with some of these rules, I was searching the internet again for some battle-reports, AARs, playthroughs and feedbacks on them, but didn't actually find so many. Does anyone play them at all, or is it just seldom that wargamers post AARs on such rules??  Please share your experience in the comments. 

Therefore I plan to play some of  those free, fast, simple, skirmish, playable and fun rules I find most apealing and post a short AAR on them here in this blog, and perhaps someone might find it helpful. To easier to compare the different rulesets with each other, I think it's fair to play them with the same scenario.

The scenario

Unlike the free wargame rules, I did not find as many free and ready skirmish wargame scenarios to base my coming games upon. Some of the rulesets them selves often contain some very easy 'scenarioes' and winning-conditions, but they're just too basic. Therefore I got inspired by one of  The United Nations largest mission in both scale and operational scope during the Congo Crisis 1960-65 (United Nations Operation in the Congo (ONUC)) ,when UN troops 'peacekeeping' was more offensive 'peace enforcement' with use of force and had several clashes with the breakaway state of Katanga.

Situation:

This skirmish is finding place in fictional place of Lumbaya in the early January of 1963, when the UN during operation 'Grand Slam' are turning their attention to the remaining Katangese strongholds in Southern Katanga after after securing the Katangese capitol of Élisabethville.

Place:

Lumbaya is a very small village located 80km south west of Élisabethville, and is made into a stronghold by a small and imrovised platoon of Katangese Gendarmes. The village is one of several strongholds in the area trying to hold the UN off while trying to keep the self-proclaimed president Tshombe by power of the self-proclaimed Katanga state.

The road to the fictional village of Lumbaya

Forces:

• Katangese:
• 2 rifle-squads each of 10 soldiers, a LMG and and a bazooka/flame thrower. Each squad can operate as 2 fireteams independently. 
• 1 HMG-detachment of 3 soldiers
• 1 sniper
• HQ-section with platoon-leader and 2 medics



TheKatangese Gerdarmerie



• After turn 12 if the rules include vehicles or skilled troops: A QRF consisting of 1 truck with a HMG and a section of 10 'veterans' with assault guns, a LMG and a bazooka arrives from the next village. Only if Lumbaya is still held by Katangese forces though.



The QRF

• UN:
• 1 Platoon of 3 rifle-squads each of 8 soldiers and a LMG. The squads can operate independently.
• 1 Light mortar-detachment of  2 soldiers and an observer
• 1 bazooka-detachment of 3 soldiers
• HQ-section with platoon-leader
• 1 Jeep with HMG and 2 soldiers. If rules do not include vehicles, the Jeep must stay stationary with the HMG at the deployment-zone. 
  
  
  

Mission:

• Katangese: To hold the strongpoint of Lumbaya. Can request QRF-support as mentioned in the force-section from turn 12 if still holding whole or part of the strongpoint.
• UN: To take and hold the strongpoint of Lumbya, preferably within 12 turns, and take control on as many Katangese gendarms located there as possible.

Let the Game(s) begin!

In Memoriam Morten Melsnes