A New Lardy Day

I spent Saturday at a second gaming event/sauna in seven days. West Mid-Lards is a new Lardy Day organised by John Cooper (aka Maraviglia on BlueSky) in Bedworth, Warwickshire.

The venue was a town-centre games shop called Venator Tabletop Gaming. They seem to specialise in Games Workshop and collectible card gaming so, as a historical gamer, there was nothing for me to buy except for the several cans of Diet Coke needed to keep hydrated. If there'd been some modelling materials on sale I'd definitely have picked some up if only to support the shop.

With doors opening to game-runners at 10 and to the public at 11, I had time to get Running For Bull Run set up and chat with mates Ken Welsh and Mike Wilkins before getting down to serious play. Sorry, I didn't get any pics of the other games.

I was delighted to learn that the first game's players would include Chris Clarke and his son James, both regulars at Steel Lard. Chris had already played as the Union side in Sheffield so I decided he should try represent the forces of Fate this time. A quick poll of the other players saw James joining his Dad while Chris Collett and Pete Hartman represented the Union officers.

This was a very tight game. The Union officers did a good job of organising a defensive line that quickly saw off the Black Horse Cavalry. 

The Fate players managed to flood the battlefield end of the turnpike with small units of routing Union men who were then charged by the aggressive Louisiana Tiger Rifles. Although the Tigers lost some men, their opponents were wiped out on two occasions. Union casualties were mounting up and with them the Fate players' Victory Points. 

Unfortunately for the Tigers though, Mr Clarke sr developed a sudden inability to roll high. At a key moment their movement distance was just three inches. This left them smack in front of the forming Union line of battle.

Dice rolling seemed to be no problem for their opponents and the draw of the cards was also on their side. Two unanswered volleys saw the Tigers wiped out with their Leader (Sgt Warren Peace) also joining the casualty pile.

With the Fate Card deck exhausted, the game ended in a narrow win to the Union by 27 points to 25.

I took a stroll to the nearby Greggs for lunch - a corned beef bake and a doughnut. Bedworth reminded me somewhat of Worksop; not an obvious tourist destination. However, Nicholas Chamberlaine's Almshouses are quite picturesque.

The second game started with far less experienced players; Pete had played before and Ben had played the related Infamy Infamy but for Luke this was a first. Pete had to leave early so I allocated him and Luke to the Union side and concentrated on making sure Luke had enough of a handle on the rules to go solo when Pete left.

This was an interesting game; Ben, as Fate, seemed reluctant to deploy routing Union soldiers onto the table and this reduced the effect of the Black Horse Cavalry - there just weren't that many wavering units for them to terrify.

The Union commanders on the other hand seemed to like the idea of getting formed Union forces over the bridge and off to safety. This was something no previously players had considered and their logic was probably reasonable. Eventually I persuaded Luke to stick around and have a go at shooting some Confederates and he did have some success.

The vagaries of the Fate Deck meant that the spectating members of Congress were only noticed to be in the area late in the game. For a moment or two it looked like the Confederates might capture them but in the end a timely movement roll of 11 on two dice saw Luke withdraw them safely behind his developing rearguard.

In the end, though, the Union officers were unable to get close enough to the battlefield-end of the table to rally the Late-arriving routers. The second game was won by Ben's Forces of Fate by 25 points to 17.

Pete, Ben and Luke

The response to the game, both as a visual spectacle and as a gaming experience was overwhelmingly positive and I was delighted that the players seemed to have a good time.

Several people asked me how many times I'd run Running From Bull Run. These, it turns out, were its seventh and eighth public outings (on top of three development/test games). 

We're now getting to the point where the game's been to most of the events I attend. Only Ebor Lard remains and I've already agreed to run Infamy Infamy there. The figures and terrain will continue to see action but I think this particular game may be taken out of the repertoire for a while.

West Mid-Lards was an informal affair and lacked some of the features we've come to expect of Lardy Days (fixed time-table, prearranged allocations of players, after-event drinks and curry) but it was none-the-worse for that. A strong start for an event that could well become a fixture in the gaming calendar.

Operations near Morris, Mississippi

Word recently reached Stately Counterpane Manor that our good friend Ron had been rather poorly but was now keen to get back into the social whirl. So knowing his predilection for the American Civil War I volunteered to put on a Sharp Practice game.

The scenario was loosely based on operations by the Union's Mississippi Marine Brigade in 1864. In August of that year a Mississippi Ram Fleet flotilla was operating along its namesake river with orders to intercept civilian river traffic:

During the operation, the quartermaster boat Fairchild, lagging behind the fleet, came under fire from near the riverside village of Austin. The fleet returned and dispatched mounted and infantry elements of the Mississippi Marine Brigade to deal with the enemy forces. The result was a rather poorly handled engagement near Beaver Dam Lake that involved the marines accidentally trapping a Confederate cavalry force between their infantry and mounted elements!

I used the outline of the Austin engagement to create a smaller game more suited to Sharp Practice. Ron had five Groups of Confederate cavalry, three of them mounted and two operating on foot as skirmishers. The skirmishers had been given all of the force's available long arms and so were treated as armed with muskets. The horsemen had pistols and operated using the Sam Colt's Equalisers rule. The Confederate plan was that they could ambush any Union troops sent to capture the (actually recently withdrawn) artillery that had fired on the flotilla.

The field of battle from the south - the Duck River is mostly off-table to the left but you
can see the hill from which Confederate artillery yesterday bombarded the ram fleet.

And Union troops there were, mostly entering from the northern end of the field. Mark commanded two groups of MMB infantry with a single group of skirmishers attached. The latter were armed with breech-loading carbines, which yet again proved their worth in this game. 

Also available on the Union side were two groups of cavalry but these would arrive at the southern end of the table with their time and place of arrival somewhat randomised.

The Confederates had two usable Deployment Points and a third, dummy one on the riverside hill. At the start of the game Ron chose to deploy two-thirds of his cavalry in the woods to the left of the advancing Union boys.

The Union advance - Confederate cavalry start to appear in 
further clump of trees

I'm afraid this was a mistake by Ron; there was little room to manoeuvre and the presence of fencing along the road would make a powerful charge difficult.

However, the Union forces were commanded by Mark and he can always be relied upon to get the wrong end of a random event. Major Wilbur Warnefield slipped and fell and would spend an inordinate amount of time getting up and dusting off his uniform!

This did, however, allow time for Captain Falke's Union cavalry to complete their ride around to the southern end of the field

Ron also took advantage of Warnefield's delay by deploying two groups of dismounted cavalry, causing some casualties to the Union line.

On the Union left the dismounted skirmishers advanced up the road to oppose Ron's horsemen...

and then took up a position behind the snake-rail fence.

Meanwhile Falke's cavalry advanced. Mark was keen to keep his options open - should he charge the enemy skirmishers in the open or engage the cavalry in the rather cramped space alongside the road?  In the end, the opportunity to put in a proper cavalry charge won out and blue-clad riders began accelerating towards the Confederate skirmish line.

The result was slaughter. Both Confederate groups were routed and out of the battle. Confederate Force Morale dropped from ten to six in an instant!

Another random event saw the cavalry discovering that the ground was rougher than they thought (perhaps slick with Rebel blood?) so I had a chance to deploy one of my specially designed markers.

At this point, as Mark carefully marshalled his dice, we realised that the Union line was firing in an uncontrolled manner.

It would continue to do so for several turns, the men firing mechanically into their own powder smoke despite the presence of their own cavalry to their front. I'm sure some harsh words were exchanged once the cavalry managed to extricate themselves from the position.

On the left, Ron finally managed to manoeuvre his cavalry into position to charge the Union skirmishers but, attacking a defended obstacle and rolling spectacularly poorly, they were forced back with significant losses.

At this point, despite the late arrival of more Confederate cavalry under Sergeant Wilkins...

...with just two points of Force Morale left, Ron ordered a general withdrawal and the Union had won the day!

It was great to get the ACW collection on the table for a game other than Running from Bull Run, lovely to catch up with Ron and Mark, and pleasing that a scenario planned in relative haste worked so smoothly. We must do this more often!

Fun running Running from Bull Run at Hammerhead

The old voice was a little husky on Sunday morning after two sessions of Running from Bull Run at the Hammerhead show in Newark.

I arrived at the Newark Showground at about 0850 and quickly transferred the boxes of game material to our folding trolley. Apparently the manufacturers secretly designed the trolley to fit one 33 litre and three 9 litre Really Useful Boxes with precisely the right amount of room for a game-marker-carrying toolbox at one end and three box files on top. I was able to get the entire game from the car in one trip.

Previous experience and careful packing of the components meant that I was able to get the game set up before the doors opened to the public. Apparently this was reasonably impressive as one of the organisers suggested I deserved the prize for quickest set-up by a late-arriving game-runner!

I had been a little concerned that I'd be standing around all day with no players (or at least all morning while attendees did their shopping). As it turned out I had two players (Colin and John) in the morning...

... and four (Andy, Alan, Samuel and Martin) in the afternoon.

I think this is probably a benefit of running a game at Hammerhead; a show that makes a feature in its advertising of showcasing participation games. I've not been to an American convention but I suspect the Hammerhead experience is more American-like in that regard.

If I recall correctly, both games were narrow Confederate wins, the second one narrower on points than we all thought during the game. 

The Cub Run bridge comes under artillery fire as 
US congressmen attempt to flee in their Surrey

Confederate zouaves in pursuit of the fleeing Union troops

In terms of the game, a couple of lessons were learned. I thought I'd counted the maximum number of Union figures I could possibly need so I didn't have to bring along the whole collection. As it turned out I must have miscounted and the second game hit the limit and went beyond. I just kept rolling high whenever further groups of fleeing Yankees were needed!

In addition, I decided to try replacing one of the pursuing Confederate Groups with cavalry. I thought they wouldn't be that good in melee but they might provide the opportunity to ride around the Union flank and capture the Cub Run bridge.

Turns out I was wrong and that charging cavalry are more lethal in Sharp Practice than I remembered.

A question that came up, and that I recalled as being unclear in previous discussions, was the speed of cavalry after fisticuffs. I decided to treat them as being at canter pace after the fighting but in retrospect I think that was probably an error. They should probably be treated as a walking pace after the fight in most cases (although one fight was so one-sided in favour of the horsemen that allowing them to continue at the canter or gallop would be reasonable). This would have made them somewhat less dominant as they need to get up to the gallop before they are truly lethal. 

So that's probably me done with Running from Bull Run for a while. Mostly; I'd like to put some effort into other projects but have been asked online for the scenario so I'm going to have to write it up for this year's Lard Magazine!

Hammerhead Handout (revised)

I've produced a draft  of a handout to accompany Running from Bull Run at Hammerhead. Any comments gratefully received before I go to print. Thanks to Sablemage via The Gaming Tavern and Prof Woodward for their feedback so far.

Running to Hammerhead

Running from Bull Run will be making an appearance at Hammerhead on Saturday 28th February. 

Hammerhead (held at the Newark Showground) is a show that specialises in hosting participation games. This will be the first time I've put on a game there since, I think, 2011 when the SOTCW team put on Crossing the Lippe. 

It'll also be the first time I've put on this particular game or anything like it at an event where players need to be recruited from the passing punters. I spoke to John Savage at Vapnartak, who does that sort of thing all the time. John says that the morning session can be quiet, while people are circulating and doing their shopping, but that after that demand picks up. John's participation games are renowned so if he finds recruitment slow...

I'm confident that once players are recruited the game will work well but I'm tempted to make one minor tweak. The legendary "Black Horse Cavalry" already make an appearance in the game with historically "mixed" results...

However, this time they may not be the only Confederate horsemen to show up. I'm tempted to replace one of the infantry units leading the Confederate pursuit with a single Group of cavalry. This should make for some interesting tactical choices in the endgame period. I'll report back on the results.

Having only previously run the game at Lardy Days where players are allocated in advance, I'll need to give some thought to display materials to have around the table. I might try a Keynote presentation on my iPad as well as some printed handouts.

Running From Bull Run tweaked

In a couple of weeks I'll be taking Running From Bull Run to Posh Lard in Peterborough. 

I'm making a few tweaks to the game to fix issues that came up at Steel Lard. When Terry and Stewart ran the Union forces on the Saturday afternoon it became apparent that, as the game entered its end phase, they were incentivised not to engage in combat with their Confederate opponents who in turn were not particularly incentivised to advance up the table. 

Accordingly I'll be modifying the victory conditions as follows:

1. The Union forces gain one victory point for each Confederate soldier killed.

2. If the Confederates manage to occupy the Cub Run bridge, any non-rallied Union forces still on the table are counted as if they had routed off the table. Hopefully this will allow for more dynamic play.

Steel Lard 2025

Saturday was a long, tiring, but ultimately rewarding day as dozens of like-minded gamers converged on Patriot Games in Sheffield for the latest Steel Lard gaming day.

Seven different Too Fat Ladies games were presented and all of them proved popular with players. In fact every game received votes in the "Best Game" category of our awards (of which more later).

The most popular game in terms of pre-event expressed preferences was Ken Welsh's Lincoln’s Life or a Tiger’s Death! This was an American Civil War Sharp Practice affair depicting a period of hard fighting during the First Battle of Bull Run.

The Louisiana Tigers' battle line

The Louisiana Tiger Zouaves (a bunch of reprobates from the wharves and docks along the lower Mississippi) played a major role in the action.

A grey-clad New York regiment advances
across a wheat-field

Ken's terrain made great use of varying ground textures.

The Stone House - now an historic
monument on the Bull Run battlefield 

A unit of US regulars crosses a wheat-field

By coincidence my own game at Steel Lard was also based on First Bull Run (or First Manassass as the Confederates knew it). Regular readers of this blog will have seen the development of Running From Bull Run over recent months.

This time I set the game up on a four feet by twelve feet table. The reason was two-fold. Firstly I wanted the option of running a large, multi-player battle across the short dimension of the table in the event that any of our game runners was forced to withdraw at the last minute.

Mainly, though, I thought it would be fun to have the retreat run from the battlefield to the Cub Run bridge in the morning and then go on from the bridge towards Centreville in the afternoon.  

The morning set up with Union wagons
lining the road to Cub Run bridge

The other half of the table, in each case, was filled with spare troops and vehicles, some of which would appear in the active sector according to card play during the game.

Running From Bull Run uses a card-driven system to represent the forces of Fate as they make life more and more difficult for players who represent Union officers trying to establish some kind of coherent rearguard from a fleeing rabble.

Because of complicated scheduling and one of our attendees crying off due to illness, I had only one player, Chris Clark, during the morning session.

And you know what? It worked brilliantly. Chris ran all of the Union leaders and I drew and played Event Cards. 

Maddened by thirst on the hottest day of the year, Range's newly 
rallied man dash to the Cub Run to fill their canteens

When suddenly the bridge comes under
Confederate artillery fire

Some US Congressmen (and a journalist) have come
out to observe the battle

In the afternoon session, by contrast, I had two Union players (Terrry Pilling and Stewart Goldthorpe) and two (Ned Willett and James Crawley) representing the Forces of Fate. A different experience but no less enjoyable. 

In this game my own Louisiana Tiger models saw action in a victory for the Forces of Fate.

Elsewhere we had a repeat offering of Ian Garbutt and John Elwen's It's a Shit-Show, a very pretty late WW2 game using the What A Tanker rules. Since this game was offered at last years' event it has seen some development work. Jagdtigers made a menacing appearance!

The results for the Americans were perhaps predictable...

Dex McHenry put on a lovely-looking game of Chain of Command 2 based on the Japanese amphibious landings at Mauban in the Philippines in December 1941. 

I understand the fighting was hard in both games. I believe the Japanese were thrown back into the sea in at least one of the actions.

Rather like 6mm games, the terrain really dominates a 15mm Chain of Command presentation. Dex's was very impressive.

Incredibly popular at many Lardy Days are the Kiss Me Hardy 2 games presented by Charley Walker.  This time we had The Battle of Pantry Bay.

I'm not a huge fan of naval games personally but Charley's offerings are always over-subscribed with players engrossed in the detail of stern-rakes and weather-gauges.

Printed game mats have transformed the look
of modern miniatures games

Ian Hemingway gave is his What a Cowboy-based post-apocalypse game What a Scaver. 

I'd seen this recently at Ebor Lard. Very impressive terrain! The son and heir was one of several attendees keen to give it a try.

Last and far-from-least of our games was Mike Wilkins's The Eagle Has Larded. This was a Chain of Command 2 game based on the BBC TV series Allo Allo.  

The terrain was terrific and I understand the game-play was fantastic. Madame Edith playing her piano on the back of a truck may well have constituted a mobile war crime! 

This game was voted as winner of the Wee Derek Award for "Best Game". Congratulations Mike; well deserved!

I should mention in passing that the Wee Derek "Spirit of Lard" Award went to yours truly. I'm deeply touched although I suspect voting chief Dex may have lobbied on my behalf given my stated intention to pass on the reins to him. Kind of like one of those late-career Oscars where the Academy suddenly realise, "Hey, we've missed out so-and-so". Thanks guys!

Afterwards we repaired to El Paso; a Mexican restaurant not far from the venue. It was loud but the food was tasty; thanks to the Barnsley gang for finding this for us.

Finally beers were taken and tales were spun at the Rutland Arms near the station and another day of very satisfying Lard gaming was complete. My heartfelt thanks go out to all who attended and especially to Dex for agreeing to carry the torch forward.