Cruel Seas: Heroics and Ros Fairmile D's

With plans to give Cruel Seas another spin on Wednesday I spent this morning sticking my two Heroics and Ros Fairmile D's together (and my fingers!).

Whilst they are not quite as detailed as the Warlord model they are a fraction of the price and look like they'll provide some useful firepower to support the smaller Vospers (Warlord Vosper model for comparison).

In the rulebook it states that they chose 1/300th so the boats could have visible crews and then the plastic models come without them. Whilst Warlord have now released separate crew figures I picked up a few Heroics British infantry command and artillery figure strips to crew my boats. The Fairmile's above are crewed (honest) and hopefully the sailors will provide a splash of colour and life to the boats when I get around to painting them...

The Men Who Would Be Kings: The Khandahar Field Force Exercises

A couple of weeks back George managed to arrived at BIG sans his natives. Fortunately I have amassed over 48 points of Imperial troops for The Men Who Would Be Kings, so as a bit of fun we decided to try out the game with two 24 point forces just to see how Regulars would fare against Regulars (with half an eye on Rebels and Patriots). For onlookers the sight of Brits v Brits was passed off as the Khandahar Field Force undertaking exercises!

First off we decided to run the Take The High Road scenario. We've played this previously with the defenders winning in two occasions and the attacker once. This time George was the attacker and I have to confess I had a wry smile as he found ordering his Regulars to move to be as much a chore as I have (especially those pesky Highlanders!).

He took the cannon in his 24 points and proceeded to blast away at my defending force on the hill line. However as his troops advanced across the dusty Khandahar plain my troops proceeded to punch huge holes in his force, quickly destroying it. The game was over rather quickly and to be honest and demonstrated when not outnumbered Regular troops firing were very potent.

As that scenario did not last very long we then decided to try the Seek and Destroy scenario again which has proven to provide a close run game and did once again.

With his cannon pounding away at the village buildings I was loathe to keep any troops in them for any length of time as once a building takes 10 hits in the rules, it collapses taking out any unit inside with it.

My reinforcements largely obeyed orders to get up the table and support their comrades in the village the game swung back and forth and following the allotted 12 turns we totalled up the Objective Points to find my defenders has won by 10 points to 9.

Whilst we will normally be playing Regulars versus Natives our Field Force games did go to show that the rule system can provide a fun game even with atypical forces like we played with here - though advancing into a line of Martini-Henry fire is not recommended...

The Men Who Would Be Kings: Isandhlwana - the Refight

So following our recreation of the heroic defence of Rorke's Drift on the 140th anniversary (plus one day) we rolled up at BIG the following Sunday for an all day refight of Isandhlwana!

Using The Men Who Would Be Kings again, we upped the force levels to 48 points and decided to use the Zulu regeneration rules that had worked well enough during the Rorke's Drift battle.

The 'Horns of the Buffalo' looked very intimidating to the thin red (and undercoat white) line...

I decided to try and get into stabby hand-to-hand combat as quickly as possible and advance At The Double, but some of my units were not too keen, notably on the left flank...

And those that advanced soon found themselves under fire by the 24th and George's Irregular Cavalry...

The attack on the left flank had turned into a bit of a mess with units getting Pinned.

Meanwhile the right flank was advancing more successfully...

...but the cannon fire and rifles of the 24th cut down many brave Zulu warriors!

On the left one unit managed to get in stabby assegai range...

...as did one on the right!

But both were repelled by the sharp bayonets of the 24th!

The Zulus drew breath and charged in again!

And managed to overrun the cannon which had been causing havoc in the Zulu ranks!

Whilst the left and right flanks of the Zulu attack had been badly whittled down by the accurate fire of the 24th (although the Zulu rifles Pinned the Natal Native Contingent after one round of fire), the "loins" in the centre were now in a position to bring numbers to bear...

...crashing into one of the units of the 24th in the centre...

...and pushing it back and Pinning it after inflicting six casualties!

Next turn more Zulus rushed in on the Pinned survivors...

...and wiped them out!

Suddenly the British line was split into two parts as the Zulus poured through the centre.

The battlefield was looking a lot emptier than when we started!

The Zulu rifles skirmished forward and managed to inflict two casualties on a unit of the 24th who then failed a Pin test (this made me smile as George's Mahdists do this to me all the time!)

This allowed a unit of Zulus to charge into the Pinned unit and inflict eight casualties!

On the left the Zulus charged in again...

...winning a round of hand to hand combat three to two!

The British defence was now badly compromised and the NNC kept failing Rally tests...

...before bottling it and running off completely without doing anything in the game!

Fortunately for George this didn't affect the remaining British who passed their Pinning tests...

...not that it made much difference for the two survivors of one unit who went down under a flurry of assegais!

As the battle entered its final phase, George had just two full units of the 24th left, the remnants of two others and his Irregular Cavalry....

The Zulus charged in on the right...

...and managed to kill nine of the British, Pinning the survivors, who went down next turn.

On the left the remaining full strength unit of the 24th faced another round of hand to hand combat against the Zulus...



... and forced them back following a drawn round of combat!

However by now it was just a numbers game and more Zulus charged in reducing the unit by another three...

Leaving just six brave soldiers facing the remaining Zulus...

...who killed another three and Pinned them.

Now it was just a case of mopping up the remnants of the British Army for the Zulus....

And one small group...

... after another fell to the might of the amaZulu!

George's Irregular Cavalry decided to retire from the battlefield, leaving it to the remnants of the Zulu army! (it is worth comparing this shot to the opening one of the game...)

So, as happened historically, Isandhlwana was a mighty Zulu victory, but not one without losing a lot of Zulu warriors.

This was the casualty table at the end of the game and doesn't show the units originally wiped out that were regenerated!

Overall this was a lot of fun to play and showed that despite being designed for smaller games, The Men Who Would Be Kings is a robust set of rules than can handle larger battles outside its remit with ease and, as both battles have shown, gives a decent historical result (and is just six quid currently in the Osprey sale!)

The Men Who Would Be Kings: Rorke's Drift - the Refight

Apologies for the delay in posting our Rorke's Drift battle George, Steve and I fought at BIG to commemorate the 140th anniversary of the battle using The Men Who Would Be Kings, but better late than never...

George and I are still in the process of building and painting our Anglo-Zulu War armies, but we were determined to get a game in as near as we could to the anniversary, and fortunately Steve had a large number of Zulus already painted. I'd managed to make the buildings but we had to use some generic stone walls in place of the melee backs and biscuit tins.

We both started with 36 points but the Zulus could regenerate badly mauled or destroyed units on a D6 roll of 3+.

My Zulus advanced through the long grass en masse...

 Whereas Steve spilt his force to attack both buildings...

Steve managed to get one of his units into hand to hand combat against the 24th Foot in the hospital but was beaten back...

Likewise my Zulus reached the melee bag wall....

...only to be beaten bag with several casualties.

Steve's Zulus attacking the Commissariat came under rather accurate fire and were Pinned (we used some spare shields as Pin markers).

My attack wasn't going too well either with many casualties and two units Pinned.



Half of Steve's force was getting annihilated!



I decided to switch tactics and take a leaf out of George's Mahdist tactics book and use my Zulus with rifles to pepper the defenders. As they were firing at long range and against a target in cover they needed three hits to inflict a casualty but did manage to draw blood - but not Pin a unit.

George's dice rolling all evening was very impressive, he clearly had been saying prayers to the gods of dice before the game!

With most of the first wave having been wiped out, the second wave emerged from the long grass!

And charged towards the hospital...

...into heavy fire from the 24th Foot!

Meanwhile Steve's second wave charged in on the Commissariat building, again suffering a number of casualties.

My dice rolling was not as impressive as George's and even when my Zulus got into hand to hand combat they found the dice let them down (needing three hits to inflict a casualty).

Meanwhile the 24th Foot showed the were as adept with bayonet as they were shooting!

My second wave was pushed back...

And Steve's Pinned! Things were not looking good for the brave warriors of amaZulu!

Once more my Zulus rushed the defenders...

...only to be defeated by my own poor dice rolling!

However, despite being Pushed Back, the Zulus had chipped away at the numbers of defenders... 

....and eventually they breached the barricade!

Meanwhile Steve charged in once more against the few remaining defenders in the Commissariat building...

Faced with the prospect of his defences being breached, George's 24th fell back from the external barircade...

...whilst a unit of my Zulus stormed into the Hospital!

Outside the hospital the Zulus who had breached the barricade rushed in to stab the few remaining defenders there with their assegais!

Only to be embarrassingly beaten back over the defences and Pinned!

Surely though Steve would at last manage to storm the Commissariat defended now by a small number of the 24th?

Unfortunately not. The round of combat was tied and the Zulus forced back...

Meanwhile the 24th waited for the Zulus in the Hospital to charge out!

Which they did, bundling into a unit of the 24th...

...and pushing them back! 

Unfortunately they were now looking down the barrels of twelve Martini-henrys!

The remaining warriors of my second wave rushed to try and support them...

But found themselves under heavy fire!

One last unit managed to engage the 24th in hand to hand combat...

But despite inflicting some casualties was defeated and Pinned!

And pretty much wiped out by a volley of rifle fire...

As the gun smoke cleared the Zulus found themselves left with a handful of surviving warriors and rifles, the 24th Foot still having a number of units intact. The Zulu izinDuna decided that fate was against them and admitted defeat...

Overall a resounding British victory that in many ways repeated history and was a lot of fun. The rules worked pretty well and George's dice rolling certainly made a difference - or maybe it was both Steve and my lamentable dice rolling, who knows?

Next up though time to turn the tables - the Isandhlwana refight!