Al Andalus : Battle for the Border

With George still building his wargaming palace/Fortress he came up to the dungeon for a game Friday morning. His only request was not WW2 and something colourful so time to roll out the Al Andalus Arabs. As I wanted something balanced it isn’t based on any historical incident. A simple border battle between two Arab Taifas fighting for control of their border.

The objectives for both sides are to cross the river, reduce the enemy numbers and if possible capture the enemy camp.

The cavalry on my left wing move forward to the river supported by archers who move onto the hill

The enemy right consists of Mercenary Christian cavalry and crossbowmen

My own crossbowmen also move forward and my right wing horse archers move to prevent any crossing of the river through the marshy ground

Not able to hold back my cavalry loose their javelins and charge the ‘lighter’ Christian cavalry, the enemy heavy cavalry is swamped by arrows which gets through thier heavy armour forcing them after a couple of turns to pull back.

My crossbows are also forced back by archer fire and with the right held infantry is pushed forward to contest the river

The heavy cavalry waver but hold the field supported by mounted crossbows.

The infantry struggle in the centre

The cavalry contest continues on the enemy right around their camp

Whilst more infantry is brought up to cross the river

…but eventually my lighter cavalry start to lose their impetus and are brought down, the enemy charge down the hill to hold the crossing knowing they must delay the advance and protect their camp

In the centre things are reaching a climax with four units engaged hand to hand, then the enemy manage to swing their cavalry around the flank through the marshy ground

Almost but not quite the Christian mercenaries having been pinned down for most of the battle manage one critical charge finishing off my cavalry before it can take the enemy camp

and hit in the flank my spearmen lose heart and flee the field. The battle is lost 🙁

A fun battle with both sides running very close, it wouldn’t have taken much for it to swing the other way, the enemy heavy cavalry played almost no part in the battle until that final critical charge. Really nice to get the Al Andalus collection out on the table but does make me want to get on with some Samurai 👍

Only one bit of painting to show for the week as I have finished off this Leman Russ tank for my Tallarn force, not really sure when it might get used but it has been sat unpainted for about 15 years in a box.

Final snap as I was putting away the Fallschirmjager from the other day I needed to put them into a new box due to the expanded numbers. I actually have about 6 more being stripped of paint so they should just fit in the box when they are done. I’m planning a CoC Sicily campaign at some point in the future when I can get round to planning the details ?

Thanks as always for checking in

Matt 😀

Sicily 1943 : 1st Fallschirmjager Division jump into battle

Having painted up the extra Fallschirmjager recently they ‘jumped’ straight into the battle for Sicily 1943.

The scenario for today sees both sides attempting to rescue/capture a high ranking German officer. Unfortunately neither side knows his exact location. There are three possible locations as marked on the photo above and marked by the Storch and two command vehicles. This created some interesting tactical decisions for both sides, whether to cover all three objectives or quickly eliminate one then focus on the others ? It will take a unit one turn to search an objective.

Roughly equal forces both have a mixture of infantry, support weapons and a single tank. The Americans have the move and fire rule whilst the Fallschirmjager are of course veterans. The Americans move onto the table using the available cover supported by a Sherman, they cover the road with their 57mm antitank gun.

A second unit running into the church yard and the vines beyond

The German smaller squads fan out holding their support weapons in the centre.

After a couple of turns of manoeuvring the German make a bid for the centre objective but the Americans immediate rush forward the jeep pinning them down with machine gun fire.

Keen to capture the officer the American GI’s push across the open fields but get cut down by mortar fire

Having ‘hidden’ in the farm building the Germans attempt to outflank the Americans but they too come under heavy fire and eventually have to pull back

The Fallschirmjager are taking heavy fire but they make the central objective only to find the officer isn’t at that location, suddenly the nature of the battle turns as both sides need to regroup to the flanks

In cinematic style the Americans charge forward again in the jeep spraying machine gun fire, but they get caught by the German command group who get a lucky roll of the dice and hit low it up 👍

Still both sides don’t know where the officer is hiding and it is proving dangerous to break cover to attempt to search

On the right one German squad has been lost searching so the second sits firm in the broken building

Finally turn 5 and the Germans are able to search near the Storch and the officer is found, now they just need to hang on

As expected they come under heavy fire but by the end of turn six and with no extra turn the Germans are clinging on. They have taken a beating with only one of their five infantry squads still in fighting shape. The Americans have the numbers but have run out of time.

Enjoyable game and the scenario worked really well giving lots of tactical decisions, we will play this one again in some form and probably have a follow up at some time. On the Sicily front I am prepping three or so squads of American Paratroopers to join the Sicily campaign so hopefully we will see them sometime.

Planning for another game tomorrow but as yet undecided what to play ?

Thanks for checking in 

Matt 😀

The Great Edinburgh Basing challenge

Things have settled slightly in Edinburgh and I have been able to spend some time basing up the figures I had painted over the last few weeks. We also managed a planned weekend away in London more of that later. Onto the figures in no particular order ………at the recent York wargame show I picked up a bunch of Fallschirmjager these have nearly all now been painted.

First up a machine gun team

Support weapon teams with Panzerschrek

Two snipers and two flamethrower teams.

Radio operators

Riflemen and sub machine guns

A couple of British AWI infantry casualties

A random collection of ‘Ancient’ command figures

Tallarn command figure

A group of dismounted British dragoons for AWI

Dark age ‘war hound’ units

Yet another ‘Celtic’ warband

French Curassiers I have a second unit to do now

French artillery limbers, I have based these in two parts for flexibility

When space is tight on the battlefield they can be used as two horse limbers

I have also completed some British limbers

In the same mode where they can be split down if needed

So far three limbers for each side I do have some more for a later date.

We have just returned from a weekend trip to London, amongst other things we visited the British Museum where there is currently one of their ‘special’ exhibitions this one on life in the Roman Legions

Loads to see with a couple of highlights

The most complete Roman armour in the world ? recovered from the Teutoberg Forest we wonder what fate the owner suffered

Apparently the best/ most complete Scutum preserved due to its location in Syria

We also went to the V&A museum 

And one final treat we attended the third instalment of the LOTR live concert at the Albert Hall

Sorry for not posting so much recently, the ebb and flow of life, but we played a game today which I will post up in the next few days as well 

Thanks as always for checking by

Matt 

The Great Edinburgh Painting ‘Holiday’

A quick post just to ensure my loyal followers I’m still alive up here in Edinburgh. The caring is going reasonably well and we finally have a date next week for my Father to move into a care home. Between my general caring duties I have managed to get quite a lot of painting done. The (poor) photo below shows the progress so far.

These are all the finished figures, but as I didn’t bring my basing materials they will still need a little work when I finally get home, but the hard work is done. I am still working on the new Fallschirmjager and some other stuff as well so it will take quite a while to get them all based up.

I have also managed some walks when the weather has been nice. 

Hopefully life will return to some normality in the next few weeks

Matt