Some worker's shacks for my Stalingrad stuff.

I've created a variety of wooden worker's shacks for my Stalingrad stuff.  I'm pretty happy with the result. They have an inside texture as well (when de-roofed for seeing troops that are inside). Unfortunately, the pictures I took don't do them justice.

I've got to come up with viable decent-looking ruins (even if only a flat "template" to put on the table) for when they have been destroyed.  I can make smokestacks standing alone I guess, but for wargame purposes they would just get in the way of moving troops (like telegraph poles would).

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I hope to get some stone buildings (and their ruins) done sometime soon.

A little Stalingrad action Pt 2

The Germans managed to gain the buildings across from their baseline on their right flank, but could not move forward. The mortars were supporting the left flank operation.

The German had placed their SMG assault units in a large group to expedite the clearing of the left flank (the plan was to use these to flank the factory then join the main assault from that side). Russian reinforcements were concentrated to that side as well (determined randomly). Luckily the StUG IIIG came in on a reinforcement event, adding its weight to the assault on that side.

The assault on the German left flank, from the Russian perspective (click to enlarge).

With the help of the trusty StUG, the assault group cleared the long 2 hex building, forcing the Russians who hadn't already routed or been killed to flee back across the railroad tracks.

With that building secure, and with follow up forces to their right, they managed to clear the other 2 hex building (with the 2 HS on the left in the picture above), despite the Russians activating a KV I M42 that (slowly) crept up from the Russian baseline due to its slow speed and the cratered terrain. The StUG positioned itself to defend against the behemoth should it get across the tracks (its long barreled 75 had a decent chance to deal with it if it got the first shot off).

The Germans were all set to assault the factory, when a series of events occurred that almost upset the whole operation.

First, the mortars started running out of ammunition. Second, the Russians managed to activate a 82mm MTR themselves, which was firing at the assault units massed for the factory attack. Third, the Russians pulled 3 turn activation cards in a row, allowing them to inflict some casualties on the Germans, including getting the slow KV I in position to spoil the assault !

With the KV I in place to spoil the assault, the German took a gamble- he moved his StUG out Line of Sight of the KV I. However, since it was out of the direct covered arc of the KV I, it had to pivot its turret in order to fire, reducing its chance to hit. He missed. The German didn't.

The shot hit the KV I in the turret, destroying the gun before burrowing into the tank to kill it. No crew escaped the inferno. The assault could go on !

The assault went in, and the Russians fought hard, inflicting some casualties (a couple HS) as well as supporting mortar fire ravaging some of the attack groups (pinning them down).

Slowly, the factory was taken hex by hex.

While the Russians tried to reinforce the factory, the StUG positioned itself to be able to interdict them by moving up to the wrecked KV. However in the process, a T-34 was activated across the tracks.

Fortunately for the German, it was immobilized. Unfortunately for them, it hit the StUG and destroyed it. The crew survived and bailed out from the blazing wreck

The StUG Crew bails from their stricken vehicle while the assault for the factory goes  on (click to enlarge)

The factory assault goes in despite heavy defensive fire.

The final assault went in, with the Germans clearing the factory at the 27 minute mark.

Desultory fighting occurred elsewhere on either flank of the factory with an advantage applying to either side.

Russian casualties were approx. 110 Russian KIA, and 1 KV.

German casualties were approx. 30 KIA, 1 StUG (although the crew lived).

The rules worked well, as did the shellhole templates and buildings. I had a few LOS issues to clear up (as well as stacking in partial hex buildings etc) but I think I cleared them up.

I have half a mind to continue for another 30 minutes to attempt to get to the next factory (the corner is visible just on the far right in the last picture above) across the tracks. But first the Germans would have to deal with that pesky immobilized T-34.

A little Stalingrad-like action Pt1

Re-reading Mark's Island of Fire (for the umpteenth time)  has re-kindled my wargaming interest in the titanic struggle of Stalingrad. So I go from the dense hedgerows of NW France to the heavily rubbled craters of that vast city on the Volga.....

Testing (and re-testing) my 15mm rules in a dense, city-like environment would be a good excersise to tighten up certain rules,  with Line of Sight and movement in particular with some of the odd (half-hex) buildings.

A little background is necessary, however. The vehicle scale is 1:1. The infantry scale is Half-Squads (HS 4 fig),  Crews (3 fig) and Partial Squads (PS 2 fig).

The hex scale is about 10 yards per hex, and fire distances etc have been reduced by a factor of 4 (to make the game playable on the size table I have available).

This allows a decent battle on a 4x6 table (6 geo-morphic hex maps in a 2x3 configuration).

The scenario is a two German Companies (for the 5 months of fighting previously had reduced many units to 50% or below combat strength) of about 120 men total, backed by 2x81mm MTR and 1 50mm MTR and 2 MG42s (in the MMG mode, not HMG (3 man crew) mode due to ammo constraints). Also, for support a StUG IIIG should make an appearance at sometime.

With this they are to attempt to capture as many factories (the two 6+ hex size buildings) against a randomly assigned Russian defense in 30 minutes.

Positions 8 minutes in to the attack. German baseline was at the bottom (click to enlarge)

The plan was to isolate the central factory by advancing on the German left  with a support thrust on the right could be exploited if successful.

The initial attack went slow, with scattered resistance from the outlying buildings. The Russians opted for an "indirect defense" (e.g. staying out of direct Line of Sight of the powerful groups of MGs and mortars) in an attempt to get the Germans to close into melee (where the Russians have the advantage).

This slowed the initial jump from the German base-line (The buildings under the road at the bottom of the picture) as they had to winkle out the tenacious defenders one at a time in order to position themselves for a thrust into the factory proper.

Overall Casaulties were light (1 PS) for the Germans, heavier for the Russians (4 HS) but at the cost of time. The defenders in the factory withdrew into its inner recesses, daring the Germans to attempt to root them out.



Russian Resistance begins to coalesce (click to enlarge)

And then things hit a snag on the German right flank.

The weak resistance over there encouraged the German to take the 2 buildings across from its baseline on that flank. Instead they wound up in a wild melee with a Russian SMG HS that lasted for 5 minutes and devolved into a head butting standoff. Neither side could finish the other off. The Germans forced another 2 HS into the melee and finally brought the house under control, but at the cost of  2 HS and of course, time.

The donnybrook on the right flank (click to enlarge)

The German left flank was held up by a MMG and Rifle HS (with LMG) from crossing the gully and pressing the flank. Belatedly, Russian reinforcements started to trickle forward, promising a hard fight to get clear the land on that side of the factory.

13 minutes into a 30 minute scenario and not one factory had been taken. The Germans were in a good position (at least on their left flank) to enter the factory, but the clock was ticking. And more Russian reinforcements trickled forward.....


Rowhouse Redux

I tinkered a little with the design (made it wider, added more detail etc) and came up with version 2 of the Rowhouse piece (reduced 50% for filesize):

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It fits onto an 8.5" x 11" page, but it does not allow me to put tabs in the design (for gluing purposes, so I have to be aware to leave a little edge for that purpose when cutting out.

I've made a ruined version of the same, which I can cut before putting together to represent it if its ruined:

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I've now got a system in place, where by replacing textures, moving windows/doors etc around there are virtually unlimited combinations that can be generated.

Now I've got to get to work on a corner piece (so that the building can turn to follow the hex grid).

Stay tuned !

Back from Hiatus and Paper Rowhouse building...

I'm back from hiatus and getting into wargaming again.

Currently I'm working on France 1940 in 15mm.

I didn't have any good buildings for Northern European battlefields, so I figured I might as well design some :D

My first creation is a rowhouse section. It fits in the 3" hex I use and can be placed side by-side with others of its design to create longer blocks of houses.

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I reduced it to a quarter of its size to fit into my blog.

I print this out on thin cardstock, crease the lines with a dull ex-acto blade and fold into shape (the bottom 1/2 folds onto the top half and I glue together before folding). I've yet to design the base for the model (although the simple roof and 2nd floor are done).

I've got a few variations of this one (interior/exterior walls etc). I'll post pics when I get a few made.

Land Combat System for Veni Vidi Vici

I developed a combat system to handle battles that occur onboard that I don't want to handle with miniatures.

My goal was to create a flexible system where some tactical choices can be made to make battles interesting (rather than just an odds- based combat roll). What follows is a very generic overview.

The side that initiated the battle is the attacker (of course), and the other the defender (of course). Defending does not mean that he cannot counter-attack the attacker.

The way to defeat the enemy army is to reduce its Army Morale.

Both sides have a reserve of all units in the battle. These are composed stacks of units as they desire, up to limits (4 units if leader is in stack, 3 otherwise). This is done simultaneously and secretly before the battle is resolved. Stacks cannot be changed once battle has begun. This models the initial dispositions of the armies and stacks that take casualties can become very vulnerable.

Here's an example: of creating stacks from an army

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The original army composition is 1 leader, 1 Heavy Cavalry (HC), 2 Legions (HI), 1 Light Infantry (LI), and 3 Skirmish Infantry (SI). Note that only the HI and LI have reverse sides (e.g. when damaged they are reduced, not eliminated). Here are 3 different compositions (amongst many more possible).

Option A is a max combat stacking. The 1st stack is flexible enough to lead with HC or HI depending on what opposing stack it is facing. Both stacks have SI and LI to inflict/deflect incoming enemy missile troops. But if the enemy has 3 or more stacks, this setup will suffer from enemy flanking.

Option B is more of an attack with cavalry setup, and would work well if he can get the flanking bonus (applies if one side has more non-SI stacks than the other side), as he can keep the cavalry back and use for pursuit instead of direct combat).

Option C is a more balanced approach. The light stack could be used for outflanking purposes but the main punch is located in the other 2 stacks.

There are many permutations/combinations that can be made, allowing free reign of genius/idiot deployments that can influence a battle. You have enough leeway and rope to hang yourself or your enemy...

Continuing with the battle resolution:

Both sides check for initiative. The side with more scouting points (Skirmish, Light or Cavalry units counts for this) has a bonus to the iniative.

The side with initiative can choose one of 3 actions: Assault, Withdaw, Defend (defender only).

To Withdraw, it must pass a withdrawal roll. Failure to withdraw may cause army morale to slip.

A Defend allows the defender (only) to force the attacker to perform an assault, with the attacker allocating his stacks first.

An Assault is where the winner of the initiave chooses which stack(s) to assault which defending stacks.

Note: The assaulting/defending side does not have to use all its stacks. It can choose as many as it desires to use for that assault but must choose at least one.

For each stack battle, each side allocates a primary unit that will bear the brunt of the combat, while the rest are in support.

For each stack battle:

Missile fire is performed by both sides simultaneously and casualties (if any) are inflicted.

Combat is simultaneous unless the primary unit is a cavalry or elephant vs an infantry unit NOT across a river (called bonus terrain and applies to walls, amphibious landings etc). Terrain (obviously) influences this roll.

Effects from each stack battle are applied, and casualties taken.

After all stacks have fought a round of battle, each army takes an Army Morale check to see if their morale erodes. A side that winds up with more primary units destroyed is at a disadvantage.

Army morale for the loser is reduced. If it is reduced too far (or the difference between the rolls is too high) the losing side routs. If it is reduced to 0 or -1, the loser withdraws.

A routed side can be pursued by the winning side.

If neither army routs or withdraws, all stacks are returned to their respective reserves and both sides check initiative again, and the process continues.

To the right is the current battle-board that allows an easier appreciation of the battle structure (click to enlarge).

The combat system has a lot of other detail in it than described here, and it generates interesting battles where the largest army does not always win. And in the end, that is the point as minaiture games tend to be that way.

Caesar vs Britannia Iterum

The advantage of a consolidated map is that I can use smaller parts for various scenarios with a little (sometimes a quite a bit :D) of editing. Working with large maps requires some patience, as there are a lot of elements to handle (layers, etc) and even on my great computer it sometimes chugs a little....

Here's the re-created Caesar vs Britannia scenario using the new map that fits on an 8 1/2" by 11 sheet:

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I might try a Caesar vs Gaul next (on an 11"x17") or maybe some Punic Wars (also 11"x17"). I could do a Peloponnesian war and think it'll fit on an 11"x17" along with Sicily.

Time will tell

DSR Veni Vidi Vici campaign map

I've completed the 1st pass of what I'm calling my "DSR Veni Vidi Vici" map (DSR V3 for short). It is over 120" wide and 40" long. It can be divided up into 3 maps of about 40" wide and 40" long.)

In this incarnation, it is geared toward major powers (Roman, Carthaginian, Parthian, Mauryan, and Han Chinese) fighting over the world. It is a campaign boardgame I can use to generate miniature battles (if desired). In that vein, I had to ahistorically add in some areas to make it playable (as well as adding "best guestimate" cities to those areas), while retaining the flavor areas of the map.

Here is a reduced size version of the whole thing:

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Here are some selected map cuts:

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I want to do some more work with India and add some parts to the Arabian Penninsula, as I'll need to "shoehorn" (pun intended) Axum (e.g. the Horn of Africa) and Southern India for completeness.

The beauty of this map is that I can re-draw the borders, assign the cities, change the terrain as I desire (albeit with a little elbow grease !) to fit any period I want to use as everything is consistent in size (about 40 miles per hex).

There's still more work to do.....

And now for something (sort of) completely different....

I wanted to expand my DSR Imperium Romanum Map to include more of the world, but found I had to skew it badly, so I took the bull by the horns and redrew the whole thing from scratch !

In the end it wound up being over 130" wide (and 40.5" long).

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This allowed me to expand my game to include the Parthians, Mauryan Indian, and Han Chinese. As it is a consistent scale, I can create another map to include Axum and southern Arabia and southern India (or Africa, or the Americas or whatever).

With this map I can structure campaigns such as the conquests of Alexander the Great, the gyrations of the Warring States period or any other period that fits on the map.

The next step is to add in the cities (and population centers) and province borders (for conquest and control purposes). Then there's sea zones, crossing points, and some graphical changes (I'm not quite happy with the steppe and desert symbols). There's a LOT of work left to do.....

Caesar vs Britannia Turn 1

This is the first turn of the scenario with the rules in their current form.

Caesar and his forces (2 legions, 2 Auxilia, and 4 Skirmish infantry units) are aboard ship and disembark to amphibiously invade the southern coast. He decides to invade away from any village, as this could immediately mobilize and allow them to contest the invasion. He wins the invasion easily (being opposed only by some nominal defense units) and lands.

Casselivaneus is randomly determined to be in the center at village 4 after the invasion. He is too weak by himself to attack, but from his position he defends a large portion of the island from Caesar's landed force.

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Now, the weather takes a turn for the worst (Storm), damaging Caesar's fleet (he loses 1 ship counter) and forcing them back and into port. Isolated and alone, Caesar decides to advance to village 1 instead of taking on the force of Britons immediately to the North.

For the Britons, village 6 mobilizes (force B). Cassilivaneous rolls a bad AP roll (you need Action points to do things) and comes up with a "1". He wanted to consolidate Force A & B, but decides to make the best of it and move to a more central position to contest Caesar's advance when he moves East. Delay is the name of the game and the storm weather favors the Briton cause.

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The weather finally changes to clear for the next impulse and he brings his loaded, but depleted fleets out of port. He decides to forgo bringing cavalry over from Gaul and instead chooses a force he can use to invade (with a leader) or reinforce Caesar as neccesary.

With the clearing of the weather, Caesar burns Village 1 and decides to move East. Cassilivaneous reacts and a battle is fought.

The Romans win the ensuing battle with the damage to a Light unit and the loss of a Skirmish unit. The Britons lose 1 Warband and 2 Skirmish units.

Despite losing the battle, Cassilivaneous delays Caesar's advance and chooses to take up a better defensive position. The Britons should only get stronger in the coming turns as more villages mobilize.

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The Britons manage to merge the Northern force B with his main force A for his impulse. He checks for the end of the the turn for the month and it ends.

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As things stand for the month of the Qunitillis (as July hadn't been renamed yet for Caesar as of yet :D), Caesar is ashore and has burnt 1 village. He has weathered (pun intended) bad weather, fought a minor battle and put himself in a position to advance further into the island. His forces at sea can either invade elsewhere or be merged with Caesar to destroy Cassilivaneous' army.

Cassilivaneous has managed (with a little help from the weather Gods) to minimize the damage done, and amass a decent force to contest the next Roman advance.

Caesar vs Britannia (Rount Two)

I've created a small scenario based on Caesar's 2nd invasion of Britain in 54 BC to test and tweak my boardgame rules . The board area is a modified part of my bigger DSR IR map:

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Here are the forces and misc marker counters: (note all but the last row show are double-sided):

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The Romans start in the port in A2211. The Britons start on the 8 mobilization points randomly with "?". Each turn they roll to see what (if anything) mobilizes.

Victory for the Romans depends on pillaging the mobilization points, along with (maybe) killing Cassivelaunus. Victory for the Britons involves destroying legions and preventing pillaging of tribal points. Of course they gain an automatic victory for killing Caesar himself.

I can fight the battles generated using a battle-board system (I'll have to make a blog post about it sometime to explain it a bit) or using my miniatures rules as desired.

The boardgame rules allow for sea movement and invasions, as well as weather. It is a an I-go-You-go system, but with possible reaction moves by the non-moving side and the turns variable,  you can never nail down when a turn will end with certainty.

The situation is interesting, as the Romans have a somewhat limited fleet but can land almost anywhere, while the Britons are scattered at first. Does Caesar land a small force and push inland in an attempt to overwhelm some of the scattered tribes (scattering his forces in the process) or does he make a more careful buildup, allowing the Britons to coalesce ?

With the season possibly changing in September to winter (ending the scenario) and the possibility of nasty weather (which can damage his fleet) during the other months, Caesar has to quickly and decisively make his mind up and execute his plan.

As a side note, in testing my version 1.0 of the rules, I used a ad-hoc Gaulish uprising scenario.

Caesar craftily side-stepped a river between a large Gallic force and managed to engage it on more favorable terrain. The hard fought battle caused lots of casualties to the Gauls but Caesar's Army still took some casualties, which caused its Army to fail its morale check and forcing withdrawal. In the pursuit after the battle, he lost his baggage train, causing further losses due to attrition before he could get back to friendly territory.


After the battle I noted that the hex the battle occurred was Gergovia ! I kind of took that as a sign that I'm doing something right with the game :)

DSR Imperium Romanum Map

I think I've finally gotten a more finalized version of my Imperium Romanum map I'm happy with (for the moment :D) :

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Its been reduced to 30% size so I can upload this up to my blog.

I've changed a number of the provinces (e.g. broken some of them up), added/removed a few cities and changed sea movement to sea-boxes (this greatly simplifies sea stuff).

These changes were done so that I can run my campaign game the way I think it should. With the addition of my province cards (and additional province properties).

I've of course created my own rules and counters, some of which I hope to post on this blog.

In addition, I hope to put together a mini-quasi historical game covering Caesar's campaigns in Gaul using my new rules and counters as well as a partial play-by play

As always, stay tuned ! :)

Province Cards

I've created province cards for my modified Imperium Romanum campaign game (named DSR IR). These are snapshots of the game map, along with some of the important features of that province (if any).

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I'll use these for each of the major powers to help them keep track of the money and total population(important for mobilizing units) they control. In addition, I can use the deck for random events.

Its all still a work in progress though :D

Imperium Romanum II Map (Reduced) and Detail (Partial)

Here is the latest version:

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I've reduced it 25% (its a 12 meg PNG file at full size).

Here is a detail map cut at what should be full size:

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I've put off doing the road/city periods for the moment and reverted to the standard designations for temporary cities.

I'm currently working to make it into my campaign system (Vini Vidi Vici) and will make a few changes to it for those purposes (as always on layers so I can revert it to the standard game if desired :D)

Imperium Romanum II- Pass 2

Here's the 2nd pass over the map, including the boundaries, cities and the structural stuff (Cultivated/Wild/Road/No Road) stuff for periods 1 & 2.

I've not included the cities that are not permanent (yet).

A hex with a dot in it has roads. A hex with an ID is considered cultivated. A hex that is cultivated and has roads has an ID and a dot.

This map was shrunk to 1/4 size for space purposes. It measures more than 60" wide with 3/4" hexes.

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A new map: Imperium Romanum II

This is the first pass for a re-draw of an old favorite wargame of mine- Imperium Romanum II.

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The full size is over 60" wide with .75" hexes. This is a quarter-size PNG version.

I found there is a yaho group for the game at

http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/Imperivm_Romanvm/

I'm still playing with the colors, some of the icons and haven't included the province boundaries or cities yet.

Sorry yet again for slow posting....

Been a slow couple of months. I hope to get some posts up when I can cure my computer of the problems it is having (or finally break down and buy a new one.). Please stay tuned :D

Geomorphic Hex "hexes"

A potential client wanted some ideas on how to make dungeon geomorphic hex "hexes" and some ideas on a random dungeon generation game. Unfortunately for me, the nothing came of it. Fortunately for you, I can post one of them here and discuss little it :D

Here is a typical Hex.

Dungeon Geomorph B04

Doors would be handled by counters placed at the appropriate spots (3 on this one). The "?" would be revealed by random generation when you came into Line of Sight of any of the 3 hexes it is touching.

I can easily create these now that I have a process down to do so. I settled on 3/4" hexes so that each Hex fits on a single A5 sheet for printing purposes.

Back from hiatus....

I'm back from hiatus and have a backlog of things to make into postings.

Stay tuned....

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year !

As you can see, posting has been light (to put it mildly) of late. I hope to get some things written up in the New Year (I've got several projects "in the works"). Please bear with me :)

Have a safe and Happy Christmas and New Year !

Slow posting ATM

Sorry for the lack of posting lately, as my interests (and health) has taken different turns as of late.

I hope to get some more miniature/card game stuff posted soon, so please stay tuned !

First Look: DSROHG Prarie Grove Army of the Trans-Mississippi (CSA)

Here's the first run of the confederate unit cards for Prairie Grove:

(click to enlarge)

I'm not sure about the game itself, yet (there are some changes I might have to make for playability, such as increasing the strength of all infantry brigades by 1 to make the game scale correctly).

Stay tuned.....

First Look: DSROHG Prairie Grove Army of the Frontier

Posting has been light, as I've been busy with a few projects. Among them a DSROHG module for the battle of Prairie Grove (Dec 7th, 1862).

Here is a first pass of the Union army (Army of the Frontier) for the game:

(click to enlarge)

Stay tuned for the Confederate army.

Mechanicsville

I've been toying with an idea with a Mechanicsville scenario. To that end, I've made a counter set of all of
Porter's V Corps (Army of the Potomac), AP Hill's Division and DH Hill's Division.

The rules are still in flux, and I can't seem to find pictures of 2 Regular Army brigade leaders (Lovell and Buchannon).

Here are the (double-sided) 1/2 inch counters:

(click to enlarge)

Not sure what I'm going to do with it yet, but figured it was kind of nice for OB purposes (and there are some mistakes in this one as well as additional forces that did not fight the historical battle).

One positive thing this project has done is that I've started compiling a database of civil war head pictures (of generals etc) for use in future projects.....

Army of Northern Virginia, Seven Days

With the Army of the Potomac already made, I finished the Army of Northern Virginia for the same time period.


Here is the first look at the Army of Northern Virginia in card form (there are errors in it that have been corrected):

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