Thursday 20 January 2022

Wednesday Night Game - Sharpe Practice Reprise

 I arrived at Julian's after work to find him half way through setting up the table for our second run through of Sharpe Practice. With most of the table features in place Julian asked me to come up with a scenario while he fetched some trees to complete the table dressing

A quick look at the table and I came up with an idea - which to be fair after we had set it up, I realised was very similar to the previous game - but never mind.

My suggestion was - a French Exploring Officer was in the small cabin in the centre of the table, and had rendezvoused with a group of Voltiguers, who were there to escort him, and his vital information, back to the French lines. However, the Exploring Officers activities had been discovered and the British are in hot pursuit to prevent him getting his intelligence back to head quarters. A unit of six riflemen and another of six light infantry start on the table in woods not far from the hut occupied by the French.

To activate reinforcements, the French have to send one of the Voltiguers back to the far table edge to raise the alarm. Once this is done, the French player rolls a D6 each turn, 1 to activate reinforcements on the first turn, 1 or 2 on the second turn and so on. The occupants of the hut cant just up stumps and decamp - they have to wait for the relief party to arrive. The British on the other hand, can start rolling for their reinforcements to arrive from turn 2 - this was Julian's suggestion which, given he had offered to play the French this time, seemed rather sporting of him!

Anyway, on to the action:


A general view of the table, you can just see the French clustered around the building in the centre and the first few riflemen in the woods below the road junction


A close up view of the riflemen's first volley - 1 dice per figure = 6, extra dice because they are expert shots, extra dice because it is their first fire, plus 2 dice as their leader is grade 2 - 10 dice in total at close range (12" or under) needing 4-6 for a possible hit. Once hits are achieved, roll another dice for each, requiring a 6 to kill or a 5 to cause shock (because the French are in hard cover) Achieving a hit is range related, determining the effect is target and cover related EG if they were in the open, 3 4 5 or 6 would be a result.


And the result was - 2 killed. I then rolled a dice to determine if the officer was a casualty - as I had 2 killed, a 1 or 2 would indicate the officer had been hit - and he was! Annoyingly, it was just a Knocked Down result - if I had killed him, that would have been the end of the game!


The Light Infantry got in on the act too, and killed a further two voltiguers (I had considered targeting the one voltiguer who was out in the open, sprinting down the road to summon assistance, but thought that would be rather unsporting!)


The results of a couple of rounds of fire - of six voltiguers, only two remain, and they have more shock than effectives - they were forced to pull back (which in the situation, was actually beneficial for Julian) We decided to use the "carrying a weight" rule, so the voltiguers dragged the unconscious officer with them, rolling two dice minus one for each element of shock they were carrying. (,This was actually advantageous to the French as otherwise, As mentioned in my intro, the scenario said they had to stay put and wait for the relief force to arrive, which given subsequent turns, would have been a very hard ask)


Meanwhile the British reinforcements had arrived on turn two or three and moved towards the building to back up the riflemen


The retiring voltiguers and their heavy load make for the French table edge


The Brits advance en masse, whereas the French had only just arrived! I did make a costly error at this point however - if you look at the top left, you will see the four remaining LI plus their NCO entering the woods - six French Voltiguers were on the other side. This was a mistake.....


......because after a round of French fire, they were reduced by 50% and had two shock markers. I should have pulled them back instead of rushing gung ho into the woods....BUGGER!


The French were very hesitant to advance, rolling 1's and 2's very often - even when attempting to run, I think Julian got a total of 7 with three dice, and had to deduct 2 because they were moving over rough ground!


The LI had attempted to leg it but the Voltiguers got back within firing range and caused another shock - now they had more shock than remaining troops and had to roll on the "bad things happen" chart - which caused a reduction of 2 on my army points table (Julian had forgotten to do this when his voltiguers were in the same position earlier, so he did it now and had the same result!)


We basically called the game at this point. The officer eventually rolled a 6 at the end of a turn to recover consciousness, and in any case, the voltiguers had successfully carried him to the French lines anyway. The British had full control of the centre of the field, with one unit of eight line infantry occupying the house, the second unit to the right in line ready to volley and the riflemen back in the woods, securing the flank from the French voltiguers. Apart from advancing just for the sake of it to prolong the game, it seemed illogical that the French would do anything other than pull back with their rescued Exploring Officer. We did set up a "fisticuffs" situation (above) between a unit of French and British line infantry, just to see how it went - seemed a very simple and straight forward process.

So a win for the French but it did not feel like I lost, so good feelings all round and the game was over in less than three hours, including a half hour meal break. I think there may still have been bits we missed but we are getting the hang of the core mechanisms I think.

And finally, because Stew requested it last time, here is an image of your correspondent, in situ chez Julian during the afore reported game

This is probably the first "selfie" I have ever done, so its not the best - mind you, the subject matter doesn't help!

32 comments:

  1. Another nice little game Keith. Simple skirmish level games are perfect mid-week fare after work me-thinks. BTW good to put a face to a name!

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    1. Thanks Steve...we definitely tend towards simple games at Julian's after work....his go to rules for a couple of years have been To the Strongest and they are pretty straight forward too. Maybe I have started a trend...next post, you guys should all add a pic of yourself?!

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  2. Actually it’s really quite nice to see who you are corresponding with, so good on you for taking the plunge you handsome devil you…lol. Also nice to know I’m not the only one who makes up a scenario as the toys are actually going onto the table!

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    1. Cheers JBM. I am glad the portrait hasn't put you off! Ditto what I suggested tobSteve above 😊

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  3. Nice report Keith, SP always gives a good outing.... Second addition gives are far better hand to hand experience.
    Cheers
    Stu

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    1. Cheers Stu...I am pretty sure it's second edition we are plying...I don't pay a lot of attention to that sort of detail!

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  4. Good write up of a fun looking game. You took a good first time selfie. Nice to put face to name, especially with all the bloggers using nicknames .

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    1. Thanks Joe...using nicknames.....what, you mean like Pancerni ??😂

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  5. Gaming frequency is picking up! I have a copy of SP but have yet to give it a go. I prefer fighting battles to skirmishes. Good-looking photo of yourself! As others have said, good to but face to name.

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    1. Thanks Jon, you should definitely give the rules a try...they would work well for small scale encounters in the AWI, for example. I like the scale of most of your games too EG the recent Princeton game...a reasonable number of units but not wall to wall troops!

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  6. nice story around the game, it strikes me from other blog comments that SP needs a good 2 - 3 games to get into what the system is demanding from you - does that seem fair?

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    1. Thanks Norm - yes I would say so, and like all other rules, once you get the basics under your belt, you still have to check every now and again for rare events. Plus of course, you need to keep playing the game regularly, or you forget half of it (well I do, anyway!)

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  7. See, I’m not the only one who likes pics of the blog writer!
    From time to time. Don’t overdo it. 😀😀

    Nice SP2 game. The book comes with some nice scenarios but it’s also a lot of fun to make up your own. People report that the get better at using the command cards with repeated play. Check out the Tactical Painter blog for some excellent SP2 reports in the AWI.

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    1. Thanks Stew - you see, you should be careful what you wish for! Now I have started on the selfies, I may never stop :) Thanks for the tip on the Tactical Painter - I could see myself possibly buying a couple of boxes of Perry AWI (Julian has more than enough for Napoleonic) or other conflicts covered in the time frame (where skirmish level combat is appropriate!)

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  8. Nice little game Keith, seems like it nearly finished before it started ! But the French slipped away. A nice little scenario I might adapt this some time ? As for the selfie well ……….it doesn’t scare me 😀

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    1. Cheers Matt - I would be honoured if you adapted my scenario for your own table one day! As for the image, you are one of the few who has at least a partial image of yourself on permanent blog display, so you have been leading the way for the rest of us!

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  9. Another excellent skirmish. Sharpe Practice are great rules for fighting these type of small actions

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    1. Thanks Scotty and I agree, we get a nice, fun game out of these rules every time we play!

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  10. A nice looking little game Keith…
    A friend of mine is just getting into Sharp Practice… he really rates it…so when he has enough toys painted for a game… I’m in 😁.
    I’m not sure the world is ready for a Morrison selfie… I get a fright whenever I walk passed the mirror.

    All the best. Aly

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    1. Thanks Aly - yes, I would thoroughly recommend bludging of your friends efforts to get a few games of SP - thats what I have done with Julian (albeit, its his idea and he went off and bought all the figures for both sides, so its not my fault he has had to do all the work himself, honest guvnor!)
      As far as images go, I have always assumed its your head grafted on to the fancy uniform, so like Matt, we already have an idea of what you look like., unlike most bloggers!

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    2. That’s actually what I wear when I am sculpting…
      You’ve got to make the effort and show the youngsters how it’s done…😂

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    3. That is very impressive Aly - glad to see some of the old hands maintaining the standards - I suppose the youngsters are just slopping around in jeans and sweatshirts....standards are dropping everywhere - even our police are getting rid of helmets and peaked caps and moving to bloody baseball caps!

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  11. Another fun game by the sound of it. I have seen Sharpe Practice played with close to a hundred figures each side, whereas my natural inclination would be for just a dozen or two. I suppose it depends on the number of players on each team, but a hundred plus would seem unmanageable to me.

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    1. Thanks Lawrence - we are obviously online at the same time, as your comment appeared as I was answering Aly above. I guess 100 per side might work if units were bigger - say a platoon of 20-30 under officer - I would not want to have twelve or fourteen units of 6-8 figures - although Julian and I did discuss the possibility of multi player games - say three per side, with two or three "units" each - so that could be three lots of twenty four per side.
      It would become even more random, as there is a "tiffin" card that when pulled out ends the move - so if its pulled out as card eight or ten of thirty cards, a lot of units dont get to do anything that turn...

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  12. Cool looking game Keith and nice to put a face to the name.

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    1. Thanks Ray....you are one of the bloggers whose features I have seen several times....I even know what the famous "Postie" looks like!

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  13. Nice report Keith. One day soon I hope to be able to join you again.

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    1. Hopefully Jane and Barry don't impose new restrictions on gaming activity now we are all back to the "Red Traffic Light" alert level!

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  14. Enjoyed that sir and a fine selfie.

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    1. Thanks Dai, I was wondering if the selfie had scared you off commenting!

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