Small Scale Solo Spanish Civil War Skirmish

 A nice bit of alliteration in that title! 

Last night I decided it was time to put some of the SCW figures on the table in anger, the inspiration being our game of "Nuts" last Friday. Now, I don't actually have Nuts, but I do have Chain Reaction 3, which if it's not the same, is very similar! 

To be fair, the original inspiration came from this blog I came across recently, Victoria’s Luck – a NUTS! Patrol Mission – Atomic Floozy Adventures, and I shamelessly plagiarized the scenario for my own version!

A four-person Republican patrol is tasked with a reconnaissance of the Nationalist positions, with a view to an assault in the next couple of days. The approaches to the Nationalist position are masked by trees, and its night, so visibility is reduced (I seemed to remember reading its 8 inches, but I could not find the section - so I unilaterally decided my memory was accurate!) I also decide due to the small playing area and 20mm scale of the troops, that movements in inches would be changed to centimeters. 

I took quite a few notes as it's a rather "different" system and I thought at least one reader might be interested in some detail on how the mechanics' work....I may be mistaken of course, but it's all here, in minute detail.....!

A view from above - Nationalist position bottom right with three Requetes PEF (Possible Enemy Forces) and the Republican patrol in the top left

The four-person patrol 

The Nationalist positions with initial PEF deployment

To complete the recce, the Republicans must spend an entire turn not moving, with line of sight to the centre of nine imaginary squares on the table.

On turn one, the PEF's all scored One Success with their two dice (see below)

The recce party sat still, so cleared box 1 of 9

On turn 2, the patrol did a test to see if they could do a fast move. Rolling 2 D6 needing 5 or less (they have a star leader, of course!) they passed and could move 16cm into box 2. The PEF's all scored 1 success again and moved towards each other rather than the enemy. 

I don't have a picture per turn so will try to link the appropriate image with the description. 

Turn 3, The Nationalist won initiative and one of the PEF's got two passes and thus moved 16cm towards the enemy. Meantime, the patrol remained still and cleared box 2.

Turn 4 The Republicans go first, do the fast move test and move into Box 3. Once again, the PEF's only manage to roll one pass and then get the Move 16cm towards nearest PEF result - lots of 5 and 6 being rolled, when you want to roll 4 or less!

Basically the game proceeded this way for a few more moves, the Republicans had recced boxes 1,2 and 3 and were now in box 4 when the PEF's finally woke up - PEF 1 scored 2 and 3 so moved 16cm towards enemy, PEF 2 scored 1 success and then a 4 so moved 8cm towards enemy and PEF reprised PEF 1's score

On Turn 8, the Republicans again did a fast move, this time into Box 4, and the PEF's again all moved towards the enemy - leaving the leading Nationalist within 8cm of the patrol and thus, within line of sight for nighttime - this triggered the PEF resolution table:

I had forgotten about EAL (Enemy Activity Level) so did it now and got a 2. I then rolled the test and resulted in a B - Contact - Two D6 rolled up a result of 7 - being a force equal to the Republicans.

The PEF in range of the patrol 

And its composition is resolved! Now, we had to do the In Sight Test - which is one of the key mechanics of the rules and determines who reacts first when opposing troops come into sight of each other.

The Nationalists start with a Rep of 4, but they moved, and the Republicans are in cover (the woods) so they het two dice each, trying for 1,2 or 3 - these are the results.

The Republicans nave a Rep 5 and have not moved this turn, but of course, the enemy are also in the woods, so they get 4 dice per figure - their results are below.

So, either figure with a 3 goes first, then figures with 2, then with 1 and so on - so, as you can see, it would be possible that one Republican could go first, then two Nationalist, then back to the Republicans - but not this time!

The Republican leader fired twice at the Nationalist leader - as with Nuts, you add the die roll to the Rep - so 5 plus the score below - times two...

Yes, it was some good shooting by the Republican boss!

A die was rolled for each hit and resulted in the instant death of the Nationalist leader!

The next two rifle armed Republicans also fired and got a target hit result - they rolled too high for dead but the got a "knocked down" result. The Nationalists had to do the Recover from Knockdown test which resulted in both of them being stunned, while the last Nationalist had to do a cohesion test and this resulted in him running away, which seemed a fair result in the circumstances!

Move 9

The Republicans got the initiative and moved up to the stunned enemy - coming into base-to-base contact with an enemy who is stunned means you either capture or dispatch them - in this instance, the Republicans chose option 2.

The PEF resolution resulted in "Something is out There", raising the EAL from 2 to 3. The one remaining rifleman from group one rolled on the Non Player movement table and got a result of moving back towards the Republicans, causing another In Sight test, The Nationalist rolled 2 D6 and got 0 success, the Republican results are below - needless to say, the last rifleman was shot and killed!

Move 10 - the Nationalists get the initiative - both PEF's move towards the enemy. The PEF resolution on EAL 3 results in a Zero score for one of them and the PEF is removed - all potential and no reality! -  the second scored a 6 on L3 = Here They Come - Two separate groups were rolled for - the result was quite lucky for the Republicans - one group the same size and a second group half the size - so a total of six enemy.

The PEF resolves into two separate groups of enemy troops.

I rolled all the In Sight tests, the Nationalists had two dice again, requiring 1,2 or 3 for success and the Republicans had four.

The Republicans were again in the ascendency, but as it was 1015 and I had been playing for roughly 90 minutes, I let the Republicans choose to retire, having scouted 4/9 boxes on the table. I thought that was a realistic reaction to having stumbled into several enemy patrols and been involved in a fire fight with one of them - in reality, this would have just led to more enemy troops coming out to investigate, so to continue the recce in those circumstances would not have been a sensible option.

I hope you found the detailed description of how the rules work interesting - as I say, I personally think these are better for very small-scale actions - having twenty or thirty figures on each side having to do in sight tests would be a bit monotonous - with 4-6 at a time, it's fine. The mechanics provided a pretty realistic outcome to me - the initial low scoring of the Nationalists just represented the sentries on patrol, unaware of the scouting party in the woods, until something obviously alerted them, and they headed into the trees to investigate! Blundering through the undergrowth, the first party were ambushed by the Republicans and shot down before they had a chance to react. As the backup group of Nationalists reacted to the blaze of gunfire, the Republicans melted back into the cover of the forest, returning to their own lines with some valuable information on the approach routes to the Nationalist lines - maybe the next game will be a larger scale attack scenario?

I am considering running another trial SCW game using the 9+ rules I have used for the Pulp skirmish games - will give that some more thought and if it goes ahead, an AAR will follow.