Today we had a very enjoyable game of RCW/ Back of Beyond with Chris, Julian and I playing the forces of enlightenment and proletarian liberation, whilst Rick, Barry and Paul were the lackeys of Imperialist oppression (including those well-known enemies of free peoples everywhere - The Poles!)
The rules are a kind of IGO/UGO but with a variation - each player on one side activates and does an action with one unit, then the other side does the same, and you continue like this until all units on both sides have done something. You cannot "pass" when it's your sides turn - so you can't "save up" your turns until later (like Iron Cross or 1914 by Great Escape Games)
The QRF for the rules is shown below, for anyone who is interested.
Each force has a number of cards, with all the stats for the various units. For example, if you look at my Naval Infantry card, they can move 5 inches, fire 18 inches effective range (double for long), when firing, they add up all the bases in the unit and multiply it by 5 to see which column they are looking at for the result of firing, if they have to do a Fear test, they must score 7 or less on 2 D6, likewise for Serious event or Rally test.
View down the length of the table - Reds to the left (appropriately!) the others to the right, with Poles right off down in the far top left corner
Джулия Большой Рот (Julia Big Mouth) - delivering an inspiring speech to the Bolshevik forces defending a vital railway station.
The initial deployment of my force
Paul's Polish force (Julians figures, all by Siberia Miniatures out of....well...Siberia!)
Barrys Back of Beyond Chinese forces
Ricks White Russian forces (even though some were Czechs and a few even Anarchists!)
Chris had an all-cavalry command - Buddenys 1st Cavalry Army (Russian: Первая конная армия, Pervaya konnaya armiya) perhaps??
Julian in the centre with infantry, holding the railway station and adjacent village.
Кэтрин бессердечная (Katherine Heartless), the Cheka Commissar, keeps a steely eye out for any hesitation or signs of cowardice!
A couple of views from the window of Barry's gaming bunker
The path down from the front of the house to the bunker door
A view inside of the layout, from the entry door.
The action continues, with Ricks force plastering the cavalry with artillery and HMG fire!
Ricks very nice figure of the Anarchist leader, Batko Nestor Makhno.
Whites advancing in the centre.
My armoured car moves up.
As does the Polish counterpart, with cavalry in support. White markers indicate the unit has taken an action this turn.
Polish cavalry galloping forwards.
The Polish C in C.
The centre of the table with Barrys advance being held back by Bolshevik fire power.
But on our right flank, Chris was being sorely handled by Rick, who had more than his fair share of support weapons and was slowly (and sometimes not so slowly) whittling down the Red cavalry.
View down the table around the mid point of the game
The Chinese continue to advance, despite losing a number of their support weapons to Red fire.
One of my high points, my artillery scores a direct hit on Barrys FT17 - the only tank on the table!
Red Banners!
To be fair, I had to reprise the photographic evidence when Barrys mortar got a double 6 on my armoured car!
A Chekist infantry unit, complete with Leon Trotsky in the lead!
The Red Airforce finally arrives .....
..... and Barrys AA MG truck rolled a double 6 and destroyed it!
Julian insisted I take a ground level image with the AAA and the burning plane both in it!
The much-reduced Bolshevik cavalry are still playing their part, pinning Ricks forces in position.
A nasty surprise for the Whites, 2 HMG's concealed in the village building shown below.
By this stage, the Polish cavalry had overrun and killed one of my gun crews and had a very lucky escape when my sailors HMG only needed 5 or better on 2 D6 to wipe them out - and rolled 4!
The Bolshevik left flank (me) repositioned to meet the Polish threat. Note the absence of my second field gun, which had now also succumbed to a Polish cavalry charge!
Three Polish HMG deployed in the woods, plus the armoured car on the road, destroyed or suppressed most of my support weapons.
And Julian was getting hammered in the centre, too (don't mention how the cavalry were fairing against an armoured car, two artillery pieces and four HMG's!)
The "lucky" Polish cavalry unit (above) that charged and destroyed both my field guns, and (mostly) lived to tell the tale!
We called the game at this point - I was down to 2 suppressed HMG plus the largely intact infantry, Julian had no support weapons at all, and the cavalry was basically gone .... time for the Chekist Кэтрин бессердечная to jump in her staff car and reposition herself - and everyone else to betray the revolution and abandon the defence of the railway - feels like some decimation might be in the offing!
The Polish infantry, who did no more than march all day, will be buying their cavalry mates a few drinks tonight, no doubt!
Well, that was all a lot of fun and it was great to get a portion of my RCW collection out on the table again, even if the result was an ignominious defeat and the loss of the strategic railway station! Hope you have enjoyed reading about it half as much as we enjoyed playing it!
