Opium for the masses - the Taku Forts

Hooray! Our Taiping Rebellion expert friend Jeremy is back in Oxford and should be here for a couple of years. During that time you can expect regular reports of more Taiping battles on this blog.

To celebrate his return, we tried one of his growing number of new scenarios: the 3rd Battle of the Taku Forts, during the Second Opium War. This did not directly involve Taiping rebels but did involve their imperial opponents and took place against the backdrop of the Rebellion, which lasted from 1850 to 1864.

The 67th Foot storming the Taku Fort. (By New York Public Library - http://www.victorianweb.org/history/empire/opiumwars/28.htmlhttp://www.royalengineers.ca/CooperHTM.html, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=9516269.)

The background to the battle is that the British and French wanted to seize Peking to compel the Chinese government to allow them to continue selling opium in China. The Taku Forts were a complex of fortifications commanding the mouth of the White River, the route to Peking. There had been two previous allied attacks on these: a successful one in 1858, when they were briefly seized but then returned by treaty; a disastrous one in 1859 when the British lost three ships and hundreds of casualties. This third effort involved an expeditionary force of nearly 20,000 men adopting a more indirect approach. First they landed up the coast at Beitang and took a couple of small towns to establish a base. After a week's logistical pause, they then stormed the northern forts from the north.

Making frontal assaults on fortifications into an interesting game is always a challenge, as I discussed in my "Reflections on Wargaming" essay on the topic here. Jeremy adopted an approach similar to the one I used for my Düppel 1864 scenario. He made it a two-phase game, with the preliminary operations against Xinhe and Tanggu being the first phase and the actual fort assaults the second phase. Victory depended on how swiftly the Allies took the forts.

The result was a tremendously exciting game. The nineteen photos below record how it went. First, a double apology: (a) although I do have a Taiping army, actual junks and Chinese buildings, all of these are still in a state of partial construction, so we had to make do with proxies; (b) I'd been away for a week and only had a couple of hours to throw the terrain together, so please forgive us if it is a bit scruffy and imperfect. If you have limited appetite for looking at my venerable terrain, you can scroll to the end to find some reflections.

The battlefield, looking south. The White River runs from upper right edge into the sea in the top left corner. Most of the coast is tidal mudflats (the patches of felt covered with scattered foliage). The light blue/grey patches are lakes. Dark brown patches with huts are villages. Lighter brown paved areas with houses are towns: Xinhe (lower right), Tanggu (upper centre next to the lake) and Donggu (top edge). There are some entrenchments around Xinhe and Tanggu but the serious fortifications are the forts clustered around the mouth of the river. The three with white counters on them are the Objectives the Allies need to take for victory.

An Imperial Qing field force starts in and around Xinhe. The Qing army wore blue and had a lot of not very regular cavalry. My Ottoman 1877 army makes for good proxies. Figures are Heroics & Ros 6mm (ACW zouaves and cavalry, Napoleonic Russian cossacks), painted by me last millennium and finally rebased for BBB this year. Houses made by my mate Colin when we were 12. Roads and river by Rob Owens of Rob's Scenics.

I commanded the Allied left wing, the French division under Montauban. My mission was to race through the mudflats and take Tanggu as quickly as possible. The brigade on the left is marines with some line and African LI; on the right, line infantry, chasseurs and Algerian tirailleurs. Figures are Baccus 6mm Franco-Prussian War painted by a company now defunct.

Anton commanded the larger British force on our right: two infantry divisions (four brigades) under Michel and Napier, a grand battery including some rockets (the red counter), and a cavalry brigade. The idea was that the British would screen our flank against the swarm of Qing cavalry, cover Xinhe and help me to take Tanggu. At least, that's what I thought our plan was.

After the planning, the execution. My French shake out to the left of the lakes and prepare to assault Tanggu (top left). Two of Anton's brigades and some guns move up on my right to cover Xinhe (top right).

Anton's other two brigades have moved off elsewhere, leaving his cavalry and horse artillery to fend off the Qing's massed cavalry charge alone. Where can the infantry be?

Oh, there they are! That's right - away on our extreme left, taking the coast road towards the easternmost fort. This took them out of action for the whole first phase as they couldn't reach the fort in time and were too weak to take it if they had. Not sure what my ally was thinking. Something must have been lost in translation.

The assault goes in on Tanggu (upper left). Our preparatory fire had seriously weakened the defenders. However, defensive fire from them, from the junks on the river (top edge) and from forts out of pic to the left will keep us out this turn. If you think the "junk" looks suspiciously like the Danish warship from 1864, the Rolf Krake, you'd be right.

Remarkably, not only do the British cavalry repel the Chinese cavalry charge, they then countercharge. This goes less well and they bounce off in turn.

Michel's 1st Division continues its futile trudge through the marshes towards the forts.

Turn 4: we finally take Tanggu. Its defenders are routed and the junks will be burned.

Entrenchments by Irregular Miniatures.

Just in time, as our right is in some disarray. The British cavalry is half-dead and being pursued (lower right with red casualty marker). The grand battery has had to reorient in all directions. Fortunately the heroic rocket battery on the end rolls good enough dice to deter the enemy cavalry and prevent the entire artillery line being ridden down.

Once Tanggu fell, Phase 1 was over and the Chinese field force was removed. Historically, the Allies then set up a pontoon bridge at the village south of Xinhe. Jeremy's scenario allows for the option the French advocated but which was not followed, namely to attack the forts on the south bank rather than the north. Although we didn't use that option, it seemed a good enough reason to deploy my Heroics & Ros Napoleonic pontoon bridge on the table.

After our logistical interlude (which we observed realistically by going for a good pub lunch at The Plough), the Allies reset for Phase 2 behind a start line running NE through the marsh. By taking Tanggu so swiftly, we had earned ourselves an extra turn to take the three fort Objectives. Our plan for this phase revolved around a grand battery in our centre to suppress the fort artillery; a French attack on the western (righthand) fort; a British attack on the eastern (lefthand) one; and the smaller earthwork in the middle to be taken by whoever got there first.

Poor movement rolls meant it took me three turns to get past the lakes, through the marsh and storm the western fort. On the plus side, our artillery had blown away the enemy guns in it. We were able to drive the small 2-base garrison out into the marsh (invisible, top right) but did not eliminate it.

Our British allies' progress on the left was slower and bloodier as they faced a more heavily armed fort. At least they now had the support of a British gunboat on the river, just visible top of pic. (Forts are by Peter Pig from their ACW riverine range. A great investment, on my tabletop they have now defended Peking, Paris, Plevna, Petersburg, and a few other places that don't even start with P.)

End of Turn 7, I think. With three turns to go, the middle redoubt is at my mercy. Unfortunately it takes all of Turn 8 just to rally and reorganise my men. The clock ticks ...

Anton assaults the eastern fort, into the teeth of Chinese cannister. It also turns out to have a strong 6-base garrison. (The Chinese get to distribute 8 bases of infantry secretly among their three forts, max 6 bases in any one fort.)

British pluck prevails! The fort is stormed, its garrison either taken prisoner or perishing in the river. Meanwhile, not being entirely confident that the British could take this one without my help and wanting to be sure of taking the middle redoubt in time to assist them, I had advanced both my brigades out of the western fort ...

... whereupon its former garrison unexpectedly rallied and sneaked back in! (Top right.) The British cavalry trotted into the middle redoubt, which proved to be unoccupied. Nevertheless, time had run out for us to retake the western one, so we had to settle for a draw. Sacré bleu!

Reflections

Successful scenario structure. Jeremy certainly achieved his aim. A simple fort assault would have been much less interesting and given the Chinese players far too little to do. As it was, in Phase 2 they were still mostly limited to rolling firing dice, but at least they had some fun with cavalry charges in Phase 1 - and of course that garrison move on the last turn that snatched victory from us, classic BBB endgame drama. And there were significant choices and options for both sides at the start and during the course of the game. Great job, Jeremy!

Rich in flavour. This was a great game with so much of the flavour that colonial gamers routinely enjoy. It had the exotic - Chinese armoured cavalry with bows, Qing infantry in forts - combined with the familiar British redcoats and French pantalons rouges. It had rockets and gunboats and a pontoon bridge. It had cavalry charges, sweeping manoeuvres, grand batteries and fortifications to be stormed. A feast.

I am spoiled! As in: I am surrounded by so many creative people, designing scenarios and running games, that it is making me lazy. I am supposed to be writing a scenario for the Battle of Atlanta (1864), but it is too easy just to sit back and let others entertain me. Ah well, there are worse problems to have.

And an ACW footnote. The same weekend, we also managed not one but two playtests of the ACW scenario for The Wilderness. These were both great contests and confirmed our final amendments so that the scenario is now fit for publication. No report on it this time as we also ran it at Colours last month.

Newly published: The Hungarian War of Independence 1848-1849

I am delighted to announce the publication of The Hungarian War of Independence 1848-1849: An illustrated military history. This is the English edition of the definitive modern history of the war. The original Hungarian edition was written by Professor Róbert Hermann, the leading scholar in the field. It was my honour to collaborate with him and with Dr Péter Bayer to translate this important work and make it accessible to a wider audience. I am grateful to Helion for publishing it.

I should take this opportunity to mention again my two previous works on the '48: Hungary 1848: The Winter Campaign and Hungary 1849: The Summer Campaign (available together as a bundle). These complement Professor Hermann's superb comprehensive work by offering more detail on particular military actions.

For anyone who is inspired by these books to build armies and wargame the battles, then of course I should also mention Nigel Smith's The Honvéd War for all the uniform information you need (and much else besides); and, finally, my own Bloody Big Hungary '48 Battles! scenario book for recreating all the major battles of the war on the wargames table.

Let me finish by reiterating that the '48 was a major conflict and a fascinating war. For too long, it has been ignored and neglected because of the paucity of sources available to non-Hungarian readers. The substantial set of publications we have now made available has solved that problem. 

The Wilderness at Colours 2026

The Wilderness at Colours 2026

(Two items in this blog post: The Wilderness at the Colours show, then the Balkan Wars battle of Driskos at OWS.)

The Colours wargames show run by Newbury & Reading Wargames Society and held at Newbury racecourse every September is one of my favourite shows. Our Oxford Wargames Society participation games have become a regular feature of the event (see previous reports).

For this year's game we chose an American Civil War battle, The Wilderness (1864). There were several factors in this decision. One was the fact that, although I wrote this scenario over 10 years ago, we wanted to playtest it again to check and polish it for the planned BBB American Civil War scenario book(s) that we hope to finish next year. Another was that we could use Dave W's 10mm Pendraken figures, which are better than 6mm for display at shows. A third was that the table is reasonably easy to set up - no hills! And, finally, it's just a rollicking good game because of the battle's geometry: two armies collide at right angles, each marching on two roads, so everyone is in motion and questing for the open flank.

We fought the battle through one and a half times during the show. The first game ended at the halfway mark as it was clear that, through a combination of veteran player skill and good fortune, the South had achieved such a good position and done so much damage that there was no way the Union was coming back. The second game was a much more even contest of ebb and flow, both sides smashing holes in each other in different places, action all over the pitch, and - of course - coming down to the last dice on the last turn to end in a knife-edge draw. Here are seven photos of the action from the first game, just to give you a flavour:

Seeing the wood for the trees ... the battlefield is woods everywhere except the small patches of fields. It's 12 miles x 8 across. One base represents 2,000 men - the Union army is 100,000 strong. Union forces are in the top left quarter, marching from left to right. Confederates are in the foreground, about to intercept them. A few cavalry are skirmishing off-table to the right and will appear mid-game. The difficult country means it is all about the road network, so the game Objectives are the main road junctions and the Union supply trains (the two wagons at the fords, top left).

The Union left-hand column is Hancock's II Corps. It's imperative that this should step off smartly to reach the objectives in the southern half of the table and cover the open flank of the other US column.

The head of the right-hand column is at the Wilderness Tavern. Steve J opted to start the whole column deployed for battle, rather than keep them in column and attempt to extend his line, as that would have risked being hit before he could deploy.

Unfortunately Gregg's cavalry failed their activation and stopped outside the Chancellorsville mansion for a sausage roll. (For our non-UK readers, that's a culinary reference.) That meant Hancock's corps had to trudge cross-country to pass them, costing valuable time.

By contrast, the arriving Confederates succeed with all their movement rolls. Their ragged columns race forward to envelop the exposed Union force at the Wilderness Tavern. Can the US bring up more troops in support in time?

The answer of course is no. Crawford & Wadsworth's divisions are caught isolated, hit front and flank by double their numbers, and smashed back.

Union reinforcements finally move up but will arrive piecemeal and be beaten back in their turn, leaving the rebels free to pounce on the Union supply train at the Culpeper Mine Ford (the wagon model in the foreground). At that point the battle was irretrievable for the Union.

But enough of the toys - it's about the people! And what a lot there were. Apart from the three of us on the team, I think we had at least eight different players join in at various times, while dozens more stopped to chat and have their ears bent by me enthusing. (Apologies to anyone I bored unduly.) Particularly pleased to meet Morten from Denmark, Chris Gosney aka "The Crusty Colonel", and Simon Miller of "To the Strongest" fame. But it was just great to meet everyone, ranging from veteran players and old friends, via those who have the rules already and are introducing their clubmates to BBB, to those who had never seen BBB before.

As always, it was an exciting and rewarding day. I had a great time, I'm sure we entertained our participant players, I had a lot of good conversations, and I hope many show attendees enjoyed the sight of our densely wooded table. (My only regret is I was too busy to make it to the Helion stand and see my new book that was apparently finally published last week.) I'm pretty sure we enhanced Colours and I hope NWRS will invite us back again next year!

===

Driskos (1912)

As if the Wilderness on Saturday wasn't enough, I was in action again the following Monday, this time running a small Balkan Wars battle at the club: Driskos (1912). This was a playtest of a new scenario to be added to a new edition of Dr Konstantinos Travlos's Bloody Big Balkan Battles! book.

This was part of the Greek effort to capture the city of Ioannina in Epirus, after the Greeks and Serbs had both inflicted some major defeats on the Ottomans. The battle picture is that the Greeks have taken some high ground at Driskos that dominates the northeastern approaches to Ioannina. The Ottomans counterattack and, in a two-day battle, drive the Greeks back. The scenario depicts the counterattack.

It's a pretty simple battlefield: the Ottomans have to advance across an open plain to storm a few villages on the steep hills and take the dominant hilltops. Figures are my 6mm Heroics & Ros (ACW zouaves painted as Ottomans) and Irregular Miniatures (WWI British painted as Greeks). Buildings are tourist souvenirs from a visit to Dubrovnik.

Phil and Crispin commanded the Ottomans. I was joined on the Greek side by a new comrade, Edward. Our opponents opted to weight their attack on their right, hoping to roll us up from our left. We launched a counterattack, advancing our reserve unit off the heights to hit the Ottoman left flank. It was a bloody fight as modern weapons took a heavy toll of both sides. It looked like a Greek win until right near the end, when the Ottoman artillery blew some of our troops away and Ottoman infantry surged forward, defying our defensive fire, to seize the objectives they needed for victory.

Situation at dusk on Day 1 of the first game. The Ottomans have been repulsed by the few elite Evzones in Morkios (left of pic) but established a foothold in Janista (centre of pic). The remaining two turns on Day 2 will be just enough for them to seize Hill 1078 (right foreground) and Moni Kiras (top right) for the win.

We were able to swap sides, reset and go again. This time we tried a different plan, concentrating against the central Greek salient initially. We got the surge in earlier, sending in three simultaneous charges just before dusk on Day. The odds said we should have succeeded with one or two, but the dice were against us. We reeled back and conceded defeat.

Reflections

Small games: pros and cons. A small game like this has several advantages. We were able to set up quickly and play it twice in an evening. The small manageable forces were ideal for introducing a new player to the game system. The simplicity provides a very distilled tactical challenge that still allows for different plans to be tried. On the 'con' side, with so few units on the table, one or two extreme dice early on that inflict particularly heavy casualties can have disproprortionate ramifications for the rest of the game. But even that 'con' can be a 'pro' in that such variability adds to the replay value.

Simple but subtle: troop quality. Though the forces are small, there is enough variety in their orders of battle to create choices and add interest. The Turks have two regular regiments with modern Mauser rifles, but their third is raw redif reservists with older weapons (and old blue uniforms). On the Greek side, there is only one large regular unit, the rest being a mix of Garibaldini, Cretan volunteers, and other irregulars, but they do have the best troops on the table: the 1-base Evzone unit.

Surprisingly successful! I wasn't sure how well this scenario would work as a game, but actually it was great fun and will need almost no revision. Thanks, Konstantinos!

My 2026 tour of defence academies

By improbable coincidence, in August I visited four different military educational institutions in three different countries;

- the UK Defence Academy at Shrivenham (as invited participant in a Waterloo wargame);

- the US Army War College, Carlisle PA (to present BBB at a Symposium on Wargaming in Professional Military Education);

- the US Military Academy at West Point (strictly as a tourist);

- and Sweden's Defence University, Stockholm (to participate in an academic workshop).

I also took in a couple of good military museums on the way.

I already reported on the Waterloo game in a previous post here.

The symposium at AWC was a much more substantial and significant event. It was the first conference of its kind, gathering nearly 100 international participants to discuss the use of wargaming in military education, share best practice, etc. It was initiated by Professor Nicholas Murray, who has regular used the Bloody Big Battles! rules to run games for educational purposes at the US Army's Command & General Staff College, Naval War College, and elsewhere. Consequently I attended to present a BBB demonstration game.

I chose to use the Montebello scenario that is my favourite "training game". A couple of bold participants took up the challenge and played it through, while a fair number of others stopped by to view and discuss it. (Since you ask: crushing French win, their all-out aggression from the start paid off, everything went right for them and none of the Austrian potential reinforcements made it onto the table.)

An example of the other games on display at AWC, this one by LTC Tyler Brooks of AWC.

As well as presenting the game, I attended a lot of interesting talks and met some really impressive people. It was an exciting meeting and I understand is likely to become an annual event. Other related activities may follow as well.

These slides are from COL Tim Barrick's presentation, reproduced with his kind permission.

Maybe I will adapt it to create my own Cognitive Wargaming Competency Framework and assess my gaming buddies. The risk is that it might be turned against me.

Professor Murray has published a report on the symposium in Small Wars Journal here. Participant Aaron Danis has also done a write-up in Armchair Dragoons here. (You'll find a pic of my Montebello game captioned as "a Kriegsspiel-type game with effective terrain representation". I used a printed battlemat with Kriegsspiel blocks rather than miniatures.)

AWC has a rather fine museum on-site. Exhibits include this mighty FT-17.

Also of particular interest to us wargamers is this Apparatus, as explained by COL Parrish below. Further information on it can be found here.

As if that wasn't enough, half an hour down the road from AWC is the National Civil War Museum at Harrisburg PA.

Vignette from Pickett's Charge, a display at the NCWM.

We spent a good couple of hours there and could easily have spent a couple more. Its collection of firearms is particularly impressive, including all sorts of firearms by makers I'd never heard of. Well worth a visit.

Sherman on gate guard at West Point.

The West Point visit was just an opportunistic side-trip on the drive between AWC and the airport. Obviously I knew it was an impressive institution but actually going there helped to reinforce that impression.

Illustrious alumni greeted us at the West Point visitor center.

The Defence University in Stockholm.

The workshop in Stockholm was perhaps the most important of the month's excursions (for me, at least). All I'll say for now is that it relates to the Clausewitz translations Professor Murray and I have published. Oh, and that he demonstrated his excellent map game of the 1799 campaign, illuminating the challenges of coalition warfare and of allocating resources between competing theatres of operations. More in due course.

I can't praise our generous hosts' hospitality highly enough. These eminent Swedish generals watched us eat some very fine lunches in the VIP room.

The 1799 campaign game. Map in foreground is the German theatre of operations; the further one, northern Italy and Switzerland. This has helped to educate a lot of officers and strategic thinkers over the years.

BBB Peninsular War scenario book published

 

I am delighted to announce the publication of our eagerly-awaited new BBB scenario book for the Peninsular War, Bloody Big Peninsular Battles! (BBPB).

Wargamers love the Peninsular War, for many good reasons:

- It is where Napoleon's nemesis, Wellington, builds his reputation through famous victories such as Salamanca and Vitoria.

- The four contending armies - British, Spanish, Portuguese and French - all feature many colourful troop types. These range from the classic British riflemen, highlanders, etc., via Spanish yellow-jacketed dragoons or guerrillas and Portuguese caçadores or militia, to Napoleon's Polish, German and Italian allies. Even the Imperial Guard puts in a brief appearance.

- These armies meet on diverse battlefields in assorted unique situations: we see wagon trains, siestas, mountain passes, crown jewels ...

The 18 scenarios in this collection capture all this rich flavour as they take you from the start of the war in 1808 through to the Allied invasion of France in 1813. Fully half of the scenarios have no British troops present, reflecting the part played by Spain and Portugal in their own liberation. Each scenario is distinctively different, portraying each battle's individual character and presenting players with different tactical challenges each time. Campaign options enable players to play the set as a campaign in which victory in one battle provides some plausible advantage in the next.

Table of Contents

Introduction                                                             
 
The Early Battles, 1808 – 3-scenario mini-campaign
Medina de Rio Seco                                          
Bailén                                                               
Tudela                                                              
 
Spanish Counter-Offensive: The Campaign of 1809 – 5-scenario mini-campaign
Uclés                                                                
Valls                                                                 
Medellín                                                           
Talavera de la Reina                                        
Ocaña                                                              
 
Meanwhile in Portugal: Soult’s Invasion of the North, 1809 –  stand-alone scenario
Braga                                                               
 
The Defence of Portugal 1810-11 – 3-scenario mini-campaign
Busaco                                                            
Albuera                                                            
Fuentes de Oñoro                                           
 
Suchet in Valencia – 2-scenario mini-campaign
Sagunto                                                            
Valencia                                                            
 
Wellington’s Advance into Spain, 1812 – stand-alone scenario
Salamanca                                                       
 
From Spain to France: The Battles of 1813 – 3 -scenario mini campaign
Vitoria                                                               
The Pyrenees                                                   
The Nivelle                                                       

The book is available in PDF format from SkirmishCampaigns here.

Print copies should be available shortly from On Military Matters (US) and Caliver Books (UK).

To help you build armies to fight these battles, there is a spreadsheet of the bases required in the files of the BBB io group here. (You need to be a member of the group to get access to the files.)

BBPB is now listed on BoardGameGeek if you want to let people know what you think of it.

In very much related news, Jared Fishman of the 20 Sided Gamified Podcast has recorded an interview with me and BBPB author Dr Mark Smith. Update: now released as Episode #134. Check it out if you want to hear Mark and me enthusing about the Peninsular War, wargames, 19th-century military history, etc.

Waterloo at UK Defence Academy Shrivenham

I had the privilege of being invited to play in a Waterloo BBB game at Shrivenham. I was going to write a full report but one of my fellow players, Steve J, has beaten me to it. Rather than replicate what he's done, let me point you to his lovely full photo-AAR here. Likewise Stu on his Cirencester Wargames blog here.

Apart from echoing his thanks to our hosts, comrades and opponents for their good company and an excellent day, I'd just add one photo and one Reflection of my own:

Replayability. I suppose I've fought Waterloo five or six times now. Each one has played out differently to some degree. This time was radically different again, the French following a plan I'd not seen before and producing a shape to the battle that I'd not seen before. That plus the fact of it coming down to the last objective changing hands with the last dice on the last turn made it a seriously good game.

Penultimate turn. Lambert's 6th Division holds Mont St Jean (the village with the red star Objective marker), supported by Uxbridge's cavalry (foreground). In front of them, the Union brigade valiantly keeps two French divisions at bay long enough to prevent them joining the fight at Mont St Jean. Upper right, though, problems: the Old Guard surging down the ridge is about to smash through the remnants of Alten's division, force Wellington himself to decamp briefly, then storm onward to eject Lambert. Lambert will need the aid of Bylandt's Dutch/Belgians, arriving from the left (out of shot), to charge back in and expel the grognards to earn a draw.

6mm figures from Dave F's fine collection.

Chess game at Bentonville (ACW)

We are steadily whittling away at the list of scenarios for the BBB ACW project. One of the few left to do was Bentonville. This week we had our third playtest of Crispin's scenario for this battle.

The historical situation is this. By spring of 1865, Grant's Union army had been besieging Lee's Confederates in Petersburg for seven months. Meanwhile, Sherman had completed his March to the Sea through the Confederate south. Sherman then turned north to march through North Carolina towards Petersburg. Lee called on Johnston (commanding the Confederate Army of the South) to concentrate all the forces he could and drive Sherman back.

Sherman's army was advancing in two columns. Johnston saw an opportunity to defeat the left wing under Slocum while the enemy was divided. On 19 March he attacked, sending a couple of Union divisions reeling back in disarray. The Union line eventually stabilised and the Confederates fell back to their initial entrenchments.

Little fighting happened on 20 March. It was mostly spent in manoeuvre as Sherman brought up reinforcements to extend his line, while Johnston adjusted his own line in response.

On 21 March, Sherman launched a limited attack but did not commit to it enough to cut off the rebels' retreat. Johnston withdrew what was left of his army overnight, then surrendered a month later.

Crispin captured these three days' action in a 9-turn game with strategic redeployment in the two night intervals. Here's the battlefield map. Note the long wooded ravines that are major obstacles to movement.

The Confederate attack on Day 1 happens in the lower left quarter, where the white stars are Day 1 Objectives. On Day 2, US reinforcements arrive from the right, so the Confederates need to fall back. The shape of Day 3 depends on a die roll to determine variable objectives. Day 3 Objectives may be either the red stars (representing the Confederate blocking position) or the blue stars (the Confederate line of retreat).

We'd had a couple of playtests already to refine the scenario. This was the definitive one. Seven photos show how it went, followed by some Reflections.

This is the only pic of Day 1. In fairly historical fashion, the Confederates have poured forth from their entrenchments and are driving back the US XIV Cps line. US reinforcements will arrive to try to stabilise it. Unfortunately, things went poorly for the US here: not only were a couple of divisions battered and rendered unfit to fight for a day, but also the US cavalry was wiped out entirely. That meant the US would lack a valuable weapon to strike at the Confederate rear on Day 3.

Figures are Baccus 6mm. Troops and terrain all from Crispin's collection.

Day 2 dawns. The Confederates have pulled back and entrenched in a strong central position with their flanks covered by steep wooded ravines. US XV Cps has arrived on their left, to be followed by XVII Cps, but will not be able to close effectively with them on Day 2. Meanwhile, XIV Cps, still bruised from Day 1, is pushing up past the rebels' right flank (out of shot top of pic).

End of Day 2. No significant combat happened, only manoeuvring for position. Note the couple of small isolated Confederate cavalry units centre and upper right of pic, falling back to cover Bentonville and the Confederate line of retreat in case that turns out to be the objective, rather than the hill position and road junction in front of it (white counters).

Overnight, the dice decreed the blue stars in the Confederate rear were the Objectives. Consequently, here we see the Confederates starting Day 3 by pulling back from their entrenched position, leaving only a sacrificial rear guard. (Yep, failed movement roll.)

Fortunately for the Confederates, all my US right wing can do this turn is struggle across the ravine. Note one US division at right edge of pic that is supposed to march straight on Bentonville (the buildings top right). The terrain is likely to be more of an obstacle than those few Confederate cavalry. Top centre and centre of left edge, Dave's battered XIV Cps has been reinforced by XX Cps and is pressing the rebels' front and right rear.

The effort against the right rear comes to nothing (just out of shot top right), fended off by those rebel units upper right.. However, the retreating rebels are hard pressed, at risk of being caught in the open by superior US numbers.

Endgame. Dave's US left wing is stalled at top of pic. Out of shot to the right, my one-division march on Bentonville has been held up in another ravine. (Should have had them in column of march?) Centre of pic, a Confederate division is about to be smashed and the guns beyond it driven off, so that we capture the objective counter there. However, the US runs out of time before the Confederacy runs out of troops. End result: a narrow Confederate win. Well played, Crispin.

Reflections

The Chess Game. Crispin's scenario nicely captured the three different days. In particular, the chess game of manoeuvring for position - in the strategic redeployments, the jockeying on Day 2, and then the tactical moves to threaten or cover Bentonville - was really absorbing. So much better than a simple line-out punch-up dice-fest.

Variable Objectives. Our usual scenario formula is that all objectives are known from the start. I've only used variable objectives in a few scenarios, but they include some of my favourites: the Alma, Gettysburg, Königgrätz. In this Bentonville game, having some objectives unknown until halfway through the game introduced some realistic fog of war that made the chess game of manoeuvre extra interesting. I should use this kind of mechanism more often.

How Things Ramify. Only a fraction of the Union force is engaged on Turns 1-3. A few particularly good or bad dice or decisions here can really hurt either side and have knock-on effects that ripple through to the end of the game. That's good in that it means the game can be replayed multiple times and turn out dramatically differently. It does make it hard to evaluate the playtests though! (But we're happy with the shape of the scenario now.)

The draft scenario is available in the BBB io group files here.