Back to Manassas once more

For a replay of First Manassas 1861 to introduce a new gaming friend to Altar of Freedom.  The scenario is an interesting one as it uses a 6' x 4' table but with a low unit density.  The battlefield is dissected by Bull Run creek which can only be crossed at a handful of bridges and fords which focusses the initial action towards those points. 

The Federals under McDowell (played by Stephen the new guy) have the objective of breaking the Confederate Army.  To do that requires them to break five Confederate brigades. While the Confederates have to do the same to the Federals (also needing five Brigades destroyed)  or to be contending the settlement of Centreville.  Which means being within musket range of any part of the town.  This is because Centreville is on the road to Washington.  The Confederates (played by me) are under the overall command of Beauregard but also have Joe Johnson as second commander.  

Both sides Generals have a mix of good and bad traits just to make things interesting.  McDowell has an additional HQ (useful for rallying broken brigades, or at least trying to) but on the negative side is inept which means no two divisions can have the same priority point bids so attacks cannot be coordinated.  The Confederates have restrictions through Beauregard who has to withhold half his priority points until the turn end phase and has a random minus one or plus two priority point adjustment each turn.  Did I mention that five times out of six he will get the minus option.  Johnson at least is more positive he can reroll one shooting roll, for any of his brigades, each turn.

Last time out I played as the Federals and tried to follow McDowell's historical plan.  It didn't work! This time I was the Confederates and decided to push over Bull Run to threaten Centreville while holding the Stone Bridge and Fords until I saw what the Federal plan was.  I decided to ignore the Sudley Springs crossings based upon the time it would take for McDowell to get troops over them and around my flank.  The Confederates have to deploy first anywhere south of Bull Run.  The Federals deploy second but are restricted to a four square foot area around Centreville which then extends along the north table edge to a depth of one foot and ends two feet short of the corner where Sudley Springs is located.

Turn one initial deployments with Confederate lines of advance marked in Red

The Federals deployed defensively covering the Potential lines of attack over Bull Run and showed no intention of swinging wide around the Confederate left.  This allowed Stephen to off set McDowell's command issues by leaving one division in a static position in front of Centreville.  For most of the Game he also managed to gain control of the turn clock which allowed him to slow it down sufficiently to ensure that three divisions were always activated.  I Started by pushing Johnsons troops over Bull Run and moved a small portion of Beauregard's division to cover the crossings.  The Confederates don't have the same problem with activation as they are organised in what are for all intents and purposes two Grand Divisions.  What is a problem is the number of available priority points as there are not enough to gain the first activation and to control the turn clock and because of his traits Beauregard's division was usually slow to activate.

The situation at the end of the first turn (11.00am)

The Federal's hold around Centreville and prepare their line in the woods (top of the picture).  Their centre advances into the woods west of the ridge Centreville stands on which is a slow process as woods are rough terrain with a big move reduction (Shown by blue arrows) . On their left Stephen reenforces his line opposite the Stone Bridge.  Johnson has a toehold over Bull Run but hasn't deployed in a firing line and I totally forgot to move Stuart's Cavalry brigade at the far end of the table (DOH!).  The massing of troops opposite the bridge worried me enough to detach two infantry brigades and send them to support the defence there.  At least those Damn Yankees aren't heading for the Sudley Springs crossings!

The end of Turn 2 (12.00 Noon) Fighting has broken out in the woods

Turn two sees my infantry pushing into the woods on the North side of Bull Run and skirmishing with the Federals.  You can see fatigue markers starting to accumulate (the white and green discs).  I remembered to advance Stuart's cavalry brigade this turn !  The Federals have closed up on the Stone Bridge but the extra two brigades of infantry are helping hold the position.  Stephen is getting to grips with fighting an army level action now and has understood that fighting on the defensive is a better option for his green troops.  His experience with Napoleonics is also coming into play as he understands the importance of supporting his infantry with aggressive use of artillery.

As the day wears on the fighting in the central and eastern sectors really starts to heat up and the first brigades start to flee to the rear in rout.  By early afternoon neither side had made any progress at the Stone Bridge, over at the east end of the field, with artillery and musketry driving back any attempt to gain a foot hold over Bull Run.  However, in the centre the Federal defence had been driven back through the woods in the centre and more and more Confederate units were crossing over to add to the pressure.  South of Centreville Federal counter attacks were holding the Confederates off and there was an entire division in and around Centreville which hadn't been committed to the fighting.  This was mainly due to the way Stephen had marshalled his priority points to offset McDowell's negative command traits.  By keeping a reserve he could give more priority to the other three divisions, which was a clever move.

Things were heating up (both on the table and in my conservatory)  as the game entered its closing moves.  Faced with the possibility of having his army split by the Confederate push against his centre, Stephen elected to consolidate by pulling back from the Stone Bridge so he could reinforce the centre of the battle line.  Given that neither side was anywhere near breaking the Confederates needed to close on Centreville to achieve their secondary victory condition.  I was making slow progress to the south of Centreville but was having more success in building for a 'left hook' into the flank and rear of the Centreville defence.  Stephen basically closed the door on that idea by bringing troops west from the Stone Bridge area.

The end stage of the battle

Red arrows show the confederate advance over the Stone Bridge and the wavy red line the extent of their advance.  Blue arrows show the Federal retirement from the bridge and the advance of the reserve Division south of Centreville.  The Federals were slowly giving ground to the North East to protect the roads toward Washington and to refuse their right flank while the Confederates are slowly pushing forward onto that flank.  The delay is due to the need to get over the bridge and deploy into line again coupled with Beauregard's command problems.  This is pretty much where we were when the game ended.  Both sides had lost two brigades, but the Federals were carrying slightly more fatigue markers, although these were being rallied off as troops pulled out of the front lines and reorganised.  I'd call it a draw as neither side had managed to break the required five brigades and the Confederates didn't look like they were going to contest control of Centreville anytime soon.

It was a good game with a new opponent who picked up the rules and tactics really quickly.  Altar of Freedom gave their usual entertaining game with command and control issues to wrestle with throughout.  I only managed to gain control of the turn clock once in the entire game but it didn't really hamper me too much.  I hope Stephen enjoyed it as much as I did.

2mm ACW - Refighting 1st Manassas

Or Bull Run depending if you go by Confederate or Federal naming conventions. On Tuesday Paul Dawson came over from York for an ACW game using Altar of Freedom. The scenario for 1st Manassas runs to eight turns and we played to a conclusion in around four hours. If we had been used to the rules it would probably have taken a little less time as it was we had a few occasions of double checking the rules to be sure we were doing things correctly, but not many. I played the Federals as McDowell, Paul had to split his attention between Beauregard and Joe Johnson as the Confederates.

1. The map from the scenario book

Altar of Freedom has two scenario books one for the eastern theatre and one for the west.  These are well worth having as they provide the maps order of battle and most importantly the commander's traits for each of the major battles.  First Manassas is fought on a six foot by four foot table but with far fewer units than any of the other engagements in the books.  In fact Greg Wagman the author actually states that "Altar of Freedom was not designed to handle engagements with so few divisions".  However the lack of manoeuvre elements does pose the same questions faced by the two commanders of how to cover all the crossings while maintaining an adequate strike force. 

2. Overview of the game table looking South East

 

In the picture above Bull Run is running diagonally across the table from Sudley Springs (nearest to the camera) to Union Mills. The nearest long edge of the table is the north edge.  Centreville is on the ridge at the North East of the table.  South of Bull Run running right to left are an unnamed two level hill (lets call it Sudley Springs ridge), Matthew's Hill, Henry Hill south of which is Mt Pone none of the other hills appear to have names.  Oh, and the troop positions in picture 2 are not the initial deployments, just where I plonked them down pregame.

Historically the Confederates knew what McDowell's strategic plan was through their spy ring in Washington.  This gave them the chance to have Johnson move his army from the Shenandoah valley to join with Beauregard north of Richmond using the rail junction at Manassas  Junction.  Two days before the battle there was a clash between one of McDowell’s divisions and Beauregard’s covering force at the fords crossing Bull Run south of Centreville. The Federals were pushed back from the crossings.  On the day of the battle McDowell decided against repeating that attack.  Instead he covered the approaches to his supply lines back to Washington which ran via Centreville with Mile’s division and sent Hunter and Heinztelman’s divisions west to cross Bull Run at Sudley Springs to turn the Confederate left flank.  Tyler was to demonstrate before the Stone Bridge to distract the Rebels.  

Overall it wasn't a bad plan but it didn't take into account the poor levels of training and lack of experience in the Federal army (to be fair the Confederates were no better).  Despite that the flanking move was successful but Beauregard was warned that his flank was turned by an observation post to the south who was able to send a message by semaphore.  The main fighting took place on Beauregard’s left flank on Matthew’s and Henry Hill.  Although the Federal’s had the early advantage in the fight there, Confederate troops were quickly able to move to block their advance due to the semaphore warning.  Throughout the afternoon the fighting continued on Henry Hill until the Federals exhausted themselves and were forced to retreat.

In our refight the Federals started deployed around Centreville with Confederate forces able to deploy anywhere south of Bull Run.  My plan was to push Hunter’s Division south from Centreville to threaten the crossings north of Manassas Junction.  Heintzelman’s and Miles’ Divisions would advance towards the crossings around the Stone Bridge with Tyler’s moving towards the fords at Sudley Springs.  Paul covered the crossings from the Stone Bridge South-Eastwards towards Union Mills but only placed one brigade on Matthew’s Hill to cover the approaches from Sudley Springs.

3. The starting deployments.  Federals nearest the camera

Command and control in AoF is interesting.  Each general has a number of priority points to spend; these are split between gaining control of the turn clock, bidding to determine the order that divisions are activated and end of turn actions.  Although McDowell has more priority points than Beauregard and Johnson combined he has restraints on how he can use them.  He is not allowed to bid the same amount for any of his divisions which means that he cannot coordinate his divisions actions.  That also means that he needs the turn clock to allow at least four activations a turn if all of his divisions are to be activated.  On average the turn clock for this scenario would run out after three activations which gives the Federals problems.  If you want a fuller description of the mechanics of Altar of Freedom take a look at my earlier post which is here: Small but Perfectly Formed: Altar of freedom - I done seen the Elephant (elenderilsblog.blogspot.com) 

From the get go Tyler had problems firstly I didn’t deploy his troops as far to the West as I could have done (entirely my fault I misread the deployment locations). Secondly the approaches to his objectives are heavily wooded which slows his troops dramatically.  Lastly (and due to Paul's good generalship) McDowell struggled to allocate enough priority points to Tyler to keep his troops moving.  After the game ended I also realised the the scenario set up rules (even when read correctly) make it impossible to get troops around Beauregard’s left and ready to attack as quickly as happened historically!  

4. The end of the first hour

While Tyler was slogging through the woods, Hunter was moving his division south from Centreville. However, Johnson wasn’t sitting idly by.  Instead Paul had him cross Bull Run with his troops to threaten Centreville (which is a Confederate game objective).  He pushed Stuart’s cavalry brigade forward on the far left of Hunter’s division while the rest of of Johnson’s wing advanced frontally on them.  I had to respond to this and for the rest of the game I had to prioritise the action on my left more than I had intended and that of course meant that I had less points to bid for my flanking movement.  

I pushed Heintzelman’s brigades towards the Stone Bridge as fast as I could and the first fighting erupted there.  This was skirmishing across the Stone Bridge that fight see-sawed back and forth for two or three hours.  One reason for this was Paul’s siting of his artillery, he placed batteries on the hills overlooking the crossings around the Stone Bridge.  Two were sited on the North Edge of Henry Hill and a third on the rise to the west of there which placed any Federals advancing on the bridge in the centre of interlocking fields of fire.  Artillery has an ability to use interrupting fire against activated enemy divisions which can drive a brigade backwards stopping them completing their movement.  Paul made maximum use of this to prevent Federal troops from crossing Bull Run in this area.

5. Fighting around the Bridge

In photo five you can see how Paul's artillery dominates the approach to the Stone Bridge and Farm Ford.  The tokens denote fatigue blue for one, green for two etc.  Any unit accruing a fifth fatigue marker is broken!  We didn't get any units past two fatigue all day, clearly we were not pushing things hard enough.

Meanwhile to the east Johnson’s attempt to advance towards Centreville forced me to give high priority bids to Hunter’s Division to guarantee they could deploy into a defensive line before Johnson could launch an assault.  I also turned Miles’ Division back to support him.   I managed to block Stuart’s route with Palmer’s cavalry brigade and put a defence together and despite Confederate close attacks this stabilised the position on that flank.  The worst moment was when Burnside’s brigade broke leaving a hole in the line.  I was lucky though as McDowell had moved across to that flank and was able to rally them and get them back into the line.  I had to bid high for Hunter’s and Mile’s activations to stabilise that end of the battle field though, which left Tyler stalled in the woods northeast of Sudley Springs.

6.  Fighting south of Centreville as Johnson pushes through the woods

7. After the end of turn five

By turn five Paul had crossed Bull Run at two points and although Heintzelman had his division in a defensive line facing the Stone Bridge his left flank was under threat from Confederate brigades who has crossed down stream of the bridge.   Tyler by this point was as close as he was going to get to crossing Bull Run having been allocated zero priority points to allow Hunter to keep the initiative over Johnson.

8.  Paul surveys the field at the end of turn 6 *

9.  McDowell holds the line at Centreville (Turn 7)

The battle was drawing to a close by this point and Paul was looking for the win.  He silenced my artillery facing the Stone Bridge and pushed troops over the Bridge and also the fords either side.  In reply I formed a defensive line with Heintzelman’s Division.  Paul launched close assaults against the line and despite my best efforts was able to break an infantry brigade and push another back.

9. Confederates attacking around the Stone Bridge in turn 7

Those attacks opened a route through to McDowell’s second HQ unit which Paul pounced upon giving him a second destroyed unit.  This was at the end of the last turn.  Paul gained the win with two of his required five Destroyed Federal units achieved v none of his own destroyed.  He was also able to remove fatigue markers from his troops so only had three fatigue markers against his units compared to the Federals who had seven markers.  

10. Can McDowell hold the line until night?

17. At the day's end -red line shows the Confederate front line

The overall result clearly favoured the Confederacy and I would call it a tactical win for Beauregard and Johnson.  The Federals have not lost  as many brigades as they did historically which is probably because both Paul and I were a little tentative in pushing troops forward to close combat.

What did we learn?

Artillery interrupt fire is useful for breaking up attacks but can’t create fatigue on enemy units and they can’t use canister in interrupt fire.  Also interrupt fire is a special case of defensive fire, so if you use it you cannot also shoot after the enemy movement phase.  If artillery holds it’s fire until the defensive fire phase it can use canister at short range which gives a huge firing bonus and almost certainly creates fatigue in the target if not outright breaking them.  

It’s hard to get troops into close combat but when you do the results are devastating.  Attacks need to form up in depth so that if the leading brigade is pushed back by artillery fire the supporting brigade can continue the attack.  Oh and we learned that we didn’t know the rules as well as we should.

It was a great day's gaming and both of us enjoyed the rules.  We will be revisiting the ACW and Alter of Freedom again in the near future.

* You may notice that Paul commanding the grey clad Confederates is dressed in Blue, bizarrely I was commanding the blue coated Federals and was dressed in grey! 

2mm ACW - The Army of the Potomac

I have hit another milestone in this project. The infantry for the AoP is completed. No more matchstick miniatures for me for a while! That's fifty-four Federal brigade bases completed, each with 4 blocks of figures on them (and those pesky pairs of flags). On top of which I have almost all of the generals for both sides completed as well. Which means I have come to the point where I have to get my wallet out (the moths will enjoy getting to see the light of day again!).  I have worked out what I need to order and I will probably make two orders to avoid clogging up the painting table and not has been suggested by some, so it doesn't shout 'Warning, Warning Elenderil is spending money' from the pages of the bank statement when the memsahib checks it.

I'm not going to bore you with a picture of the massed ranks of blue clad infantry  (BTW the groaning sound you are hearing in the distance is the shade of 'Little Mac' who loved to display the massed ranks of the Army of the Potomac) instead I will wait until I can do a shot with the artillery and cavalry present as well (exit 'Little Mac' feeling  somewhat mollified).

Well I say no more matchstick miniatures but somewhere in the back of my head I can faintly hear a murmur of 'Blucher, Blucher...you know you want to...go on, just a division of two....'.

Well I already made test bases.

I invested in yet another Really Useful Box to store the figures in.  This one is a 9 litre one as it takes four trays which, really usefully (ba dum...ting), are made up of fifteen 60mm x 60mm sections which is the ideal size for these bases.  So all my little matchstick warriors have new purpose built barracks to live in.

In other news Mrs Elenderil tested positive for the dreaded 'Rona this morning so it cannot be long until I too have the lurgy which will probably put a crimp on blogging (and walking, talking etc).  She is uncomfortable and has a racking cough but it doesn't seem to be as bad as we feared it might be.  I think she deserves a medal for testing the ailment out first before letting me have a go.

2mm ACW - Pictures or it didn’t happen

There was one important photo missed from the last post,  an actual picture of the Army of Northern Virginia as it currently stands.  So here it is.

Bobby Lee's finest

The Confederate army currently consists of 39 brigades of infantry, two generals, one HQ and one battery of artillery.  That leaves me 13 batteries of artillery, seven cavalry brigades, two generals and three HQs to make.

The Army of the Potomac is also coming along nicely. I have 31 infantry brigades finished with a further eight in progress,  one cavalry brigade , one artillery battery, one general and three HQ's are also finished.  Billy Yank's infantry take slightly longer to make than Johnny Reb's as they have two flags per regiment rather than one and the flags are the slowest part of the process.  I have the models for two more batteries of artillery but these are 'unassigned' at the moment.  I think I'm gonna need a bigger storage solution!

2mm ACW - Army of Northern Virginia infantry

This post is one of pure self-congratulation as I have now made and based all the infantry required for the Army of Northern Virginia for Gettysburg. That OOB has the most Confederate infantry stands of any of the Altar of Freedom scenarios for Eastern or Western Theatres, a total of 39 brigade bases. My order from Warbases arrived on Saturday so I have all the bases I am going to need for the rest of the project and as a bonus Mrs E and our guests went out to a Jubilee tea party so I was able to get a coat spray paint on them (The bases not Mrs E and guests).

I am reorganising the artillery onto bigger bases so that they have a more accurate frontage.  Altar of Freedom has an optional rule which puts artillery onto 60 x 60 mm bases rather than the standard 30 x 30.  I have split the difference and put three guns and limbers onto a 60 x 30.  That is because I forgot to order 60 x 60 and got extra 60 x 30 instead...DOH!  Still as the standard base is only 30mm deep I can live with that and I have the optional frontage right!  It will not really make any difference as I am building both sides of this conflict.

The standard bases are 30 x 30mm this is 60 x 30 mm

The next thing to do is finish the Army of the Potomac's infantry, then buy the necessary extra artillery, generals and HQ tentage castings.  Those will be from Irregular Miniatures but i will probably not purchase these until later in the summer.  All in including bases I estimate the two full armies will cost no more than £65 and that gives me enough units to fight any action of the war, East or West.  Terrain items will increase that a bit, but those can be used for other periods as well so I'm not counting that cost.  If Mrs E asks I scratch made everything so it was all free!

Moving on apace - 2mm ACW and a little rock music

 Or should that be moving on at the double quick time?

Rebasing from card to MDF is now completed (phew) with the exception of the artillery which is a minor task by comparison.  So I have moved onto adding new infantry brigade bases with the ultimate aim of having the right number of bases to field both sides for Gettysburg (Yes, I know that my megalomania is showing again!).  I have settled into a simple production line system working in batches.  This means I cut a lot of matchsticks to length, move onto assembling that batch, then basing them and last is adding the flags.

Tiny flags you don't have to be nuts but...

The trickiest part of the process is the last, the flags, one for each Confederate unit but two for each Federal one, so either four or eight on each base as I'm doing four regiments per brigade base. I have made them way over sized as I need to be able to handle them and after all the work printing cutting, shaping and gluing it's nice for them to be noticeable. It does make a real difference to the bases though as it makes them come 'alive'. So far so cheap (other than the cost of bases) but before long I will have to bite the bullet and spend money on extra bases and those items where I use Irregular Miniature castings! It's still not a huge outlay though compared to even 6mm projects.

The flags add some movement to the static lines of troops

To help with the tedium of multiple repeats of a single process I have fired up Spotify on the PC and have been working through the back catalogues of some bands I haven't listened to for a while (in some cases for a VERY long while) and catching up on stuff I missed first time around.  I was an early convert to 'art rock' in the1970's and that brought me to the band 'Deaf School'.  I was lucky enough to see them live in  back in 1976 touring their first album which incidentally is a real gem.  It's a quirky mix of rock, cabaret and glam rock stylings with some clever lyrics.  I am currently listening to some of their later albums that I missed out on when they reformed after a long break.  Coincidentally their original drummer was born in my home town a couple of years before I was.

This is the first album and its a cracking listen

I also have found my Father's wartime photo albums from his time on HMS Chaser (a US built escort carrier).  He served from 1942 to the end of the war in the Far East. So a new project is born scanning the prints to obtain digital versions that I can make available to anyone who is interested.  More on that in due course.

 

2mm Altar of Freedom - recruiting the troops

 It's been a while since I posted anything about my dabblings in ACW gaming.   The interest hasn't waned but I had nothing significant to report.  Unlike the news, which must fill a certain amount of pages or a TV time slot even if there isn't any actual news, I felt no need to report that I had nothing to report!  Still here we are so there must be something to report now.  This being that I am rebasing the test figures onto 'proper' MDF bases and have a test unit of cavalry that is far superior to my home made attempts.  The bases are 60 x 30mm from Warbases.  AoF uses these as the standard for infantry, cavalry and HQs.  Generals and artillery are mounted on 30 x 30mm, although the rules do suggest that for base purists artillery should be on 60 x 60mm squares.

US dismounted cavalry ready for action

I have toned down the figure’s bases to something nearer the green of the MDF base since I took the photo above.  The figures are Irregular Miniatures from their 2mm horse and musket range.  Open order infantry to the front as dismounted troopers, horse holders behind and lastly a mounted reserve.

I have rebased the HQs as well.  Again these are from Irregular’s 2mm range.  Strips of small and large tents, Army command posts and some covered wagons.  I know the flags and flag poles are well over scale but it makes it easier to ID them on the table.  I thought about using some Sibley tents but I couldn't find a 2mm source and they were phased out from 1862 anyway so all my tents are ridge type dog tents or larger wall tents.

Various US and CSA HQs

I have also started rebasing the home made infantry blocks.  These are made with match sticks trimmed to 25mm in length glued together in pairs so each ‘rank’ of soldiers is one match stick deep.  I’ve been playing about with the printed paper skin I glue around the matches to create the look of ranks of troops. The version I’m using for the new units is slightly deeper so the two ranks appear a little wider apart.  The images aren't perfect but they are a huge amount better than the detail I could paint at this scale.

Basic Infantry bases (pre dry brush)

All the bases are textured in the same way using block paving sand which is glued to the MDF with PVA.  This is then dry brushed in olive green and for variety I add a sprinkle of Woodland Scenics' fine turf in ‘burnt grass’ colour.

Altar of Freedom - new unit labels designed

Just a quick update on one of the things I wanted to change about AoF, to whit the unit labels.  The labels as designed by the author are intended to sit upright from the rear of the unit base.  That works OK for 6mm figures but kind of dwarfs the 2mm blocks I'm using. but leaving them flat to the playing surface meant that the text was hard to read as it was the wrong way around!  I spent a couple of hours over the weekend redesigning the sheet provided in the down load section of the AoF site (Yes, I do know that I probably need to get out more, thank you for asking) so that the labels can be left flat but read the correct way round from behind the unit.  I also added two small boxes one to indicate the Division the Brigade belongs to and a second to designate the parent Corps   Not rocket science just making life a little easier for solo play.  You will be able to see them in use in the next game report I post.

After playing the first game I have decided that the bidding spreadsheet does need a couple of tweaks but that is a task for another day as it is a little more complicated.  Not impossible just complicated.  The actual formulas all work I just need to add a couple of lines and set a rule for allocating reserved points between end of turn actions and control of the time clock bids.  I fear it may be something I have to tinker with to suit each different scenario I play!

Altar of freedom - I done seen the Elephant

Or to put it into plain English I played my first game of Altar of Freedom over the last few days! There was a fair amount of cross checking the rules to make certain I was understanding things correctly but in the end there was only one rule I was unclear about and one potential house rule I might introduce.

To get things started I generated 13 separate random bids using the spreadsheet I concocted a while ago, one for each card in a suite of cards.  Each turn I drew a card at random from a full pack to see which bid would be used by the Federal side that turn.  I chose to operate the Federals that way as they had a very straight forward bidding set up for this scenario.  As each of the Federal divisions has to have a different activation bid all I had to do was have the spreadsheet calculate three bids and a reserve bid.  I simply allocated the priority of the four Federal divisions and allocated the highest down to lowest generated bids accordingly.  To prevent me having to much foresight I allocated the Reb's bids before the card draw.

I played the First Bull Run/Manassas scenario but used a different map to allow me to concentrate on the rules and not be blinded by knowing the true tactical situation.  You can see the table and initial deployment here: Small but Perfectly Formed: Altar of Freedom - Setting the scene (elenderilsblog.blogspot.com) .  Apologies in advance but I neglected to note which brigades took which action a lot of the time so it's mainly going to be a battle where the actions of divisions will be cklearer than those of individual brigades.

Turn 1

The first turn (each one is an hour in game time) mainly consisted of both sides advancing and shaking out their lines.  The Federals are able place artillery on the heights in the bend of the creek and get a cavalry brigade over the ford to cover their deployment around the town.  The Confederates occupy the ridge line on their side of the table.  The turn clock had an impact as it prevented the Federals activating Tyler's Division.  There was a single shooting event when a Federal battery opens up on Stuart's cavalry brigade and forces it to recoil.

1.  The overview at the end of the first turn

Each General of Corps or Army level has a set of points they can allocate to divisions under their command.  These are used to determine the order in which divisions are activated.  They can also be used to add to the di roll for control of the turn clock or for end of turn adjustment moves.  

Although McDowall has 13 points to use in this scenario his entire army is a single Corps of four Divisions. His traits mean that no two divisions can have the same activation points bid unless they are zero and zero means no activation.  If he wants all four Divisions to activate the lowest bids he can use are 4, 3, 2, and 1 a total of 10 of his 13.  On the other side Beauregard is in overall command with 6 points but one of his traits means that he has to dice before bidding and there is a 5 in 6 chance that he looses a point and a 1 in 6 that he gains 2 points!  Johnson has 5 points.  The two  Confederate Armies are treated as two grand Divisions of a single Corps so only two bids are needed to activate all their troops and as a result as often as not one of them will outbid McDowell!  This means that McDowell has little to spare to gain control of the turn clock.  

Control of the turn clock provides the means to influence how fast the clock runs down.  For this game the clock is set at 10.  After each set of activations both sides roll a di and whoever has control of the turn clock decides which score will be deducted from the turn clock.  An activation can be for more than one division and covers both sides so if McDowall and Johnson both bid 4 for an activation it is still only one activation round with one turn clock reduction.  Given that the average rolled value on a D6 is 3.5 then the turn clock would (again on average) run down after 3 activation rounds.  You begin to see McDowell's problem?

Turn 2

The second hour comes around and McDowell's bids only provide for three Divisions to move but I have allocated enough of his points to win control of the turn clock.  Mile's Division stays stationary while the first division to move is Tyler's  the Confederates bid the same amount for both Divisions and advance towards the Union men.  There is  more artillery action this turn with Federal guns inflicting recoils but no casualties.  The Confederates are able to offset the effect by using the end of turn adjustment to consolidate on their right where Beauregard is in command and to start to push forward with Johnson's division on their right.  It's clear that a Confederate attack is massing against Tyler and Miles' Divisions.  As Johnson pushes troops forwards Beauregard moves his command to close up on Johnson which opens up space on his right.

A number of things happen at the end of a move but priority points only apply to trigger reserve movement for any Brigade within 6 inches and line of sight of any general on their side.  One point allows a Brigade to make a full move but not to come within 2 inches of any enemy.

2. Both sides are starting to see skirmishers engaged

Turn three.  

Federals loose control of the turn clock but get to move Tyler’s Div . The division attempts to attack the far left of Johnson’s troops.  They are beaten back by a combination of firepower and close combat but not before a brigade on each side are broken.  Fatigue hits are starting to show up.Turn three

3. Tyler and Miles beat of the first assault

Miles division pulls back to avoid being outflanked.  In the centre sporadic fire fights are occurring with the Federals having the better of things.  The Confederates have started to move elements of Beauregard's command to their left to close up on Johnson.  This is leaving room to manoeuvre around the Confederate right.

Turn four

As the day wears on Confederate attacks intensify upon the federal right but again are repulsed by a combination of cold steel and fire power. Both Jackson’s and Bee’s brigades are heavily engaged and eventually have to retire from the battle line to reorganise.  Towards the centre of the Confederate line an attack on the hill in the bend of the river is repulsed but the Federal cavalry is pushed back across the ford by sustained artillery fire power.   On the Union right Confederate attempts to cross the creek are repulsed and Longstreet’s Brigade is left isolated in the open .  The Federals are not having things all their own way there though as Wilcox’s Brigade is similarly isolated.

4. Overview of the battlefield after four hours.

At the turn end phase both sides take the chance to withdraw brigades from the battle line and re-organise them.

If a brigade ends a turn more than 10 inches away from any enemy unit it is able to remove all the accrued fatigue markers.  This is a big deal as being fatigued inflicts a minus one in combat and accumulating four fatigue points breaks a brigade.

Turn five 

Five hours have elapsed it is now 1.00pm on a hot afternoon.   Confederate assaults brings further pressure against the Federals all along the line and the Federal artillery battery is driven off the heights commanding the ford outside the town.  The sustained fighting means many federal units are now carrying fatigue markers but they are still grimly hanging on all along the creek bank.  The intensity of the fighting is preventing McDowell from withdrawing units to recover from combat.  Two Brigades break and flee during this heavy fighting, Bartow's of Johnson's Division and on the Union side Blenker's Brigade of Mile's.  In the reserve movement phase the federals reoccupy the heights but it wasn't to last.

5.  Federal Artillery temporarily regain the heights but their left is giving ground.

Longstreet's Brigade is isolated as the supporting brigades have been driven back into the woods.

6. Mile's and Tyler's Divisions are still holding but are outnumbered.

Close combat is decisive in AoF with a chance of a unit being broken straight off.  Broken Brigades are placed alongside the relevant HQ unit and in the turn end phase roll a dice.  On a six they reform and can move back towards the front line on the next turn.  in all other cases they fail to rally and are removed from play.

Turns six and seven

For the first time the federals are able to activate all four divisions but at the cost of limited points being available for reserve movement but McDowell again wins control of the turn clock.  He uses the advantage to ensure all four divisions are able to act and prioritises Heintzelman's Division to attack over the creek on his left.  This blunts Beauregard's plans to assault on that wing.   In response both Beauregard and Johnson launch a series of coordinated attack all across the front inflicting more fatigue markers on the federals.  Johnson’s assault against Tyler and Miles‘s Division's push them back from the defensive line on the creek but at the cost of a second Confederate brigade breaking (Smith's) the federal army has very few units now which are not showing fatigue markers.  Richardson's Brigade of Tyler’s division threatens Stuarts cavalry who have spent most of the game hanging on the federal right unsuccessfully attempting a flanking manoeuvre.  The cavalry fails to evade and gains fatigue point but at the turn end is able to position the brigade so a recoil or evade to attempt to evade will not push them off the table.

7. Six hours in and McDowell's boys are still holding in the centre and the right

8.  An hour later things do not look so good with Confederate infantry in the town

Cavalry and Artillery can attempt to evade from close combat if successful they make move of three base depths to the rear as if recoiling.  In the turn end phase any unit may change it's facing for free.

Turn eight.

With dusk approaching there is little point in holding back points for reserve moves, although Beauregard is of course forced to do so.  The Union left launches a final assault against Johnson’s depleted Army of the Shenandoah.  Sherman's brigade forces Bee's brigade to recoil and follows up bringing them into contact with Johnson and his staff.  In the fight which follows Johnson is seriously wounded and rushed from the field.  As the day ends the Federals have been pushed out of town and their left flank driven back but at a high cost to the Confederates.

9. The Federal left has fallen back towards town which has fallen.

10. Close up of the situation around the town at the end of the game

The Federal left and centre  has been driven in and are mixed together around the town.  Only Mile's and Tyler's divisions still hold their ground from the morning.

Neither side reached break point but counting fatigue points and broken brigades the Federal side had a slight advantage.  I calculated this on the basis of 4 points per broken unit and one point per level of fatigue.  In the photos I used coloured counters green for one fatigue point, yellow for two and (if it had happened) red for three.  The Confederates have paid the price for making repeated assaults but have taken ground.  The Federals have lost less men but their army is more tired and would have been struggling to hold on much longer.  Over all I'd call this a draw.

The 'Butcher's Bill'. 

How do I like the rules?

I like these rules, I like them a lot.  They force players into a different decision making space.  To be honest they are not perfect as by default they are mimicking high level decisions not low level Regimental level issues.  That removes a lot of chrome, all shoulder arms have the same game effect profile for example.  I can live with that though, as at army level I don't care about how the enemy is being fought rather I should be concerned with the results of the fight.   To keep the fast play aspect brigades have a dice modifier of between minus three and plus three which tends to dwarf all the other factor adjustments given that the random element is either the result on a D6 (ranged shooting) or the difference between two D6s (close combat).  That said the effect could be reduced by adding a few additional factors although the counter argument is that the brigade base factor is already doing exactly that.

There are a couple of rules that caused me to stop and think 'how accurate is this?'.  The first is rallying a broken brigade.  It is difficult to do but if successful the Brigade is back to full strength.  I'd be tempted to reduce the rallied Brigade's base factor by one each time it rallies successfully so a plus three drops to plus two for example.  

The other niggle is moving into close combat.  If a unit closes to shooting range before they can shoot they have withstand defensive fire from the enemy.  That may cause the advancing unit to withdraw and never actually have the chance to fire.  However, if advancing to close combat there is no shooting before close combat (either defensive or attacking).  At one level it makes sense as close combat includes very close range fire fights but on the other the attacker has to cover the same ground as a shooting unit does yet there is no mechanism for a defender to send an attack to ground or make them retire.  Given Infantry can launch a close assault from way outside shooting range it makes close combat more likely to achieve contact and to trigger a fight.  That seems wrong to me.  I asked about this on the AoF Facebook forum and the response was that ranged shooting represents skirmishing.  The unspoken logic seems to be that a close assault drives skirmishers back to the main body before they can do enough damage to stop a brigade scale assault going in.  I'm wondering if allowing the charged Brigade a defensive fire turn but at a hefty negative adjustment of say minus two might be more realistic.

I also need to redesign the unit description tags to include a Brigade ID as I had to resort to coloured dots on the AoF provided ones midway through the game as my eyesight couldn't easily read the info from a distance.  Plus I want to use a more neutral colour as the white is  really stark.

These are minor points though, overall I do like the rules and they will be my first choice for Grand Tactical ACW actions going forwards.

Altar of Freedom - Setting the scene

I got the game table set up over last weekend and, this being me, I promptly ignored the Dark Age and WW3 campaign games in favour of trialling the Altar of Freedom bidding spreadsheet. I chose to go with a fictional game but used the game OOB for First Manassas as that was the game I designed the random bidding spreadsheet around. The game was played on a 4x4 table as I don't yet have enough terrain for a larger table! I also used a fictional battle to allow me to concentrate on the game mechanics rather than being influenced by knowing what the actual tactics used were.

The key to Altar of Freedom (hereafter AOF) is that the two sides have a number of priority points to bid each turn.  The points are used to determine the order that divisions activate in and control of the turn time clock which determines how many activations there will be each turn.  After each round of Divisional activation is completed the turn clock is reduced by the result of a D6 dice throw.  The player with control of the clock has the choice of which of two dice to use for this.  The point being that the divisions with the higher priority points are more likely to activate then those with less as the turn clock may hit zero before the latter divisions get to activate.

Generals are represented at Army and Corps level.  These have traits based on the actual historical counterpart's performance at the actual battle being fought or random traits for a fictional action.  There are around twenty of these traits many of which have an impact upon priority point allocation or even the number of points available to them each turn.  This is something I have struggled to represent within the random bidding system and it means that some aspects of it will need to be redesigned before the next game.

The Federals
For this game the Federals are commanded by Irwin McDowell.  He has four divisions under his command:

• Tyler's of four Infantry Brigades and one Artillery Battery
• Hunter's of two Infantry. one Cavalry Brigades and an Artillery Battery
• Heintzelmann's with three Infantry Brigades and one Artillery Battery and
• Miles' Division of two Infantry Brigades and an Artillery Battery.

McDowell has the Inept and Quartermaster traits.  Inept means he cannot bid the same number of priority points for any divisions (other than a bid of zero which means no activation).  This prevents attack co-ordination between his Divisions.  The Quartermaster trait means that he has two HQ elements rather than the usual one and he can move these at the end of each turn by up to four inches.

The Confederates

The Confederacy is fielding two armies (as at First Manassas) although for game purposes these are treated as two grand Divisions.  There is are smaller subdivisions for point bidding purposes.  Pierre Beauregard is in overall command and also commands one grand division.  Joe Johnson has command of the other grand division.

• Beauregard has eight Infantry Brigades and three Artillery Batteries.
• Johnson has four Infantry brigades, a Cavalry Brigade and a single Artillery Battery.

In terms of traits Beauregard has Revered, Grandiose and Micromanager.  Revered allows an improved chance of rallying a broken brigade , Grandiose creates a variance in priority points upwards or (mostly) downwards each turn and Micromanager requires him to hold back half his points for end of turn adjustments.  Johnson has Disciplinarian and Shrewd Tactician.  Disciplinarian allows a reroll of one shooting dice result each turn and shrewd tactician allows him to reserve priority points for use in the following turn.

The Battlefield

I created a battlefield with a shallow creek crossing the Federal front  which turned out to have no impact on movement or combat (using a house rule for testing it's impact) a number of dense woods which had a variable effect on movement (using one of AoF's optional rules) a small town (rough terrain) and some minor hills which create an advantage for line of sight but no other effects.  Essentially I was keeping things simple(ish) for my first game.

The battlefield.  Federals will deploy to the left and Rebs to the right

The Battle

The game mirrored the First Manassas AoF scenario limits, eight turns duration or first army to break.  Both armies have a break point of five, that being the destruction of any five brigades, batteries, HQ units or generals.  I was controlling the Confederates with random bidding for the Federals but my playing them to the best of my abilities within the constraints of the bids.  Both sides deployed within the boundaries of the roads crossing their fronts and had the objective of destroying the other side.

The initial deployment

As you look at the image above Beauregard is on the Confederate left and Johnson on the right.  The federals have Heinzelmann on the left wing, then Hunter, Tyler and lastly Miles.  The basing is very basic for this trial run as I'm using home made match stick and card armies, apart from the artillery and HQ's which are Irregular Miniatures 2mm items.  As I'm posting this I have finished six of the eight turns and neither side has reached their break point, full details of the battle and some thoughts on the rules and my random bidding spreadsheet in the next post.

So where were we?

I'm about ready to resume gaming now as I am able to lift and carry playing boards and banqueting tables again.  Which means I can set up a game and restart the Dark Ages and World War Three campaigns.  I might even be able to try out the Altar of Freedom Random bid spreadsheet once I have created enough terrain (my collection needs to be extended to include more roads, rivers and a lot of woods).  As it's been a while since I was able to move any of the campaigns forward I thought that a short catch up post might be in order.

Dark Ages Campaign
It's still 799AD in dark age Great Britain.  The last entry for that campaign was way back in February and can be found here Small but Perfectly Formed: The Dark Ages Campaign (elenderilsblog.blogspot.com) and details the forces about to clash in the South West of modern Scotland where Strathclyde and Northumbria are about to fight.  The Northumbrians have the advantage of numbers and are intending a straightforward line 'em up and let 'em go approach to the battle.  The Strathclyde Welsh are hoping to use the terrain to narrow the battle lines to off set the Northumbrian numbers.

Cold War Gone Hot 1982
The second encounter between BAOR forward elements and the Soviet assault formations is going to be a tad unbalanced.  You may recall that a BAOR recon formation is facing probing Russian Motor Rifle and Tank battalions in sector D8 of my campaign map.  Details of the run up to this game are at Small but Perfectly Formed: Cold War 82 - further information (elenderilsblog.blogspot.com)  The big question is should NATO funnel armoured formations into the table from adjacent map sectors or hold the line until all Soviet lines of attack have been identified.

Altar of Freedom
The most recent thing I was working on was the semi-random bidding spreadsheet.  I think this does what I want but I need to trial run it in a game.  My big issues is that the PC with the spreadsheet software is not in the same room as the gaming table.  So I came up with the idea of generating several turns' bids (actually more than the game will need) before the game and recording them on cards.  Each turn I shuffle the cards and draw one at random so that I have no solid idea what that turn's enemy bid is going to be.  It means that I'm not running from room to room every turn which will let me get on with the game with minimum interruptions.

So that's where we are.  Normal (or at least what passes for normal around here) service will be resumed in the next day of two.

Return to the Altar of Freedom rules

You may recall that around this time last year I was waxing lyrical about the Altar of Freedom ACW rules.  The only issue with them is that they are definitely not solo friendly, which is a bit of an issue in times of Covid isolation.  This has meant that I haven't been able to play a game since I bought the rules.  Which of course really annoyed me as it was an itch I couldn't scratch!  So I built a back scratcher to solve the problem.  If you don't know the rules the heart of the system is a bidding process where a player bids points to allow a division to activate.  Generals have a set of traits which impact the total number of points and in some cases how they can be used.  Points can be saved for a reserve action phase but cannot normally be shared between commands or passed on to the next turn.  Divisions activate in highest bid order but here is the thing.  The Army commander can use his points to control the turn clock.  The turn clock runs down by an amount determined by a dice roll after each set of activations and when it reaches zero the turn ends even if some divisions have not yet activated.  both sides roll a dice after the end of each activation and the player who controls the clock decides which one to use.  Its a neat system which simulates a general's limits to command and control his forces.  So how to make it solo friendly?

For those who don't know me, in real life, I work as a tax consultant which means I have more than a passing familiarity with Excel spreadsheets.  So I built a spreadsheet to generate semi-random action bids for the non player side in a solo game.  I say non random as I built in a bias based upon which division I determine the non playing side needs to prioritise.  In brief I enter the number of points a general has to bid for the turn, the number of points the Army commander wants to add to that total and the level of priority a division will receive (as a percentage).  At the start of the game I allocate a number of points to be bid for each priority every turn and set a minimum and maximum range for the random bid that will be added to that value.  There is some jiggery-pokery in the formulas to ensure that the maximum bids are not exceeded and each turn the spreadsheet churns out semi-random bids made up of my pre-set manually entered amounts and the spreadsheet's random additional bid.

It looks like this, sorry I can't show the formulas but if anyone wants to play with the Excel let me know and I will send a copy by email.  The yellow and green cells are where I enter values.  Green at the start of the game (these will not then change) and yellow for any changes during the game (although my current thinking is that the player bid for each divisional priority level will stay the same throughout).  All I have to do in game is allocate each division a priority level each turn and get the spreadsheet to update the random bids.  The screen grab above is the initial version,  I'm up to version 2 now having ironed some bugs in the way it totals up the points.  It looks the same but some of the formulas have been refined.

The only thing this spreadsheet doesn't do is focus on combined attacks by more than one division.  A player could allocate the same bid for two divisions so that they activate together this spreadsheet doesn't have an option to do that.  The current version is rather clunky as the total in the check box is calculated in a different way to everything else but I'm pretty sure that it does what I want.  All I need to do is test it to destruction to find any errors which needs me to actually play a game.

Making a wargames board part 3 Snagging and finishing.

I got side tracked from finishing the board off last week and only got back to it this weekend just gone.  I drilled the frames through on the long edges and bolted them together to ensure everything lined up and fitted snugly together.  This is one of those jobs where measure twice cut (or in this case drill) once is very much the thing.  It would have been easier if I had remembered to place all of the screws which hold the frame to the MDF table top the same distances apart.  What saved me was that I used 50mm deep battens and 20 mm long screws so that even allowing for 5mm as the depth of the counter sinks into the table top the screws only reach 25mm down into the batten.  That meant that I still had 25mm of the frame to drill into.  Live and learn as they say.

Framing all done.  Centre line battens are to help stabilise the end sections if they hang over the end of the banquet table a bit. 

Bolts help the sections butt up tight but mainly are there to stop sections moving apart in use.

I have bought 6mm diameter bolts with 50mm length.  So I drilled 8mm holes to give a bit of leeway. but I didn't really have any problems as the holes all lined up and the sections bolted together fine.  I do have some snags to deal with.  One section doesn't butt up as closely as I want.  This is either the batten not set square to the top so the bottom of the batten is leant outwards a little or the drill hole having to be tidied up a bit, but either way the application of a wood plane will sort the issue.

Some of the filler I used to hide the screw heads has shrunk and I need to add a second layer but that is a simple job to do before I apply the second coat of the green paint to the table top and paint the edging strip.  One more weekend's work should be sufficient to see it all done.  The only outstanding question is should I leave the table top the single shade of green or try to break it up a little?  I'm open to ideas here.

I haven't got it to the point of  gaming on it yet but while I was trying out the 6' x 4' combination I did deploy some 2mm ACW figures.  This was to give me a visual on the Altar of Freedom First Manassas scenario comment on this being a very large table for the small number of troops deployed, but it recreates the issues of command and control on the day.  I set up all the forces in the game's order of battle for First Manassas and it is clear that there is a lot of ground for them to cover.  Next step on that particular project will be to make the specific terrain called for to replicate the main features on the battlefield.  Some of my existing terrain can be used but there are some items I don't have or don't have enough of for the scenario.

You can see how lost the troops for 1st Manassas are on a 6 x 4 table

At the moment I have some Brigade models ACW small scale scenery buildings on the painting table.  These are slightly smaller than the figures and still wildly larger than ground scale but they work well enough in use.  I'm making some additional river sections especially for the scenario, first up are the numerous fords that allow crossings of Bull Run, then some additional hills.  More on those in coming posts.