Austrian Hungarian Legation Peking Blues

Our "little" side project continues to grow. This week we tried a different scenario. We are still suffering a lack of buildings but this is gradually being addressed but we are still using some of our rather dodgy mdf types. The objective being to polish the rules and generate a scenario to the point we can run through a game with half a dozen players. The Men Who Would Be Kings (TMWWBK)  rules already cover most situations, but we wanted to make some tweaks to suit our circumstances.

This time we are testing out our machine guns. In this case an Austrian Skoda (there was at least one at Peking, possibly two) and a Royal Navy Nordenfeldt (but due to a technical fail this was a Gattling model). The Scenario revolves around a relief attempt by the British to reach and rescue the Austrians in their Legation - which for this game is a walled compound. The Austro Hungarians have one unit plus the Skoda, the Brits two units of Marines and a Nordenfeldt.

Initial table - Austrians in the Compound, Brits enter at other end of the table

Initially everything was quiet, however this changed as the British advanced. As they approached the choke point of the canal bridges the Boxers started to appear, mostly massing at the other side of the bridges, but also to the flank. The flanking troops were ruthlessly cleared by the nearest Marines, and the Boxers, driven by the "Mr Babbage" system from TMWWBK seemed happy to just mill around cautiously around the bridges.

This gave the Austro- Hungarian mg a target - even if at long range, and they "had a go". The Skoda M93 is a typical A-H piece of technology - fine in principle but practically hamstrung by a minor and wholly predictable problem - in this case the gun ammunition is fed by a manually loaded chute on top, so the practical rate of fire is quite limited - about a quarter of what a (then) modern Maxim (or US Colt) could achieve.

The other problem with the Skoda was the junior officer was rated as a Brutal leader, which caused a -2 discipline modifier for the gun. As firing requires the unit to pass a discipline test this was not great, increasing the target number from 6 plus to 8 plus on 2d6. Even so, they managed to hit one Boxer unit hard and pin it down. Meanwhile the sailors who made up the main part of the garrison manned the barricade at the gate and fired down the street at the Boxers. The range was long, but a couple of hits from an unexpected direction pinned the Boxers.

At this point it was looking ok for the Legation. The Boxers were pinned between the admittedly desultory fire from the Legation and the volleys of the Marines and Sailors.

and then...

A unit of Boxers appeared at the corner of the wall, close to the Skoda gun. The gun commander ordered the gun to turn to engage, but the crew, possibly scared into helplessness by the brutish officer,  failed to respond. Happily the Boxers also seemed to be struck down by indecisiveness and they hesitated. All over the Legation a sigh of relief was heard - both sides had bungled. The Austro Hungarian Sailors redeployed towards the threatened wall.

Which is what "Mr Babbage" - the game's simplified system for managing the Boxers actions - was waiting for apparently. You test each time you move a unit to see if this generates more enemy, and almost as though scripted a unit of Boxers appeared directly at the barricaded gate.

The sailors turned and fired into the advancing Boxers as they crossed the barricades, pinning them. Meanwhile the Boxers outside the wall took this as their signal and rushed to the wall. The Skoda had them at point blank range, and passed it's firing test - and rolled 5 "1s" - a jam and no casualties caused!

The Boxers swarmed the wall and killed the crew as they tried to un-jam the gun.

The sailors turned to try and stop them, but it was too late and the garrison troops were caught, fighting bravely but being overwhelmed and destroyed.

As the Boxers set fire to the Legation it became clear the rescue attempt had failed. The Marines and Sailors fell back, the game clearly over.

Well, almost. The Nordenfeld gun had played little part in the battle so far, which suited its commander very well as he was a coward - he had to attempt to keep his unit out of charge range of the enemy. Unfortunately the Boxers were not going to cooperate forever, and a rather aggressive group burst from around the buildings and attacked and killed the gunners as they tried to retreat with their gun.

That was the last act of our game. Boxer casualties had been quite heavy - at least two units were wiped out by the European's fire, but the loss of the Legation building was a terrible blow. A great game was had, and thanks to Sam, Paul and Charlie for taking part.

That should be our last Boxer game for a while - looking forward in anticipation to both Blood Red Skies from Warlord, and What a Tanker from Two Fat Lardies, and I expect these will be taking up my time for the next few weeks.