This is a home-spun conversion of the newly published '1812 - Retreat from Moscow', by Pazoot. It is four linked games in a skirmish campaign, set in the infamous French retreat, to see how many of your men can escape the Russian pursuit. The most interesting part is its co-operative, with automated chasing Russians behind. Three of use were playing, starting with 2 soldiers each to control. I don't have the models for the Russian winter of 1812, but I do stuff for colonial Afghanistan, so I just transposed the scenarios into the desert by 70 years. Little else needs to change... our squad would be British survivors from the Battle of Maiwand, escaping hostile Afghan pursuit, with frostbite becoming heatstroke and dysentry, etc.
Game One
The intro game is played on a 2 x 2, to learn the basics. 6 soldiers must get across the board diagonally, whilst collecting loot counters, which might be food (you men need to eat between games), medical supplies as bandages, etc. and useful extra equipment. Grabbing this en route, as the Afghan tribesmen hunt you down is the big part of the game.
As it turned out, we got across the tabletop with some ease, only 1 slight wound from a musket ball, and enough supplies to get through the campaign phase unhindered too. It took about 30 mins to play, but as an intro, we learnt the rules and I assume it's supposed to so easy to start with., to gets you going. So, after picking up another straggler as a seventh soldiers, we moved to Game 2.
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| 2 x 2, top corner to bottom, searching the buildings (+tents) and camels etc. on the way. |
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| Afghan tribesmen's actions are automated, and often just charge the nearest enemy. Another is shot down before they could reach us, but then, we did roll well all game! Accurate firing from the lads... |
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| Afghan snipers... scores one long-range hit and a wound just as we are about to escape. |
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| Our six pith-helmed survivors about to get off the table corner, trading a few parting shots, then off! The Sarg is last to leave. |
Game Two
Game 2, things get serious as our seven survivors (one limping), must make their way through a village. More loot to collect from the yards and buildings, and added civilians too, who can aid your squad. We set off speeding through the streets and alleys, grabbing loot counters, but the Afghans were soon arriving in numbers... most sword armed, but a fair few muskets too. We left a small rearguard, 3 men including the Sargeant, to slow the enemy up. This they did, shooting a fair few down, then three riders appeared. As an obvious threat, they were caught in a crossfire and all killed, but that allowed other tribesmen to charge us, and it was bayonet-work for the rearguard. Wounds were taken, and it looked like the rearguard would be cut-off. Time to run for it!
Up front, the other 4 soldiers had an easier time and gathered needed loot (food), but a group of 4 musket-armed Afghans arrived (random entry points around the table make it unpredictable) and drew a clear line of site to Lt Willams, our leader. Hit by 3 shots, he was almost dead. One private ran back to aid him along (assisting a wounded man speeds him up - which is cool mechanic). One soldiers also collected a handy camel, well, it was just standing about doing nothing!
The finale saw a mad a dash for the exit corner, the leading group now covering the rear-guards retreat (run away!!). It seemed like a lot of Afghans would catch them, but heavy fire from the covering soldiers thinned them down, but returning muskets shots also caused a few return wounds, and one melee resulted in Private Edwards wounded 3 times (4 wounds kills a soldier). It was getting bloody. It the end, all 7 of our lads escaped, if two were being dragged with 1 wound left. Pretty exciting stuff...
The campaign phase followed and we had enough food and water for all, plus our friendly civilian, and then gained 2 more stragglers by killing and eating the camel... which was bit sad. Our civilian turned out to have surgical skills and helped heal up the badly wounded Lt, and we expended our medical supplies to get most back to full wounds, that was until we rolled from heatstroke and dysentry, and all gained another wound from the environment. Weakened from the desert-heat, we are now a party of 10 refugees, ready for Scenario 3, set in a sand storm (snow storm in the 1812 version).... coming soon.
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| A 3 x 2 village board. There are rules for entering and moving through buildings, climbing walls, etc. Again, escaping top corner to bottom |
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| A heavy fire-fight along the main street, trading shots. It's much more even this time, and two soldiers, including Lt Williams, are badly wounded and close to death. The camel was part of our loot... I thought it might come in handy. In the end, it ended up as extra food supplies! |
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| Three riders appear, and are shot down. Our small rearguard of three men got themselves into some trouble... but in the end, made a mad dash for it... which was tense for a bit, it looked like we might lose them all. |
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| One rearguard private engaged in melee, whilst behind the Sergeant puts more fire on the riders. He has a civilian in tow... they can be helpful in the campaign phase, but you have to feed them too. Ours turned out to be handy at fixing wounds, which we really needed, because almost all of our squad were wounded in the fight through the village. |
