Sword & Sails

Here's a quick one for AAR Central. I had expected to put a post together for something a little different, but while I was in Jersey earlier this month, I ended up putting the most time into a six-player game of Sword & Sail. It played like a medieval era version of Twilight Imperium. 

In our game, I took the French by random draw. The other players took England, the HRE, the Vikings, the Kievan Rus', and the Byzantines, while North Africa was out of play. We had a few house rules in play to dictate control of the minor factions, but they don't really need any explanation. The important rule to note though is that movement is simultaneous. Everyone plots the movement of their armies and fleets and then moves simultaneously.

I did not want the French for security reasons, but I felt better than having the HRE. In the early game, I managed to secure the bordering territories through lucky marriages. My first army stayed north to deter an invasion from the English while the majority of my armies drove south to invade Spain. By a stroke of luck, I managed to properly guess the location of Joe's (England's) invasion. I moved the first army into Normandy just as his second army crossed the channel. In the ensuing combat, my army outnumbered his, but his heavy cavalry wrecked havoc on my forces. Luckily, I managed to eliminate his knights and cavalry to the man just as he defeated my army. They perished on French soil, but Normandy remained under my control.

While I busied myself conquering northern Spain, the Vikings harassed England from the sea, the Byzantines engaged the Bulgarians in a losing war, and the Kievan Rus' kept absorbing more steppe. 

To weaken the empires in Spain, I allied with the Kingdom of Leon and had them invade Qurtuba. The invasion wrecked havoc on both armies, but the troops from Leon retreated before all forces were knocked out. Fearing invasion from England again (who allied with Mike's HRE forces), I sailed Leon's troops to northern France to sit on my borders and free up more of my armies. 

Joe described the ensuing political changes as follows: disappointed by the political abuse from the French who treated their troops like cannon fodder, the Kingdom of Leon flipped sides and joined the English, just as their troops landed in Northern France. This just about threw my lead in jeopardy. Thanks to my stockpile of political cards, though, I canceled Joe's attempt to flip the Kingdom of Leon. As a result, I managed to retain control of my Spanish Allies, just as the Vikings invaded England. To consolidate my lead, I spent most of my income on building up cities for VPs and on the final turn, I thwarted an invasion by HRE troops in Lower Lorraine. At the end of turn 5 (Spring 1001 AD), I was poised to win the game with 36 VPs and I had the money to get me to 40 and the victory. With that, we called it a game. It was a great experience, and I'll likely get my own copy sometime soon. And to top it off, I had a rare victory to claim on my visit to New Jersey.

The Whole Front in Flames -- The Battle for Caen

It's been quiet on AAR Central, but it's been busy elsewhere in my life of late. I've been gaming, to be sure, but I haven't had much time to either finish a game or post any updates on what I've been up to since September. In October and November, I went out to California to pay a visit to the fine folks at Decision Games. I got to do some acceptance testing and play testing on the next series of magazine games slated to come out in 2026 and 2027. Talk about a highlight on the year. Since much of that process is internal only to DG, though, that's all I will say for now. And therefore, no pictures to go with that. 

Since I had the chance to pick the brain of Doug Johnson (who has developed the Grand Operational Simulation Series for the last ten years), I decided to break out my copy of Atlantic Wall and play the first scenario: The Whole Front in Flames.

The first scenario in Atlantic Wall starts with the Canadians holding the northern part of Caen and the German 272nd Division holding the southern part of the city, with the Orne river flowing between the two. East of the city, out in flats, are a motley assortment of German defenders from the 21st Panzer Division, 16th Luftwaffe Division, and various other corps elements (notably heavy AA and heavy AT emplacements). Opposite these defenders and their emplacements were the British 11th Armoured Division and 3rd Infantry. The Guards Armoured Division was also in place behind the tanks of the 11th (but they ultimately factored in very little in the game).  

The battle opened with the famous carpet bombing of German positions. In Caen, there is no effect. The 272nd remains emplaced on the south side of the river, two Canadian divisions and one armored brigade facing them. To the east, though, the bombing wrought havoc and blasted a hole through the German line. The loss of the only King Tigers on the field to the heavy bombing caught me by surprise. But, die rolls are die rolls. 

And with those die rolls rolled the tanks of the 11th armoured. The scenario goes for nine turns, and on turn one, the British plunged into the gap (pictured left). The Canadians for their part attacked the 272nd in Caen. For the British, it was a cake walk on turns one and two, for the Canadians, anything but. Now I may have cheated a bit by deploying all of the divisional artillery for the Commonwealth forces onto the field without doing the same for the Germans (I only realized that error in turn two), but it lent no benefit to the Canadians. The Canadian 2nd division struck out on turn one with huge losses trying to make a crossing in the city. The 3rd fared slightly better, and over the course of the next seven turns, the 3rd Canadians slowly made headway into the city from the north east. They had the benefit of fighting on the near side of the Orne, though; the 2nd had to keep making crossing attempts, which they abandoned by turn 4. 

The German 21st Panzer put up a delaying action against the British 3rd Infantry and 11th Armoured Divisions, but they were spread too thin. By the end of the first day, they vacated Troarn and fell back south on the village of Cagny to establish new defensive lines. The presence of German Tigers from the 501st and 503rd Schw. Pz. Abt. helped keep the British infantry at bay. The Germans were still spread too thin, though, and by mid-scenario, the arrival of the 12th SS couldn't change the situation. Even still, the SS reinforcements arrived in time to plug gaps in the crumbling line held by the 21st Panzer and on the far east edge of the front. 

The British received their reinforcements with the 7th Armoured. With the front clogged behind the 11th and Guards Armoured divisions plunging south, I assigned the 7th to the Canadians' sector to take Caen. In all honesty, I couldn't tell if that wasn't allowed with the parent formation rules. But, I did it anyway. Oh well. The Canadian 3rd, supported by the 7th, slowly chipped away at the last of the 272nd's positions. Their grenadiers still held fast to the ground around Caen and what fortified sectors they still had left, but the deteriorating situation to their south made holding the city untenable.

The Canadian third and British armor east of the city made short work of the German positions that were left, even as SS reinforcements continued to trickle onto the field. As a result, by scenario end, the 272nd abandoned what positions were left in Caen and threw a complete victory to the British.

Including ARVEs (which give two combat shifts) was I think the most consequential part of the British victory for this scenario. Even with the added artillery and possible rule-breaking deployment of the 7th Armoured Division, I think the ARVEs contributed the most to the British victory. With four steps, it was easy to assign British losses to the tanks that otherwise didn't suffer any negative combat effects. Next up, Hill 112.