Last weekend was another Williamsburg Muster and as usual Williamsburg Legati Attended and ran some interesting games. First a demonstration of Radio Dish Dash’s new game Skirmish Sangin on Friday, followed my Chain of Command Espana and Chris and Peter’s beautiful Ronin game. I will leave it to others to report on those games though I was in some way involved in playing a;ll of them!
While scenarios set in the Jarama campaign of the Spanish Civil War is not something new for me, the rules were. Chain of Command is an excellent set of skirmish rules by Too Fat Lardies. As is common with their games the rules revolve around the leadership abilities of men on the ground. Unlike most of their games which are card driven, CoC relies on rolls of command dice. too Fat Lardies has very generously provided several PDFs for free to back date the game to actions of the Spanish Civil War.
The scenario, based upon the Republican counter attacks of Feb.23 and 27 1937, pitted a platoon of the Lincoln Battalion against a platoon of the Army of Africa. Primarily this was a platoon of Spanish Legion though it was brigaded with some Moroccan Regulares. In part that was because it was frequently done and in part because I was lacking a Section of La Legion figures.
On of the more unusual aspects of CoC is the “Patrol Phase”. this is a phase prior to the start of the game which represents the effect of scouting and intelligence gathering from both sides which serves to create the position of the front lines for a game. In this scenario, described in the rules as an “Attack and Defend” The defenders begin with their Patrol Markers placed 18 inches into their side of the table. The attacker then rolls to determine a number of free patrol marker moves before entering into the usual alternating on side to another.
The Nationalists held a small farm along the road, the Republicans were advancing through a wood line and attempting to drive the Nationalists back. The IB began approaching through an olive orchard on the left of the Facist rebels. There they discovered strong resistance from the elite Legionnaires but their steadfast determination whittled away the Nationalists numbers.
The Republicans were supported by a Machine Gun Company firing barrages from off board and a Soviet supplied T26 tank. the tank approached up the road but found a safe spot far from the action just below the bridge. here it was safe from the Petrol bombs carried by the Moorish scouts which were about the limit if the Nationalist Anti Tank capacity in this scenario. The tank did what it could to help the 1 section’s advance.
On the Nationalist right however things were unfolding quite differently. Two of the larger squads of the Legion held the farmhouse and were engaged in quite a firefight with communists and close range in the pig sty. One squad was pinned and nearly destroyed. Only the presence of their capable Sargeant prevented them from breaking.
The Nationalists took advantage of this circumstance to send their section of Moors into close combat. Leaving the shelter of the farmhouse the charged into the communists but thanks to their brave Sargeant, not to mention the presence of the Company Commisar and a light machine gun the moors were repulsed.
Unfortunately it was about here that time allotted for our game ran out. I called it a draw though I suppose I could have given victory to the Nationalists as they still held their positions at game end.
I should mention, just for the point of honesty, all the photos on this page are reconstructions. I had my camera on the wrong setting for the game itself and all the original pictures were therefore badly focused. I guess that makes these a re-enactment, or perhaps just propaganda as was so common in the Spanish War.
Viva Republica!
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