Ameriga's Alamo

 Whilst the Amerigans recently won a major battle against Blusia in Blueland the Blusians launched a surprise invasion of the Amerigan island of Teddyton. The Amerigans were outnumbered two to one.

 AMERIGANS
Colt machinegun
Dynamite Gun
Teddys Rough Riders (elite)
Elite infantry

3 regiments of militia quality infantry

1 Wright Brothers steam plane

BLUSIANS
Elite Zouaves
Elite Cuirassiers

Lancers

Cavalry

6 units of infantry including Foreign Legionnaires

Quick Firing Light cannon
Medium Cannon
Machine gun

  The rules were based on the original Funny Little Wars rules by Paul Wright

The scenario was taken from the 'Last Stand' one from the book, One Hour Wargames. The difference was instead of three units versus six we had 5 Amerigan units versus ten Fezian ones plus the artillery and machine guns on each side with the Fezians having an extra cannon. Any wiped out Blusian units (in accordance with the One Hour rules) would come back from the dead as new equivalent units from the player's board edge. It took too long for this to play a major part in the game but some cavalry eventually were reappearing and galloping down the road.

  My Amerigans were defending. The Fezians had to wipe out my army. Unfortunately, for them, they had to get across the river by two bridges. This meant they would suffer heavy casualties in column.
My forces on the hill were classed as being in a redoubt. All the Amerigans were of random quality and unknown until they fired their weapons. Actually, one infantry (in the redoubt) were elite quality and the other infantry were militia quality. The scenario called for all of my defending forces to be the equivalent of elite in melee but those classed as militia (three of them) were minus one firing and had lower leadership. (As it happened, melees were rare). The Rough Rider cavalry were classed as elite.

A Blusian column heads for the central bridge. (The cavalry were originally painted as South Americans - Chilians, Argentinians or Bolivians - from the Pacific War). The roads were cut from rubber mats from Cheap as Chips and painted.

  More Blusian columns. The ones in the foreground are repainted Hilco hollow=cast ACW Federals.

                                                                     Blusians advance.

        Amerigan skirmishers in the forest. They were so spread out that a limited number could shoot however they were also hard to kill.

     Rough Riders. These are mostly conversions from Airfix US cavalry on Britains Detail horses.

                                                                         Blusians

                                                                Crossing the bridge

     Amerigan positions. The cottage with dog is a terracotta one I picked up from an op shop. It looked good when painted.

                                                              Skirmishers in the forest

       

                                                           Blusians crossing the bridge

         The Rough Riders dismount and move into a building from where they fired at the Blusian positions. The dynamite gun peeps out from the corner of a building. Its blast radius was nine inches, like heavy guns but there was a chance it could misfire and explode.

              The Amerigan plane arrives and bombs the Blusian column on the road. The glass dessert glass stand worked well.

      Decimated Blusian cavalry. The cut down white earbud stick worked better as ammunition than matchsticks. We used a Crescent armored car for firing from non-firing cannons.

   Amerigan machine gun fires from the corner of a building. (The building was later destroyed by Blusian artillery). Machine guns had 12 dice for shooting but if three 1s were rolled then it jammed for next move until unjammed. It had slightly better chance of hitting than rifle fire but the same range.

       Blusian plane shot down on front of the town and into the river. The grey building was a Pepe Pig one. The older style one was made by someone. The plane originally had two extra engines on the top and what looked like bike handlebars. I cut them off but may use the extra engines on another plane. I don't know if this plane was based on a film or cartoon. I like the wings as they have a Leonardo da Vinci look. That is my torso in the background!

 The Amerigan plane left the filed to get another bomb and returned to bomb another infantry unit before being shot down and the pilot escaping.

                        The Amerigan machine gun continues to fire from behind rubble (made from wooden castle steps) but after suffering 50% casualties the crew fled, abandoning their gun.

                   The Amerigans in the redoubt and across the road poured fire into the advancing Blusians.

The dynamite gun knocked out of action

                                                    Blusian zouaves advance on the redoubt.

    The Amerigan pilot escapes the wreckage of his plane and joins the skirmishers in the forest.

                                                    Blusians establish a toehold in the town.

Mat thought he had to move at half speed across the bridges which we only have done when the bridge has been exceptionally narrow. He also stopped to fire after crossing the bridge. The dynamite gun and my elite troops in the redoubt poured fire into anything crossing. The elite unit had a bonus firing as elites and also for firing at column formation.

 The planes came on from reserve, but Mat's Blusian plane was shot down by my machine gun before it could drop its bomb.

  PLANE RULES

I determined that our planes would arrive from reserve and have six-foot moves but could do 45 degree turns half way in the move, otherwise they travelled in straight lines. They had to complete a whole six foot in a move and if they ended up off table they went back into reserve. The planes were intended as earlier than WW1 and did not have machine guns, but a single bomb made from some crunched up aluminium foil which the player would drop from above his head. The blast was six inch radius and equivalent in damage to a shell from a light gun. Pilots also had pistols. The rules details were taken from Funny Little Wars and FLW Campaigns.

GAME CONCLUSION
As usual we went for 12 moves with a 50 % dice roll deciding against continuing. The Blusians lost about half their force. The Amerigans lost an infantry regiment which retreated off the field, and the dynamite gun. The Rough Riders had heavy casualties after the building they were in was destroyed by cannon fire. Both of us lost our planes.

  The Blusians had finally established themselves on my side of the river and their cavalry charged and took out the dynamite gun crew. The elite Blusian infantry zouave column was preparing to engage my depleted elite unit in the redoubt.  Another few moves and the outcome might have been different.

  However, this 'last stand' went the way of the defender.

PS

mat took the photos with his phone as my camera is apparently malfunctioning or maybe I accidentally altered settings as it presently takes only very dark photos.

PSS 

Next game will be Duchy of Grand Fenwick versus Fezia but it might be a few weeks before we do that one as I have to pack my swaps for my March swap-meet in Melbourne. I will no longer be doing the ACW game there so at least it is less for me to pack. In any case I chose Grand Fenwick as the last game I included it was the most popular of all posts since the blog has been running.