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| The British camp by the Nile |
For our April game, we played another game of The Men Who Would Be Kings, this time in Epic (13.5mm) scale using Rafael's beautifully painted figures, and this time using measurements instead of grids.
The genesis for this game came when I learned that Rafael has an Epic scale Napoleonic Ottoman army, a British army, but not a French army. I wanted to run a game using his armies, and recalled a scenario from Battlegames' Tabletop Teasers compilation that featured the French army looting an Egyptian site and the Ottoman and British trying to stop them - well, who's to say the British couldn't do a spot of looting themselves after seeing off the French?
I floated the idea to Rafael, and he got onboard, printing, assembling, and painting a ketch (that would end up doing sterling service in the game) just for the scenario. I made a few simple river barges (from wooden boat models bought off Shopee), tents, painted up a half-buried sphinx (snapped off an aquarium decoration also from Shopee), and based some palm trees (again Shopee) onto cork sheets, to which I added tufts to represent reeds - I thought they didn't look half bad placed against the river terrain piece.
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| Ottoman forces surge towards the British camp in the middle of the table |
The British started the game divided into two parts, one in the centre of the table at the dig site, from where they must drive two wagons loaded with loot to the riverbank, where the other half of the British forces are. Docked at the riverbank are barges, and a ketch with howitzers.
The Ottoman forces are also divided into two parts, with one representing the professional and household troops of the local lord, and the other the local tribal forces.
To add randomness to the game, I forsook grid movement and returned to the tape measure, giving the wagons a move of 2d4 per turn. The random movement distance, coupled with the activation rolls and random move distance when units move At the Double, added suspense to each turn.
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| Ottoman Irregular forces |
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| British forces hold off the Ottoman |
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| Home stretch! |
It was a close game, with the British successfully loading both wagons of loot onto the barges with the Ottoman Janissaries just one move away.
This is definitely one scenario I would like to run again.
