Batu Khan's Wargaming: Hell of a Gaming Week!

Hello everyone,

Two weeks ago, I spent absolutely wonderful time the whole week, played a lot of different games, boardgames, wargames, roleplaying and even attended a tournament. Here, I want to talk about them, maybe even introduce some for you in a few words and get your attention over these games.

Summary;
I spent the Friday night with Eldritch Horror board game, a game where players strive to save the world from demonic invasion in a Lovecraftian setting. On Sunday, we had perfect fun playing Kiss Me Hardy with 6 players, a Napoleonic naval wargame. Wednesday, I helped my friend Konstantinos to playtest a scenario he designed for Bloody Big Battles, an 19th century wargame that represents, well, bloody big battles! I attended a Flames of War small tournament on Saturday, Early War, kind of a test of our skills for ETC. Lastly, on Sunday, there was a roleplay gameday with more than 15 people, where players tried to secure a village after it's been raided by gnolls on a sword&sorcery setting world.

Guardians of the Earth

Eldritch Horror is a wonderful board game and I just feel sorry that I've never tried it before. It's set on Lovecraftian setting (Cthulhu myth) during 19th century. Players take the role of investigators, traveling around the world, trying to close otherworldly gates where demons spawn and also do tasks that help them stop the apocalypse. Every turn, the world comes closer to total invasion by a great demon. Players need to slow down and eventually stop this process by performing tasks such as collecting gems or banishing demons. The game also has very high roleplay elements, each character has a different set of skills and players can collect items that increase their stats. Performing tasks also require going into an encounter where any skill may be crucial such as diplomacy and wits. Failing these tasks may mean that characters lose insanity, go mad, die and eventually fail to stop the apocalypse.

In our game, the first task was very hard to manage as it required banishing some powerful demons around the gates. Only after our characters collected some items and improved their skills, we could confront the demons and with help from some special skills of the characters, we could take them down. The remaining tasks were fairly easier and we managed them just in time to stop the apocalypse. All in all, thanks to all my friends that introduced me Eldritch Horror and I also recommend any boardgame fan to dive into the adventure.

"All Cannons! Fire!"

During week time, I had a business trip to Istanbul and I also had chance to visit the local gaming club "Karargah". Luckily, our Greek friend Konstantinos was hosting a "Kiss Me, Hardy" game so I just joined in. We played with 6 people, more others occasionally watching and commenting. The scenario was as followed; sometime during early in Napoleonic Wars, a Spanish squadron consisting of two 1st rate warships is on Caribbean Seas and a British squadron of two ships is following them closely. An allied group of one Spanish and three French ships are on their way from Europe to meet the Spanish ships. Another British group of 4 ships are chasing them. The battle takes place near the Caribbean, allied Spanish-French objective is to get together and repel the British ships. British objective is to interrupt the linking of two groups and capture-destroy as many enemy ships as possible. I was commanding 2 British 3rd rate ships on the center.

Start of game, view from British side

In early game, Spanish-French allies tried to move closer. British Caribbean squadron was not effective while others ships, including mine, tried to stop the Allied European squadrons to come near the Spanish warships. I had a lucky shot on a French ship, destroying it's main mast before moving fast towards the Spanish Caribbean squadron. Mid game saw so much cannon fire exchange between ships, my ships were now between the two enemy groups. And in late game, in a dashing move, I boarded the Spanish flagship, my marines fighting all their way to the last deck and eventually capturing the prize. My ships took immense fire over the course from the French ships around but at last the British Caribbean squadron was able to help with engaging the enemy.

My British 3rd rates firing at Spanish squadron

British 3rd rates, boarding the Spanish flagship

In the end, our British side managed to snatch a close victory by capturing the Spanish flagship and no other, in turn letting none of our ship to be destroyed or captured. 11-8 victory for Britain! In your face Bonaparte! All in all a very enjoyable and intense game which really captured all the elements of Napoleonic naval war.

All having fun, the main objective of all games!

The Defense of Constantinople

Konstantinos is also a big fan of BBB (Bloody Big Battles) and a designer of scenarios for this game. He is currently working on finishing his scenarios for Balkan Wars and he asked me to help him playtest the Battle of Chatalja (Çatalca in Turkish; the last line of defense before Constantinople in European side) which I gladly accepted.

scenario map, red stars are Ottoman redoubts and green squares, elements of Bulgarian Army

Historically, the Battle of Chatalja was fought during the First Balkan War. On 1912, Bulgaria, Serbia and Greece attacked the Ottomans to push Turks out of Balkans and extend their territory. Bulgaria won some important battles and even captured Edirne. Constantinople itself was now in danger. Bulgarian army assaulted the defensive line of Chatalja and they were at last stopped there, Ottomans thus holding their capital.

Konstantinos designed a wonderfully balanced and challenging scenario. Neither side has easy job, Bulgarians have immense manpower and Turks have very good defensive positions. The game is a Bulgarian victory if they can capture 2 or more redoubts, a draw if they can only capture 1 and an Ottoman victory if no redoubts are in hands of Bulgarians at the end. Historically, the Bulgarian frontal assault failed while a night attack on the flank allowed them to capture a redoubt, but it was later taken by Turks with a counter-attack.

view from Turkish side, front redoubts visible, Bulgarian Army is closing in

I took charge of the defending side. My friend planned a full frontal assault, using all his manpower and all guns, concentrating them on my redoubts one by one. Seeing that he will not attack from the flanks, I ordered all my units holding other positions to move towards the battle zone. As these units moved, I sent my back line units to strengthen the front line. The first day of battle (first 6 turns) saw heavy combat on the front line and one of my redoubts had at last fallen under pressure from the whole Bulgarian army. But in meantime the Bulgarian army lost half of its troops and they had little strength to carry on the assault.

view from Bulgarian side, they advance with massive artillery support fire

It was late at night and I had to leave. My friend finished the last 4 turns the other day. He told me that Bulgarians were able to capture a second redoubt but on last turn, a decisive Turkish counter-attack took it back. The game was thus a draw, which is a very good result for both sides on such an intense battle. Constantinople was secured!

BBB is a very good game, but it is not for everyone. It is so much realistic that you really feel the pressure on your shoulders. This scenario also forces players to think very carefully, plan 2-3 turns ahead. BBB is a game of tough players and Chatalja scenario is for real veterans.

Operation Barbarossa!

In the weekend, we had a small Flames of War tournament in Izmir. This year, some of us plan to go to the ETC tournament in Zagreb so we made a practice tourney, Early War 1650 pts. Four players participated, me playing Soviet Strelkovy. Other armies were: Soviet Tankovy, German Grenadier and British Rifle Company. We had three games and all players fought each other.

my glorious Soviet infantry horde!

My first game was against the fellow Soviet Tankovy player. It was a game where I could lose badly, due to his tanks being much numerous and I just didn't have enough anti-tank power to resist him. But he decided not to attack until last moments and move with caution, which game me time to organise my reserves. It was a close victory for me.

Germans defending the village against the enemy

On second game, I faced the British Rifle Company. (US Riflemen proxied as British) My opponent was a very good player and the game was a free-for-all. He opted to go on to the offensive and indeed he successfully captured one of my flanks. But luckily, a whole new Strelkovy horde came to my help in place of the destroyed one and they were able to secure that flank. Then, I tried a weak offensive with my tanks but they were stopped, so the game was a draw.

amazing miniature carry box of a friend

On last game, we played with another great player with German Infantry. I had to attack, which was a tough job with conscript infantry against veterans. When my own tanks were destroyed, the enemy tanks which arrived early on reserve could easily stop my infantry and I lost the game, thus ending the tourney in 3rd place. I really need to improve my skills in the new edition of Flames of War.

and group photo!

Fight Against the Gnolls

The last activity I'll cover in this post is the RPG gaming day of Kule Sakinleri club in Izmir. There is an ongoing Living RPG campaign, which is set on a sword&sorcery world, where 30+ players take part. Each week, there are at least 5-6 games related to each other and some weekends, when there is a special event, they host all-day game events. That was such an activity; it was about a Gnoll attack on a nearby village, the creatures raided a village and killed and kidnapped many people. As residents of an important town, we, the players, had to form a militia force and respond quickly to that raid. The play-system is good old Warhammer Fantasy Role Play 2nd Edition.

a shot from the gathering before games

We played two games, the first games were about securing the town, killing any remaining Gnolls who still lurk around the place and go after nearby villagers who are still pursued by Gnoll raiding parties. I had a mercenary character and my group at first game successfully rescued a lot of villagers who ran for the hills, killing many Gnolls. But in the meantime, all the groups eventually discovered that Gnolls had a camp on top of that hills and it would be very hard to destroy every single creature.

the campaign map, the region of Raven Plains

In the second game, my group headed for the nearby woods to clear the place of any Gnolls still wondering around. We found some Gnoll scouts which captured a giant spider, we could defeat the spider and some Gnolls, others ran away but we were also heavily wounded. So at the end of the game day, the village and surrounding region was secured and many villagers rescued but Gnoll chieftain was still alive, the camp was still active and it was sure that raidings would not stop. Which is a problem for the regular players of the living campaign.