(Sadly no pictures as I was too busy pushing models and throwing dice. Photos coming once the facebook page is updated)
Wargames require two things that a lot of people can struggle to have – lots of terrain and another person to play. In addition, because of how long they take to play, you need somewhere that doesn’t mind you taking up a lot of space. For most people, a wargames club is the best bet.
One of the things I looked into when moving was if there was a local wargames club in Edinburgh. As you would expect, yep there is a pretty major one. SESWC (or South East Scotland Wargames Club) meets once a week in the centre of Edinburgh, a 20 minute walk away from where I live. Deciding to finally give it a go, I walked through the cobbled streets to find my way there.
5 minutes after walking in the place, I was sat down at a table covered in trench systems and shell holes, all ready to take my proto-Stoßtruppen up the left flank and into the bulk of some entrenched Senegallese. Huh?
Chain of Command is something I have been looking at for a while and this game was being run using the custom WW1 rules set. We were using a big board, with two commanders per side as the Germans launched an assult during the Battle of Verdun (so no tanks here). I took the elite half of the German force with my ally (also called Michael) taking the regulars, while the french had regulars and colonials. We took some additional support options based our reading of the map.
The right and centre of the map were dominated by attacking trench lines but the left was a ruined wood, covered in shell craters and patches of trees. Our plan was to push left hard while the right slowly moved forward. To assist, I took a flamethrower team and a sniper on the left, the right took two machine guns to support and the team also picked up two artillery bombardments and an adjutant to assist with bringing troops forward.
The patrol phase went well with our forces pushing forward into a good position while the french took up the best defensive setup. We were also able to prevent one of the French players from deploying at all thanks to our artillery hammering their jumping off point.
And then during the game my dice rolls went really well, with raining coming in and reducing visibilty for everyone. The flamethrower cut a bloody swathe through the defenders while a mad rush through a possible artillery bombardment managed to stop the frenchies utilising the centre. On the right the close combat ended up with a stalemate as our MGs were unable to support effectively due to the rain. A few good turns of combat later and the French morale had collapsed due to the loss of leaders and whole units
Overall it was a fun game and a great intro to the club. From talking to a few guys, they seem like a pretty active club with lots of different games. More importantly, a few people were interested in trying out moderns so I’ll be back soon pedalling tiny Operators and more.
Even better, I’m heading back next week to try my hand at the latest Too Fat Lardies rules, Sharp Practise V2. It seems like they are big fans of the Lardies so hopefully I’ll be able to try Chain of Command Fighting Season some point soon.