Hills!?

WE are nearly ready to fight a test battle for Project Kaiser - my 54mm toy-soldier refight of the Franco-Prussian War.
Unfortunately the Covid-19 crisis has made it next-to-impossible for me to source the terrain I was hoping to get.
But my daily exercising out-doors has been taking me down Bethnal Green Road in the East End, which has more shops open than many other parts of London thanks to having lots of family-run 'essential' businesses.
One I popped into had a pack of plastic bowls with a diameter of about 5in - not much use for most people, I would have thought, but just the right size for my planned 5in gridded Project Kaiser playing surface.

The pack

An individual bowl

The pack was £1.99, I think - I cannot recall exactly, but it was cheap enough that no harm would be done if the bowls proved unsuitable for what I had in mind.

Add a lick of green paint and I reckon they make suitable hills for my toy soldiers to fight over.

Four hills on a 14x11 5in grid

Perhaps not ideal - but good enough for me.

The Portable Franco-Prussian Wargame

AFTER much thought, I have decided to base my Project Kaiser rules around Bob Cordery's Portable Wargame series of books.
In particular I am adapting the late-19th century rules from his original publication, The Portable Wargame (Eglinton Books 2017).

The Portable Wargame … a modern classic

Because the figures for my 150th anniversary refight of the Franco-Prussian War are 54mm toy soldiers, I will be using a 5in square grid.
By putting my two wargame tables together, I can create a grid of 14x11 squares.
You will need Cordery's book to understand the brief summary of my rules that follows.
I have changed a few of his concepts - sometimes to fit in with how I like a wargame to work, sometimes adapting ideas from Neil Thomas's book Wargaming Nineteenth Century Europe, and sometimes to give the rules a more-distinct flavour of the Franco-Prussian War.
The summary below mainly covers the changes I have made to Cordery's core rules, and below that I give my reasons.

UNITS
Type                                         Strength Points  Move  Weapon Range
French Infantry                                    4                2                  4
German Infantry                                  4                2                  3
Cavalry                                                2                3                  -
French Imperial Artillery                      4                2                  6
French Republican Artillery                 4                2                  9
Prussian Artillery                                 4                2                 12
There is no separate commander figure as the huge numbers of men involved in the battles would make such a figure disproportionate.
VICTORY (replaces Exhaustion Point)
An army has lost once it loses more than half of its total of starting strength points OR more than half of its starting units.
TURN SEQUENCE
Turns are alternate (aka IGOUGO). Defender goes second. If neither side is obviously on the defensive, dice for who goes first in turn one and continue with alternate half-turns.
1. Artillery fire.
2. Move activated units. To be active, a unit needs to roll a minimum die score.
Prussians and Garibaldi Redshirts: 2.
Others, including non-Prussian Germans: 3.
Elite: +1. Poor: -1.
3. Rifle fire (available to inactive as well as active troops).
4. Resolve melees.
ARTILLERY FIRE
Line-of-sight firing only.
Roll a die, needing a 4 to score a hit.
Prussian: +1
French Imperial: -1
Target in cover: -1
Firers have more than 3 strength points: +1
Firers have fewer than 3 strength points: -1
MOVEMENT
No deduction for firing (or for planning to fire).
RIFLE FIRE
Roll a die, needing a 4 to score a hit.
Firers moved this turn: -1
Target in cover: -1
Firers have more than 3 strength points: +1
Firers have fewer than 3 strength points: -1
MELEEING
A melee occurs when a unit tries to enter a square occupied by an enemy unit.
Both units roll a die, needing a 5 to score a hit (if, with modifiers, the score is 8 or more, then two hits are inflicted).
Attacking in flank or rear: +1
Being attacked in flank or rear: -1
Enemy uphill: -1
Enemy in cover: -1
Unit is infantry or artillery with more than 3 strength points: +1
Unit is infantry or artillery with fewer than 3 strength points: -1
Unit is cavalry with fewer than 2 strength points: -1
Unit is cavalry fighting infantry: +1
Unit is infantry fighting cavalry: -1
Unit is cavalry fighting artillery: +2
Unit is artillery fighting cavalry: -2
Unit is infantry fighting artillery: +1
Unit is artillery fighting infantry: -1
A unit that wants to break off from a melee (as opposed to withdrawing as the result of a hit) must move in a straight line directly away and end its turn with its backs to the enemy.
ALL OTHER RULES
All as in The Portable Wargame, unless a scenario requires a rule to be modified.

THE THINKING BEHIND THE CHANGES
UNITS
Cordery uses strength points of four for infantry, three for cavalry and two for artillery. I have debuffed cavalry and upgraded artillery to make them in line with my reading of the Franco-Prussian War.
Weapon ranges are largely based on Thomas's figures.
I have removed the ability of cavalry to fight dismounted with rifles and/or carbines as that basically did not happen in the Franco-Prussian War, at least not at a division or brigade level.
TURN SEQUENCE
Prussian staff work was ahead of its time, which is why Prussian units are more likely than most other units to activate. Garibaldi's Redshirts showed similar abilities.
ARTILLERY FIRE
Cordery's artillery needs a 5 to score a hit, but guns using line-of-sight get a +2 modifier, meaning they only need a 3. I am only using line-of-sight because howitzers were largely anonymous in battles involving many tens of thousands of troops, so it would make sense if my artillery only needed to roll a 3. I am making it 4 because I have also added modifiers for a unit's strength points, so an artillery unit with four strength points gets +1, which means it only needs to roll a 3 to score a hit. I have introduced modifiers for the number of strength points because it seems strange that a unit at full strength can fight as effectively as a unit with only one strength point remaining.
The modifiers for Prussian and French imperial guns represent the quality of the guns and the respective armies' use of guns.
RIFLE FIRE
Cordery's units need a 5 to score a hit. But units that have not moved get a +1 modifier, meaning they only need to roll a 4. I prefer to to say units need a 4 (the same as for artillery) to score a hit, but with a -1 modifier for having moved.
MELEEING
Cordery has units meleeing when they are in adjacent squares. But at the scale of my battles, I think combat in adjacent squares should be determined by firing, with melees taking place when a unit tries to enter a square occupied by enemy troops.

History Today April 2020

HAVE you any idea why there are 360 degrees in a circle, rather than, say, 100 or some other round number?
Issue 4 of volume 70 of History Today has the answer, along with other interesting articles on the Roman Inquisition, the foundation of Liberia and Charles I's early fractured realm.
The cover story is about a female Soviet WW2 sniper with 309 claimed kills - a claim that is not seriously looked at.

Femme fatale .. Soviet sniper

Instead we learn about Lyudmila Pavlichenko's propaganda tour of the West, particularly how the media reacted to her - part of a tendency for the magazine to prioritise social history.
Still, all in all I found this edition of History Today to be a compelling if light read.

French Line-Up

HERE is the latest line-up of the French army for my 54mm toy-soldier Project Kaiser refight of the Franco-Prussian War.

French ... 32 infantry, six cavalry and nine artillerymen with two guns

In the front row are two guns - one with a four-man crew, the other with five men - either side of the Foreign Legion.
The second row has five units of line infantry.
In the rear (left to right) are two units of dragoons, the 2nd Hussars, the 3rd Zouaves and Garibaldi's Redshirts.

German Line-Up

HERE is the latest line-up of the German army for my 54mm toy-soldier Project Kaiser refight of the Franco-Prussian War.

Germans ... 32 infantry, 10 cavalry and 12 artillerymen with two guns

In the front row are two six-man gun crews either side of the 3rd Garde-Regiment zu Fuss.
The second row has seven units of Prussian line infantry.
In the rear (left to right) are two units of Bavarian Chevaulegers followed by one each of Prussian Uhlans, Bavarian Lancers and Brunswickian Hussars.

Having A Blast

I HAVE finished two heavy guns - one in Prussian colours, one in French - for my 54mm toy-soldier Project Kaiser refight of the Franco-Prussian War.

Prussian on the left - French on the right

Four artillerymen (two gunners and two guards) with the French gun

Another four-man crew - this time with the Prussian gun

Beowulf

HAVE finished reading Beowulf: A Translation And Commentary by JRR Tolkien.
The book, which was edited by Tolkien's son Christopher, was published by HarperCollins in 2016.
It is really three books in one: JRR's prose translation of the Old English poem, his commentaries on the difficulties and controversies surrounding such a translation, and his rendering of the main part of the story into modern English as Sellic Spell.

Tolkien's Beowulf … three books in one

Beowulf is written in Old English but contains no characters who are English - perhaps it would be better to say none who are Anglo-Saxon.
Instead the a story is set in Scandinavia, telling a mythical duel between Good and Evil against the factual background of the sixth century.
I found the first part of the book heavy going. Although JRR did not try to compose his own poetic version of the tale, he kept many poetic turns of phrase in what reads to me as cod Ye Olde Englishe.
Much more interesting is the second part, where Christopher publishes, with explanatory material where necessary, JRR's detailed notes on problems thrown up by translating a language no longer spoken or fully understood.
There are many insights into warrior mores that the unknown author of the poem evidently believed were commonplace among his likely audiences.
And finally there is Sellic Spell, a freehand retelling of much of the story in a fluent style that I read at one sitting. If only JRR had felt confident enough to perform this service for the whole poem ...

Well Pleased

ONE of the few non-supermarket chains still open is Poundland.
I popped into the firm's East End branch in Roman Road earlier this week, on the off-chance of finding something useful.
The toy section was disappointing, from my somewhat-niche perspective, but in the gardening section there was an eclectic range of "fairy furniture."
I nearly walked out with more than one item, but in the end just bought a well, which I think could make a picturesque addition to a 54mm village or town.

Well ... worth £1

 

A touch  ... of black paint to finish 

Zouave officer … alongside the well, which can be seen to be no mean size

Unusual War Memorial

MANY WW1 memorials follow a standard pattern, but not the one I came across yesterday in Roman Road, East London.

This memorial is on the outside of St Barnabas's Church, which was originally a Baptist chapel, before becoming Church of England in 1870, which makes this year its 150th Anglican anniversary.
Despite the name of the church, the plaque depicts St George and a vanquished dragon, standing on a scroll engraved: TRIBUTE.
Underneath is: TO THE MEN OF THIS PARISH WHO GAVE THEIR LIVES FOR FREEDOM 1914-1919.

Project Kaiser Update

HOSTILITIES in the Franco-Prussian War began in August 1870, so the 150th anniversary, and thus the start of my Project Kaiser refight using 54mm toy soldiers, is some way off.
I have painted most of the figures I will need, but have not made a start on devising the rules.
Accordingly I spent time yesterday refreshing my memory of how Neil Thomas tackles the subject in Wargaming Nineteenth Century Europe 1815-1878 (Pen & Sword 2012).

Wargaming ... 63 years on one continent

The following table shows the differences in maximum firing ranges and effectiveness of most of the troops:
Unit                                         Range  Dice per Base
French Imperial Artillery         32cm    2 normally but 5 at 0-12cm
French Republican Artillery    48cm    3
French Rifles                          24cm    2
Prussian Artillery                     60cm    4
Prussian Rifles                        16cm    2
So Prussian artillery outranges French artillery and usually has more hitting power; French rifles outrange Prussian rifles but have identical hitting power.
There is an optional rule, but in my view it would not be a very good simulation of the Franco-Prussian War without it, covering command & control: French imperial leadership is rated poor, French republican leadership is rated average, and Prussian leadership is rated good.
What this boils down to is that imperial armies will have an average of three units "in command," republican armies five and Prussian armies seven.
An army typically consists of 10 units. Those "out of command" can only move half their normal distance, and usually only roll half their normal number of dice for firing (but fractions are rounded up).