Tin Soldiers in Action - SYW club game

Started by Leman, 01 June 2018, 06:03:07 PM

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Leman

01 June 2018, 06:03:07 PM Last Edit: 01 June 2018, 06:05:09 PM by Leman
Square Bashing the FPW down the club has made quite an impression. During my last game one of the club members asked if it was possible to play the SYW as a square based game, so I told him about TSiA and organised a game for last night. Many of my 10mm armies are in units of four one inch bases, so I had ordered a 4'x3' 10cm squared cloth from Simon Miller's Big Red Bat Shop (it was made by DeepCut Studio in Lithuania). Here is the battlefield laid out, using a scenario from the Grant/Asquith book, with the Austrians closest and the Prussians on the far side of the battlefield.



The scenario was that the Austrians were holding a hilltop settlement directly in front of a ford. The Prussians were determined to cross the ford and take the town, which could be a very bloody business. However, ranging Prussian hussars have discovered a bridge further upstream to the west of the town. A small Prussian force is rushing to take the bridge, whilst a small Austrian force has also been despatched to cover the bridge. The next photo shows the bulk of the Prussian infantry preparing to descend on the ford.



The Austrian force preparing to defend the hilltop town.



The next shot shows the smaller Prussian force designated to take the bridge, and on the plain beneath the town the small Austrian force tasked with pushing the Prussians back.



The Prussian steamroller approaching the ford, which is in the curve of the river.



The Prussian infantry halted on the far side of the bridge, so that if necessary they could defend from the riverbank. This allowed the cavalry to cross the bridge and take on the Austrians.



Although costly to the Prussian cavalry, it did result in the Austrians having to pull back as they had taken a number of casualties. this enabled two completely fresh Prussian infantry units to cross the bridge and begin an advance on the town. Meanwhile the 6 unit Prussian juggernaut had realised the mistake of crossing the ford with one unit (owing to the one square width) and engaging with the bayonet. Once this painful lesson was learned the remaining Prussians poured volley after volley into the Austrians, supported by artillery. Despite being in cover the Austrians took enormous casualties, the Austrian grenadiers being dispersed before any further Prussians crossed the ford. Once the position was sufficiently weakened the Prussians moved forward again and the Austrians, now reduced to a mere four battered infantry units, conceded.

The artist formerly known as Dour Puritan!

Steve J

Great looking game 8). It's also a scenario I've fancied playing for sometime, so might give it a go with my wooden blocks and HoW rules.

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Westmarcher

Very nice, Leman. Always partial to a good looking SYW game (and 'yes' this is a good looking SYW game  :) ). As Steve suggests, this looks eminently adaptable for HoW.  :-bd
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FierceKitty

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Norm

A very attractive looking game. I like grid games and am interested in (a) the stream cutting across two squares diagonally (b) the formations that face a square corner rather than flat face. How do diagonals work in this game?

Leman

In TSiA you can move, shoot and combat diagonally.  Long range shooting is done by using a straight edge to determine line of sight, then how many squares that line of site passes through to the target. There is no chess-knight style of shooting. The diagonal river does not cause a problem either. If your unit is in a square with a river and is attacked, the attacker will be penalised for attacking across a river that is fordable but does not have a recognised ford. In this game the river was uncrossable except at the ford or bridge, Only one unit is permitted per square, although commanders may accompany units and we have a house rule allowing a battery to be in the same square as another unit. Also in this game we ignored the attached battalion guns, simply counting them as the fourth base of the unit.

If you look at the fourth picture, the Austrian unit is in the square with the uncrossable river running diagonally. The facing Prussian unit in the next square cannot attack it. Both units may fire at one another. The farm building is on the Austrian side of the river (and has been moved to make room for them). It has been left in the odd position to show that the Austrians have cover, not that it did them much good in the long run.

TSiA is a straightforward game to play and runs very quickly. Casualties can also accrue very rapidly; the Austrian grenadiers went from a full strength of 12 to zero in two moves. The rulebook itself takes the toolbox approach, so that a game can be tailored to fit the War of the League of Augsburg through to First Ypres 1914. The core rules take up only 30 pages of a 270 page book. The rest is taken up with explaining how the game runs, the different troop types, weaponry and terrain; there are numerous examples of play, suggested army lists, different styles of play, a points system and three scenarios.

It is also a great set for solo play as commands within the armies are linked to a playing card. Full turn occurs after all the cards have been turned and all commands have been activated, so, for example, the king of Spades represents general X whose command is four infantry units and a battery. On the turn of that card X must determine how many  of his units are in command (2 squares). Those that are can perform two actions, otherwise only one action. Any charges must be declared at this point. Any units in the command able to fire may do so and then any enemy damaged as a result must take a tenacity (morale) test. Close combat then takes place in a defined order - the close combat test (to determine whether troops become disordered, or some possibly slip away); the attacker's support fire from adjacent units; the defenders defensive fire and then the attackers close combat. If the defender is only armed with close combat weapons (eg most cavalry or spear armed tribal types) then close combat is simultaneous. After the results of the close combat another card is turned for another command. It could be the same army or it could be a command from the opposing army.

I have only one major quibble with the rules. They are a normal hard back book size, published by Caliver and not what I would call cheap. Despite being published by a British firm, they were originally a German set of rules and they have not been translated particularly well. Although someone with a British name has been credited with the translation, the book has been rendered in German rather than British idiom, giving rise to some very odd phraseology. I can't fathom why this has been done with a book intended for the English-speaking market. Consequently, although this is an innovative and very enjoyable set of rules, there are sections where very careful reading is necessary to understand the authors' intent (they are two brothers). Indeed there were two sentences which have translated as pure gobbledegook that I have just ignored. At the end of the book there is an explanation of the design philosophy and a set of FAQs and this is extremely helpful in sorting out some of the cloudier issues caused by the translation, as are some of the example playthroughs throughout the book.
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Techno

Excellent !

Lovely photo's too.

Cheers - Phil

sunjester


Norm

Thanks very much for the extra detail, like the look of that very much.

Womble67

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