Friday, September 17, 2021

GAME REPORT: PIKEMAN'S LAMENT IN THE "WAR DESERT"

Trotters (foreground) and Gallopers of Mark D's Company on the Move.

Life has has been intruding on art for the last few weeks, depriving me of the uninterrupted time needed for posting.  However, there has been unrecorded gaming activity going on, dear reader, some of which I will reveal in this post...
 
Amiable company and sporting opponents AJ (left) and Mark D preparing for combat.
 
Several weeks ago, on Labor Day (a bank holiday here in the US), I ran an impromptu familiarization game of Pikeman's Lament for fellow club members and bloggists Mark D (of Mark D's Gaming Site) and AJ (of AJ's Wargaming Blog).  This was also a familiarization game for me and also a first: 1) Although I had played PL, I had not yet run a game, and so this was a familiarization game for me from the perspective of facilitating PL 2) This game marked the return to face to face gaming to my man cave, a long anticipated moment (even if it turned out to be impromptu and low key). As usual, in this post you may clix pix for BIG PIX.
 
The initial deployments
 
I used the Ga Pa scenario for the game (essentially a "tournament" game where each side tries to knock the other side out: no concern about objectives or other special victory conditions).  For the setting, I put together a "War Desert"--a term of reference during the Thirty Years War for regions that were devastated and depopulated by the war.  Rather than buildings, there are foundations (aka, ruins), to include a ruined tollhouse next to a bridge (all of these were treated as "rough" terrain in PL terms and not as cover/buildings).  Two roads converge leading to the only intact bridge in the region--with the opposing companies bumping into each other as they were making for this crossing.  In order to provide a good overview of the game system, I put together mirror companies, each providing a good cross section of unit types and special abilities (as illustarted in the above for those interested in the mix for PL).  We were very involved with the game, so this report will be rather narrative and visual rather than detailed.

AJ's Pikes and Trotters size up Mark D's Company in the Distance. 
The view from the right end of AJ's line; the Croats (foreground) were operating as Dragoons in this game.
View from the extreme left of Mark D's array, where his Dragoons (actual dragoon figures in this case) are mirroring the Croats/Dragoons on the opposite side of the table.
The view down the line of Mark D's Company, his Trotters and Gallopers on the extreme right.
Mark D's Center: Pike and Shot, with his officer deployed with the Shot.
AJ's left moves forward: Commanded Shot (represented by Haiduks), Trotters, and Blue Bonnets (ie, Scottish Shot)-with AJ's officer.
Mark D's right wing begins to respond: his commanded shot (represented by Cossacks) begins the show by moving up through the vineyard.
Mark's Trotters, two figures down, taking fire from AJ's Haiduks posted in the orchard.  These would prove to be a thorn in Mark's side all afternoon. 
The view from behind Mark D's Gallopers: in the distance, his Trotters suffering under the fire of AJ's Haiduks in the orchard. The Gallopers would take a roundabout path towards the center to avoid a similar fate, arriving too late to influence events (but I must say they looked splendid doing so!).
Mark's Commanded Shot move up to challenge AJ's Haiduks in the orchard.
Back towards the center, AJ's Blue Bonnets (Shot) swing around the ruins and take up position on the hill while his Aggressive Gallopers push forward...
...and Mark's Pike counter, taking up Close Order and moving out, demonstration an amusing dirty trick in Pikeman's Lament vs "Wild Charge" units.  In the next phase, AJ's Gallopers failed (or passed, depending on your perspective) their "Wild Charge" roll and wound up involuntarily throwing themselves onto the Pikes--end of Gallopers, for practical purposes. 

 I got practice using my players aids to facilitate the game, and was happy with how they worked. 

The game was characterized by extreme dice on both sides.  AJ kept on failing activation rolls, terminating his turns prematurely or even entirely in some cases, while Mark could not manage to get a hit (I think we counted something like 72 dice tossed over the course of a few actions resulting in only two or three casualties).  In the end, AJ managed to get a normal run of activations and deliver average damage, which we agreed was enough to give him an edge, albeit a narrow one. In the end, we called the game on time, the point of it being about familiarization with the system more than anything else, which we certainly achieved--and of course, playing with toy soldiers on the lad's day off, which we also achieved (being recently retired, every day is a day off for me!). Thanks to the players, Mark D and AJ, for their sporting attitudes and good company; we're looking forward to more of the same.
 
Excelsior!

20 comments:

  1. Certainly looks like an excellent way to spend a public holiday Ed! I can empathise with Mark - I am sure most wargamers have has those sort of dice rolling days!

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    1. A day off from work (and other distractions) to play games does tend to compensate for the occasional intervention of "General Dice" in our affairs (part of the game, too).

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  2. Lovely looking and lovely sized game

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    1. Thanks, Norm: Pikeman's Lament fits the bill for something not too elaborate and not too small/simple--just right: a Goldilocks game :)

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  3. Some beautiful units here, superb period and great looking game...

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    1. Thanks, Phil: I am fond of my collection for this period; our group's discovery of Pikeman's Lament will finally allow me to get them on the table more often.

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  4. Pikeman's Lament are my 'go too' set of ECW rules plus I can remember most of the rules in my head !

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    1. Agree: once you have the core system down, it does flow well (and you can move on to other rules in the family, too).

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  5. ‘Life intruding on art’ is a great phrase.
    Hooray for gaming returning to your man cave. The low key nature is like a soft opening. 😀
    Looks like a good game of PL.

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    1. Thanks, Stew: sometimes, talking a good game is as good as playing one ;) "Soft opening": sort of like a pop up game!

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  6. A lovely looking game Ed…
    I do like the various Lion Rampant style games… they’re a nice size and fairly easy to play…

    All the best. Aly

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    1. Thanks, Aly. Our group, collectively, has just about the entire range of rules in the "Rampant" series. Although we've mainly only played PL so far, I think the consensus is that PL is the optimum mix of simplicity and "chrome" of the family.

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  7. Good looking game and a most interesting report Ed. Seventy-two die rolls for two or three casualties sounds excessive. Terrible die rolling or rules that are heavy on the dice?
    Regards, James

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    1. Hi James: the "Rampant" system is very "dicey" but Mark also beat the odds with a string of lopsided rolls that did defy the odds (we've all seen it happen every now and again).

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  8. Lovely looking game and sounds like fun in spite of unfortunate die rolling!
    Best Iain

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    1. Thanks, Iain: yes, indeed. It was a good day out with toy soldiers that we all enjoyed.

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  9. Good AAR, Ed. PL is one of my favorite sets of rules not that we play it exactly according to the book. Extreme dice rolling can happen in most rules systems, just have to grin and bear it - or play chess!

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    1. Thanks, Mike. Agree: the underlying PL framework lends itself to adjustments without losing its basic structure and feel. Although we're still trying to keep it "by the book" before we get to tinkering with it, one thing we decided right up front was that we would not use the random events generated by the boxcars and snake eyes rolls. Works for us.

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  10. Oh yeah we have never used the random events. Also when a unit fails to activate, you just go to the next unit. Not one failure ends the whole side's turn. We are usually playing with like 3 to a side.
    I also never use points.

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    1. When we've played multiplayer, each player on a side goes until he fails an activation or activates all units, then the next player on that side goes--so the entire side doesn't lose a turn on an activation failure. Having said that, the sentiment is divided right now on whether or not to limit the failure to activate to the unit vs the side (my guess is that we'll be moving to the model you describe at some point).

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