Last week our little group did a colonial game using
The Men Who Would Be Kings rules from Osprey.
The game was an experiment since our only experience with colonial games was roughly 30 years when I tried a few games using The Sword and the Flame.
When I reentered the world of historical wargaming my interest in colonial gaming was rekindled and I began to paint up both sides for the Zulu War of 1879. A short time later my friend JZ began to paint some up as well and before long we had enough to try a game.
We use mostly 1\72nd plastic figures from Italeri\Esci and HAT but I have a number of metal figures from New Line Designs and a few from RSM.
The scenario was loosely (very loosely) taken from Black Powder because I was more interested in learning the game mechanisms that I was in a finely tuned scenario.
I told the Imperial force commander that his job was to 1) assess the strength of the Zulu's defending the drift and 2) establish a force on the drift itself for a future fort.
The Zulu commander was to defend the drift and destroy the Imperial force if possible.
Both sides had some obstacles to overcome.
The Imperial forces were stacked up in a line of march along a track. The Natal Native Horse let the column followed by a company of the Natal Native Contingent. Behind them came two companies of the 13th Foot followed by the Naval Brigade contingent of Royal Marines, Royal Navy sailors from the HMS Shah, a gatling gun and 7pdr.
In The Men Who Would Be Kings most actions have to be diced for (although there are free actions as well depending on troop type). The Natal Native Horse passed their action tests famously but the NNC behind them stalled for three turns thus making deployment difficult for the rest of column.
On the other hand the left and right horns of the Zulu impi were not under direct control of the commander and their activation had to be diced for. Both horns acted prematurely thus making it difficult for the Zulu player(s) to launch a coordinated assault. The pictures will tell something of how it went.
Figures are from the collections of BR and JZ.
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| The Natal Native Horse scouts and discovers the inDluyengwe behind cover. |
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| The inDhloko attack! |
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| The uThulwana flank the Natal Native Horse |
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| The 13th Foot deploy. The 13th are metal figures from New Line Designs. |
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| Royal Marine Light Infantry (RMLI) by HAT. |
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| Three Iviyo of the umHlanga form the right horn! |
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| The Naval Brigade 7pdr works to deploy. |
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| Three Iviyo's of the umBonambi form the left horn! |
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| inDluyengwe |
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| The right horn closes in and takes heavy loses. |
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| The Imperial forces form a rough square. |
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| The inKobamakosi form the loins and cross the drift to reinforce the Zulu center. Figures by HAT and a scratch built inDuna on a horse leads them! |
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| The umHlanga are shattered but manage to close and inflict heavy casualties on their tormentors. |
