Muskets & Tomahawks at Barries

Steve & Russell's British
v.
Mike & Jim's French

Barrie & Leigh umpired and looked up the unfamiliar rules.  We used the same table as last week but fought it other direction & with a different scenario - this time M&T's equivalent of Free for All.

All players had 1 officer, 2 regular inf, 1 militia & 1 Indian  & each side had a CIC & 1artillery piece. 

 Pic from behind the French.  The French regs are advancing up the centre.  Their militia & Indians are advancing up both flanks.  Their artillery is on the right, hidden from the camera by trees. The brits are doing something similar, but are not quite so well organised.

 For once a close-up - Rusty's British regs looking good.

 

On the right, Jim's artillery & regs have blown away one of Steve's regular units.  His Indians have defeated their opposite number, but then badly mauled by Steve's militia's fire from the far right.  the British artillery is not well sited and is reduced to taking pot shots at the French gun.  Mike is taking on Rusty's advance guard on the left.

The right is a stalemate with the militias a few surviving Indians exchanging long range volleys with little effect.  In the centre, Jim's regs have been mauled, but more hot shooting from the French artillery has destroyed Steve's regulars.  On the left, Mike is making steady progress.

Rusty's men are gradually wasting away under the fire of both French commands.  The British concede after about 2 1/2 hours fighting.

This week the game rattled along a lot faster than last week.  This time not only did we generally know more about what we were doing, but we also gave both players of each side some of each type of troops (regular, militia, & Indians), rather than having different players for the regs, militia & Indians.  This allowed both players to do stuff simultaneously.  Having 2 umpires helped too as we could keep going while someone searched for obscurely located rules.

The game has a lot going for it - interesting variety of troops types, interesting scenarios, small numbers of figs so easy to raise your own army.  The rules are not that complicated, but it was originally in French & it seems the translation isn't always as clear as it could be.  Items are often not where you'd expect them to be & regretably, as usual there is no index.  I find the sighting rules confusing & not that logical.  Maybe we just haven't got it yet, but the end of game rules seem a bit unsatisfactory - a side can be clearly losing, but the game seems to keep going on without a definite end.