American War of Independance - On the New York Frontier

 

This week I ran a game of Rebels and Patriots. I had geared it at 36 points per side as I had expected 4-6 players. It turned out to be only 4 players, so everyone had plenty of troops to use. Unlike a lot of Daniel Mersey's rules, failure to activate a unit does not end your turn. This turned out to be a very good thing as there was a lot of poor dice rolling for activations in this game by both sides. 

The scenario was for a force of British and Loyalists to scout the area to determine the Continentals intentions. For the Continentals it was to prevent the area being scouted and cause as much damage to the Crown forces to make it too costly to continue. 

Colonials Initial Deployment. All of Their on Table Forces are South of the Fox Stream, mostly close to Van Ives's Farm and Scott's Hill. 

About Midway Durning the Game. The British had Been Slow to Deploy, while Their Allied Tories and Natives had been Rapidly Advancing to Bring the Fight to the Colonials. Here Thay have Just Completed Scouting of Green Tree Medow. The Opening in the Upper Right Between the Two Woods. 

A Short Time Later the Natives have Chased Away the 3rd New York from the area of Scott's Hill. They are Coming Under Heavy Fire but have Managed to Scout the Hill. The British 60th Lights have Finally made it to the Bridge. 

Late in the Game the Continental's Rifle and Minutemen have Finally Made an Appearance. Their Firer has Greatly Reduced the Tory Line Infantry. Up Until now The Crown side had Things Going Their Way, but in two Quick Volleys Washington's Riflemen had put Some Serious Hurt on the Crown Troops.   

Games End. The Crown has Succefuly Scouted Three of the Four Areas of the Battlefield. While the Continental Riflemen have Pushed the Win into a Pyric Level.  

Everyone had a good time despite what I can only call some hideous dice rolling. I will be running more of these games in the future. A lesson I hope was learned that while firepower can weaken troops, it takes guts and cold steel to move them off a position. Future games will see players creating their own Commanding Officers, which is something I left out since this was a learning game. 

I feel that each person controlling an 18-point force is sufficient. It will need to be, until I paint up another great block of figures for this game. There already are Culpepper Minutemen, New York and Connecticut Regulars in official uniforms, as well as a large group of the British 24th and now that I have seen them in action, forces from the Iroquois Confederation will all be joining in.