Shedquarters Day Q1 2025

It was time for another quarterly meet up of the Shedquarters Crew. We met again at the original SHQ, so we really must visit Shed West next time.

Due to a mix up we forgot to tell Phil until the day before, so he couldn't attend due to another commitment. Those present were me, Chris A, Chirs K and Richard.

For our opening game I revisited my Divisional level SCW rules "If You Tolerate This". They were originally written for offset squares, but now I have a hex cloth so worth a go with that. The hexes are smaller than the squares so I needed to reduce unit footprint. I was also unhappy with some of the combat systems, so I did close to a complete transplant from Martin Rapier's take on the OHW WW2 rules. With Phil absent I filled in as one of the Republican commanders, partnering Chris K. We're closest to the camera in the picture above. 

We had a couple of Divisions, each with two Mixed Brigades, and the Nationalists had similar with two regiments each. We had to cross the bridges and capture the three towns. They had to counterattack and take the bridges. Each of the towns had a small garrison of Nationalists.

I started by sending my recce to have a look at the central village. I spotted some hostile Guardia Civile, and so called down artillery on them.

But this was mainly CK's domain, so he sent some of his troops to deal with the defenders. The armoured car comes from an Asalto battalion. The label behind the infantry unit tells you what it is (in this case Ejercito Populare), its quality ("C" for "Competent"), the "I" indicates the brigade it is in, and the coloured dot tells you the division it is in. The 1 & 2 markers indicate how many activations the unit has made in the turn, up to a maximum of 2.

We had a load of stuff piling forwards, but then Chris rolled a 1 on the activation dice (you can see it next to the T-26 bottom left). That passes the initiative to the other side. The d12 is left next to the tank, as that will activate automatically when it becomes our turn again.

Perceiving where our main thrust was going to be, CA and Richard pushed reinforcements into the village. CK countered by driving his armour up the road, and delivering close range fire to the original defenders of the village. This wiped them out.

Now I mentioned before that my youngest daughter bought me a model dinosaur kit for Christmas, telling me it could turn up whenever a 12 was rolled. Well, someone rolled a 12 on the d12 activation dice. It didn't do anything. More of a photo op.

I started to get myself on the table. I've got recce across the bridge and a couple of armoured cars to counter the Panzer 1s which had made an appearance. My infantry was a bit more laggardly, with the Anarchists having to discuss orders before marching up the road.

Chris got a foothold in the centre village, but we struggled maintaining our activation sequence as evidenced by the blue d12 by a unit that has just failed. The Nationalists have deployed an anti tank gun to hold up Chris' armoured thrust.

The Pz1s are halted in their tracks and take some punishment from the a/car 37mm guns. Their MGs are surprisingly effective and I lose one of the cars.

Another 12 is rolled. It is mayhem around that village, but Chris has occupied most of the buildings.

Next activation I manage to knock out one of the Pz1s, and move up my infantry.

Chris' tanks cleared the street, but again the initiative failed us.

On my flank I have got most of my forces across the river, but both sides artillery has made moving around risky.

Richard's armour and infantry tried to hem in my (literal) bridgehead. He even moved up one of the village garrisons to make up the perimeter

Chris finally loses a tank, but both sides are running out of reserves to keep the fight going. On the left you can see the fight for that village, not previously mentioned, was starting to warm up.

Chris K had got a foothold in the lefthand village, but it was still very much a matter of contention.

By now we'd been playing for about four hours or so, with a break for lunch. Both sides had fought themselves to a standstill. We held one village, the Nationalists one and the other was disputed. Neither side had enough forces to rally a last push for victory, so night fell and it was probably a draw. although I think we would claim we were a little ahead.

Besides, the Anarchist and Socialist commanders had met up to argue over who had betrayed the revolution.

The mash up of the two rules sets worked quite well. If I'm to persist I need to revisit a few things including troop types and hex stacking limits. Martin's rule set is intended for WW2, and so the game needs a bit more of an SCW gloss putting over it than I had time for in the prep for the game.

However, it will be mainly remembered as the game in which an armoured car got eaten by a dinosaur.

You can't turn your back on players for a moment.

Our second game of the day was to be a big Dux Bellorum scenario, but what with my game overrunning we only had time for a quick match up to teach Chris K the system.

I can't remember the exact armies, but we had mostly warriors with a couple of good quality cavalry nits. They were mostly shieldwall.

On the left we evened things up by supporting our cavalry with some infantry, once the combats started.

No one got a major advantage in the first round of combat, so we piled in the Leadership Points for the second.

This meant leaving our Warriors to cope on their own against the shieldwall.

I was concerned on our right to prevent Richard - who had given himself more skirmishers - getting up to his usual trick of chipping away at the enemy skirmishers to get a leadership point advantage.

It looked like we were gaining the upper hand on our left, but couldn't achieve a breakthrough.

We pushed back their cavalry on the left, and I was hoping that a similar overload of LPs would get us a breakthrough next turn.

Fortunes in the centre were much more mixed. Shieldwall are tough to crack.

Sure enough in the next turn Richard killed a skirmisher unit, and we came up short on breaking through on the left. In the centre we got pushed back pretty much everywhere. It was looking dicey.

Then we realised it was time to go to the pub for dinner. Where we played Chris K's inter-war tank design game.

This involves making choices about armour/guns/speed and turret design under a strict budget, then conducting field trials against the other player designs in order to supply Bombastia with it's latest war winning weapon.

I'm not as good an artist as Chris K, but the Bombastia Terror Tank Mark VIII, triumphed in the first round of trials, the judges being particularly impressed by the multiple turrets and whippy aerials to put flags on. And the pointing skills of the commander.

And then we all went home