Thursday, January 28, 2010

Battle in the Sudan: Relief of Atbara- Finale


With the first Dervish over the outpost wall the Egyptian garrison's situation become much more desperate!


Soon more of the fierce tribesmen scale the wall.


Meanwhile the first companies of Sudanese and Naval Brigade clear the wharf area.


The Mahdists gather in the distance to resist the landing.



Trouble on the wall. The Egyptians are no match against the ferocious Hadendowa warriors in single combat!





The Royal Marines rapidly deploy after disembarking.


Mahdist warriors charge the Sudanese attempting to push inland from the wharf but are stopped by the Sudanese volleys.


The fate of the garrison is sealed...the relieving force is too far off to save it...




Mahdist cavalry and camelmen further delay the relieving force.




The RM assault the village





The last defenders of the fort desperately try to save the situation. But to no avail and are either killed or rounded up to be marched back to Khartoum.


...and though the British relieving force clears the landing area they are too late to save the fort and in the falling light the sight of the fort burning, convinces the British commander to withdraw to the gunboats. The headlines in London and Cairo will no doubt drum up popular sentiment over the loss and perhaps the Brits will be back in greater force!

***

In hindsight, I think the key to the game was a to easy chance (4-6) to scale the walls...in the future I think a better game would be served by decreasing the chance of successfully scaling the fort walls, thus giving the Brits a reasonable chance to fight their way to the outpost.

Hope everyone enjoyed the game!
Next up on LeadGardens,...a play through of the new "Black Powder" rules from Rick Priestly just received from Warlord Games...and the return of my 18th century Imaginations!

11 comments:

Fitz-Badger said...

Fun and inspiring report and pics!

"Next up on LeadGardens,...a play through of the new "Black Powder" rules from Rick Priestly just received from Warlord Games...and the return of my 18th century Imaginations!"
I shall look forward to both! :)

Bluebear Jeff said...

I too am interested in your Black Powder breakdown . . . which doesn't mean that I do not want more Colonial posts (because I do).

An excellent account and wonderful photos. Yes, a 50% chance to scale the walls seems high to me too . . . but this result IS a good excuse for an ongoing campaign.

Hopefully you will soon return to these desert sands.


-- Jeff

Larry Stehle said...

Great write-up & photos! If you find that raising ladders is too easy, have a roll for figures next to the ladder to push it away.

I noticed you had foot figures on round bases. Any reason why you didn't put the cavalry on rounds as well?

legatus hedlius said...

Really enjoyed these posts and am very much looking forward to your Black Powder report!

Steve-the-Wargamer said...

I can only echo the above - what a brilliant looking game, it looks like you had huge amounts of fun...

littlejohn said...

Egil,

I once mounted cav on round bases but I found they took a fairly large washer and made storage a bit too complicated...but I think they would look better on rounds and I may go back and mount the command guys on rounds for a start. But the real driving reason was a whole box of pre-cut 20mmx40mm bases that I had that seemed the right thing to use.

Fitz-Badger said...

iginally based my cavalry on round washers, too, and found as you did that they take up more space than I wanted. But I wanted a way to make consistently sized bases. After a bit of playing around I hit on the idea of using 2 smaller washers end-to-end. These are the same size washers I use for my infantry. If anyone is interested you can see more about what I'm talking about at http://soweiterleague.blogspot.com/2009/09/tricornes-and-laurel-and-hardy.html
(I like to use metal bases because I use magnetic movement trays)

Christopher(aka Axebreaker) said...

Very nice pics and the storyline was fun.

Cheers
Christopher

tidders2 said...

Super stuff, loved it. Trying to resist temptation to go colonial ..

-- Allan

Donogh said...

Bravo! Fantastic looking game. You've done yourself proud there.
A fitting finale, but leaving the door open for a return expedition...

A J said...

An excellent AAR, and plenty of potential for a rematch. I like the figures and terrain.