kallman | 17 Aug 2014 10:12 a.m. PST |
I hate the mlockfile error message so here is my second try to post this. I went ahead and copied my comments from this other thread to focus the discussion. TMP link Well I ran the game and,…well it did not go so well. Sorry I did not take pictures as I think I had a beautiful board. Anyway I had set up a compound that included a large domed shrine building with a courtyard and a second two story building all surrounded by a wall. A river ran past this and the rest of the table had rock outcroppings areas of brush and scattered trees. Arab slavers had taken the compound and had a German female archaeologists as a captive. The Arabs had gotten the local native population in up roar and these forces were hidden in various position of ambush. The German forces were to rescue the captive and rout the Native and Arab forces. I was using the unit organization and tables for The Sword in Africa. The German forces were made up of one unit of 10 Kreigsmarine, Two 10 men units of Askaris, an over all commander and then a small 10 man gun boat armed with a Gatling Gun that was coming up the river. Facing them were two 8 men Arab Rifles that occupied the compound, 5 ten man units of natives with shield and spear and one unit of 10 Native muskets. The German forces decided to come onto the short table on the side of the river where the Compound would be located instead of opting to cross the river directly in front of the compound. The gun boat was of course coming up the river to support the German forces. The Native forces had opted to go for a forward offense and placed the Native muskets and one of the spear/shield armed units in brush close to the German entry area. Of course all of the positioning of the Native forces had to be determined before the Germans deployed. In the first turn scouting units of Askaris reveled the hidden Native musket unit. Shooting from the gun boat and Askari rifles left most of the Native muskets either wounded or dead but not run off. The other unit of Askaris sent scouts forward to check the other area of brush and found the hidden unit of Native spearmen. Next turn the Native spearmen were able to charge the Askaris (who were on a hill ) The unit of German Kriegsmarine also managed to join into the fray during the movement phase. This where is all went to hell. The single Native Spearmen unit with included their leader even outnumbered two to one managed to reduce both the Kreigsmarine and the Askari units to less than half strength. At this point one of the German players stated that was the end of the game because they could not achieve their objective as they would have to detail the rest of their forces to carry the wounded. I even suggested that I would allow for a single figure from each unit to stay with the wounded so that the game could progress. The Native muskets had by this time been wiped out. It did not help that one of the German players before the game declared how much he did not like TSATF because it did not allow for reaction fire. He used the resulting fiasco to support his opinion. Anyway I was pretty dejected as I had lugged all the terrain and figures for what was a 45 minute drive for me one way and the game ran less time than it took for me to set it up. Or so it seemed to me. Now some of the players were conciliatory stating it was their bad tactical choice to have deployed as they had with the Germans forces and that you never want to go into hand to hand with native forces in TSATF. I should add the German forces were in open order when they went into hand to hand. Regardless the whole affair left a bad taste in my mouth. Granted it has been a long time since I had run TSATF and really wanted to give this classic a go again. I am sure I made some errors. In fact several players had been pretty jazzed that I was going to run this. In the end I felt it was a huge waste of my time. I had spent most of my scant free time getting things ready this week coming up to the game and now I feel I could have used my time in a more productive way. I am also not so sure I want to run TSATF in the future. It seems like a good set of rules and it always earns high praise here on TMP. But I just do not know. I will take blame that I might not of had a balanced scenario. I felt that having the gun boat would balance the numbers the German forces were facing. Sadly I had pretty much my entire collection on the table that was painted and according to what the rules stated this should have been about right in terms of numbers. Ah well. |
John Leahy | 17 Aug 2014 10:42 a.m. PST |
Tsatf does have reactive fire. It's in the newest set. The game does sound interesting. Sorry it didn't work out. |
vtsaogames | 17 Aug 2014 12:08 p.m. PST |
My suggestion: don't let the natives deploy within charge distance of the initial colonial deployment area. I haven't played TSATF in a long time but recall having to go forward through lots of rifle fire with my Boxers. I have had scenarios go pear-shaped too rapidly and had my crew blame it on the rules. Wait a while and maybe try again, with less props. That way you don't have to haul as much. Those who never create scenarios bitch the most. |
Bobgnar | 17 Aug 2014 12:38 p.m. PST |
Sounds like an historical outcome. White invaders lose. Is this not a case for, "ok, let's change sides, and have another go?" |
Dragon Gunner | 17 Aug 2014 12:52 p.m. PST |
Small numbers of troops have the potential to create a quick game. Darkest Africa does not take as long to play as regular TSATF. If it was over that quick maybe you could have run it again and had them switch sides. It is very much a skirmish system instead of big battles. I would also make use of scouts in your scenario. The Europeans could detach troops like they do in regular TSATF or have some assigned native scouts represented by a couple of native miniatures. Your force balance actually looks pretty good. If you find you need to tweak the force balance a little add some tribal mercenary units with low combat value to beef up the Germans numbers. |
Doc Ord | 17 Aug 2014 2:11 p.m. PST |
Too much terrain can be a problem as well.As suggested above some native auxilliaries can be useful such as ruga-ruga. It takes some playing experience to get a good feel for what scenarios work and what don't. |
kallman | 17 Aug 2014 2:12 p.m. PST |
Actually the German players did detach scouts to flush out hidden native forces and were successful in that regard. Luck of the card order in the second turn and good dice rolling had the Natives on the Askaris in quick order. As to running a second game, my game was the second one of the day for our monthly game group and we did not start until about 8 pm. First game starts at 1 pm (sometimes) and then we break for dinner. My game was "over" at a little after 9:30 pm. I was not in the mood for a second go at that point. Perhaps my expectations were too high and when things went south so fast I took it hard. There was also some belly aching during the hand to hand combat that made me just not want to continue. Now a number of the players did want to have a post game discussion and were trying to put a positive spin on things. I just was no longer receptive and knew I had to leave. |
Dragon Gunner | 17 Aug 2014 2:44 p.m. PST |
Oops overlooked the scouting in your battle report I was on my way out the door and in a hurry. |
Dragon Gunner | 17 Aug 2014 3:06 p.m. PST |
I have struggled with scenario design for TSATF Darkest Africa supplement just like you have. The published scenarios are actually fairly close to what you had in your scenario. One of the things I have found is superior firepower does not matter in Darkest Africa as much as it does in TSATF unless you are playing on a flat surface with no vegetation. Hand to hand combat is much more likely to occur, no roll to close and very little time for shooting. You are lucky to get off one volley in Darkest Africa. Formations are actually quite critical if the Germans had been in a "knot formation" the outcome might have been very different. The 3-1 force balance that regular TSATF uses does not apply. You can quite literally get by with 2-1 or even 1-1 depending on the scenario and terrain layout. The German Mauser becomes as good as a spear or a musket under the right conditions. Having some scrubs (tribal allies or mercenaries) to soak up damage is critical. |
kallman | 17 Aug 2014 3:08 p.m. PST |
No problem Dragon. Hi Doc Ord, I would agree that I had too much terrain. I just like a good looking gaming table. If I decide to run future games I will make things a bit more sparse. I do have Rugga Rugga figures but they were not finished by the time I was running the game. When I feel I can go back to giving this another go I will get those painted up and add to the game. |
chicklewis | 17 Aug 2014 6:27 p.m. PST |
I noted similar problems the two games I ran (and one in which I played) using Sword in Africa. My conclusion is that the high expense of the European troops is not matched by increased usefulness. A casualty to the Europeans is easy to cause, and much more expensive for them than casualties to the native player. No roll to close is, imo, a large factor in the apparent imbalance. |
Dragon Gunner | 23 Aug 2014 5:56 p.m. PST |
Well I have come up with a rough formula from play testing. If you have dense jungle terrain with restricted view you could use the following formula… 1. Assume the shooters will only get off one volley before they are in hand to hand combat. Figure out the average number of casualties inflicted for close range fire. 2. Step two get a rough estimate of the hand to hand ability of the surviving attackers versus defenders. It usually comes out at one for one casualty inflicted versus lost. Modifiers such as formation and terrain can of course modify this but calculate it with no special bonus other than troop quality modifier. 3. What I have found is roughly 2-1 native versus European units makes a good balance. A 1-1 native shooters versus native melee troops. Native missile troops don't inflict as many casualties and don't get decent hand to hand modifiers so they take more losses in hand to hand as a result thus the 1-1 ratio. Note this play test was done with dense terrain this formula would not apply if the shooters had better fields of fire. A video not Darkest Africa but I think it captures the feel. The European player needs to believe this can happen to him at any moment and plan accordingly. YouTube link |
SgtGuinness | 26 Aug 2014 8:01 p.m. PST |
Any battle plan does not survive first contact with the enemy! I've played the same games 3 and 4 times and every time I have a different outcome. No matter how well you think it out and feel you've accounted for so many eventualities at least one gamer will FUBAR your plan. It sounds as if it was a case of "OK, wow, cool, now lets switch sides and do it again"! I've been in that situation a few times, and each time we've just switched sides and played the battle again. Two games for the price of one…LOL Cheers, JB Sgtguinness.blogspot.com |
Dobber | 29 Aug 2014 5:16 p.m. PST |
In regard to your friend saying that TSATF has no defensive/opportunity fire. (I am reading from TSATF20) Opportunity fire: p.26 Pass Through fire you can choose to shoot in the movement phase, forfeiting a shooting phase shot for that unit (amended on last page "Rules Changes) Defensive Fire: p21 b. 4. you must stop 1" from unit you are charging p27 references the defending unit being shot up. I can find nothing saying that a unit that is going to be charged can't shoot. p27 C. List of figures that cannot shoot in a shooting step. (amended on last pg) Units that used Charge movement cannot fire, It says nothing of units that are about to receive a Charge. based on the above, I believe that in the shooting phase of the turn, chargers are eligible targets to be shot. (perhaps those charging from hidden/concealment can only be shot at by the unit they are charging?) so unless your players were using charge movement across the table (if they did, they deserved to be wiped out) then on the turn that the charge was declares they should have been able to issue a last volley perhaps try the scenario again with that in mind? It seemed like it should have been a great deal of fun. by no means am I an expert on TSATF, so if any more experienced players know that I am wrong, please let me know. hope that helps, Joe *Edited to get my facts right, duh* |
John Leahy | 30 Aug 2014 6:25 a.m. PST |
Like I said in my post above. Imperial troops DO get to fire on enemy movement. A huge improvement in the game. |
Dobber | 30 Aug 2014 9:12 a.m. PST |
Sorry John, didn't mean to repeat you. I read this at work and replied when I got home. My bad! |
John Leahy | 31 Aug 2014 5:56 p.m. PST |
No worries. |
piper909 | 10 Sep 2014 10:07 p.m. PST |
My experience running conventional TS&TF games at conventions (ahem) is that completely different results are possible for the same scenario given the vagueries of the cards and dice and the unpredictability of the players involved. So don't be too harsh on yourself or too quick to give up on your scenario (playtest it a few times with friends or colleagues and see if there's a pattern or an inherent problem that needs to be addressed). |
laptot | 14 Sep 2014 8:10 p.m. PST |
Ts&TF grossly favors native player. MGs and artillery far too weak. Effective Range and rate of fire for European rifles need to be several orders of magnitude better than natives to achieve historic results. With a few notable exceptions, European columns generally inflicted kill ratios of better than 100:1. The question, however, is who would want to play such a game. TS&TF is Hollywood's version of 19th C. Imperial battle. |