We did a Sudan campaign yesterday. It was just a brief three game thing with the results of each battle affecting the next in some way.
We had three Mahdist players and two Egyptian/British players.
Game 1
The first game saw a small force of Egyptians trying to capture the Mahdi as his movement started.
The Egyptians had three small units and four small units of Bashi Bazooks. The Mahdist had 3 regular units visible and one hidden in the village near the well.
The Egyptians moved North and then through the village when they got off the boat with the Bashi Bazooks moving South in column.
The two Egyptian commanders were rivals, so they weren't necessarily supposed to cooperate.
The Eqyptians quickly ran into Mahdist forces while in column and were pretty jammed up by that. They sent a unit through a building to flank the Mahdists but then a second unit of Mahidists were able to come into the village from the West side and hit the Egyptians in the rear.
After the dust cleared the Egyptians were forced to retreat back through the city.
The Bashi Bazooks were having the opposite luck.
They managed to destroy one of the units of Mahdists opposite them and force the other unit, along with the Mahdi, off the table.
The end result was a minor victory for the Egyptian forces. They weren't able to pursue the Mahdi but the Mahdist wouldn't have any rifles for the next game.
Game 2
This time four tiny units of Bashi Bazooks were holding a village against three brigades of 3 units of Mahdists. An Egyptian column was following the Mahdists and trying to stop them from taking the town, which had supplies, including a number of weapons.
The victory conditions were that the Mahdists won at the end of any full turn if they held, uncontested, four of the six buildings in the village.
The Mahdists sped up to the village on the first turn eating up ground like a kid eating candy.
The Bashi Bazooks decided to consolidate their units into two buildings with two units in each. Pretty much surrendering the objective to the Mahdists if they could get to them.
On the next turn they reached all four buildings they would have to enter. They also assaulted the Bashi Bazooks in the buildings they occupied.
The Egyptians were not as quick on the draw but after a turn of slow marching really put the pedal to the metal to catch up.
The Mahdists sent a force back to deal with them which caught one of the units in the flank while they were in column.
It wasn't pretty.
The other units managed to get around this and made it to one of the buildings that Mahdists had occupied and assaulted it in line.
They pretty much bounced off and the Mahdists were able to take the required four buildings without much fuss.
Game 3
The Mahdists had taken a pretty significant supply dump. Since the revolt was going so well for them the British decided to intervene.
But the Mahdists were armed to the teeth now with rifles, cannons and all manner of other goodies, like horses and camels.
The British decided to attack their position in square. At least for a short period of time.
Trusting in the power of their Gardner gun the British advanced towards their left to put some distance between themselves and the cannon the Mahdists had.
They were moving slowly and started cranking out some shots from the gun. But then it jammed. On the first attempt.
The Mahdists didn't need an invitation.
They poured out of their works and into the British square. The British were suckered into a counter attack breaking up their square and more Mahdists charged.
British units were being smashed in melee all along the line.
The cavalry tried to rescue the situation and smashed through the Mahdist camels but were repulsed by a counter attack from the Mahdist cavalry and forced to flee.
Eventually the gardner was unjammed just as Mahdist riflemen found their range to it and shot down the crew.
With only two units left the British attempted to retreat but it was every man for himself as the Mahdist force almost encircled them.
now paints and bases the model.
