"starting an Alamo game on the cheap" Topic

Ok I had a small Fort, turned out was a good size for the table. I could not find any top down figures on juniorgeneral.org for the Alamo, so grabed some standing, but I am still looking for standins topdown, got my book from osprey, so now to figure out the battle, I am a gamer not a historian so i may get things slightly wrong.

Some of those buildings and redoubts just shouldn't be there, not to be hypercritical. Here's a good model from overhead, looking to the west (west is UP):

There are some nice cheap 20mm plastic figures out there now, I think IMEX makes them? Also, Napoleonic French line makes perfectly good Mexican soldados in a pinch.

thanks, I like the model. im trying to make do with what i have, but its nice to know. thanks for the correction, good to know what ive done wrong

Yeah, those bastions are too Vauban in style. Wrong for the era.

in mini wargaming you are taught to use models you already have, or you would have millions of models. I know its not perfect, Im trying just to play a game based on the history of the battle. Im sure if you only fight this battle you would have everything perfect, but i will be on a differrent battle in a couple of weeks, so i do my best.

as an example of being correct, the model quoted as being a guide, shows a river in blue, but i may be wrong but inital re3search suggests the river was driedup, so should not be blue, and would change the battle considerably, but im learning yet and could be wrong.

Do what makes you happy. You can certainly have a game "based on" the Alamo if you so choose.

i want to be as acurate as possible, but the fort being wrong i cant change easily, I am doing the best with what i have. I like learning about it too

By all means, do what satisfies you and make good use of what you have! I use some of MY Alamo models as generic adobe/Southwestern buildings when they aren't needed as Alamo pieces. Or I'll use some of the big Alamo buildings in Wild West games set in later-day San Antonio. Plenty of possibilities!

That said, it is never a bad idea to keep learning and try to stay accurate as is possible if you want to recreate an historical scenario. Alamo scholarship is always evolving and there have been many excellent new works in the last 20 years. Check our Mark Lemon link or Huffines/Zaboly link if you get a chance. You'll learn a lot and it will help your gaming of this battle.

And if you want to read an engaging novel set in this period, you can't go wrong with Stephen Harrigan's Gates of the Alamo link

-- the last chapters are all about the Alamo siege, and are very gripping and evocative.

Finally, the model's water obstacles are accurate and based on contemporary drawings by Mexican military engineers. This is Feb./March in San Antonio -- the acequias, streams, and wet boggy ground on the east side are just as they would have been.

Have fun! A la carga!

PS: Alba gu brath!

Thankyou for the links and advice, you seem like an authority on it. I will make a game that starts with the same final attack, and add some weights to events that happened, but i want to add alternatives so you may do better or worse than the battle

Im gaming the alamo, I may be wrong in some things, just trying to get a flavour of the battle in the game

OK the fort is small, so minatures were going to be to small i think, I decided to represent forces with dice, 1 pip = 2 men on the texan side, also when the attack started the texans left one wall to reinforce the main attack. so no reserve. I am going to have more men per dice pip on the mexican side.

the mexican cannon was to far away to do damage, so im going to disregard for gaming purposes. I going to allow alamo cannon to always be able to fire as they defended in the church at the end with them, but only outside the walls and not close range as the mexicans sheltered at the base.

The only significant water hazard was the marsh to the east. It was maybe a foot of water on top of a foot of mud. I allow Mexican columns to enter it but they require an extra turn to get across it.

You might take a look at my BLOODY DAWN rules. They are very far away from what you are trying to do, but inexpensive at Wargames vault, and contain a lot of information that IS useful to you.

link

softcover b&w plus full color pdf is $10. USD

Make that triangle of creek into a marsh that slows movement, and ignore the rest of the water lines.

thankyou, I will have a look, but i enjoy doing the rules myself from what i learn, I know rules would be better but I like the process.

Best way to write your own is to read the others and steal what you like. Certainly what i do!

Bookwise, I recommend BLOOD OF NOBLE MEN and the ALAMO SOURCEBOOK. Either has far more data than the Osprey.

well I fought the battle, but the photos are gone, dont know what happened, they are just not there.

I made the 4 attacks, and had cavalry waiting to cut down anybody who left. I had 20 men per pip on the mexican side, I had a rule that if cannon hit 8 times in a row without a miss the mexican attack had to take a simple moral check, if passed they had to take a moral check every turn if hit, but if never happened, so i should amend that. 

I had long range, medium range and near cannon ranges. the mexicans moved slowly but eventualy reached the walls. when they got in I retreated the texans to the middle of the compound, but the mexicans got in on 3 sides and totally finished off the texans, so the battle did not end in the church.

doc mcb thats for your help. you dont see to many wargames playing the alamo, so you have been a big help

I'm going to order the Wargame Vault rules set myself and give them a spin. I recently ran a fantasy version of the Alamo at GaryCon -- Santa Anna was secretly a santeria voodoo necromancer, turns out (history didn't record that!) and raises undead from the Campo Santo and other Bexar mission Indian burial grounds and launches these skeletons and zombies against the Alamo along with his soldiers. Chaos ensues! Meanwhile Bowie is stricken with sudden illness (a voodoo curse) and his Secret of San Saba and the lost silver mines is left to the Alamo noncombatant curanderas to decipher, if they can. Will they unravel the riddle that could save the day before the garrison is overwhelmed?

Pictures above from my 25mm model and in use with 20mm figures. The last image above is a painting by military artist and Alamo expert Gary Zaboly.