Seven Days to the River Rhine... à la française

A small number of members from the TWATS (Tantobie Warfare And Tactical Society) managed to get a Saturday game organised last week and it was my turn in the chair. As it had been a good two and a half years since their last airing, it would be Seven Days to the River Rhine, but in Africa because... why not? Well, it actually gave us a chance to get Shaun's excellent collection of toys out again, with a ton of technicals, some rather spiffing AMX-30B2's and who doesn't like a shiny AMX-10RC? 

Sneaky beggars, hiding behind the tree line

The scenario was a basic one - a bunch of ne'er do wells (led by Andy) were extorting money from the general populous at a nearby crossroads, and the French (captained by Shaun) were going to sort them out. However, our impromptu tax collectors had decided to put some friends on a nearby ridge line and remonstrate vigorously against the armed forces of France. Thusly, an ambush was set up and all that had to be done was get the game started.

La bête noire des français - l'T-12.

Now, I had previously commented that these rules were decent but, given the passage of time, would that remain the case after this play through? Spoilers - not quite. Still, there was soon a column of 10RC's and VAB's motoring towards the technical stoppage. Shaun couldn't see the massed infantry, T55's and a singular T-12 (described as a T55 without the good bits - you might call those good bits the actual tank and the rifling!). It was the latter that opened up first and smartly dispatched a 10RC with a flank shot. The sole Technical with a 106mm recoilless rifle also had a go and scratched the paintwork of another 10RC. At this point, Shaun dismounted his infantry from the VAB's and set up a base of fire. He also called in for reinforcements.

A technical of Technicals?

At the front of the column, there was quite a bit of to-ing and fro-ing, as the three surviving 10RC's started their revenge against the Technicals. This, gentle reader, lasted all of one dice throw, as out of three shots, Shaun fluffed two. Still, one dead Toyota (other vehicle manufacturers are available). Andy replied with some mortar fire from behind the ridge line (a miss), and another shot from that T-12, this time killing a VAB, though to be fair, a sharp stick could probably have done the same job. 

Rouler, rouler, rouler... apologies to Limp Bizkit fans...

Andy decided that he needed to bring his tanks to the ridge to engage the newly arriving French reinforcements - three AMX-10P's supported by a trio of AMX-30B2's. It was at this point he was gently reminded of the T55 main gun depression limits so he couldn't get the mechanised infantry heading his way. The tanks, however, would be fair game.

L'AMX-10RC, c'est mort.

The Technicals were still causing bother, as they tried to use their heavy MG's against the 10RC's. Of the three that fired, two caused paint scratches, the other missed. In response, Shaun demonstrated a superb level of consistency by firing three times and hitting only once again. Le sigh. Meanwhile, Andy had motored up a couple of Technicals to engage the left flank of the advancing French infantry, neatly adding two morale points to the gentlemen of the Legion. They shrugged this off with Gallic flair and continued their advance. 

Right, lads! Let's have 'em! (In French, obviously).

This was getting a tad exciting (maybe you had to be there...) so we decided to break for victuals. As this was at our new venue, Stanley Masonic Hall, this entailed decamping to the nearby Cooplands (Gregg's pastry is just too greasy) and a suitable lining for the stomach was purchased. All the better to soak up the Moretti that was hitting the spot possibly too well...

Un kilometre a pied ca use, ca use; un kilometre a pied ca use les souliers.

Back to the game and we had yet more shooting. The impressively capable bete noire of the French, the T-12, took out another VAB, the mortar finally scored a hit on the infantry, adding another morale point to their tally, and the three T55's on the left engaged the French armour. Once again, the dice rolling was terrible, with both players scoring one out of three and that was in no way good enough, not even for Mr Meatloaf! The effect, however, was akin to eggshells hitting eggshells. With nothing decisive and yet more French forces on the way, Andy was done and planned to withdraw from the field (well, covered pool table top), using the six T55's he had as a covering force. 

In this game, pretty is as pretty does... which is not much.

This was a Technical (see what I did there) militia win, what with the destruction of four French vehicles and scoring worthwhile hits on the de-bussed infantry. The French would, if the game had a) continued longer and b) we were happy just to have a dice rolling contest - no, we were not, have reached the crossroads and seen off the militia but at quite a heavy price, and only because of the flood of armour and mechanised infantry. 

As for revisiting the rules, the activation/reaction process - sounds good. It plays alright (damning with faint praise maybe), but on this particular play through, it slowed things down a lot. May be it was the way we were playing, in which case as umpire, that's on me, but it didn't seem to suit the flow of the game.

Andy had good right to feel down about his tank's lack of depression.

I did need to add a few things here and there since we were, admittedly, playing outside of the expected theme of the rules. It was quickly noticed that infantry very much play second fiddle in the rules, and HMG's on vehicles are practically non-existent - the VAB's had MG's but not according to the rules. Same with the 106mm, so I played with the stats of the Kanonenjagdpanzer. Yes, they're not the same, but that's the benefit of having an umpire-led game. It also helps when, if there is some disagreement with the players, you remind them of the selection of single malts behind the bar that might aid the memory of said umpire. 

The Charge of the Technicals. Great elan, utterly pointless.

Noted, too, was the morale system, in that it doesn't really fit any real world doctrine, so the idea of taking a few hits, pulling back, re-organising and then having another go isn't in the rules at all. You get your morale limit and that's it. 

Having said all of that, it was still a good game and kind of played out how I thought it would. It may well be that in a couple of years, these will come out to play again - the rules that is, Shaun's toys are most certainly to see daylight much sooner. As for the venue, it's good to play in a bar because there is beer and the odd single malt (after the game unfortunately, both Shaun and Andy ignored the hints about helping an ageing umpire remember things!), and there was much conversation had as well - remember, just because it's a wargame doesn't mean to say it can't be a social event too. Finally, apologies for the French used in the post - a near thirty year old GCSE gave way to Google Translate. 

Epilogue (or post credits sequence to the younger readers more familiar with Marvel movies).

Andy has pondered for weeks, trying to figure out the logistics of putting a game with his Shinyloo collection at the current venue, and questions were asked about a larger playing surface. After all, a covered pool table isn't that big. Gimlet eyes were cast over the other tables in the bar, then a short perambulation to the main hall by Andy and I revealed a scene to which Andy's eyes lit up! Nine decently sized tables that could be combined to offer a much larger canvas. The plans for a Shinyloo game were back on!

Seven Days to the River Rhine - First Play Through

A week last Saturday saw the assemblage of a small twattery at our usual venue, The Commercial, for a first time play through of Seven Days to the River Rhine. The Cold War is my favourite historical period and these rules, in a similar vein to Team Yankee, aim to provide a suitable game for the 1980's period.The rules themselves are not that expensive and, as noted in a previous post, it's not the usual model catalogue that some companies release under the guise of a rule set.

Joining me were Andy with his modern's and Shaun with his rather significant collection of modern French and Soviet's. With his focus on Africa, this meant a ton of T-55's and BTR-60's. Before I go on, I will point out that the photographs taken of the game are not of the best quality, the lighting being of particularly poor quality and I've not had the time to play around with them in an editor.

The scenario was a return to H'irraq, our regular modern location. UN forces were watching the border between H'irraq and H'irran, securing local oil facilities and the nearby town from H'irranian backed militia and any formal attempt by H'iranian forces to annex some territory.

Hill One to the left, Two to the right.

The British were leaving their border posts, having been replaced by a company of French infantry with some armour support. The British occupied a town at the far end of the table (3 x Challengers, 3 x Warriors, 6 x infantry stands). The French held the two hills separated by a valley that was the main axis to the Oyston Oil facility in the middle of the table and the main road that led to the town. The French were split pretty evenly between the hills, a total of five AMX-10P's and eight infantry stands, whilst three AMX-10RC's covered the gap and six AMX-30S MBT's split into two three-tank units were further back. As these were mostly Shaun's toys, he got to play with them.

Skulky McSkulkface...

Andy was the opposition and started the game with one stand of militia which he placed in some handy cover behind the French front line. Unfair, I know, but the plan was to begin with an uprising and see how Shaun reacted. Once the uprising had started, then Andy would get more gear on the table in the form of 10 militia T-55's, 6 BTR-60's and 24 infantry stands to add to the initial rabble of 10 Skulking Militia. As I was the umpire, I accepted the role of being a twat and didn't tell Andy when he would get the additional troops, or Shaun that there were more British due once the word got out. Nor was Andy told when the regular H'irranian forces would arrive. The goal of the uprising was to take the oil facility and the town. Very asymmetric to begin with but I hope you can see what I was trying to do in simulating limited effective communications between forces in the heat of battle.

As you may have noticed, this was not the traditional Seven Days scenario and there was a smidge of umpire decision making throughout the game but since the first play through of a rule set is to ascertain if the mechanisms themselves are usable, that wasn't much of a problem. It did, however, mean that the tactical advantage cards were unused on this occasion.

Charge!

With everything set up, off we went with the first initiative dice roll. This went to Shaun who, with nothing much to do, handed this to Andy. The Skulking Militia opened up at the nearest group of three AMX-30S's and killed one, giving a second tank a morale marker.

Turn two saw Shaun deal with the morale issue but using up a number of command points in doing so. Returning fire on the Skulking Militia saw morale markers on two militia stands whilst a tactical withdrawal was made to get out of range of the effective RPG fire. He also reversed two AMX-10P's on Hill One and scored two more hits on the Skulking Militia.

Those 8-inch shell splash markers do come in handy...

Andy, however, having kicked off the fight, now had his militia armour to play with and a sudden charge to the base of Hill One with a total of six T-55's and three BTR-60's. Shaun failed in his reaction rolls from Hill One but supporting fire from Hill Two saw a dead T-55 and a dead BTR-60, whose infantry managed to de-bus but with maximum morale markers. Shaun also moved the British Warriors up from the town to support the engaged AMX-30 unit and the AMX-10RC unit moved towards the gap between the hills to cover any move there.

All is not well on that hill...

Turn three saw the 10RC's reach the gap and the Warriors stop to engage the now extremely Skulking Militia. It was on Hill One that most of the action happened. Andy managed to crest the hill with two T-55's whilst his infantry de-bussed from the surviving BTR's and advanced. French fire from Hill One was ineffective with no armour penetration on the T-55's from infantry LAW fire, whilst an AMX-10P was taken out by a T-55.

It was then that Andy used four of his militia T-55's to try and take out the advancing French "tanks". Note, gentle reader, that he called them tanks. It mattered not to Shaun that the three AMX-10RC's were little more than an engine wrapped in tin-foil with a 105mm gun. Nope, he was just happy they had been called tanks! Well, as the umpire, I was looking forward to see what would happen here. It would the sign of a "good game, good game" for Andy if he neutralised the French reaction force (You'll see what I mean in a minute!). The 10RC's required a 5 or more to be hit, so Andy started rolling. A 1. Next dice: higher than a 1? A 2! Next dice: higher than a 2? A 3! Final dice: higher than a 3? A 4! Much laughter ensued but as you can clearly see, Andy was not playing his cards right! Not that it mattered, as the French reply was equally as bad and some truly bum dice rolling was seen. The support fire from Hill Two was also a swing and a miss, whilst continued French fire on the Skulking Militia added another morale marker.

1, 2, 3, 4... Damn it!

Turn four saw the climax of the battle (and it was getting quite late in the afternoon). The militia finally took Hill One but not before losing a T-55 to a flank LAW shot from the retiring surviving French infantry whilst the 10RC's finally paid the ultimate price but not before killing one of the attacking T-55's. A cheeky T-55 shot from the hill even took out an AMX-30S near the oil facility! The advance elements of the H'irranian army were added to the table whilst an additional British Challenger unit also entered the town.

Les braves Chars, ils sont morts!

I called the end of the game as a draw as, whilst one of the hills had been taken, the other hill remained resolutely in French hands and there was much more support coming up. Publicly, the H'rranians were never there whilst the UN forces had been given a bloody nose. Of the game itself, it was nice to have a game where equipment wise, everyone was pretty much even. I am sure that if the Challengers had arrived, it would have been a bit more one-sided. A note on accessories. We had no markers specific to the game so some 8-inch shell splashes were used to denote hits, with dice used to show morale markers. The usual trees and buildings were kindly supplied by Andy but sadly he forgot to bring hills. The solution? Well, as we were in a pub, there were several handy bar trays that sufficed as ad-hoc terrain under the cloth. We didn't even have to pay for the hire! As always, Eric and Jean sold copious amounts of Consett Ale Works' Consett Pale Ale and the ever-beautiful Beef Butties and Chips (with peas this time, a lovely addition!).

That last T-55 was a bit cheeky!

So, about the rules. I like them. They play quite freely and there didn't seem to be anything majorly wrong with them. The initiative system, which I had my doubts about, works well enough but is far better suited to games that use smaller sized units, company size and smaller. The potential change in initiative in each turn does limit grand scale thinking, though as noted in the rules, the game is suited to a large number of players with set overall commanders and if we had the numbers, the initiative swapping could work out better. I have no doubt these will come out to play again and, given a Cold War hot scenario (I am thinking Steve's excellent 20mm collection here), the tactical advantage cards will be added to the mix. There was some discussion about how you would add troop quality to the game (aside from the cards) and minor amendments to the number of command points handed to each commander would suit that. In this game, that would have meant the militia and French each getting their assigned number of points with the French gaining a few more because of training and doctrinal advantages. How many points? Well, that would be decided by creating a table for each of the forces you can play in the game but it's something that we'll look into. Overall, I am happy with the set and pleased I picked up a copy.

Seven Days to the River Rhine - Preview

Seven Days to the River Rhine by Great Escape Games describes itself as a fast play set of rules covering the NATO/Warsaw Pact 1980’s. It claims it is suited especially for large multi-player games where each side has an overall commander who guides strategy and the other players control the actual units. In this preview, I’ll let you know what I think.

Not as gung-ho as Team Yankee

I had heard of this game last year but it wasn’t until the First Partizan of 2019 that I saw a demo game taking place. Intrigued, I searched for a copy of the rules and found a set for around a tenner. The rules themselves are a nicely produced 44-paged softback accompanied with a set of special cards. More on them later.

The overall layout is clear and concise, with quite large text and numerous photographs. Unlike Team Yankee, these picture detail miniatures from several manufacturers and credit is given to them with each picture.

The process of play is based on command tokens and initiative. One player has the initiative, uses their command tokens, then there are reaction rolls and this continues until all of the command tokens have been used or the other player steals the initiative via a 6 on a reaction dice roll. On the whole, this is probably the part of the game that I am dubious about the most. It just seems so finicky and I can’t help but think that the process as described might hinder fast play more than help. Having said that, most games I have played are simultaneous movement and effect so this initiative malarkey is a bit of a stranger to me. When we do get round to playing these rules, we’ll see how this goes. There is the usual morale and stats sections and the rules don’t get too bogged down in minutia unlike some sets I could care to mention.

The biggest game changing aspect of the rules would be the Tactical Advantage Cards. These are mostly generic but there is a card specific to each side and whilst I can see how they can add to the game, I am not entirely sure they help the game play to the period, and that is a thing for me and my approach to historical gaming, hence the amendments I made to the core Team Yankee rule set last year. A play through will sort out that question. 

Another interesting part of the game is range, or lack of it. Except for infantry fire, there are no defined ranges for weapons, the inference being that given the scale of miniatures used, assigning ranges to say tank cannon fire in relation to an assault rifle would make the scale of the game look a bit funny. Again, I can see how this would help the game but would add a caveat in that if you game on quite a large table as we often do (say 16x5 feet), you’ll need to consider terrain and buildings in you scenarios or you’re just going to have a shoot ‘em up on your hands. Then again, maybe that was what they were going for with the fast paced point of the game.

Sgt Bradford and a QR code? Tsk!

There is one bugbear that I must comment upon, and it’s nothing to do with the mechanics or the style of play. No, it’s a layout choice and one that peeved me slightly with my recent look at Cruel Seas. It’s the ‘advice’ boxes, from either Sgt Bradford for the British or Lieutenant Vasilov for the Soviets. These seek to impart tactical or strategic advice for those in it for the game and whilst I can understand why the designers put these sections in, they do come across as a little condescending for anyone with only a little knowledge of the tactics of the period. It’s a small thing, and you may very well disagree, but I would prefer it if games designers did not think every reader is a bored child with the attention span of an MP in a re-election campaign. Oh, and in case you don’t understand what the rules are trying to tell you, there are QR codes that will lead you to videos explaining the relevant section of the rules. Helpful, maybe, appearing to cater for the Fisher Price ‘My First Wargame’ market, almost certainly. I know I am being waspish here but if you can’t explain a simple process in two paragraphs, are you really trying at all?

It could be considered easy, and lazy, to think of Seven Days to the River Rhine as a kind of Team Yankee lite without the model catalogue level of miniature pictures. And yes, it would be. The designers have clearly thought long and hard about what they wanted to put on the table and, my reticence aside for initiative table tennis, it feels like they have succeeded in their self declared goal. For the price, I don’t feel set upon by the rules and there isn't the relentless commercialism of Team Yankee and its ilk. As with my recent Cruel Seas preview, I have certain doubts but am more than willing to give these rules a full airing, probably in late 1990’s H’irraq at 15mm or West Germany in 20mm if the kit is available. Command Decision is our usual modern rule set (albeit at a different unit scale to Seven Days or Team Yankee), but the latter has become our alternate go to set with suitable amendments. You never know, maybe Seven Days could replace TY in that role. We shall have a play and find out.