John Curry

The weekend was one in the series of the West of England Calves (these are smaller versions of the well established Conference Of Wargamers that runs annually in July each year in Northamptonshire). They involve playing a variety of games that are often in various stages of development. These games are supported by historical sessions (some of which are very current history). Twenty-three people attended at least part of the weekend, with some local people only coming for the day.

The weekend was at Fort Purbrook, a Victorian fortress on the heights overlooking Portsmouth harbour.

Friday

The conference dinner was on HMS Alliance, a Royal Navy A Class submarine designed in WWII to fight the Japanese. This was followed by a tour of the submarine from an experienced submariner. The submariner seemed to be reliving his service as he was subconsciously pressing buttons, pulling leavers and operating the controls as he talked.

I was particularly interested by the escape equipment. Actually, only three people have ever used it successfully. These were on HMS Artemis sank in Portsmouth Harbour on 1st July 1971 in one of the most shameful accidents in Royal Navy history.

The first plenary Game was ‘One of Our Submarines’ by John Basset. It was a submarine game, using a real submarine as a prop. There were light hearted arguments about submarines and their roles in the past and the future. During this game, Ian Mitchell returned the classic quote of the weekend, ‘the problem with submarines is they cannot go ashore’. We then returned to the fort for orientation and some late night games. I was very disappointed that the FOOTFALL Situation game run by Tom Mouat had none of the players killed. The special operation was run as a special operation and with appropriate tactics/ leadership/ luck they captured the enemy submarine.

Ironclad Draughts by Bob Cordery was another late ADG (After Dinner Game) that needed some play-testing before taking to SALUTE 2007. It looked highly amusing and I hope to have a go at COW.

Saturday

Saturday commenced with a tour of Ft Purbrook, where I presented a tactical tour focussing on the issues involved in attacking and defending such a fort. This was in preparation for the “Le Queux’s Nightmare” a TEWT (Tactical Exercise Without Troops).

In the TEWT the players were the German military staff planning an attack on England. Their task was merely to produce an outline plan of seizing the newly completed Fort Purbrook in 1871. If this fort had been taken, guns could then dominate the harbour and open up the next of the five forts on the hills overlooking Portsmouth to be seized one by one.

The three groups came up with largely similar plans consisting of regimental level assaults on the main gate. Engineers charging in with shells on sticks to attempt to blow a breach. Perhaps with another regiment screening the assault. Having read Annals of a Fortress by E Viollet le Duc, personally I proposed a two to three week preparatory bombardment to create entry points into and out of the moat, gaps in the battlements and breaches into the tunnels. This would be concluded by a three pronged assault, each by a division, with a fourth division in reserve to exploit the first attack that gets a foothold. This scale of attack might overwhelm the defenders by forcing them to put all their men on the walls and giving them no opportunity to hold back a reserve.

The Moon Grey Sea by John Salt was a WWII convoy game that focussed on the problems of commanding a convoy and keeping it together.

Pass the Fly Swatter was WW1 in East Africa by Martin Rapier. A toy soldier game with six players attempting to find, fix and destroy the elusive Hun in the African bush.

The Fletcher Pratt Naval Wargame was a hypothetical battle that explored what would have happened if the Germans had kept back their capital ships and sent them out to challenge the Royal Navy in 1941. The rules allowed a fast and furious game on the ballroom floor in the officers mess. I write up a more detailed account in due course.

The Realities of Defence Procurement by Tim Price was a Matrix Game that involved: • Understand the Military Requirement to meet a Capability Gap! • Engage Defence Contractors in Partnership for Mutual Benefit! • Manage the Equipment Programme Budgetary Profile! • Drive your Programme through to deliver Military Capability! • SMART Procurement - On Time, Under Budget and Above Performance Requirements! • Discovering what "Loitering Munitions" are...!

The game was technical, but involved everyone arguing to control defence expenditure by scheduling, rescheduling, increasing requirements, decreasing requirements etc… I am glad that the actual MOD Procurement Agencies work in a far more rational manner than that portrayed in the game…

The Clearing of Falkland Sound by Wayne Thomas was a surprisingly tense sub hunting game during the Falkland wars. With only one sub, and some assorted fish, the Brits had a hard time pinning down the enemy sub. The game ran several times to a satisfactory conclusion (for the RN at least).

The Naval Brigades Lecture by Richard Brooks was last delivered at the National Maritime Museum. It was a rare chance to explore such a fascinating piece of Victorian naval history.

After dinner was Stalingrad: The LRP Game by John Curry and Bob Cordery and Tom and others. The comrades were given a rousing political lecture by Alec and told that glory awaited those who took the factory back from the Fascist dogs! Of course, the players were a little surprised to meet two airsoft champions to join the German side. The Russians attack can only be described as a hesitant after the Germans lobbied a simulated grenade and opened up with blank firing weapons (none of the this airsoft namby pamby quiet little plastic pellets for us). The Russians recovered and fought their way across the fort. At least until they realised that the Germans had a airsoft equivalent of an airsoft heavy machine gun.

The Russians took 12 casualties per 50 metres advance. They had to take doorways, corridors, stone staircases, and various pillbox’s. There was some blue on blue, at least on two occasions as the Russians left and right flanks engaged each other. The players learnt the hard way how to take pillboxes; using suppressing fire and grenades. After the first initial adrenaline rush, players realised how many times they had been ‘killed’, so the second phase saw them a lot more cautious. However, the new platoon commander (Sid) gave clear motivation and tactical coordination in language that would have made a regimental sergeant major grin. When they were reluctant to enter a tunnel, he provided suitable encouragement that much of Portsmouth would have heard.

Although only airsoft, I think the participants took away a deeper understanding of harsh realities of FIBUA

The late night games included the Count of the Saxon Shore by John Bassett RPG on the coastal defence of late Roman Britain against Saxon raiders.

The Russian Package Holiday: The Russian Occupation of Afganistan game by Wayne Thomas was very interesting. It consisted of juggling the forces to keep down the insurgents, while minimising Russian casualties in order to keep support back home. I have played the game at a CALF before and it is well worth an hour or so of ones time. The Armetis Project by John Basset was a disturbing role-playing game about characters breaking down under stress. Basically you defined your character, then every time you failed an argument, you had to replace one of your personality characteristics with something less favourable. In the end, you seem to have a well defined character that seems to have a life of its own.

Nuclear War was a particularly sad game that was rumoured to have been run (by someone). It would be in very poor taste to run it again at a nuclear bunker in March 2008….

Sunday

Invasion! This was an experimental game about a planning an invasion in 1944, then running it through using a simple system. The offside view by David Bradbury (printed in the Nugget and to be found on this website) is far superior to my efforts to summarise the game. It will return with a new scenario at COW. However, I will ask the players who planned and executed the invasion at the CALF to plan the defences for the next group to assault. Jaw Jaw not War War was a very original consensus building game to end conflict by Stephen Anguillar Millan. It was a committee game that explored the process of ending hostilities in the modern era. The players examined some of the subtleties that are needed when establishing a multi-national force to act as a peace-keeping buffer between two recently warring factions. There was not a great deal of dice throwing and toy-soldier moving in the game, but it had the appeal a Matrix type game. I await the write up with interest.

The final plenary session was Digitization and the Future of War by Tim Price. The military have discovered GIS (digital maps and databases plus GPS). The key advantage is that our soldiers are hardly ever lost. The military advantage of this is so huge it hardly needs expansion.

The weekend was a fun and interesting weekend, set in some fine historical locations. My thanks must go to John Basset for his assistance in organising the event and Michael Curry for being the conference Gofor. The next big event is COW in July 2007 and then the next CALF is at the bunker in March 2008. Of course, the might be some smaller events planned in due course. See the Nugget for further details of the day long events.