Trench Wars Night Fight

Charlie was the only 'regular' to show up, but we still had a blast!

Seems no one really considered night-fighting and true 'small unit' skirmish in Trench Wars! Ok, that's harsh - actually it's only the night fighting they didn't touch on enough, but there is also a definite push for larger, grander games.

I took ten German trenchfighters, one officer, and two NCOs against Charlies' three ten-man squads and a unit of four Royal Engineers - Signalers, and their lone sentry. One of those squads was the crew of a pair of field guns. The Field guns were the objective for the night raid.

We started the game off with me rolling for a random entry point on the table. As fate would have it (or my demon-possessed dice!), I rolled to pop up right in front of the sentry.

But that was ok, since my next roll for "noise and light discipline" was passed easily - so the sentry at least didn't hear my guys!

Unfortunately, since they came on the table so close to his guys, I gave Charlie a roll to see if his sentry could spot them. They were less than six inches away! He made the roll, spotted the raiders, and fired a warning shot.

He missed, but the Royal Engineers in the dugout awoke and one started running to raise the alarm. In addition one of the ten-man squads awoke and started thinking about moving towards the shot.

Next turn, my lads poured into the bunker and a one-sided brawl ensued where the Royal Engineers died valiantly defending their dugout without slowing my lads down very much. Still, there was a lot of ground to cover, and since it was dark, we could only move six inches.

A couple of turns went by with us just maneuvering, and with the last two squads waking up and moving to the sounds of battle. This was not going to be good.

Charlie had one of the gun crews manhandle a gun away from the bunker it was behind and prep it for firing, while the other crew ran up to greet three breakaway trenchfighters.

On my left flank, my officer, an NCO and a handful of trenchfighters ran towards a unit that was firing at medium range in the dark. The raiders took a few casualties, but closed into Bergman range and opened up with two submachine guns and a pistol, kiling half the Brit squad.

The three breakaway lads charged into the five gunners and beat them to a pulp, directly after which the other five gunners opened up and close range with the 18 pounder. It was a direct hit instantly Annihilating all three lads.

A reserve unit came on not long after and hammered the last of my lads, ending the night in a valiant, but futile attempt at spiking the guns.

We had a great time, making rules on the fly that made sense. Charlie liked the game and drew a map of the terrain layout so we can try again sometime.

Fortunately I remembered the camera!! Unfortunately it didn't have it's "memory stick" in it, which is why this is a text-only report. Fear not gentle readers, Eye Candy is on the way soon!!