Bourlon Wood

We played on Saturday night a WW I "monster scenario" (at least for the Mud & Blood standards) loosely simulating the British efforts to gain control of Bourlon Wood during the Cambrai Battle. I said "monster" because it involved over 100 minis per side and, as I initially feared, it was an oversized game that did not fit well with the scale of Through the Mud and Blood.  That translated into a very loooooong game that we need to cut abruptly after almost five hours playing, ending with a clear advantage to the German (as you will read below) at that point.

On our way to the frontline

Exciting week-end ahead as tomorrow evening we will celebrate one of our regular "Longest Nights" at the club (see previous reports in the blog). This time it's me organising and umpiring the game and I have chosen a really large WW I scenario located around Bourlon Wood in Cambrai (1917).

To increase the level of "fog of war", but also to smooth the game (there are a total of 8 players confirmed, 5 on the British side and 3 on the German, which is large number to tame), I have appointed two C-in-C, ione for each side, and they have supplied specific orders to each member of their respective teams. Orders will have to be implemented and would only be changed by the C-in-C using runners. We'll see how this works, but in principle that should  limit players taking advantage of the "wide battlefield view" in their decisions.

As you may have noticed, I'm not providing now details of the scenariom and that's on purpose: do not want of  the players get any intelligence of the enemy forces they will face tomorrow. So, lots of tanks, artillery fire, gas and, of course, the brave infantry. We will play with our favourite set of rules "Through the Mud and the Blood" from the Too Fat Lardies and I expect to post a fully illustrated AAR early next week.