The Unenthusiastic Skulker.

 Date-28th February 192ish.

Place-Garvald’s Twin Town in the Back of Beyond.

             

Artsakh-Garvald’s Twin Town.

                The first game of the year saw us return to the deserts and backwaters of Artsakh which to some I would imagine would qualify it as Garvald’s twin town.Tonight’s game was to be the last rule tester before a few of the Gothenburg Gamers headed out to Scotland’s backwater of Kirriemuir to do battles with the League of Gentlemen Wargamers in their biannual get together.

Garvald’s Twin Town 

A Picture Postcard view of the local market.

                Four ne’er-do-wells and myself gathered to play out these final run throughs with all the amendments and rule simplifications .Basic forces had been set up and we were ready for the off but we had to delay kickoff as we were waiting on the Mad Baron of North Berwick to arrive.After his grand entrance we got down to the nitty gritty with each unit facing another.Due to a late call of Donald and I were left in charge of three units so I let him have some extra cavalry and an armoured car to help him cut swathes through the Mad Baron’s forces and his partner in crime Comrade Gilchristi.What was I thinking off? I expected to be able to concentrate on removing El Presidente’s Chinese rabble from the playing field and bask in my glory but that wasn’t to be the case. I systematically took the Chinese apart but on glancing to my left found that the chief Skulker’s forces were diminishing with a lot of dead horses lying about and an armoured car that was needing a visit from the local AA.

Donald’s forces given some support.

My Brits about to bestow the British way of life on some Oriental heathens.

         After our usual visit to the local hostelry in Garvald we got down to fighting to the bitter end.In Donald’s case that didn’t last long. I duly got down to business of eradicating the enemy with a combination of cannon fire and a stiff upper lip clearing the Chinese infantry from the field and thoroughly dismantling the enemy’s armour.The Russian allies that I had appropriated were found to be under enthusiastic in moving forward to take the village but eventually one of the units finally arrived at the railway station but found themselves in opposition with their fellow countrymen albeit in the form of Redskis courtesy of Comrade Gilchristi but alas his infantry didn’t want to occupy it as enthusiastically as myself.My lads duly entered the station bought some railway tickets and proceeded to fire at the Comrades’s lads with some good old lead shot.

Corned Beef on the hoof.

Comrade Gilchristi’s infantry looking to see if they have enough money to buy some train tickets.

My Russian conscripts seemed to have lost their way to the village.

         On the other side of the pitch Chief Skulker was not making as much headway as myself and as previously stated was finding his part of the battlefield littered with equine corpses as he struggled to deal with the cavalry onslaught from the Mad Baron and his erstwhile ally as first his lesser cavalry were coming up trumps against Donald’s supposedly better cavalry and as for his armoured car it was coming up second best against what looked like a lorry with some scrap metal on it.

Donald’s Armour looking as proud as a Peacock-For Now!

The Mad Baron’s hastily put together armour.

And his “inferior”cavalry.

        I must have been distracted with events going on in my flank as I lost track of my own advances and found that El Presidente was beginning to cause a few casualties amongst my lads culminating in the destruction of my armoured car.To rub salt into my wounds Comrade Gilchristi had sneaked a machine gun team into an adjoining building to the railway station and was taking aim on my ensconced infantry picking them off and forcing them to vacate the premises and then proceeding to shoot them in their retreating back and that was their fellow countrymen.Their remaining colleagues on seeing this decided to head for cover in the other buildings.Donald was still playing to form as he was whittled down to a squad of Japanese sailors (what they were doing in the middle of a desert I don’t know).They took cover in the village but the vicious two way assault was too much for them and they eventually dissolved into a mass of sushi.

           

The “better cavalry “getting the s**t kicked out of them by the “lesser”cavalry.

Comrade Gilchristi’s sneaky machine gun.

Japanese sailors passing their useless armoured car whilst heading for the local Premier Inn.

        With the destruction of our left flank and the wrath of the Mad Baron and the Comrade’s coalition about to descend on me the full time whistle was blown .My only bit of luck in the evening.

Comrade Gilchristi’s infantry coming to the market to buy some apples.

Whilst the Mad Baron’s forces devour the rest of the village.

And the suburbs.

      An interesting game played in order to check out the final draft of the rules.An ok set of rules based on Men Who Would Be Kings with a few added rules (and bad spelling).Hopefully they will go down well on the day.All figs and scenario came courtesy of The Three Stooges-El Presidente,Cheif Skulker and Comrade Gilchristi.

The Mad Baron/Comrade Gilchristi’s coalition forces basking in their victory.

       See You All When I See You.

     This has been a Garvald Film Studios Production.