The Best-Case Scenario

Having come through our baptism of fire ( in Action! ) and thoroughly  enjoyed the experience, I am encouraged to continue with the adventures of Generals Dachs and von Kleist and their somewhat improvised forces. But how to go about it?

What I need now are further situations in which  our plucky metal protagonists will join battle:  and I hope, not just arbitrary  'line em up and roll dice' situations.   In a word: scenarios.  I'd also like to establish some sort of narrative to connect  the scenarios and give a reason for each battle. Not a fully-worked out, detailed campaign with maps - it's rather early days for that. But a series of linked actions, where the outcome of one influences the initiation of the next in some way; that shouldn't be impossible.  And in this I am fortunate to have plenty of material to draw on.  Over the years I've acquired some books which should  come in very handy:

Every expense spared on the cover design - but don't judge..

Age before beauty - certainly in terms of the cover illustations!   First up must be the original 'Scenarios for Wargames'  by Charles S. Grant, from about 1982. I'm sure these were developed from his 'Table Top Teasers' series in 'Battle' / 'Military Modelling' magazine, and included here is 'Reserve Demolition'  which must have been 'Teaser' No.1 - I'm sure I still have a much-thumbed copy of the magazine it featured in!  Not  only that one, but the book has no less than 52 suggested scenarios, 'one for every week of the year' as the cover helpfully points out. By the time you'd played all those, you would have been ready for the next book - 'Programmed Wargames Scenarios'. Now this took things to another level - each of the 18 scenarios ( plus two mini-campaigns ) can apparently be played with one side  or even both sides 'programmed' -  "whose inital dispositions, orders and responses to battlefield events, were not known to the player beforehand".  Given that this is years before most of us had the use of personal computers, this was heady stuff.  I say 'apparently', because I admit that I don't think I ever summoned up the courage to actually play any of these!  Looks interesting, though, and aimed directly at the solo player.

A truly great double-act

Next,  the master of Scenarios teamed up with the late and much-lamented Stuart Asquith for 'Scenarios for All Ages' from 1996 , though I acquired mine much more recently. Another  'every week for a year' set of 52 scenarios , which Charles Grant  assures us are all different from those in the earlier book. Very much a horse and musket slant,  "For simplicity, the relative forces have been considered as units of infantry, light infantry, cavalry and artillery" - perfect for my purposes. Just as with the previous volumes,  every scenario complete with outline of the aims, map and ground, opposing  forces, deployments, success criteria and special rules.

Even if you don't like the rules - 30 scenarios!

Finally, and certainly not the least - Neil Thomas 'One Hour Wargames'. I suspect we either love or hate Mr Thomas - I am generally a fan.  His ability to boil down a period to its  essence , then create the simplest possible rules to reflect it, is just brilliant. Even if you don't fancy the rules, here are another 30 decent scenarios - well worth the price.  And two major advantages for me;  first, they assume a playing area  only 3 feet square, which is exactly what I have right now;  second, forces of typically  6 units each side - ditto.  'Scenarios for All Ages' assumes a 7 feet by 5 table -  well, maybe I can shrink it down?  But Neil has done the work for me. I think on the whole, we are likely to start with Mr Thomas' scenarios and Bob's Portable Napoleonic  ( suitably tweaked for 7YW ) rules.

Now, having been narrowly rebuffed at Tragers Grat , what is Von Kleist's next move?