Re-Writing History (Wilderness War x2)

I've been thinking about war games recently. Some time ago we played Midway, and although I had issues with the game, I could tell that there was something in this genre which was appealing to me. Other than ASL, two types of wargames appear to be well liked at BGG: Block games and Card Driven Wargames. I recently picked up Napoleon and quite liked it (enough to now order Rommel in the Desert), so I was really looking forward to the opportunity to give a Card driven wargame a shot. As it happens, Kozure owns Wilderness War.

Wilderness War covers the war between the English and French for control of North America. Being French Canadian, the setting held obvious interest. Beyond that, the game is held in very good regard as an excellent GAME.

I spent a bit of time reading the rules leading up to the session. It's complicated, but not overly so. The base systems are fairly easy to absorb, however there are enough exception and small fiddly rules that it's impossible to remember everything at first. Luckily, in play the pace is such that the rules can be looked up as they become relevant (which we did quite a bit), and once they are put in practice they make sense and can be remembered.

We gave ourselves the entire evening, since the playbook estimated 2-3 hours for the tournament scenario we assumed a learning game would take 4-5. Things turned out differently. Read on.

Predictably, I played the French while Kozure took the British. All I knew from reading reviews was that the French have to hit hard and early if they want to win. My opening hand, in retrospect, was quite good. I was able to put some drilled troops down in Quebec and make an agressive push down the Hudson river to the heart of the face off there. Kozure hadn't fully grasped the implications of river movement, and therefore didn't see this coming. On the western front, I saw the masses of (mostly) undefended stockades and decided to raid as much as I could.

I followed though on that plan and was on the receiving end of fabulously good luck with the dice. Dumas laid waste to the stockades and forts in the south west. Combat routinely went my way. Sieges were resolved quickly and without much losses. The net effect was that the British were on the defensive the whole game. Being so difficult to activate, they couldn't keep up with the damage and I was raking in the victory points. A surprise seige attempt in (I forget the name of the city, but it was the South-Eastern most fortress) nearly made matters even worse for the British, but Wolfe came along and kicked the French out (this would mark the only time die rolling didn't go my way, as I could have had the opportunity to assault the fortress prior to Wolfe's arrival but the siege took longer than it could have). Poor Kozure did not manage to move an inch on ANY front, nor make any attempt on Louisburg. By the end of the first year, the French achieved an automatic victory with 12 points (note: I was going for broke. If my offensive failed, the British would have cleaned up in the spring due to my depleted forces)

The whole thing only took 2 hours, so we tried again, armed with a better understanding of the rules (and hopefully for Kozure) more evenly distributed luck.

In the second game, my hand had a number of Indian Alliance cards, but no French Reinforcements. I decided to play the Indian angle much more strongly than I did the first game. Kozure's hand seemed pretty decent, and he forced me to takes things more slowly this time around by shoring up his defences in the weak spots I had identified previously. I now had a large contingent of auxilleries heading to the south west. My own error in understanding the terrain led to a successful block of Dumas, and he essentially had to retreat and hide for the rest of the game. The Indians successfully raided one city, but then the british sent (insert name of leader here) to attack a second group before they could do any more damage. The indians were hopelessly outclassed. 2 of them vs 4 drilled troops. Should have been a massacre. Somehow, they won!!!. This would be the start of another enormously one sided game in the French's favour, from a die rolling point of view (and a string of really bad showings by that particular british leader). Those plucky indians proceeded to rack 4-5 raid markers, completely unassisted, against all odds.

My advance down the Hudson was slower, but over the course of the game almost all of my able bodied soldiers and auxilleries found themselves there. A few massive battles were fought, with the French being pushed back once and then returning for the kill.

You guessed it, the first year ended with another automatic victory for the French. The second game took approximately 2 1/2 hours.

So, there you have it. Two sessions which never made it past the first year. From reading reports and reviews, I can tell these were uncharacteristic games. The French are meant to hit hard, yes, but normally spend the majority of the game afterwards simply trying to slow the inevitable British advance. Here, the British were essentially unable to advance at all! In future games, where luck will inevitably be more balanced, I would guess that all out French assaults on the british will be fewer (and less successful). I also suspect that the intricacies of using terrain to our advantage, according to unit type, would come more into play. I would also expect to see more action and Louisburg and in the north west (which both went unused in these games).

I am left with one question, however. In our games, forts/ fortresses and stockades seemed like more of a liability than an advantage. For the french, these are easy targets for victory points! Stockades are at least cheap, so you do get some return on your investment by using them as a method to cross terrain more rapidly and provide a place to fall back to during retreats. But Forts are expensive to build and provide no (?) advantage that I can think of... certainly none in combat! I bet I'm missing something, so if anyone knows please fill me in (I know they play a critical role in wintering, but not having had to play through to a second year yet I don't fully understand the impact of the change in seasons. Do stockades help with wintering?)

Anyway, I had a great time and I look forward to playing this game again. I'm sure the British are already planning their revenge.