Coronavirus/COVID-19 and wargaming

Now that the UK is on the verge of moving from the ‘contain’ to the ‘delay’ stage of national response, the pandemic is beginning to have a significant impact on normal life. We’ve already seen some panic buying of antibacterial hand gel, face masks, pasta, and toilet rolls, the cancellation of a growing number of sports fixtures, and it looks as if large gatherings of people will be banned sooner rather than later.

So, what will the impact be on wargaming?

At present, SKIRMISH – a wargame show due to be held in Sidcup, Kent, next Sunday – is still due to go ahead, and as far as I know, SALUTE – which should be taking place in five weeks time – has not been postponed ... although I suspect that the likelihood that it will be is growing.

Luckily, wargaming does not depend upon shows to exist as a hobby. They are a nice opportunity for wargamers to get together, but because most of us wargame on our own or in small groups, we can carry on fighting our tabletop battles without them. We have a plethora of electronic means by which we can communicate with fellow wargamers, and I for one will continue to blog as long as I have something that I think is worth writing about and sharing with other wargamers.

I hope that all my regular blog readers manage to avoid contacting the virus, but if you are unlucky enough to do so, I hope that you make a full recovery as quickly as possible ... and that reading my blog helps to keep your spirits up.

My latest book sales figures

Because I was away at the time my book sales figures were available on Lulu's website last month, I didn't manage to look at them in any detail. This month's figures have just been released, and my book sales look like this:

It was good to see that I have managed to break the 6,000 sales barrier, with paperback editions accounting for well over half of those sales.

With the publication of my next wargame book on the horizon, these figures have given me something to think about. It is my intention to publish THE PORTABLE COLONIAL WARGAME in hardback and paperback editions, but I am not sure whether to opt for an eBook edition or an PDF edition as well. What I am hoping to do is to be able to give anyone who purchases a hardback or paperback edition from Lulu a free PDF edition of the new book as a bonus ... but I am not sure if this is possible. I am currently waiting for a reply to an enquiry I have made to Lulu about this.

Virgin Media is upgrading our broadband network today

We were notified a fortnight ago that Virgin Media would be upgrading the local broadband network today. They should be starting work very soon, and I am expecting to lose our connection to the Internet at any moment. I have no idea how long it will be before it is restored. That is very much in the lap of the Virgin Media Gods.

The Portable Colonial Wargame Book: Another progress report

Over the weekend I managed to get quite a lot of work done on the book (including adding a chapter on twentieth century Colonial wargaming), and the Contents page now looks like this:

The chapters or sections that are incomplete are shown in below in bold:

• Introduction
• Organising and basing units
• ‘The Gatling’s jammed …’ Simple Colonial Wargame Rules
• ‘The Gatling’s jammed …’ Simple Colonial Wargame Rules in action: The attack on Morobad
• ‘The Widow at Windsor’ Colonial Wargame Rules
• ‘The Widow at Windsor’ Colonial Wargame Rules in action:
• Railways and Ships
• A playing card-driven turn sequence
• Heroic Leadership
• A simple Colonial campaign system
• A simple Colonial campaign system in action: More trouble in Zubia
• A simple tabletop terrain generator
• A simple tabletop terrain generator in action
• Early twentieth century Colonial wargaming
• Selected bibliography
• Appendix 1: Colonel Frederick Gustavus Burnaby (1842-85)
• Appendix 2: Heroic Leadership cards

Completing the selected bibliography should not take very much time, but I will probably need a couple of days to draft each of the two battle reports.

Queen Anne commands ...

I was recently taken to task on Facebook when I quote the following:

Queen Anne commands and we obey.
O'er the hills and far away

I had made the quote in response to a photograph of the popular TV historian Lucy Worsley dressing up as Queen Anne for the third part of her recent series of ROYAL HISTORY'S BIGGEST FIBS. The person who took me to task pointed out that the words had been written by John Tams for the TV adaptation of the SHARPE stories, in which John Tams played Rifleman (later Sergeant) Daniel Hagman.

In actual fact, the tune is a traditional one, and the words that I (mis)quoted were from the version in George Farquhar's play THE RECRUITING OFFICER, which was written in 1706:

Our 'prentice Tom may now refuse
To wipe his scoundrel Master's Shoes,
For now he's free to sing and play
Over the Hills and far away.
Over the Hills and O'er the Main,
To Flanders, Portugal and Spain,
The queen commands and we'll obey
Over the Hills and far away.

We all shall lead more happy lives
By getting rid of brats and wives
That scold and brawl both night and day –
Over the Hills and far away.
Over the Hills and O'er the Main,
To Flanders, Portugal and Spain,
The queen commands and we'll obey
Over the Hills and far away.

Courage, boys, 'tis one to ten,
But we return all gentlemen
While conquering colours we display,
Over the hills and far away.
Over the Hills and O'er the Main,
To Flanders, Portugal and Spain,
The queen commands and we'll obey
Over the Hills and far away.

What I had not realised was that John Tams had written specific verses for several of the episodes:
Chorus:

O'er the hills and o'er the main
Through Flanders, Portugal and Spain.
King George commands and we obey
Over the hills and far away.

For Sharpe's Eagle and Sharpe's Mission:

Here's forty shillings on the drum
To those who volunteer to come,
To 'list and fight the foe today
Over the Hills and far away.

For Sharpe's Company:

Through smoke and fire and shot and shell,
And to the very walls of hell,
But we shall stand and we shall stay
Over the hills and far away

For Sharpe's Enemy:

Though I may travel far from Spain
A part of me shall still remain,
And you are with me night and day
and Over the hills and far away.

For Sharpe's Honour and Sharpe's Siege:

Then fall in lads behind the drum
With colours blazing like the sun.
Along the road to come what may
Over the hills and far away.

For Sharpe's Gold:

When Evil stalks upon the land
I'll neither hold nor stay me hand
But fight to win a better day,
Over the hills and far away.

For Sharpe's Battle:

If I should fall to rise no more,
As many comrades did before,
Ask the fifes and drums to play
Over the hills and far away.

For Sharpe's Sword:

Let kings and tyrants come and go,
I'll stand adjudged by what I know.
A soldier's life I'll ne'er gainsay.
Over the hills and far away.

For Sharpe's Challenge:

Though kings and tyrants come and go
A soldier's life is all I know
I'll live to fight another day
Over the hills and far away.

For Sharpe's Waterloo:

Old Wellington, he scratched his bum.
He says, "Boney lad, thee's had thee fun."
My riflemen will win the day
Over the hills and far away.

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In defence of my misquoted version of the words, all I can say is that I know of a military Masonic Lodge in the UK where they sing George Farquhar's words at every after-meeting dinner, but with 'Queen Anne' added to them in place of 'The Queen'. I suspect that this has been done to avoid any confusion that the words of the song refer to our present monarch.

Problem solved ... but the cause wasn’t what I expected!

The Virgin Media engineer was scheduled to arrive between 4.00pm and 7.00pm ... and he actually arrived at 6.35pm. He introduced himself, and explained that he knew what had caused the problem before he had arrived as it was affecting the whole area! When I pointed out that the Virgin Media website was displaying the message ‘There are no problems in your area’, he apologised and admitted that Virgin Media was experiencing ‘a few problems’.

He then explained the cause of the problem and how they were working to solve it.

At approximately 2.00am on Wednesday night there had been a short power cut in the local area. Power was restored very quickly ... but it had knocked out the local Virgin Media exchange box. Because this was the original Videotron* exchange box that was installed in the late 1990s, and which used 1980s technology, it could not be restored remotely. Every connection had to be reset manually by a technician ... and he explained that he was about to do ours.

He then returned to the exchange box ... and ten minutes later he was back to check that the line was working ... and it was.

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It is interesting to note that our landline is connected to the telephone network using what the technician described as being '1980s technology'. In other words, I live in the largest city in the UK, and if I want to use a landline telephone, I'm dependent upon equipment that is nearly forty years old! To make a probably inappropriate comparison, that is like trying to take part in the Battle of Britain in a Bleriot monoplane!

I suppose that the counter argument is that my generation (i.e. anyone born in the 1950s and earlier) tends to use landline telephones rather than mobile ones, and that the technology in use is sufficient for the job. The demands placed on it are reducing as the rest of the world moves over to mobile or wireless technology for its telecommunications, and that old stick-in-the-muds like me are getting as obsolete as the equipment we continue to use.

So, roll on the arrival of 5G ... then 6G ... and 7G etc., etc., etc. They will no doubt allow us to communicate more ... and say even less of value.

Here endeth the moan!

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* Videotron is a Canadian company that won a licence in the late 1990s to install fibre optic networks in the UK. They supplied us with phone, Internet, and cable TV ... and then sold out to Cable & Wireless ... who sold out to NTL ... who then became part of Virgin Media.

Problems with Virgin Media

At 2.00am yesterday morning the internal bell of our monitored burglar alarm began ringing. Sue and I were instantly awake, and in a matter of seconds I had gone downstairs to check why the alarm was sounding. The display was showing a handset symbol, which indicated that our landline connection was no longer functioning. I was able to reset the alarm, and went back to bed.

When I got up at 8.00am, I checked the landline and discovered that it was still not working. I checked that the handset was not at fault, and then tried to contact our service provider, Virgin Media. This proved somewhat difficult as they were experiencing a service outage across most of the south-east of England. (Sue discovered this when she attempted to contact P&O online about a forthcoming cruise, and was informed that their service provider – Virgin Media – was ‘experiencing difficulties’.)

At 5.15pm I finally managed to access the service test page on Virgin Media’s website. This enabled me to test our landline connection ... which appeared not to be faulty. I have therefore booked an engineer call, and they should be arriving between 4.00pm and 7.00pm today to sort the problem out.

We had the same problem in April last year, and they traced it back to the box where the incoming cable enters our house. On that occasion the engineer checked the connections and resealed the box ... and told us that it ought to be replaced.

It hasn’t been ... and I’ll be more than a little unhappy if the faulty box is the cause of the problem.

The Portable Colonial Wargame book: A progress report

I have been working on the draft of the book, and I really feel as if I am fast approaching the home stretch of the race to finish it. At present I have completed the text of the sections and chapters of the book shown in below in bold:

• Introduction
• Organising and basing units
• ‘The Gatling’s jammed …’ Simple Colonial Wargame Rules
• ‘The Gatling’s jammed …’ Simple Colonial Wargame Rules in action: The attack on Morobad
• ‘The Widow at Windsor’ Colonial Wargame Rules
• ‘The Widow at Windsor’ Colonial Wargame Rules in action:
• Railways and Ships
• A playing card-driven turn sequence
• Heroic Leadership
• A simple Colonial campaign system
• A simple Colonial campaign system in action: More trouble in Zubia
• A simple tabletop terrain generator
• A simple tabletop terrain generator in action
• Bibliography
• Appendix 1: Colonel Frederick Gustavus Burnaby (1842-85)
• Appendix 2: Heroic Leadership cards

I still need to add appropriate images to some of the above, but my main task over the next week or so is to fight and record the two exemplar tabletop battles. I might also add an additional chapter that looks at how the rules can be adapted to fight from some of the Colonial wars that took place from 1900 to the late 1930s (e.g. the Mesopotamian campaign, the Third Afghan War, and the Second Italo-Abyssinian War).

Other people’s Portable Wargame battle reports: American Civil War

Martin Smith has recent fought a couple of American Civil War battles using ideas from Alan Saunders' ECW variant of my PORTABLE WARGAME rules. (In fact, it was the same battle fought twice, with minor changes being made to the rules between the first and second battles.)

The report is featured on the game's Facebook page, and as not everyone either has access to or wishes to belong to Facebook, I have shared some of the photographs of the battles below.

I love the sheer simplicity of Martin's very effective terrain board, which is a repainted chessboard. It works very well with his micro-figures and terrain, and is a truly portable version of the game!

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Please note that the photographs featured above are © Martin Smith.

The Portable Colonial Wargame book: A campaign 'taster'!

I finished writing the scenario for the campaign that will be featured in the book, and as a 'taster' I thought that my regular blog readers might like to have sight of it.

The southern part of Zubia had always been problematic. It was economically unproductive, and its people lived by subsistence farming, herding cattle and camels, trading slaves taken from tribes living further south, and mounting occasional raids on some of the more prosperous areas of Zubia to the north.

The Zubian government had attempted to rule the area, but over the years its grip had weakened considerably, and in the end the garrison at Wadi Halfwa was abandoned and left to fend for itself. Most of the soldiers were recruited by the local Emir of Wadi Halfwa to become the backbone of his army, which he used to oppress the tribes living in the surrounding area and to protect his slaving activities from interference from other slavers.

The Zubians managed to maintain a small garrison in Abou Nasir, and the town was used as a base for the irregular tax collections that were levied on the hill tribes of Dendara, Adydos, and Dakla. Tax collectors set out on expeditions into the hills, but often either disappeared (presumably killed by the tribesmen or members of the Emir of Wadi Halfwa’s army) or returned barely alive with little or nothing to show for their efforts.

Matters would have continued like this had it not been for the impetuousness of SPOG (the London-based Society for the Propagation Of the Gospels) in sending the Reverend Noel Deedes to southern Zubia to ‘spread the word of Christianity amongst the heathens therein’. Accompanied by his sister – Miss Charity Deedes – he had set off down the River Zub to Abou Nasir, and thence by mule train to Dendara.

No sooner had he arrived there but he was seized and placed in chains, and then transported in an iron cage to Wadi Halfwa, where he was handed over to the Emir. Miss Deedes was also taken, and sent with her brother to Wadi Halfwa, where the tribesman hoped to sell her into concubinage. On seeing her, the Emir paid the tribesmen the price they wanted in Maria Theresa thalers, and she was swiftly incarcerated in the Emir’s seraglio.

Once news of this outrage reached the commander of the Britannic garrison in Zubia, he immediately communicated with his superiors. An outcry in the newspapers gave the government little alternative other than to mount a punitive expedition against the Emir of Wadi Halfwa in order to secure the release of the good Reverend and his sister.

I intend to play through and record the events of the campaign until it reaches the first battle between two sides.