Stripped Down for Parts: Redver's Reverse: the Battle of Colenso, 1899

  

 

Redvers’ Reverse: The Battle of Colenso, 1899 (Legion Wargames, 2016) is a solitaire wargame designed and developed by Geoff Noble and Godfrey Bailey, and released in a boxed version by Legion Wargames. Legion has built its reputation on publishing games from under-represented and even overlooked theatres of war. To my knowledge, there aren’t that many games out there concerned with the First and Second Boer Wars, but Legion has released one on each; Hill of Doves: the First Anglo-Boer War, 1880-1881 (Legion Wargames, 2018), an intriguing-looking solitaire combined operational/tactical treatment of the First Boer War (designed by Godfrey Bailey), and this one, and there is a follow up to Redvers’ Reverse on Legion’s CPO list, Failure at the Tugela (Legion Wargames, no release date confirmed), that looks promising.

The title, Redvers’ Reverse, refers to the comeuppance of Redvers Buller, VC, overall commander of the force sent to relieve the besieged towns of Ladysmith and Kimberly. Buller’s relief force was divided into three task forces, each with a separate mission. In the space of a week, – Sunday  10 December to Friday 15 December 1899 – all three forces suffered demoralising defeats. As the commanding officer of the relief force, Buller was made the scapegoat for the British army’s failure to evolve in the face of a radically different enemy, for which it proved woefully underprepared. And so it goes.

The black and white illustration on the box-cover of Redvers’ Reverse is evocative, though I’m unsure of the exact provenance. I couldn’t find any details in regard to it in the rulebook. It bares some similarity to a painting from the Siege of Kimberly, aptly named Siege of Kimberly, by Frank Feller, though the style is very similar to that of Richard Canton Woodville. If I can clarify the artist responsible, I’ll mention it in the review of the game.

The box itself is on the light side – a typical Legion one-inch card box that will be familiar to anyone who has bought the company's games previously. It is perfectly serviceable, and personally I appreciate the slimmer boxes for storage considerations.

The box back gives a brief historical sketch of the situation, including some of the challenges replicated in the game, a list of components, and pictures of the map and sample counters. The time scale of the game is roughly 30 minutes to a turn, and the playing time is listed as two to three hours’ duration. We are also reliably informed that the difficulty level of the game is medium (3 out of 5), and the solitaire suitability is high (5 out of 5), which is something I look for in a solo game.

Rulebook.

Legion Wargame rulebooks have their own style; simple and no-frills (and often, as in this case, just black and white), but easy to read and digest. It’s my understanding that Randy Lein, Legion’s owner, does nearly all the layout for the rules and PACs for Legion’s releases, as well as some editing on occasion. I hope he keeps this workload up, because I’ve never come across a rulebook from Legion that I had significant problems either finding what I was looking for or understanding it when I found it.

Sample page.

Like most Legion rulebooks, it’s printed on matt paper-stock in a sans-serif font that is nonetheless easy to read and absorb. The rulebook runs to twelve pages of with about a little over eight are the actual rules; the cover has a list of contents and description of the game, and the final pages include a short recommended reading list, an Order of Battle for each side, and a page of Designer’s Notes round out the booklet.

Game board. Apologies for the puckering, but I couldn't get a decent shot under plexi. 

The inclusion on the map of a fairly detailed Sequence of Play to the right of the play area and equally informative Boer and British Fire Procedures on the left cuts out a lot of the need for constant reference to the rulebook. The map of the contested area takes up the majority of the board. It is divided into areas, which suits the style of play. As the British, you will need to move your troops North toward the Boer-occupied hills and the town of Colenso, and engage with the enemy. This makes it sound easy; it won’t be. Before you engage with the Boer, you’ll have to cross the Tugela River, which has a six drifts (fords), but you only know roughly where they are, and must conduct a search when you move into an area adjacent to the drift. Victory goes to the player who can force the Boers (with their superior weapons and entrenched positions) to withdraw, while maintaining a “reasonable” level of losses.

Most units can only move to an adjoining area in a turn (Leaders and mounted infantry can move two areas, as can horse-drawn artillery). River crossings are slow as each drift is treated as a separate area, and only one fighting unit can remain in a ford area at the end of a turn.

The map also incorporates a turn track and a helpful phase track running around the turn track (top-right corner) and a display for placement of the tiles representing variant rules in play (bottom-left corner – I’ll come back to the Variant Conditions later). It is printed on a good gloss paper stock (roughly industry standard, if such a thing can be said to exist) and is in itself quite attractive and very well laid out, and a pleasure to use.

Redvers' Reverse comes with two counter-sheets.

The counters are mounted on decent, if a little light, grey-core cardstock, and are all 20mm in size. The British formations (mostly brigades, all colour-coded) have a varying number of unit (regiment) counters with a separate Leader counter. Boer units are named for the region they hail from. There are fewer of them but they are tough and have the home-ground advantage, as well as being dug-in, and fielding excellent equipment.

Most of the counters are markers of various kinds. In combat, a unit will take hits progressively to its indicated strength (four for most British regiments), at which point it will be flipped to it's reduced side. When it has absorbed hits equal to its reduced strength, the unit is removed (and the Loss counter moves up a notch). Successful artillery can disrupt or suppress a unit, which will affect its quality in combat.

Terrain Effects Chart

Terrain doesn’t affect movement in Redvers’ Reverse. What it does affect is the likelihood of a given attack hitting its mark, and a unit’s morale when a check is required. The TEC is nicely presented, on light but fairly rigid cardstock of the kind and you’ll be familiar with if you have another Legion game (some might argue that Legion games don’t use really great component materials – this is a position I’d dispute – but I’d posit that their games are reliably consistent in this area).

Charts and Tables Card (one fine piece of work).

The Charts and Tables Card is a masterclass in setting necessary charts out in a sensible and useful way. There is no wasted space, the tables that flow from one play-action to the next are grouped together (and colour-coded to indicate relationships at a glance), and everything is on one side of a bi-fold 11” x 17” card, so you have the option of leaving it conveniently open or to fold and flip (for the space-poor among us).

And an eventful time was had by all.

One of the factors that will contribute greatly to the replayability of Redvers’ Reverse is the event chit pull in two stages, one for the British (at the beginning of each turn after the first) and one for the Boers (about two-thirds of the way through the turn sequence, after the British movement/assault but before the Boer movement). The British events include free activations for Infantry units and the Cavalry, Leader-centric events, and situational events, like automatic drift discovery. It’s not all gravy; one draw chit can see Buller dithering (unable to give orders for that turn), while another may see Lieutenant Roberts – son of Buller'
s commanding officer – die in battle, pushing the British losses up another notch.

Sortie, anyone.

There are less Boer events to draw from. Most of these involve one of the four groups being released to withdraw if a loss-quota has been reached. Two more will affect either the Boer or the British artillery for a turn.

Boer Targeting Examples card.

Boer targeting is handled randomly, with the placement of sighting markers numbered 1-6 on possible markers (greater threats receiving more than one marker if there’s a surplus) and rolling a d6 for the chosen target. To help with this, a handy guide is included with examples for issuing targeting chits in various situations for rifle and artillery fire.

Variant tiles (30mm to a side).

The introductory scenario for Redvers’ Reverse represents the historical situation and conditions under which Boller and his staff laboured. To mix it up for replayability, a set of nine Variant tiles are included with the game. These tiles are referenced on the Variant Table, another bi-fold PAC (the other PACs are all 8½" x 11").

Game Variants (explanation and cost) Chart.

The game variants system is simple and quite clever. Included are a mix of positive and negative changes to the starting situation and circumstances of the game. Some involve the board situation or the status of certain units (such as two of the drifts being identified at the start of the game (Reconnaissance), or the 2^nd Royal Fusiliers entering the game at full strength instead of reduced (at the cost of a Mounted Infantry Regiment)), while others – represented by the tiles – tweak the rules to the player’s advantage or disadvantage. The clever bit is that each of these has a positive or negative value. For the most part you can choose which and how many you would like, though the choice of some positive variants will be dependent on choosing corresponding negatives. The only stipulation is the sum of the variant values must come to zero.

Pre-cut Variant tiles, dice and baggies.

Being a Legion game, Redvers’ Reverse reliably comes with two dice (the 10mm variety, one red, one blue) and a clutch of baggies that should prove sufficient for the game’s counters. I think that even with the copious number of player’s aids, you should still be able to fit a GMT counter tray in with everything else. When I secure some more trays, I may put that to the test.

So that’s Redvers’ Reverse. Having only played it once so far, I don’t want to say too much about the game, except that I lost and it was still a lot of fun, but it took me about five hours over two sessions instead of the advised two-to-three, mostly due to consultation of the rules. By about the fourth or fifth round I was scooting through the sequence of play like a pro. Once I’ve got another couple of plays under my belt, I’ll write up a review of the game. Watch this space.