It has to be said that I have some sympathy for those wargamers who look at army lists and comment sagely that generals take what they can get, they don’t get what they want. That isn’t to say that there is a lot of fun to be had ‘building’ the ‘perfect’ army from the army list, but it doesn’t hurt to try something new occasionally.
Political entities, be they states, empires or whatever, go through hard times and their forces can look remarkably ad hoc.
In this solo ‘campaign’ for Hellfire (yes there are other 6mm sci fi rule sets out there and they can doubtless be tweaked to fit) you control a distant province of the empire. (It’s no longer worth the capital letter to be honest)
For your map, take a chess board. Running the length of the board, effectively from one end to the other, is a river and the line of squares on either side, (in green) is fertile. Beyond that is the waste. Dark squares are dry rocky hills, and light squares are dry rocky plains. Where the corners meet, you can cross from one plain to another, but it is ‘a pass’. The green ovals in the dry plains are oases where the sturdy peasantry depend upon you for defence against the barbarians lurking beyond.
Fortunately you are well equipped with cutting edge modern equipment and it can be confidently asserted that three, or perhaps four, generations ago, your force would have been the envy of lesser nations. Now perhaps less so. The best you can hope for is the scrap dealer sucking sharply through his teeth before commenting that there isn’t much call for that sort of thing anymore, and you’re lucky he isn’t charging you to take it away.
Your force consists of three Battalion Combat Groups. Each consists of
A medium tank company.
The armoured company has four Armoured Vehicles on a hover craft chassis. They have medium armour, crew served projectile weapon and three Man portable guided missiles with conventional warheads.
Reaction 5,5,5,5,1,1,1,1 24 pts
Two mechanised infantry companies.
Each mechanised infantry company has 9 bases of infantry who count as having personal energy weapons and flak armour.
Each base rides in a hover craft APC with light armour, mounting a crew served projectile weapon.
Reaction 3,2,3,2,3,2,2,1 18pts
An Artillery company
Each company is one hover craft with a vehicle mounted artillery piece. It has light armour and will normally be accompanied by a vehicle carrying ammunition. Given auto loading and similar, it is capable of a high rate of fire.
Each company also includes one hover APC which mounted a crew served projectile weapon, mounted mainly for anti-aircraft defence.
Reaction 3,2,3,2,3,2,3,2 20pts
A Support and Recovery company which has
Three light armoured hover vehicles for mechanics and workshops.
A tracked vehicle with a heavy tank chassis to be used as a towing vehicle.
A low-loader for vehicle recovery. It can carry one heavy tank, two medium tanks or three light tanks or APCs. This also has a tracked chassis.
Each vehicle has a base of men who along with their skilled trade also count as infantry with personal energy weapon and flak armour.
Reaction 3,2,3,2,3,2,2,1 18pts
The Light air support/recce Company
Each company has
A command hover APC with portable ECM
Two light armoured vehicles for mechanics and workshops.
Two vehicles with trailers, each carrying a drone. The drone can carry one vehicle portable bomb.
A light air car.
Each vehicle has a base of men who along with their skilled trade also count as infantry with personal energy weapon and flak armour.
Reaction 3,2,3,2,3,2,2,1 18pts
The three BCG share the support of a medical support company.
These are strictly non-combatant, so don’t have a reaction total. They have personal weapons for self-defence. The company should have three APCs converted as ambulances, each will have a crew of three, driver, medic and paramedic. Normally one APC is assigned to each BCG. Each BCG will also have a ‘hospital’ which may be a tent in the BCG’s base area. Here there is a staff of 3 doctors, 3 nurses, and 3 porters.
Repairs
Because you have a vehicle recovery unit, by ‘breaking for spares’ and using stuff ‘they just acquired because it was bound to come in’ you can get three vehicles running for every four you salvage. The first vehicle is ready next day, the second vehicle in d6 days and the third vehicle in d10 days (but not before the second vehicle.)
The vehicle recovery unit cannot do anything else whilst it’s doing this but it costs you nothing.
What vehicles do you actually have?
For each vehicle on your force roll a d6.
5,6 Congratulations, it’s in perfect working order.
If it isn’t in perfect working order, roll again.
Tanks.
1,2 Long gone, the crew absorbed into the unit.
3, breaking for spares
4, sitting waiting for another vehicle to be broken for spares so you can use it.
5, Because of drive problems, the vehicle is totally immobile but otherwise fine. You can have it emplaced as a pillbox somewhere. Alternatively you could have it on a trailer towed by an elephant or similar large beast.
6, you’re not sure how they did it, but somehow your mechanics have refitted the tank to a heavy lorry chassis. So it is now a wheeled tank which can only move at half the speed you’d normally expect.
APCs
1,2,3 Long gone. The infantry who previously rode in it now ride on horses, camels or other local equine replacement livestock. For every three bases of mounted you get one extra base with a cart mounted crew served projectile weapon.
4,5,6 The APCs have been replaced by locally produced trucks. These have no armour and each lorry also has a crew served projectile weapon.
Artillery.
1,2, The company has reverted to horse drawn. They’ve scrounged some old fashioned/obsolete artillery from gods alone know where. Because these are have no autoloader or anything, a battery is three pieces, which fire together as one vehicle mounted artillery piece, picking just one target. But they can also fire individually as crew served projectile weapons where each can fire at a separate target. But they cannot do both in the same move.
3, The Company has reverted to lorry drawn. They’ve scrounged some old fashioned/obsolete artillery from gods alone know where. Because these are have no autoloader or anything, a battery is three pieces, which fire together as one vehicle mounted artillery piece, picking just one target. But they can also fire individually as crew served projectile weapons where each can fire at a separate target. But they cannot do both in the same move.
4,5,6. The company remains as it was, but the artillery piece is now mounted on a heavy lorry chassis.
Support and Recovery Company
If the vehicle doesn’t work it’s been replaced by a lorry. The tracked vehicle with a heavy tank chassis to be used as a towing vehicle and the low-loader for vehicle recovery are still available. They may not be exactly the same vehicle but they’re still there. After all, if these company cannot keep stuff working, nobody can.
Light air support/recce Company
Missing vehicles are replaced by trucks. A missing drone is replaced by six, small Quadcopter type drones each operated by one man. Each drone can drop the equivalent of a man portable artillery round. The drones can also do recce, and for the purpose of the game can operate within three feet of the operators.
The air car has been kept going by picking up parts second hand on the commercial market.
Medical Support Company
Any missing vehicles are replaced with trucks.
The oasis villages.
Ena, Thio, Tria, Tessera, Pendi, and Exi. Each has a militia unit composed of 8 bases of infantry who count as having personal projectile weapons and flak armour. A ninth base has a crew served projectile weapon.
Reaction 2,2,3,2,2,2,1,1 15pts
The village itself will have some sort of fortification, a wall around the houses, or if you’ve got a French Foreign Legion type fort, that would be a nice addition.
The Bad Guys
How about the Desert Raiders from Brigade Models
https://www.brigademodels.co.uk/HammersSlammers/Hashemite%20Nation%20-%206mm/HS6-4260.html
They have Desert Lizard Riders
Magister Militum do technicals
V# https://www.magistermilitum.com/mn-607-technicals-x15.html
Irregular Miniatures have Toyota technicals
And also some Mad Max style vehicles
https://irregularminiatures.co.uk/indexes/6mmindex.htm
So the Desert Raiders who seek to plunder your villages (and even hit the main river) have the following troop types
Technicals
Technicals are ‘civilian’ vehicles with improvised armour mounting various weaponry. Roll a d10 for each technical.
1,2,3,4 Mounts crew served energy weapon.
5,6,7,8 Mounts crew served projectile weapon.
9, 10 Mounts vehicle mounted artillery.
A company of technicals has four vehicles, which deploy in the same combat but need not stick together, they can be detached to support individual infantry or mounted formations.
Reaction 3,2,3,2,2,2,2,1 17pts
Mounted
A unit will have 8 bases of cavalry who count as having personal projectile weapons, flak armour and a riding animal. They can of course fight dismounted.
Reaction 3,2,3,2,1,2,2,1 16pts
Infantry
A unit will 10 bases of infantry who count as having obsolete projectile weapons. They fire at half effect over 10” but at normal effect under 10”.
Reaction 3,2,1,2,1,2,2,1 14pts
Playing the game
You as the solo player control the Imperial forces.
- Firstly you might want to reorganise your three BCGs. So, for example, you might put all the infantry on camel back in the same company. At the end of the process you still end up with three BCGs.
- Then you have to decide where your BCGs are based. The river valley is fertile and heavily populated. Every green square contains villages and you can base yourself on the edge of any of them. That will be your permanent base for that BCG, with defences etc. You can if you wish base a BCG in an oasis making that it’s permanent base.
- Finally you have to decide which side of the river each BCG is based on. When you have hovercraft it doesn’t matter. But when you have wheels or tracks it does.
Movement
Mounted and troops in vehicles cover two squares a day. Infantry on foot cover one square per day.
Crossing the river doesn’t slow down troops on foot or mounted on livestock. It takes half a day for troops with wheeled or tracked vehicles. Hover craft aren’t slowed either.
There are no bridges over the river.
Intelligence reports
You are reliant on your District Agents (who are merely human), plus satellite imagery (which the raiders know how to hide from) and your own recce drones (who only cover the squares adjacent to the square the BCG is in) for information.
Each day you get four reports, one from each District Agent. They cover the four regions.
North West, north of the red line, west of the river.
North East, north of the red line, east of the river.
South West, south of the red line, west of the river.
South East, south of the red line, east of the river.
Roll a d10 for each.
1,2,3, All quiet.
4,5,6,7,8,9 Restive
10 Raiders
If you get a restive result, nothing happens but then you add +1 to the die roll next turn.
If the area has been restive and you get ‘all quiet’ you lose one +1 but however many ‘all quiet’ you roll, the raiders still become restive if you roll a 4.
When you get raiders, they will appear at random on the East or West edges in that region. You now have combat coming up. Movement is now simultaneous.
The raiders will move to the nearest oasis, if two are equidistant, they’ll pick one at random.
You can move your BCGs.
When you get within one square of the raiders (your recce) or they approach an oasis
At this point you know exactly what they have.
A core force, and one extra company for every +1 they got for each move of being restive.
A core force is
- One company of Technicals
- One company of Mounted
- Two companies of Infantry
The first extra company is a company of technicals
The second extra company is a company of mounted.
The third extra company is a company of infantry.
Follow the same pattern for the fourth, fifth and sixth +1s
Roll a final d6. On a one, your District Agent is an idiot and totally messed up. Toss a coin.
- Heads. The core force is double strength, and consists of eight companies, not six.
- Tails. Raiders, what raiders. A handful of peaceful nomads gracing their livestock and no weaponry in sight. A false alarm.
Note that the Raiders can split their force, sending the mounted and technicals on ahead and following on with the infantry. Either toss a coin or use dice moderated story telling.
Winning and losing
If the raiders take an oasis, and are not kicked out of it, that becomes the base from which that region mounts raids, this time on the main river valley. If the raiders capture a village (a square) in the main river valley and are not kicked out of it next day, you’ve lost.
♥♥♥♥
Whilst discussing the fall of empires, I thought I’d mention I have a new supplement for Hellfire. A solo campaign where you do your bit to keep the show on the road.
It is available as a pdf for £3 from Wargame Vault
https://www.wargamevault.com/product/438276/Hellfire-and-the-Fall-of-Empire
It’s also available from Amazon. On Kindle for £3, or in paperback for £7.50.
Jim's SF novels and wargame rules 