(such as they are) Divide up the porter companies and loads among the players. If there are fewer than six players, go with one company per player and assume the rest are back at Yambuya with the fictional characters. Stanley decides who gets the two companies of askaris. Actually, Stanley wants to decide everything. There are several ways to play this game. The simplest is the orthodox RPG format with players sitting around a table keeping track of events and making a map as they go. The umpire traces their progress secretly on his own map and throws out events for them to react to verbally. This would work adequately but would lack visual drama. A more acceptable approach for miniatures gamers is to use the route map for overall progress but set up a display on the tabletop featuring a length of jungle track with a screen of trees on either side and a selection of ready props — villages, swamps, river crossings — for encounters. The players need figures for the officers, askaris, and porters, which they lay out in “order of march.” Rather than move this column across the table, the umpire leaves it in place on the track and lays out whatever lies just ahead. Events can be played out using any rules you wish. I go on the basis of “rolling 6 is good, rolling 1 is bad” for brief, fast moving encounters rather than “here’s another battle to play out in detail.” Once completed, the column is returned to its formation on the line of march. Wargames Foundry, Reviresco, The London War Room, and Honourable Lead Boiler Suit, among others, make 25/28mm figures that are ideal for these events. I also use 6mm figures, mostly Irregular Miniatures African porters (which come in strips of five in single file) with a few single officers and a few stands of soldiers in fezzes for the askaris. It’s easy to switch scales as well, using 6mm figures for grand scale encounters and 25s for smaller encounters. Or you could split the difference and use 15mm figures. Irregular make 15mm porters and explorer types, and Zulus and Arabs can be pressed in service as tribesmen and slavers. I’m considering getting some 6mm hobbits (4mm?) to serve as pygmies but for now the wily little forest people are imaginary shadows under the trees. Perhaps pygmies are simply a terrain effect, like stone walls or swamps. Three other wrinkles that I use in this game at conventions involve a certain amount of trouble but make for a memorable event. They don’t all need to be used together. 1. Lay out a whole table, say 6 feet by 8, representing the entire Ituri forest/Lake Albert region at a scale of approximately 10 miles per inch. This requires hundreds of trees (buy plastic palm trees in bulk from a cake supply store), at least part of a lake, and a mountain range. It looks great! You may need a separate table for the order of march display and for papers, etc. It’s a big undertaking. Of course, you need hardly any toy soldiers. You can use 6mm porter pieces as markers to show where the expedition is on the table and little else. 2. Rather than keep track of what loads are taken, which are left, and what gets left where by paperwork, buy a selection of actual African trade beads, cowrie shells, etc. in different shapes and sizes, and use those as a visual aid. Each bead represents 10 loads of a given type. That way, each player has his own handful of colorful, arcane markers to show what his company is carrying. When a bead is lost, eaten, or traded to slavers, the player hands it to the umpire. Sneaky umpires can even steal beads from unobservant players to represent pilferage! This method works very well, even if you just raid your wife’s button jar rather than buy actual exotic beads. 3. Tell the players that they need to decide what to take in the way of provisions. After, and only after, they’ve done this, tell them that each two-week turn they will be obliged to actually eat something that you have thoughtfully provided. Provisions These are: EUROPEAN PROVISIONS. These are pleasant. I used things like Scottish shortbread, Callard & Bowser toffees, and other very British delicacies you might find in a hamper from Fortnum and Masons. Rich umpires might actually send for a hamper from Fortnums. Ordinary sweets would do, of course. NATIVE FOOD. This ought to be plantains and manioc, which we know as semolina. Sliced banana will do. JUNGLE FOOD. This is the horrible scourings of the forest: beetles, fungi, wood beans, bruised leaves, etc. It’s desperate food for desperate moments. My preference is an unmarked container of canned white beans, mushrooms, something cabbagelike, and plastic ants. They only have to take a spoonful, of course. In twenty-odd years of wargaming, the only time I have fallen to the floor in helpless laughter was on seeing Mr. Phil Merrill of Nashville, Tennessee take a heapin’ spoonful of beans and mushrooms, with one obvious plastic bug attached, and try to swallow the whole thing. Sadly, or fortunately, he didn’t. If you don’t do the two hundred trees, or the beads, or even the table display, do provide the food. You’ll not forget the players’ faces. Following are the few rules that you actually need. Make up everything else as you go! Keep it fast and simple but give players lots of problems that are fundamentally unsolvable. Turn Sequence 1. Roll for movement. Move the marker on the strategic map. Each turn is two weeks. Movement is 3d6 x 10 miles on the first move and any other move when there are no sick members with the expedition, or 2d6 x 10 when sick people are accompanying. A “light” group can force march an extra d6 (“light” is left up to the umpire to define but the group should be carrying quite a bit less than its capacity). Movement by river is always 4d6 x 10 miles. If players want to make rafts or steal canoes, make it difficult for them. Even buying canoes should be touchy. 2. Roll for officers getting sick. Each player rolls for his officer. An officer becomes sick on a roll of 1. Already sick officers roll to recover: 6 = immediate full recovery, 5 = improve (+1 on next roll only), 3 or 4 = stay the same, 1 or 2 = get worse (no die roll penalty but cannot walk). Three results of “get worse” = death. 3. Roll for sickness among the porters and askaris. Porters lose 1d6 sick per 100 men each turn. Ten percent of already sick porters die. Others struggle along, slowing the column to 2d6 movement. After two turns of sickness, a sick porter or askari has a 50/50 chance of being unable to walk at all, rolled each turn. They will not get better until they receive proper food and rest. Let the medical men make up ideas for curing them and roll for effect (as always, the higher the roll, the more effective the scheme). Each player is responsible for keeping track of his own company’s losses and returns. Remember that abandoning the sick or otherwise treating them without compassion should cause desertion problems. 4. Remove markers from the company tallies for food eaten or goods traded for food. Eat the food for this turn! 5. The umpire selects one or more events. In general, events should occur in roughly the sequence they’re listed but feel free to pick events that you feel are appropriate and ignore those that couldn’t apply or that you don’t want for some reason. The Loads ITEM # NOTE Remington ammo (cowrie shells) 20 Reserve as much as possible for Emin’s men Gunpowder and caps (black rings) 19 For Emin’s men. Trade goods (red beads) 20 To trade for food -- 1 bead per month Winchester ammo (white beads) 3 Try not to lose these Officer’s kits (blue beads) 3 European provisions (blue beads) 8 Each is two weeks’ food for the officers Boat in sections (purple beads) 2 Axes, hoes, blankets, etc. (long beads) 10 Dried fish, manioc, etc. (brown beads) 8 1 per month will feed whole column Maxim gun (big blue bead) 1 Medical stores (big brown bead) 1 Lose these and you are in trouble! A Measure of the Journey Trip Distance Yambuya to Banalya 92 miles Banalya to Ugarrowa’s 279 miles Ugarrowa’s to Ipoto 104 miles Ipoto to Ibwiri 79 miles Ibwiri to Lake Albert 128 miles To the Mountains of the Moon: A Campaign Game An Expedition with Mr. Henry Morton Stanley, the Famous Explorer Introduction and Background Stanley's Party and Knowledge Rules Events Battle Report Historical Expedition and Bibliography Back to Table of Contents -- Courier # 90 To Courier List of Issues To MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 2004 by The Courier Publishing Company. This article appears in MagWeb.com (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other articles from military history and related magazines are available at http://www.magweb.com