It is 1896 in the Khyber Pass on the North-West Frontier of India. A patrol of British soldiers of the let Battalion, The Royal Hampshire Regiment are ordered to clear a party of Afridi tribesmen from a hill. The British Patrol: Captain Charles Durrant Lt. Bertle Baines-Bolton Sergeant Oakeshott Pvt. Dabney Pvt. Birks Pvt. Hallam Pvt. Freemantle Pvt. Mayo Pvt. O'Reilly Pvt. MacDonald Pvt. Carey Pvt. Wellington Pvt. Napier Pvt. Flanagan The Afridi Tribesmen: Amanulloh Khan Dera Ghazi Khan Chatar Singh Ahmad Afzai Abdul Ghaffar Abdul Hamid Abdur Rahmon Ali Akbar Ohuiam Singh Jewand Nobi Mahmud Tarzi Muhommed Mirza Shahzada Hasson The Officers and Khans are worth two points each; Sgt. Oakeshott and Chatar Singh are worth two points and the strong man (italicized) in each party is worth two points. The remainder are worth 1 point each. Set up The British patrol, is given orders and broken into squads as deemed necessery. They may enter as desired from their baseline. The Afridis can be placed singly or in groups where their leaders wish, but no further forward than the middle of the table. Rule Construct a grid upon which you can record the characters names and the actions or moves they will make each turn. Each move should be dearly marked showing if the man is running, walking, crawling etc. and the direction of the movement marked by an arrow, i.e. Walk 10. Decisions to fire or melee are taken at the end of a move, when the situation is assessed and if is possible for these things to occur. Movement A man can either (The 'strong man' may add 2cms to each) Run 25cm (Wounded cannot Run and move rest at 1/2) Walk 15cm Crawl 10cm Firing All British, except officers are armed with an Enfield rifle and bayonet. Officers have swords and revolvers. All Afridis are armed with a motley selection of rifles and swords. Ranges: Rifles 75cms Revolvers 40ans To Fire: Throw a 1d20 and add to the score the personal value of the firer. i.e. A Private throwing a 6 will score a 7, a strong man thowing an 8 will score 10. To score a hit the total score must be 7 or over; but if the firer/target is moving during turn, or if the target is behind hard cover, then a score of 5 or over is required. Effect of hit: The man who is hit will throw a 1d20 and add his personal value to the score Over 10 Unhurt 6-10 Minor wound - does not odd personal value to any future scores. 4 or 5 Serious Wound - does not odd personal value to any future score and moves at 1/2 3 or less Killed Hand to Hand Fighting When opposing soldiers come Into contact with each other, they will fight hand to hand; each throwing a 1d20 and adding his personal value to the score. The man throwing the highest score wins and survives unhurt. The loser throws a die and if scoring 3 or below he is killed; otherwise he runs away his full move distance at once and can only come back into action if he can score over 5 on the next throw. He may make an attempt to stop running of the beginning of each move, but if he tails to score over 5 continues to run. When two men are fighting one - all throw dice as usual. If the single man beats the score of BOTH his opponents Individually, then they lose; If one man beats the single man's score then he is beaten. Orders and Communications Leaders may give orders before the action, but once the action has begun, men can only communicate with each other if within 16cms. Conclusion The battle ends when: 1. One side obviously achieves it's objectives. 2. When the value (in points) of a force become less than HALF that of their opponents, the lesser side will retreat. 3. During this retreat, they may fight off the enemy and, if at the end of 20 moves, they have not reduced the enemy to below their own points value, they have lost. 4. If none of this occurs, of the end of 20 moves, the situation is assessed, and winners/ losers declared. Good Luck Gentlemen! Back to The Gauntlet No. 1 Table of Contents Back to The Gauntlet List of Issues Back to Master Magazine List © Copyright 1994 by Craig Martelle Publications This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other articles from military history and related magazines are available at http://www.magweb.com