A fairly straight forward game on the British campaign in Mesopotamia during WW1 from Strategy & Tactics #176. It has some good ideas but is poorly put together. One map covers the area around the Tigris and Euphrates from the Arabian Gulf to Baghdad at a scale of 6 miles per hex. The units are at regimental level and there are numerous counters for supply, entrenchements and a surprising number of planes. Turns are one month long. Movement and combat are all pretty much standard. The game correctly places a lot of emphasis on command and supply. Each division has an HQ unit. To be in command regiments must trace a line of communication to the division HQ. In turn that HQ has to trace a LOC back to its ultimate supply source. Units out of command are halved for movement and combat. The rules are not clear on what you do with non divisional units. Do they have trace command to a Corp HQ or do the rules about being in command not apply to them? Each side has a very limited number of supply points. These can be used within a limited radius of the ultimate supply source. In general you have to create depots and move the supply points out close to the front line. From there you can provide supply to your forces. This is essential. Units out of supply suffer attrition. In addition their movement is halved and they cannot attack or defend at full strength. If you draw supply from a depot for combat purposes then the supply counter is removed. Special Units There are lots of special units and rules to give the right feel to the whole thing. Both sides have gunboats and steamers although the British have a marked superiority in numbers. Steamers are really useful for pushing up the rivers. The British made major use of the rivers, shipping most of their troops and supplies on the steamers and avoiding the long slog through the desert and marshes. They also made some big leaps up the rivers seizing key points. There are also rules for; support units, trucks, armoured cars, planes, entrenchments, ships running aground and weather. The plane counters are a bit of a waste of time for their value. We tried the campaign game but after a few hours wrestling with the first few turns we abandoned it. We had a long list of rules and play balance queries. I wrote to S&T with these queries but needless to say got a rather vague reply. The basic problem is that the British simply cannot achieve anything like their historical result. One of the main causes is that they lack the vital river transport that played a key role in their opening moves. These are a few of the rules problems we had; Supply Presumably you cannot trace supply through enemy units or ZOCs? Do friendly units negate the effect of ZOCs for tracing lines of communications (and supply)? Presumably you cannot trace supply across rivers (unless using the HQ rule)? Can depots that are not in command move? Support Can support factors be greater than the basic combat value of the defending/attacking units? that is, the Turkish units in Basra on Turn 1 have a defence strength of 1 (depending on rounding). Can the Turkish gunboat still provide 2 support factors? Non division units Do non division units that is, cavalry, unattached regiments have to trace a line of command? Arab cavalry - entering at 2944 on Turn 3 What is the point of these units! They are out of supply and possibly out of command . If the British have garrisoned Ahwaz there is basically nothing they can do. They will very quickly die from attrition. Historically they were ordered to move to Baghdad. Unfortunately there is an impassable river in the way. Is the river stretching between 2944 and 1548 actually meant to be a wadi? According to my atlas it is only a minor river. My knowledge of middle eastern geography and water resources has never suggested this river as being a major waterway. S&T gave me a rather odd answer on this one. It implied that the units could cross the river. The terrain effects chart clearly states that movement is prohibited across "seasonal waters". I wonder if this is only meant to apply in rain turns? Assuming that they can actually cross the river they will probably die from lack of supply before they get to Baghdad (assuming they can only move 3 hexes a turn). According to 'The Siege' they did in fact take about 6 weeks to get to Amara, arriving shortly after the British seized it in May. British steamers Historically the British captured Qurna on turn 2 by using river steamers to move up river. Then on turn 6 they jumped up the river to seize Amara, a key town in the region. Unfortunately in the game they do not get steamers until turn 8. Even by land there is no way they can move by land to Qurna by turn 2. The Turks can build Qurna up in the mean time so that it becomes a slog to take. Again the reply from S&T was not much help. They recognised the problem but did not want to put in transport steamers for only one turn. It complicated the rules. That's all very well but the game becomes a joke if the British do not have the steamers. The Kut Scenario Then we set up the Kut scenario. It was silly. The scenario starts with the British adjacent to the Turks at Ctesiphon. They do not have a movement phase and can either attack or do nothing. They have only one depot. If they attack at full strength it will be used up and the attacks will not achieve much anyway. The Turks are too numerous and entrenched. The British then have no supply at all and even if they fall back to Kut (12 hexes away) will quickly die. It all academic anyway. A good Turkish player should be able to swing around and cut the British off from Kut on the first turn. They then simply die stranded in the desert before they can even get to Kut! Great, the British can do a suicide attack and lose their depot. Alternatively they sit there and let the Turks simply surrounded the British as their opening move. Now I know Kut was a disaster but surely its meant to last more than the first turn! When a game raises so many problems right from the start its a bit of a worry. My colleague and I do not have a great deal of spare time. We play this kind of game because we want something that can be picked up quickly and played fast. Instead we spent ages figuring out the rules and trying to decide what to do. There are no player notes to give any clues and it seems to us that the British cannot do half of what they did historically. All in all we were pretty disappointed. I have long been interested in the Mesopotamian campaign. Many years ago I read Russell Braddon's gripping book 'The Siege' on the siege of Kut. When I saw this game I had to try it. It was many years ago that I gave up subscribing to S&T. Most of what I have seen since only confirms that decision. Every now and then something will appeal to me and I will give it a try. Unfortunately Blood on the Tigris is another futile exercise, full of errors and overall a waste of time. Back to Perfidious Albion #93 Table of Contents Back to Perfidious Albion List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1996 by Charles and Teresa Vasey. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com