At Broadsword 5, I tried Charlie Company (by RAFM) in 28mm. For those that don’t know about Charlie Company, check out my play-through and initial impressions article from when I first tried the game. In this post, we take a quick look a 28mm adaptation of Charlie Company ran at a convention. This time around, a few modifications were made to the game – including changing the scale to 28mm.
The next change that the guys made was that some of the players controlled the NVA (North Vietnamese Army). Three players controlled the American Army and three players controlled the NVA. In the first game that I played, the Game Master Controlled the NVA and sprang all sorts of surprises on the American Army.
That said, surprises still existed for both sides in this session. The Game Master had hidden knowledge for each force that the other side did not know (for example, the US used White Phosphorus grenades as smoke grenades).
This post is not so much a full Battle Report, but rather a quick article to let you know about my highlights from the game.
I played as part of the American’s team. Our goal was to enter the board on the left side of the table, reach a building on the other side to help some American Combatants inside.
The Battle Field
My highlights
As this is not a true Battle Report, I just wanted to quickly go over my highlights of the game.
The Tank
First off, I was very excited that the Americans had a Tank to help them out.
The surprise related to that tank is that the crew in there did not want to fight. They locked themselves in there and didn’t bother shooting at anything until a number of turns into the game. 🙁
Still, a neat surprise that I did not expect from the Game Master.
Into the Hornets’ Nest
My next highlight was when my troops made an assault right into a mass of enemies. We assaulted not realizing that there were as many troops on the board as there really was. Yet another surprise in the game – hidden units.
I threw the smoke grenades to provide cover as my force assaulted a force in a building. Our goal was to take out a well guarded machine gun nest from behind so that our core infantry units could make their way down the road with the tank.
We did not know at this tank that the crew of the tank would lock themselves in and not participate for the majority of the battle.
We knew that our grenades would burn and cause irritation in addition to providing cover. My unit fully equipped themselves with gas-masks and protective gear. We threw the grenades to cut off the NVA Reinforcement group to the right.
We were surprised to find out that there was a gun crew in the building immediately to the right of us. The NVA hid a recoilless gun in there that could threaten our tank.
After we eliminated the machine gun crew, the recoilless gun crew opened fire on my unit with small arms fire. The only bonus to that is that we took their attention off of the tank.
Meanwhile, the NVA reinforcement unit behind us made their way through the phosphorus smoke and assaulted. We did not expect them to make it through so fast.
This battle put us on the back foot. We have one unit on our flank shooting at us with small arms while another unit assaulted us on the rear. My group is in trouble!
Across the street, another ambush popped on my unit.
My unit manages to take out the Recoilless Rifle unit and hightails it out of their. Instead of heading towards their objective, they retreat with what is left of their squad (dragging along the casualties with them).
Wrapping it up…
Overall, I had a lot of fun with this game. I liked the the GM had a few surprises for us and it was interesting that they had opposing players play the NVA (instead of the Game Master).
Hopefully you enjoyed this quick little post of a game that I played at Broadsword 5. For those interested, Broadsword 6 runs this Saturday (August 25, 2018) in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
Until next time, Happy Gaming Everyone!!!
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Related Links
My First Play Through of Charlie Company – Battle Report
Hey Jacob! This post of yours piqued my interest. I might have mentioned before (either here or in one of your BoLS articles) that I consider the Vietnam war a problematic wargaming setting: I hold the view, common among people outside the US, that the Americans were the aggressors in that war — the “wrong side” so to speak — but wargames like Charlie Company tend to have the players take the role of US troops and have the North Vietnamese as the enemy mooks, a position I find upsetting.
That said, you’ve intrigued me enough to read more about Charlie Company’s campaign rules and indeed they seem very interesting, even surprisingly novel for a game this old! Since it’s just the setting that I find unappealing, I wonder if it could be adapted to a less problematic one: say, scifi troopers trying to survive a tour of duty in an alien planet 🙂
Your posts always manage to get me interested in new games!
Interesting take on the game, and the setting: Take Vietnam for what it was, really, America’s last hurrah at colonialism.
France had their go, the Dutch, the English, all of Europe really, be it South Africa, the Sudan, Somalia, the Congo, or Angola.
I’ve played wargames set in Vietnam as Americans, French (pre-Vietnam war) and of course North Vietnam. As an American I feel this was the defining conflict of a generation and proved again that mere aggression and power can not make changes in the modern era. Sad we forgot so soon.
Let me know how you get on with the game, and what your setting is Andres, I’m interested.
PR… Thanks for some more historical context to the era. I enjoyed this comment. Andres F, let us know if you try the game in another setting and how it goes.
I would imagine you would be able to do substitutions to make the game fit other environments, but to be honest, I have only taken a quick flip through the rulebook, but have tried the game twice at conventions.
Thanks for following the site. I am glad that I am able to get you interested in other games. I just like looking at what all is out there and letting other people know that there are so many other options than just the popular games in their FLGS. 🙂
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