Background and Overview
For the year anniversary of Cardboard Conflicts (hard to believe its been that long). I did something a little different. Instead of my normal historical background section, I will point you out to my video outlining the history with a walk around the actual battlefield and comparing to the game map. See the video below:
Overview
The game itself is a very low complexity hex and counter. For those of you that might not be familiar this game is from small publisher: High Flying Dice Games. They specialize in mostly very affordable folio games. Many of their games are on obscure topics and battles that don’t get many wargames making them interesting to play. A Dark and Dastardly Fight is the third in the “Battles of the Old Northwest” series. Designer and HFD owner Paul Rohrbaugh has set out to model several conflicts in the period between the American Revolution and War of 1812.
As I mentioned in the video overview, this was a time where the fledgling United States began to push westward into present day Midwest. The Natives of the area resisted this settling and many skirmishes broke out in this period. These battles were frantic, and typically involved units of a few hundred to a couple thousand men at most. Between poorly trained militia and Native surprise attacks many battles were quick, bloody, and frantic.
The system is very well adept to show this style of battle making the game very interesting to play.
Gameplay Overview
Setup
To start the game the American’s set up first. Harrison and the supply and corral counters are place in one of the hexes marked with an “X” near the middle of the battlefield. Remaining US forces must be a minimum of 3 hexes but maximum of 4 hexes away from these two counters.
The other thing easily noticed during set up is the triangular broken hex areas. These represent harder terrain to travel. The broken 2 hexes especially line up to the actual ridgeline that surround the east and west flanks of the battlefield.
The Native player then sets up and must roll for each tribe to see what units he can deploy immediately. Each tribe takes a different map edge. The Kickapoo enter along the south, Potawatomi to the East or West, and Winnebago to the North. Any units not placed immediately are checked between turns to see if they will enter the battle.
Lastly the turn marker and morale markers for each side are placed on the record track. The Natives also receive a Surprise marker that increases all units’ combat factor by 1 until it is removed. This represents the surprise attack the natives launched. Each turn a D6 is rolled by the American player. If it rolls at or below the number of turns played the surprise is removed. This signifies the Americans getting over the shock of the attack and recovering their resolve.
Sequence of Play
At the core of action selection for all games in the series is a standard deck of poker cards. The deck consists of only the ace through 10 cards and one jack of each color. All red cards go to the Native player and all black cards go to the US player. Each side then adds ONE Jack of their color to their deck and shuffles.
In stead of a typical “I go/You go” format for impulses, each impulse starts with both sides drawing a card. This card draw is used for two things:
- The player that draws the higher number gets to act. Ties go to the last player NOT to act
- the value of the winning card denotes how many actions the player can take.
What results is often VERY swingy combat. One side might get dozen or more activations before the other side can go. However over the course of the game this often will work its way out.
The turn continues back and forth until a Jack is drawn. The first Jack drawn has the drawing player roll for a random event. The second Jack drawn immediately ends the current turn.
This means that not only might each card draw prove swingy, but the length of each turn also is varied. Jacks might be pulled early in a deck meaning a short turn. On the other hand, if buried the Jacks might be pulled near the end of each deck making a long string of activations.
Again I have to credit Paul that this style is uniquely suited to the battles in particular in this era. They are meant to feel desperate, one sided, and make you very nervous.
Activations
So I mentioned that a card draw will give the “winner” a number of activations. What does that mean? The value of the card allows the user to use that number to do one of the following things:
Move
To move one unit a single activation point (called ACTS) allows the unit to move up to its movement points (MP). Nils illustrates this using dots on each unit.
Essentially all normal hexes cost 1 MP to move. Entering any Broken Hex costs 2 MP and crossing a riverside hex is an additional 1 MP. The rules also state that any normal unit can use ALL MP to move 1 hex always.
Fire Combat
One ACT allows a player to select a unit to fire onto an enemy unit. US regulars and rifle companies can fire 2 hexes away, if target is in the clear. Otherwise units can only fire adjacent. One D6 is rolled and if the value is less or equal to the combat factor of the firing unit a hit is scored. All Native forces get a +1 in fire combat showing their discipline with muskets was not good. Firing at a unit in a broken hex adds a +1 as well. Unwounded leader stacked in a hex with firing unit grants a -1 DRM.
Any natural six rolled however adds a permanent LOW AMMO marker to the unit. This means that unit for the rest of the game will have a -1 to their combat factor.
Hits follow several steps:
- First hit: Full Strength + Disrupted marker. (disrupted gives -1 to CF and -1 to MP
- Second hit: Unit flipped to reduced strength and retains disrupted marker. This further lowers CF and MP
- Third hit: Unit stays in reduced strength and disruption is flipped to Routed. Routed units cannot move or fire. At the end of the turn any units with a Routed marker will move 2 hexes to closest map edge and if they leave the map will count as a unit lost.
- Forth hit: Unit is eliminated
Assault Combat
This works nearly identical to fire combat, however it represents melee combat. Therefore there are no penalties for targets in broken hexes. However if a natural 6 is rolled, instead of a LOW AMMO the ATTACKING unit is disrupted (or follows the next step if already disrupted or reduced.) Natives receive a -1 bonus as well as leader bonus. Also if Morale level is more than double that of your opponent all units receive an additional -1 DRM.
This allows for potentially higher chance of hits usually especially for Native player, but at risk of hurting the attacking force.
Rally
The last ACT that can be used is a Rally action. This can only be attempted once per Card Draw. This allows a unit to try to improve one step from damage. The caveat here is that reduced units never rally to full strength. The maximum they can recover is reduced but without a disrupted marker. If a reduced unit is hit again they would first receive a disrupted marker, then if hit again be reduced.
To rally a D6 is rolled and compared to the current morale level of the acting player. If the roll is less than or equal to the morale level the unit is rallied otherwise the attempt fails. Unwounded leaders up to 1 hex away give a -1 DRM.
Victory conditions and Chrome
Victory is measured in VPs. Points can be awarded in many ways, but mostly through elimination of a units, wounding and eliminating leaders and for Natives for destroying the supply and corral counter and carrying out an assassination attempt on Harrison.
Special rules apply to check leader loss anytime a unit stacked with a leader takes damage. However like the rest of the game this can be punishing. Even rolls of a D6 wounds or eliminates an already wounded leader. Odd rolls are saving throws for leaders.
The other rules are about adjusting morale. For every 2 units lost a morale point is lost or gained for every 2 units destroyed. Again this means Morale is typically swinging as well. Most of the time as you lose morale your opponent gains it. Making it easier for them to rally troops and harder for you.
Games are decided after 8 turns with no sudden victory conditions. Tally up victory points and the side with the most wins. Ties go to the US player.
Final Thoughts
This is a very interesting game and one that is near and dear to me as I live very close to the battlefield. This particular battle was a precursor to the War of 1812 where Tecumseh joined the British to fight against the Americans and was killed during the war. His death ended any hopes of a Native Confederation after the war.
Some things to keep in mind: This game will have WILD swings. It is likely that you might lose several card draws and watch in horror as your opponent takes action after action. It is likely you will lose a couple units and/or leaders and watch your morale crash quickly making all units painful. However this is very much in line with the frantic pace that these battles were fought and knowing that I am okay. That be said know that going in.
One criticism to note: Most games you will have a sea of orange routed, disrupted, and low ammo markers everywhere making even locating your units difficult. Also the 8 turns can go very slow if you have multiple turns where both Jacks are buried in the decks. I suggest some house rules to perhaps end the game if morale would drop below 1, or adding 2 jacks to each deck to speed up the end of each turn.
This is a game I think is great if it can be played in an hour, but much more than that and the swingy pace becomes tiring.
That said, for the price of under $20 plus an additional $8 for mounted (but not pre-cut) counters the game is a great investment. I think the back and forth nature gives a sense of panic and dread and the game has just enough chrome and asymmetry to keep things interesting. I have one more in this series and plan on getting the remaining. Also, Nils artwork on the whole series is fantastic and alone is worth the price of the game. The interesting perspective of the map in this one really gives some interesting depth.
All in all this was a fun one to cover and hopefully you’ll see more Battles of the Old Northwest soon!
