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Up to now my 28mm Modern itch has been scratched by Force on Force but having seen a write-up and a favourable review of the Skirmish Sangin rules, I decided to treat myself to some new models and the rules now that this New Zealand company now has UK distribution (I did toy with ordering from them a while ago but the international shipping thing puts me off a little - I have had too many parcels stopped and taxed in UK customs). I am also the type of person who favours hardcopy rulebooks - PDFs just don't do it for me, unfortunately so I have held off for a while. However, UK distribution means no import charges and they also sell a nice line of 28mm Aus/NZ infantry (from Eureka miniatures) so I treated myself to a set of them too. I have had a quick flip through the rules so I thought I would try and squeeze in a brief game before I depart for Adepticon - hobby time has been limited recently so I have to squeeze stuff in when time, kids and motivation permit.

I chose the first scenario in the book - recon patrol - where a patrol of two 4-man fire teams from 2 Para are caught between 2 groups of Taliban and have to try and fight their way out. Here's how the battlefield looked at the start:



The Paras are pinned down in cover in the middle of the board and the two Taliban conga lines are rapidly approaching.



Skirmish Sangin is not a traditional UGOIGO system; instead, each miniature or character has a BODY rating (modified by body armour, if they are wearing any) which determines both the order in which they activate and the frequency. Therefore, pieces with high BODY ratings will generally activate and get to use their actions first and they will also get more activations than pieces with lower ratings. Instead of turns, the game iterates through a number of combat rounds where certain pieces are activated and actioned depending on their rating. It's all quite elegant and well-thought out IMO.

Anyway, the battle is soon joined and the Taliiban suffer the first casualty as one of the Northern group legs it across the road to try to get in cover and to a better fire angle but is spotted and nailed by a burst from a member of fire team 1. The Taliban are hindered by not wearing armour like the ISAF members do.



On the Southern flank, the Taliban advance to cover and lay down some fire without hitting anything. The Para fire team 2 advance in cover and try to get some shots away. They get some effective fire down but without hitting.



Fire team 1 are a bit more strung out. The NCO and LSW gunner advance in cover in the street trying to pin down the northern group of Taliban whilst the 2 other members go round the back of the buildings to try and flank the rest of the Taliban on the Southern flank



The northern Taliban team take another casualty without inflicting any significant fire in return. This flank looks in danger. The Southern end is holding up; both sides trading shots but no casualties and everyone holding their ground.



At this point, real-life intervened (also known as putting kids to bed) so I had to call it a day for the time being. I might pick this game up when I get back from Adepticon or I might try a new scenario. either way, it looks likely that the Paras should be able to make a breakout on the Northern Flank and get away, assuming they don't take any casualties from the advancing southern team.

Thoughts

Very impressed by the rules so far. It manages to be both complex and simple at the same time. I am the sort of person that usually needs to digest a rulebook for some time before I dare attempt to play a game - in my advancing decrepitude, it takes me some time to learn new rules but with Skirmish Sangin, I felt sufficiently confident to have a bash after just one brief read-through. On the other hand, the rules are actually quite detailed and realistic. You generally have to spot an opposing enemy before being able to fire at them and there are an awful lot of modifiers involved in both spotting and shooting to best and most realistically model the fog of war and the adrenaline kick of battle. Its all quite complex. The downside to this is that there are a lot of factors both to consider and to keep track off; who activated and when, who fired and at what, morale tokens, action tokens etc etc so it isn't the sort of game you can play with half an eye on; it certainly demands full attention. That being said, I think this is by far the most realistic and 'best' approximation of actual warfare in miniature form - the attention to detail is incredible. Yet despite the complexity and realism, it is really quite smooth to play - I printed out the playsheets at work and with these to hand, I didn't really need to refer back to the main rulebook so it's not like I was flipping backwards and forwards and cross referencing different books which is a plus in my eyes. I think the creators have struck a good balance between realism and ease of play and the novel model activation process demands both tactical awareness and thought; just because a model activates first doesn't necessarily follow that you should run out all guns blazing - the game seems to reward more patient tactics as even fire which doesn't hit or wound can be effective; the best troops in the world won't hold their ground if they are taking significant incoming so with good positioning, you can get effective fire on enemy troops and force a withdrawal even using poorly trained and ill-disciplined Taliban troops, which, of course, is what happens in real life.

Anyway, big thumbs up from me. My next dilemma is how better to improve my terrain - I need some more buildings and some irrigation ditches I think. My French Foreign Legion models arrived in double quick time from Fighting 15s this week too so I think 2eme REP might see some action soon.

Looks like a lot of fun . I want to pick up those rules . Thanks for sharing

The buildings you have now look nice. Apparently metal cargo containers are quite often used for housing in Afghanistan so maybe you should model up a bunch of those.

Looks cool. I might have to take a gander at the rules.

Very interesting Pacific, thanks for sharing.

This may be some bedtime reading to pick up at Salute.

Do the rules cover vehicles and air/artillery support as well?

I need an excuse to build the Airfix Jackal I have lying about.

 notprop wrote:
Very interesting Pacific, thanks for sharing.

This may be some bedtime reading to pick up at Salute.

Do the rules cover vehicles and air/artillery support as well?

I need an excuse to build the Airfix Jackal I have lying about.

Despite calling me Pacific, I forgive you!

In answer to the question, yes, they do include rules for a multitude of vehicles, up to and including main battle tanks I believe, as well as on table mortars etc and off table artillery, air strikes etc. i haven't tried any of the advanced rules out yet so I don't know how they play. I think the authors suggest limiting vehicle and tank use as it could end up unbalancing things.

That has always been a problem with modern skirmish games.

 filbert wrote:

 notprop wrote:
Very interesting Pacific, thanks for sharing.

This may be some bedtime reading to pick up at Salute.

Do the rules cover vehicles and air/artillery support as well?

I need an excuse to build the Airfix Jackal I have lying about.

Despite calling me Pacific, I forgive you!

In answer to the question, yes, they do include rules for a multitude of vehicles, up to and including main battle tanks I believe, as well as on table mortars etc and off table artillery, air strikes etc. i haven't tried any of the advanced rules out yet so I don't know how they play. I think the authors suggest limiting vehicle and tank use as it could end up unbalancing things.

Sorry mate, must have been multi-threading again.

Thanks for the response.

Had a look at the demo table for this at Salute, looked very interesting. Was listening to the chap (the writer of the rules perhaps) saying that they had done a lot of research into the actual effectiveness of weapons - so if a grenade goes off, it affects a wide area, not just a 2" template etc. In terms of how the tactics should play out on the table also, and actually resemble encounters in real combat situations.

Then I logged in to Dakka and found that I already had the game and done a battle report!

Filbert, a few questions about the game if I may
- How do the rules look like they would lend themselves to other scenarios? So, for example if you wanted to 'west' vs.'west'. Is the way the insurgents play a big part of the game, and is there a method of scaling the effectiveness of troops and their equipment? And I guess a good density of terrain is pretty important?
- Did you manage to get the rulebook from a distributor in the UK?
- And, are you going to finish the AAR?

 Pacific wrote:


Filbert, a few questions about the game if I may
- How do the rules look like they would lend themselves to other scenarios? So, for example if you wanted to 'west' vs.'west'. Is the way the insurgents play a big part of the game, and is there a method of scaling the effectiveness of troops and their equipment? And I guess a good density of terrain is pretty important?
- Did you manage to get the rulebook from a distributor in the UK?
- And, are you going to finish the AAR?

1) You could just as easily have a scenario where UK forces attack French Foreign Legion, for example. The mechanics of the game involve suppression and fire manoeuvre so apply to all forces. The forces themselves are distinguished by their troop quality and equipment and you could certainly tinker with those if needed. The way that the Taliban are distinguished from Western forces is that they are generally of lower quality and less well equipped, however they make up for that with numbers in most scenarios but the basic premise of finding, fixing, flanking and destroying the enemy is the same for all forces - you manoeuvre into position, suppress the enemy with effective fire and them manoeuvre to outflank and destroy them or that is the theory at least. I could quite easily see the rules adapting to a 'cold war gone hot' type scenario or an Iraq war or something like that; it strikes me as a very flexible ruleset.

2) Radio Dishdash, the people that make the game, now have UK distribution so you can get the rules etc from their UK site here

3) I won't be able to finish this particular scenario since I have had to dissamble the table for other things but will probably pick it back up again very soon when time permits and post another bat rep.