Relief of Baler

17-10-1897 (08:00 AM)

by

Jesus Serrano Mateo

Further Rules Editing and Development by:

Andrew Preziosi

Aftermath of the Second scenario:

The marine landing party, from the transport ship "Manila", forded the river finding intermingled corpses of Spanish and tagalogs around the broken bridge. When they arrived at the plaza of Baler they were hailed from the church; apparently the Tagalog had retreated. While deliberating the best way to evacuate the wounded the Tagalog hidden in the houses around the church began a firefight. The Spanish, seeing the mounting numbers of insurrectos blockading the church decided to fortify their position and await further reinforcements.

The steamer waited until dusk, then without news from the landing party or the garrison sail back to Manila city to report the situation.

Scenario:

A full company of the 2^nd Expeditionary Jaeger Battalion under Captain Roldan was committed with the task of relieving the garrison of Baler and fight the insurrecto's around the town. The infantry was embarked in the steamship "Cebu". The "Cebu" met the "Manila" and a gunboat on the night of October 16th.

Early in the morning of 17 October, the ships arrived off Baler beach and began to disembark the troops.

The game

Objectives:

Philippine: Avoid the Spanish landing party attempting to contact with the forces inside the church.

Spanish: Wipe out all rebel forces in Baler and environs.

Special Rules:

The river is fordable only near the broken bridge. The rest of its length is unfordable, except if a figure decides to throw away its rifle and continues as knife armed only for the rest of the game, or until it takes another weapon.

The Spanish forces at the church can't leave the building until in communication with the relief party, but can fire at any insurrecto within range and LOS.

The ships are armed with three 50-mm guns that can reach 40 inches from the center of the coast side (edge) of the table. Every gun has 10 shells and can fire a shot every turn if the Spanish player rolls (for each gun) 3+ with a 1d6. The guns cannot use indirect fire, so any target must be in LOS.

The Philippine player must write his troop deployment down before the Spanish marine's land. He can deploy forces wherever he wants. The two kinds of troops (rifle and homemade weapon) must be deployed intermingled.

The trenches are superficial, perhaps three feet deep at the most, so they count only as medium cover.

Victory points:

50 points if the Spanish landing force does not link with the troops at the church.

-1 point for every marine re-embarked after linking with the garrison.

1 point for every marine or infantry private dead.

2 points for every Spanish NCO dead.

5 points for every Spanish Officer dead.

60+ Points equals a Great Tagalog victory.

49-59 Points equals a Tagalog victory

40-49 Points equals a Draw

29-39 Tagalog defeat.

29-0 Tagalog debacle.

Spanish Forces

At the church

Landing

Philippine forces