{"id":10372,"date":"2025-05-31T10:00:17","date_gmt":"2025-05-31T09:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brigademodels.co.uk\/mws\/blog\/?p=10372"},"modified":"2025-05-27T16:00:42","modified_gmt":"2025-05-27T15:00:42","slug":"its-getting-a-bit-chile-a-slow-burn-project","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brigademodels.co.uk\/mws\/blog\/2025\/05\/31\/its-getting-a-bit-chile-a-slow-burn-project\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s Getting a Bit Chile – A Slow Burn Project"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/fb:like><\/div><\/div>

Club member John reports on a game from a lesser known historical conflict.<\/em><\/p>\n

Introduction<\/strong><\/p>\n

Our youngest daughter lives in Chile and she gave me a copy of \u2018Andean Tragedy<\/a>\u2019 a history of the Pacific War 1879 \u2013 1884<\/a>. This detailed book covered the war between Chile and the allied forces of Peru and Bolivia, a war which started over mining claims in the Atacama Desert. The area was an important source of Nitrates for explosives and fertilisers and when the Bolivian government sought to tax Chilean mining companies mining on Bolivian soil, war was inevitable.<\/p>\n

It was impractical to march a Chilean army by land through the Atacama Desert so the initial campaign was a Naval one (itself a good subject for wargaming) where Chile gained control of the sea and could then launch amphibious operations initially on the Bolivian coast and later the Peruvian coast. These were successful with Lima being captured and resulted in Bolivia being land locked (still contentious today). A later Guerrilla war took the fighting high into the Andes before Peru was finally defeated.<\/p>\n

\"\"
The Andean Tragedy, W.F. Sater University of Nebraska Press, Jan 2007<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I started to paint up forces from Pendraken intending to use \u2018Principles of War\u2019 as the rule set but in 2020 a new rule set \u2018It\u2019s Getting a Bit Chile\u2019 was launched and I decided to use this period specific set. This required more troops and a gridded cloth. The project stagnated then Stephen kindly donated me a cloth, the reverse side being ideal for a desert, it was the kick up the backside I needed and within a few weeks I was ready.<\/p>\n

Pendraken 10mm \u00a0Range of 19th<\/sup> Century Pacific War<\/a> Figures<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
Chilean infantry<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"
Battalion Misti Peru<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"
Bolivian Colorado Btn<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"
Libres del Sur Bolivia<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"
Artillery<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Review of \u2018It\u2019s Getting a Bit Chile\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
It’s Getting a Bit Chile, G. Evans, Wargaming for Grown Ups Publications 2020<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I was attracted to this set of rules for its period specific nature which I felt was merited after reading \u2018Andean Tragedy,\u2019 I didn\u2019t want to use any generic 19th<\/sup> Century rules. When I received my copy, I realised it was more than just a rule book. The book includes a history of the war, a uniform painting guide and a bibliography, it is well laid out and the rules are easy to follow with diagrams to help with explanation, there is a scenario included with the rules and a quick play sheet is included. I also discovered that the author had visited the same location in Peru which was his inspiration, the previous year to us.<\/p>\n

The rules are army level where each army can be organised into divisions, though these are smaller than European armies. The rules are I go – you go. The lowest organisational unit is an Infantry battalion or Cavalry Regiment consisting of four bases, Artillery are a single base. Unit formation is determined by how the bases are aligned in a grid square.<\/p>\n

Each formation has a different number of firing bases, support bases and melee bases and is a specific target type if fired at and a separate melee target type. For combat a dice is rolled for each eligible base and the sum of the dice rolls is compared on a \u201cTo hit multiple\u201d table to determine how much damage is dished out. This avoids the 6 to hit method of casualty calculation and damage is instead noted as disorder. A fresh unit with no disorder fights using a d8 per eligible base, a unit with one disorder uses d6\u2019s and a unit with two disorders uses d4\u2019s. If the target formation has a support base, a disorder marker can be absorbed by the support base allowing the formation to fight unaffected if all disorder is absorbed. Changing formation can reduce the number of support bases and hence increased unabsorbed disorder, reducing fighting capability. Disorder can be rallied off by the unit itself or an adjacent Divisional or Army Commander and this is key to maintaining fighting capability.<\/p>\n

The \u201cto hit multiple\u201d table and disorder mechanic are very neat and set these rules apart.<\/p>\n

Play Test<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
The set up<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As usually happens with a new project, there was lots of last minute stuff to do which meant I hadn\u2019t spent much time on planning a scenario. I decided to have three objectives on table, two minor ones were to secure water supply either at a village or Nitrate mine.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Peruvians advance on the village<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"
Chileans occupy the Oficina<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The main objective being capturing the hill. The Allied forces had an extra infantry battalion and an extra Cavalry unit, this last tied down some Chilean artillery as it threatened to outflank.<\/p>\n

\"\"
The Battle for the hill<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In the centre, the Chilean assault on the hill ran out of steam and in true style, the Chilean Cavalry followed the routed Bolivian cavalry off table.<\/p>\n

\"\"
The Cavalry Battle<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Thanks to Tony Gibbs and Jon Roche for helping. The rules played very smoothly with hardly any queries. Afterwards, I read through the rules again and posted some queries with the Author. I received an e mail back within 24 hours so excellent support.<\/p>\n

Next Steps<\/strong><\/p>\n

I have three Peruvian battalions ready for painting and artillery limbers have arrived this week. I\u2019m considering the small dice holders and dice to keep track of disorder. Whilst the card buildings are OK from three feet away, I\u2019m considering making some better alternatives. Finally, I\u2019ll need to put some time aside to consider scenarios, perhaps working those into a campaign.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Club member John reports on a game from a lesser known historical conflict. Introduction Our youngest daughter lives in Chile and she gave me a copy of \u2018Andean Tragedy\u2019 a history of the Pacific War 1879 \u2013 1884. This detailed book covered the war between Chile and the allied forces of Peru and Bolivia, a … Continue reading “It’s Getting a Bit Chile – A Slow Burn Project”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":10377,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Club member John reports on a game from a lesser known historical conflict, the Pacific War of 1879 - 1884","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[100,85,156],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10372","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-10mm-wargaming","category-19th-century","category-its-getting-a-bit-chile"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/brigademodels.co.uk\/mws\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/20250524_Chile_130617.jpg?fit=800%2C344&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9A5LG-2Hi","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brigademodels.co.uk\/mws\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10372","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brigademodels.co.uk\/mws\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brigademodels.co.uk\/mws\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brigademodels.co.uk\/mws\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brigademodels.co.uk\/mws\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10372"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/brigademodels.co.uk\/mws\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10372\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10393,"href":"https:\/\/brigademodels.co.uk\/mws\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10372\/revisions\/10393"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brigademodels.co.uk\/mws\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10377"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brigademodels.co.uk\/mws\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10372"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brigademodels.co.uk\/mws\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10372"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brigademodels.co.uk\/mws\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10372"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}