IHMN: Captain Nemo's Epic Fail

I am thinking of starting a new series: Great Military Disasters In Which I have Participated.

This is possibly my worst defeat ever: an utter wipe out, an epic fail, a total and complete disaster...

It started well enough. Most military Epic Fails start by looking like a good idea to someone. Here you see the Nautilus away team lead by the only just painted in time Captain Nemo. His varnish was still sticky on the night - and no that is not a euphemism.

My gallant allies, dispossessed members of the global poor, always on the good Captain Nemo's mind. This particular bunch of dispossessed poor are Boxers.

Both the Boxers and Nautiloids are close range troops so we elected to charge into close combat as fast as possible relying on speed to confound the enemy fire.

Ah, yes, the enemy, Commodore Mik of the Royal Navy was my immediate foe. The Boxers were faced with a detachment of Pongos. Revolutionaries against The Empire on which the sun never sets.

Mik is an accomplished IHMN player but...let the battle begin.

PS Don't like the look of that Gardiner.

The approach was fine and I charged up the target hill with my Merman: we were playing a King of the Hill scenario. You can just see a couple of tars below.

On the right flank, my crewman with a steam cannon escorted by a leading seaman with a harpoon pistol and boarding axe positioned himself to sweep the sailors out of cover.

Bit of a setback as a Jolly Jack tar shot and killed my steam cannon chap but on the whole I was comfortable with my tactics. I had got my whole close combat army into a melee with about two thirds of Miks. I had the men, I had the weapons, and I had the points. Let the slaughter begin.

The slaughter not only began but ended two turns later with my entire army as casualties. And not one Royal Navy casualty, not even Roger the cabin boy - and, yes, that is a euphemism.

I haven't got a photo as there was nothing left to photograph. So I have put up a piccy of the Boxers getting stuck in. They were a bit discommoded to find that they now faced two Imperial armies.