Friday, March 4, 2022

Scenario Two - Napoleon's Battles

After all that General d'Armee I needed to get back to some Napoleonics that I knew.  I thought I had played this scenario fairly recently, but in checking my blog see it was back in July 2020.  Oh well, when you are getting on in years, probably a gap of eighteen months is still fairly recent.

[Edit: turns out I was right, I hosted this scenario 11 November last year]

This time I took the French and walked John through the Austrians.  Instead of random close up photos of the fighting, I took a single whole of table shot at the end of each turn.

Deployment
I advised John to keep his forces mobile, i.e. not deployed (into line)
The double bases for the Austrian artillery is just something I am trying out to be better able to show casualties, I really need to finish my research into the ground space a battery takes up.

We both started off pretty aggressively,
but with the French suffering multiple routs in the ensuing long range fire combat.

The Austrian Second Division advances menacingly against the struggling French left.
However on the French right the Austrians have been forced back.
A couple on inconclusive cavalry engagements had occurred as well.

The French Third Division has seized the BUA on the Austrian left.
The French artillery has also been successful in silencing the Austrian guns.

An Austrian counterattack failed against the right hand BUA
The brigades on the left of the French line have now deployed, 
but are still out of effective range.

With both flanks now secured on the BUAs,
the French are letting their artillery dominate the battlefield,
while cautiously advancing

Did I say cautious?
I should have said very cautiously

Previously routed units had been rallied, but with losses mounting,
the Austrians suffer their first dispersed unit.

With a second dispersed Austrian brigade and the French position strengthening and time getting on, 
we called it a draw.  
We had played 8 of the 15 turns allotted for this scenario.  
John hadn't experienced the delight of the Free Rerolls.

I was very happy with the infantry brigade casualty markers, on the French cavalry you can see the less aesthetic casualty counters in use.


6 comments:

  1. Nice sized action. Looks like the French recovered well from their early routing.

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  2. so what would be your preference for rules? WHow well would that preference translate into a 6mm scenario? Asking for a friend ;)

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    1. Depends on preferences, by which does your friend want to command a brigade, division, corps or army, but off the shelf, probably Blucher.
      Personally I would adapt Napoleon's Battles, but it is a nontrivial exercise (based on my current attempt)

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    2. ok, how do I get as many as possible figures on the table to make it workable? Remember, I'm a megalomaniac!

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    3. Have a look at this post: https://onesidedminiaturewargamingdiscourse.blogspot.com/2021/10/a-little-bit-of-6mm.html
      It is how I'm doing my 6mm. It represents a brigade of four battalions, but that is neither here nor there as if it was being used for Blucher it would have a strength tag like we have in the Rommel games. The main thing is to create a mini diorama in my opinion'
      The base is business card size, something like 2"x3"

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