This was our third game practicing the rules with the 28mm figures. We are satisfied now with our understanding of the rules and our next game will be a 15mm game based on an early Peninsular War battle. While Neal is preparing that we will be doing a 15mm WW2Blitzkrieg Commander game.
This is how the game played out with Tom taking the French and me and Neal taking the British. We had been hoping Derek would turn up with his Russians reinforcements for my meagre force but, reflecting the real Napoleoic wars this was one of the many occasions when they stayed at home!
Initial French deployments.
The Allies with my Brigade of Portuguese on the left flank and Neals British infantry and cavalry Brigades in the centre and right.
French from the left flank.
British artillery deployed for action in the centre of the Allied line.
French Dragoon Brigade.
French cavalry advance and and inflict a disorder point on the British.
The British cavalry charge.
The French begin to accumulate disorder.
Defeated French cavalry lose a base.
Disorders on two French brigades.
French cavalry pull back from the British.
But the British have several units threatening them and lose their initiative following the worst possible dice result, a 1 and a 6 giving a minus 5 off their cohesion score
The Portuguese get their first threat assessed against them.
As do the British infantry.
The Portuguese extend their line to protect their flank.
The cavalry withdraw from the threats to their front and flank.
In the centre the British artillery prepare to meet French columns cresting the ridge.
The French Grenadier brigade.
Their right flank in mixed order.
A French brigade loses initiate and must move some units out of threat range. Threat can also be reduced by adding commanders to units as this halves the threat against them.
A view from behind the Portuguese lines.
A panorama of the game.
The French right advances.
The right also.
As the French advance their Portuguese opponents lose their resolve.
The British withdraw their skirmishers and prepare to meet the French as they march up the hill in their columns.
The small French Grenadier brigade have a number of units threatening their front and they lose their initiative. They will not be advancing in their next turn.
To their right the larger brigade suffers no such fate.
The two lines face off.
The French cavalry supported by infantry.
They charge the British cavalry.
The lines close as the French advance uphill.
A view from behind the British lines with the cavalry engagement on the right.
Two and a half squadrons of French cavalry take on five British.
The Portuguese having regained their initiative prepare to engage the French as they advance up the hill.
The French brigade lose their initiative and increased disorder level to 4.
The other French brigade also loses initiative.
The French cavalry again lose their fight withe the British light cavalry Brigade.
They lose initiative, a stand and are forced to retreat.
As time was getting on we ended the game with all French brigades having lost initiative. We felt that we had reached a point with the rules which meant we could test them with a more demanding and historically based scenario. After a week off to do a WW2 Blitzkreig Commander game in 15mm we will be doing an early Peninsular War game using Neils 15mm dwarf armies. We will use the same sized table so there will be plenty of room for maneouvre. Looking forward to that one.
Carl had intended to do a report on the x-wing game he played on the same night but they used a new blue vinyl mat the club has just purchased for naval games and the glare from it made the photos useless! We'll have to tone it down a bit to resolve that problem.
Thanks for reading.
Mick
