Saga-Age of Crusades- Sort Of!

As a part of the Montreal Historical Wargaming Club's AGM yesterday we finished off with some games of Saga. I was interested in getting one of my Age of Crusade's armies on the table and after a lot of discussion about balance and historical relevancy, I took on Luis's Free Companies with my Moors.

Free Companies

Warlord

Cannon

3 Foot Warriors

1 1/2 Mounted Hearthguard

Levy Crossbowmen

Moors

Warlord

Mounted Javelin Hearthguard

Blackguard

Mounted Javelin Warriors

Foot Warriors

Levy Bowmen

Of course I forgot to take photos, but it turned out to be a terrific game which was quite close until the last turn when a series of mistakes by myself ended in a very lopsided victory for Luis. 

In the photo above probably around the end of turn 5 it looked Ok, but in an ill planned attack by my Blackguard, I ended up losing them all in Melee and because of their Paragon's trait, I ended up putting 2 fatigue on my Warlord thus making him unable to take on the Free Company Warlord. I learned 2 things from this game; learn to close ranks and appreciate that the Blackguard are a very strong defensive unit. 

Unfortunately, although I keep on saying I am not adding any more Saga figures, it looks like I might have to buy a unit of Moorish Levy Crossbowmen.

Many Rivers-Turn 4-Farm and Forest

Myself and Graham got together at his place last Sunday week for the next game in the Many Rivers campaign. We finally had moved on to another table, this time playing the Swift to Support scenario from the 1940 Handbook. As you can see I was extremely lucky with my support roll get 19 support points. Graham ended up with 9. Both platoons were in good shape but I should note that my other 2 platoons are pretty shot up.

Forces

Guards Platoon #2 (missing 1 man)

FR 0, 5CD, Regulars

Supports (9)

AAMG 1

Infantry Section 4

4 Emplacements 4

Schützen Platoon #3 (missing 4 men)

FR +1, 5CD, Regulars

Supports (19)

Shabby Nazi Trick 1

Red Dice 2

Smoke Barrage 2

le.18 IG 4

Stuka Attack 4

Pioneer Squad 6

The Game

I got boxed into a corner with my JOP's. Graham stayed well back. The Stuka Attack resulted in the large barn being in ruins which was a significant advantage for me as this is solid cover for the British with a good LOS over the hedges.

This photo is from pretty late in the game, as I had forgotten to take photos as usual. I held off with the smoke barrage which landed right on target until I had my troops ready to advance rapidly forward. I also waited to see where Graham was to set up his defence. He eventually placed all 4 sections behind the hedge on his right flank. I used my large Pioneer Squad as the main advance. As you can see above they got quite shot up. I had a strong firing base on the hill on my left flank.

Base of fire with SL, IG, squad and 5cm mortar.

As you can see the British suffered quite a few casualties and shock from my firing base with at least 2 teams routing. Graham decided he had enough and withdrew. Game over!

Summing Up

German Platoon #3

Platoon Leader Outlook: Happy

Men’s opinion: 0

CO’s opinion: -1

German Platoon #3: 3 dead next game

German 1st Platoon has lost 5 dead , 5 missing for next game

German 2nd Platoon has lost 8 dead, 4 missing for the next game

British Platoon #2 

Platoon Leader Outlook: Happy 

Men’s opinion: +1

CO’s opinion:  -1

British Platoon #2: 2 dead, 2 missing next game

British Platoon #1: 5 dead, 2 missing next game

Next Game

I have decided that I will use a Blitzkrieg to attack the next table using my same force. The 5cm Mortar will be out of ammo and we decided that it would be unreasonable for the Pioneer Squad to be intact as they lost 6 figures, so using the casualty table they will be down 5 men for the next game.

CoC in 15mm-Delaying Action

 

A week ago Saturday, I got together with William at the abyss. He had expressed interest in learning the Chain of Command ruleset, he had one previous game an this was to be his second. He had been putting together a 15mm force for WWII and wanted to put them on the table. I had not played CoC with 15mm troops for more than 10 years so I was looking forward to it.

William had a French and German force put together and decided to go with the Delaying Action scenario from the v2 rulebook. He also put together all of the terrain. the OB is as follows, we diced for supports before the game on Discord. The Germans were the Attackers.

French 1940 Infantry Platoon (FR+1)

2 SL

VB Team w/JL

3 Groupes de Combat w/JL

Supports

AAMG

Franc Tireurs

Escouade de Fusiliers Motocyclistes

Canon de 25mm ATG /JL

Great Army Group A, First Wave Division (FR+4)

2 SL

5cm Mortar Team

4 Squads w/JL

Supports

Shabby Nazi Trick

Red Dice

Sniper

Stuka Bombardment

le.18 IG

Photos

As usual I forgot to take many as it was quite an exciting game.

The Objective was the red roofed building in the centre. William almost flanked me in the Patrol Phase as you can see he got a JOP in the forest on my right flank.

The Stuka Bombardment was quite effective, catching the actual Objective on fore. It collapsed at the end of turn one.

William was agressive in his defence advancing on both flanks.

The Germans made short work of this GdC.

Well this was quite an exciting game, The hedges blocked LOS up to 2". My attack was a little slow to get going but the Germans did advance up the table. I have never seen anyone like William for throwing triple sixes on his Command Dice, thus unlike most games of CoC there were actually many turns. I had brought down the French FM but William started the Final Countdown while I was still some distance away. I was able to get close but alas time ran out for me before I could get to the Objective. This was quite a fun game and we used many of the new mechanisms that have appeared in v2 of CoC.

It was the first time in a while that someone else supplied the troops and the terrain for a CoC game and I really appreciated it. Many thanks William for doing that and for an exciting game!

Limes Game 3

 

Myself and Robbie had our third game in the Saga Limes campaign a couple of weeks ago and unlike history the Saxons were driven back by the Britons.

Some Photos

The Saxon Line

I will not bother with a report as I think the game was over pretty quickly and my Morale fell to zero giving the Britons a victory in the campaign.

I am trying not to be negative, especially where I lost, but this is a campaign that I cannot recommend. Even on the Saga Discord where there are thousands of members, hardly any one had played it. I remember when it first came out it got bad reviews. It is structurally a mess, although the individual ideas are quite cool. I doubt if it was ever play tested. You play the same scenario every game which is sort of boring and although it is suggested that the attackers have an advantage as the campaign progresses it is the reverse. The defending player can essentially restore almost every killed figure as the campaign progresses. Thus, the attacker gets no benefit from killing figures and his only chance of victory in a game is if he can get units off the table. 

Saga Night-War of the Roses

This past Thursday, we had our monthly Saga Night at the Abyss. It was another good turn out with 12 players. Several new warbands appeared on the tables from the Age of Chivalry. Germans, Bretons, Scots, Flemish, English, Ecorcheurs, French and Venetians were represented. Myself and Rob, however,  played the War of the Roses factions, a first for our Saga Nights!

Yorkists (Rob)

Warlord

Mount Hearthguard

Foot Hearthguard

Warriors

Handgunners

Levy Bowmen(1.5)

Cannon

Lancastrians (John)

Warlord

Mounted Hearthguard

Foot Hearthguard

Warriors

Levy Bowmen (2)

We used the Chaos set up. Although I have played many games using this method, it always gives you a different game.

Scenario

Scenery-Uplands

Deployment-Pincer Attack

Game Length-Pitched Battle

Special Rule-Forced March

Victory Conditions-Target

Game Photos

Initial Setup

This ended up being a big mistake for me, with my WL and HG deployed together although I should say the scenario conditions forced me to split my warband in 2.

Other unit in my deployment.

Keep the bowmen in the forest

The Yorkist right flank.

The Yorkist left flank.

Well it seems that the Cousin's War will end up going on, as we had a draw with less than a 3 point margin of victory. It was quite a bloody battle with both of us losing most of our HG, the Yorkists had 2 left and I had just one lone mounted HG. The only reason that I was able to eke out a draw, as I was quite a bit behind going into turn 5, was to charge my WL into 12 levy, luckily for me this worked out but it could have gone either way. 

What I found interesting is that the Yorkists have a complex BB which is quite different then the English BB, while the Lancastrian BB is quite similar to it!

ACW 15mm Terrain

 

Recently, I have been working on getting some Pickett's Charge games back on the table. This is a ruleset by David Brown which is similar to his Napoleonic ruleset Général d'armée. I played quite a few games several years ago with my friend Adam but have never set up a game in Montreal for our wargaming club. I am a little limited as I do not have a CSA army but I am working on this now. I also know that version 2 of Pickett's Charge is in the works but I suspect that it might be another year or so before we see it.

In the interim, I felt it important to work on some terrain for the game. My sense is that terrain is more important for the ACW than for Napoleonics, especially linear terrain. I already have several buildings, crop fields and trees that are suitable. I do have a lot of snake rail fencing but otherwise my linear terrain and barricades were lacking.

To test my new Centauri Carbon printer, I thought it would be a good choice to print some small terrain especially picket fences which can be a challenge in any scale. What follows are my efforts.

It does not look like much, but there is 5' of snake rail fence as well as 5' of picket fence. 

Really happy with the print of these fences from 3D PrintTerrain ACW set.

Some log barricades 

This fencing was put together some years ago and comes from Battlefield Terrain Concepts. It was pretty beat up and I had to reassemble more than half of the pieces.

Some resin field barricades from Battlefield Terrain Concepts

A mixture of resin prints as well as some 3D Prints. I am not sure how the haystacks came out but I think they are OK.

Lots of 3D printed stone walls.

Overall, I am quite happy with how everything came out, and I should be good for most battles. I still have another package of snake rail fencing to put together.....a tedious job which can be put off in the short term, but for now I will have to shift focus to some CSA troops.

Mockern-The Battle for Germany 1813

 

Last Saturday, 5 of us got together for the penultimate battle in our 1813 campaign.  The scenario features the Battle of Mockern and was fought in October of 1813, as part of the Battle of Leipzig. As you can see from the map below this action was fought north of Leipzig and featured the French under Jarmin defending against attacking Prussians under Yorck on day one of the battle.

Overview of the Battle of Leipzig

Victory conditions for the Prussians were to capture Mockern in 20 turns that was made up of 2 BUA's back to back. Victory for the French was to inflict 3 Suave qui Peut's on the Prussians.

GdA has a scouting phase and myself and Iannick played it out a couple of days before our gathering. The French (myself and Helge) had to decided to just field 3 of our 5 brigades and the start of the game. 

Pelleport was deployed on the yellow marker, with Lorge's Cavalry on the pink and Jarmin on light blue, despite 4 scouting attempts the Prussians were only able to identify the position of the cavalry. 

We ended up having a pretty tight deployed frontage that I believe almost lost us the game but more about that later. 

The French kept Bouquet and Joubert as off table reserves. The Prussians had no off table reserves aside from Rummel who would arrive as a reinforcement on Turn 6.

The Game

Saturday came and the Prussians (Graham, Iannick, David)  rapidly deployed their troops across the whole width of the table, I dod not remember their exact order but Mecklenberg was deployed on their right flank with Sohr on their left flank with the other 3 deployed infantry brigades in between. We deployed Pelleport on our left with the 1e Marine holding the front Mockern BUA, with Lorge next and Jarmin on his right. I will let the photos tell the story.

The table, I think it is roughly 8x5', Mockern is in the distance with the French position to the right. There was large hill on the French side, otherwise open ground.

Here are the starting positions as seen from the Mockern side of the table. You can see to the left the Prussian wide deployment with their cavalry in the distance. The French had a very tight deployment with their 3 artillery batteries deployed together in defence of Mockern with their cavalry to the rear. Skirmishers were deployed to the left of and in front of Mockern (one legere unit deployed in skirmish). An infantry brigade was deployed to the right flank to defend against a flanking manoeuvre from the Prussians.

The Prussian players;  Graham, Iannick and David

Helge for the French and I am taking the photo!

Turn 4. The Prussian advance, as you can see they went into line pretty quickly, I believe this slowed their advance but did protect them against cannon as did the skirmishers. The French held their position aside from advancing the skirmish units on our left flank to harass the advancing Prussians. Our initial plan was to focus on our 3 batteries of artillery to weaken the enemy. The Prussian cavalry moved quickly to challenge our right flank.

Turn 6. The Prussians have advanced on all fronts and now their reserves have deployed. By now our artillery batteries are starting to suffer some attrition but we have weakened the front line Prussians.

Turn 12: Th ePrussians are now advancing on Mockern in column with their reserve. Their initial assault in line was repulsed. You can also see that Jarmin's infantry on our right flank is collapsing. The French have now brought on one of their reserve infantry brigades to buttress the right but also to be ready to support Mockern. You will notice that we have left the 2nd BUA unoccupied.  Our skirmishers have been pushed back but our cavalry is still intact.

Turn 12; a close up of the defence of Mockern.

Turn 18. A lot has happened. The Prussians were able to drive the French Marine Veterans out of one part of Mockern and only with great difficulty were one of our reserve units able to occupy the other half of the town. Our cavalry became trapped and was unable to challenge the advancing Prussians. By now, however, we had inflicted 2 Suave qui Peut on the Prussians. Before the Prussians could take all of Mockern we were able to inflict the 3rd Suave qui Peut...thus a very narrow French Victory.

Summing Up

I thought this was going to be an easy game for the French but the Prussians almost did win it. If their initial advance was a little more aggressive at the start, I think they might have got a victory before we met our Victory Conditions. Our defence was good but we had a lot of difficulty bringing in our reserves because of our narrow frontage. In retrospect, Jarmin should have been more to our right allowing our reserves to move more easily to support Mockern. I am not sure also if Pelleport should have started one of his battalions in the 2nd BUA. Certainly, his skirmishers did a good job to protect Mockern and were able to retreat in good order once their job was done. The French Cavalry, as usual, caused significant havoc to the Prussians. But a good game was played by all. I should note that around Turn 13-14, some of the Prussian players considered withdrawing their troops, Helge and myself urged them to continue the game as all was not lost. I believe we were quite correct in this and once they got "stuck in" they almost turned it around. 

There were also complaints about the actual scenario design with the one objective being stuck in a corner. I disagree totally. As gamers we are presented with what we are given, this was a historical simulation and the scenario was what it was. It ended up giving us a very good game, not an easy game but it was quite exciting.

Hopefully, we will get to the last game (Liebertwolkwitz) in this campaign fairly soon. I should note that there were 1500 18mm AB figures on the table and with the last scenario using the large OB option we hope to hit close to 2000 figures. And what will be very exciting is that we will see some Austrians.