Some Royal Navy Ships

 

I have enjoyed play testing the TFL Naval rules so I recently decided to finish off a couple of more ships. I already have quite  few brigs so I focused on the one 3rd and 5th rate that I had yet to assemble. I was lacking Royal Navy ships as my primary focus when playing Black Seas were the Spanish. Not sure why in retrospect but it is what it is.

The ships are easy enough to assemble and paint and I have applying the sails down but rigging is still a challenge. I have noticed that some of the rigging is not necessary and I am not a purist so it was ok to leave some off. I also had no interest in attaching the rat tails. I am pretty happy how they turned out.

I still have some work to do on the rigging of 4 or 5 more ships but that will have to wait until I get to Montreal.

Général d'Armée at the Abyss

Last Saturday, we gathered at the Abyss for a game of Général d’Armée. Graham and I had been planning the game for a couple of months and had previously play-tested it. The full order of battle can be found in this post. We made no changes to the scenario following the play-test.

Two of the four players were complete novices, while the other two had played only a couple of games. The Abyss is one of Montreal’s main miniature-gaming venues, although I would estimate that around 90% of the games played there are fantasy. Members of our club regularly play historical games at the venue, but it is rare to see a divisional-level historical game being staged.

We decided that the best approach was to have two game masters and effectively divide the battlefield in two. Each player was responsible for one flank, ensuring that all four remained engaged throughout the game rather than spending time waiting for their turn.

The game masters handled the mechanics with the aid of the quick-reference sheet, while leaving all command decisions—including the allocation of ADCs, the use of the C-in-C and movement—to the four players. Overall command alternated between the two players on each side.

The game was limited to ten turns, which we completed in approximately four and a half hours.

I thought of would post some photos which I took as well as some taken by the players.

Myself and Graham in the club t-shirts laying out the plan

Myriam and Rob, playing the defending French.

Michel and William planning the Allied attack

The village of Osma

Attack on San Millan

It was a lot of fun, Graham is already planning our next game which I believe will feature the French vs the Prussians. We will also probably put on some divisional level ACW games.

Some Painting

 

A bit of a dramatic painting!

Anyway, over the last 6 weeks, I managed to grind out some figures. Here are some photos.

Mounted Crossbowmen from Bremen for Saga. Figures are from the Perry Light Cavalry Box.

Some French Carabinier Skirmishers for GdA from ABFigures.

Some Moorish Crossbowmen for Saga from V&V Miniatures (1st of 12)

I have some Russian houses to paint next for CoC.

Dresden 1813 The Battles for Germany

 

A couple of weeks ago we all went to Chez Helge for the 4th game in our Battles for Germany campaign. In this game the French were again the attackers in the 2nd day of the Battle of Dresden. The scenario focussed on the Allied right flank with Ney's attack against a combined Russian/Prussian force.

Set Up

Final OB with Brigadier Quality

GdB Starting Positions

French Plan

Helge and myself had a pretty clear plan for this game. We have understood that Artillery is not effective at long range and needs to start limbered so it can rapidly advance to Effective Range before deploying. With this in mine we deployed 3 Brigades with attached artillery. Our Veterans and our Légére were deployed in Skirmish order as they are also effective at a longer range. We focussed on our left flank with the plan to batter the Russian guns with both Artillery and Skirmish foree, thus weakening them before we did a rapid infantry attack. 

Allied Plan

The Allied plan was to hold the centre and left, and possibly flank the French left. What we did not comprehend was our abysmal ADC rolling!

Game Photos

The Allied right

The allied left

Graham's movement trays again worked brilliantly.

The French centre ready for action. The légére made one move and went into skirmish order.

The Game

The Allied Commanders

The Allied Troops deployed up to their maximum zone.

Russian Battery

All Batteries within effective range of each other, there was quite a bit of counter battery in the first few turns. It did go back and forth ....... 

........but a cavalry battle on the French left seemed to sort things..........

....................with the Russians losing their cannon on the centre high ground and their second battery between the high ground and Seidnitz collapsing with the 3 French Batteries larger intact. The Allies had now lost some of their Cavalry as well as Infantry.....the outcome was clear and on Turn 9 they decided to withdraw.

Summing Up

I felt our pre-game plan of attack really was quite effective and this was an easy victory and a very quick game. It will be interesting to see how we do as the defenders in the next battle, The Battle of Mockern.

Bautzen 1813 The Battles for Germany

This past Saturday we had our 3rd game in the 1813-Battles for Germany campaign. We had planned a two day event but we were able to complete the game in 6 hours with a clear victory, more about that below.

This time we played at Graham's in Beaconsfield. We had 4 players but an extra player, Steve, showed up unannounced and Graham very graciously withdrew as a player and acted as the games master. Thus we had Helge and myself, again taking the French while Iannick and Steve played the defending Russians. 

Scenario Victory Conditions

The game was 18 turns with the French being the attackers. They have to control 2 of the 4 areas of terrain on the Russian side, this including the two villages and the two hills. What the French had selected was kept from the Russians.

The Russians ended with a Bold and Poor Brigadier, the French had minimal success with their scouting just identifying the position of the Russian GdB Phalen.

The revealed starting positions of the 5 brigades aside, only the French had a reserve brigade of cavalry which was treated as an off-table reserve rather than a reinforcement. 

Initial Deployments on the Table

Overall View, unfortunately I cut off the French right flank, so you are missing a brigade of Reservists. Unlike our last game the Russians did not deploy far forward in their defensive positions. The stream in this scenario was rough not severe terrain. The French deployed their 2 artillery batteries limbered.

Top left are the French Reservists, being confronted by 4 battalions of Russian line.

The Russian centre.....

.....which was a brigade of Jagers with a brigade of line further back. Their 12pd large battery was deployed on Windmill Hill.

The Russian left flank

The Russian right flank

Game Turns

We started around 1030h, being slightly delayed by the usual chit chat, the players were also allowed to rearrange their internal organisation of each of their brigade. The French won the initiative on the first turn.

Being one of the French players I knew our plan which I can reveal here. We had decided to lead with our reserve brigades on each end flank. We had selected the two hills as our victory points. They had to be cleared by turn 18. The reservists were to advance to these hill in order to weaken the Russian defences but at the same time to soak up attrition to the point were our 2 line brigades could replace them and finish the Russians off and seize the two hills. We decided to not deploy our artillery until they could move up to effective range. We have found long range fire pretty ineffective. The skirmishers were send in on both flanks to harry the Russian guns. Our initial focussed attack was on our left flank towards Windmill Hill, to do this in our first few turns Forwards tasking was heavily utilised. For our right flank the attack was to be more leisurely, our deployed cavalry brigade was deployed to our centre right which turned out to be the correct choice as you will see.

French Right at the end of turn 6

French Left at the end of turn 6

The above 2 photos show our positions at the end of Turn 5 when we broke for lunch at 1300h. As you can see on the French left flank, both brigades had advanced with the reservist brigade on the extreme left now broken out in line in a firefight with the Russian line. The French line have advanced to the left of the forest in column but are having some difficulty manuring with their tight advance. Abling holding them off is the Russian Jagers. The French cannon are now focused on the Jagers.

The situation on the French right was quite a different proposition as the Russians tried to go on the offensive despite orders to the contrary. They successfully threw their 2 brigades at cavalry at the French advance hoping to catch them out of order. The first attack was repelled by the French line and skirmishers while a second attack on a French column resulted in minimal success with them being repelled. Meanwhile the French cavalry charged the second Russian cavalry and caused them to falter. They subsequently fail a falter test and disperse. An infantry charge by the Russians also failed with the chargers ending up in a position where they were run down by the French cavalry and were subsequently dispersed. The end of turn 6 essentially found the Russian defence on their left having crumbled with a few stragglers left on the table.

Position at the end of turn 15

The above photo is the final position of the troops at the end of the game. As noted above the French have captured the hill on their right achieving one of their victory conditions. The next 9 turns went quickly as essentially only 2 Russian brigades were left limiting their number of ADC's. They fought well dispersing the French reservist brigade but this left the hill open to the French line who were able to break out and advance in line towards WindMill Hill. They were ailing assisted by the victorious French cavalry crossing the river to run down the demoralised Russian 12 pders. The Russian defence collapsed....a French victory.

Summary

This was a strong victory for the French and because of this in the Battle of Dresden they will have a veteran guard cavalry regiment added to their order of battle. This will be invaluable as they are again the attackers. I should note that the Russians were a bit handicapped in this game as one of their players was not in on the initial defence planning. We plan to be much more careful with this in the future. Our next game probably will not be until the end of April, lots of vacation time between now and then to shake off the doldrums of the Winter and the Orange Buffoon.