Back to the Italian Wars

After the deep dive into the differences between charge types and when to use them in Basic Impetvs, time to return to the painting desk and something a bit lighter.  Although, I know that the intricacies of Basic Impetvs are not of universal appeal, I do appreciate those readers who weighed in with their thoughts.  These rules' ruminations seemingly clog my mind frequently so putting them down for later reference is a worthwhile diversion from normal programming.

With that prologue out of the way, time to get to the topic at hand.  Today's topic is what figures have recently mustered out from the painting desk.

Out from the painting desk today are two bodies of Men-at-Arms for the Great Italian Wars.  All ten figures are from Wargames Foundry.  The flags, I think, are all from Pete's Flags.  Another five of these MAA remain in The Lead Pile to push into the painting queue another time. 

On the gaming front, Richard hosted another of his Koenig Krieg games in a remote setting and played on hexes.  Dan and I split command of the Prussian Army while Lee and Ray commanded the Russians.  For me, the highlight of the game saw one of my infantry brigades back off the ridge line in the best Wellingtonian fashion to protect itself from artillery fire.  This brigade later re-emerged over the ridge to hit the unsuspecting Russian infantry in the flank, destroying two infantry regiments.  Caught the Russians off guard with that ploy!  Great fun!  For a full battle report, visit Richard's blog at The Battle of Fernspiel, A SYW Remote Encounter.

Next game up on my table provides a look at the 1800 Battle of Montebello.  Since this is a meeting engagement with reinforcements for both armies arriving throughout the battle, the first trial with be a two-player affair.  After Game #1, I can reassess to see if this scenario can easily accommodate multiple players without having some players sit idly by for a long time.  First game is on Monday.

For now, back to the painting desk and preparing for Montebello.

Clash Course in Flower of Chivalry

As an alternative to a Monday Paint & Chat session, Reject Richard gathered a collection of Postie's Rejects for a remote game.  Richard pulled out a 30-plus year-old Medieval ruleset for the session's entertainment.  Richard converted these old rules to hexes, made some amendments, and gave the rules a couple of solo playtests.

The rules that Richard dredged up from his vault are Flower of Chivalry by The Canadian Wargames Group and Bruce McFarlane.  Now, I have had this set of rules filed away on my shelves of wargame rules since about the date it was published in 1993.  Since I only recently became interested in bringing Medieval warfare to the gaming table, McFarlane's book sat on my shelf mostly unread.  Certainly, the rules, themselves, were not give much consideration.  Coming in at only four pages of the 76 page book, they were easy to overlook.  This is especially true since the rules are quite terse with ambiguities at every paragraph.  With four pages of rules and a number of interesting concepts and mechanisms, cramming everything into such a small space would be a hard task.  The game uses card draw, percentile dice, D10s, Orders, Leader Aggression and Command Ratings, Personal Challenges, Army Morale, Variable Actions, and a concept of Battle Lust.  As for brevity, for example, Morale and Melee explanations are only given one paragraph each and short paragraphs at that!  After a quick read, I envisioned sizable holes to be fill.  I explored no further.

Figure photos courtesy of Richard.

This is where Richard comes in armed with multiple pages of custom designed QRS' and the knowledge to lead us all through the basics of the game.  Since Richard will almost certainly provide a more comprehensive battle report (see My Wargaming Habit), I provide a simple, captioned overview of the action from my few screenshots.

The battle opens with a French column caught on the march by an Imperialist Army.  The battle begins!  Since I commanded the French van, my brief recap focuses on that wing almost exclusively. 

Imperialists interrupt the French march.
Imperialist Right heads for the high ground at charge rate.

Dual cameras showing the battle from each side.
The French turn to face the enemy.

All three French Battles deploy as the Imperialists approach.

On the French Left, crossbow crossfire drives off the

Imperialist MAA causing significant damage.

Having destroyed the enemy Landsknechts at the bottom
 of the hill through firepower, alone, French Center attacks.

As the French Center goes crashing in to clash with enemy pikemen, 
the French Right sees its commander cut down in a personal challenge.
  They are leaderless for a turn.
French Gendarmes continue fighting arquebusiers over the hill
on the left in a protracted melee. 
Gendarmes should have made short work of these fellows!

Against the French Left, Imperialist MAA charge to the hill.
With no remaining actions, the horsemen stop.

With Imperialist MAA hampered by the hill,
French Landsknechts move into contact.
French Center makes progress against the enemy center.

In one turn, the Imperialist Left and Center collapse.
This battle is over!

Decisive victory to the French!  A battle well executed by my French comrades Ray and Dan.  Game lasted about three-and-a-half hours.

The game provided a lot of interesting play with some uncertainty and careful decision making.  With only one game in the books, I look forward to more opportunities to give Flowers of Chivalry a bit more exercise.  On exercising, a review of these rules along with my thoughts and a compare and contrast to Basic Impetvs and my more recent work for the WotR might be interesting.  At least, to me, perhaps!

Thank you, Richard and the Rejects for a very entertaining gaming session!

Swiss Handgunners

After a couple of weeks of gaming and analytics focused activities, attention returns to the painting desk.  Both of those activities have the capability to expand to consume most of my available time so it is nice to get a reprieve to pick up the brush.

Of course, increased roadwork out on the bike in warm weather leaves me without a lot of motivation to accomplish more than sit in the game room and read rather than actually getting a bit of painting accomplished.  Yardwork is constantly calling as well.  Still, I push through the pain...

Anyway, mustering out from the photo booth today are two, nine figure stands of Swiss handgunners for the Great Italian Wars project.  Figures are from Wargames Foundry.  Nice figures and good to add some Swiss handgunners into the mix.

Work at the painting desk is focusing on 15mm FPW figures, at present, with more Prussians and Bavarians seeing action.  A couple handfuls of Prussians commanders are being readied as well.  An order from Lancashire Games is winging its way to me although the latest reports suggest that it is held up in Irish customs.  Please, let my figures go!  Before any FPW figures decamp from the painting desk, some WotR cavalry may be up next.

On the blogging/tech front, I have been giving Perplexity's Comet browser a test drive as my default browser.  So far, I like the integration of Perplexity's AI engine integrated into a browser.  Given that Perplexity is my favored AI engine, nice to have browser integration.  Will I go back to my "old" default browser?  Stay tuned for further updates on the tech front      

Until next time.

Agnadello, Game #4

Game #4 in the series of 1509 Battle of Agnadello refights took place a week ago and saw a rematch with the players of Game #1 (see BatRep: Agnadello 1509).  In Game #4, players switch sides with Tony (Carpi) and David B. (Alviano) commanding the Venetian Army while Mark (King Louis XII) and Chris (Chamont) taking command of the French Army.  On Turn 5, David C. joins in to take over Tremoille's reinforcing column.    

Armies arrayed for battle.

Recall that in Game#1, the battle ended in Tony and David B. scoring a decisive French victory.  Would game #4 even the score?  Read on to find out!

As both armies advance toward one another, Carpi moves his light cavalry forward in a charge against the King's exposed guns.  As an aside, in my two games with Richard, this ploy worked for Richard when he led the Venetians but failed for me when I was at the Venetian helm.  For Tony, this day sees the Stradiots sweep away both guns without hardly breaking a sweat!  The Venetians are off to a solid start.  Carpi's two pike blocks hold their positions behind the irrigation ditch as Chamont brings his troops forward. Gascon crossbowmen take up positions in the vineyards and harass the Italian pikemen.

Stradiots attack!

Both of the King's guns are destroyed!

The French Right Wing advances against the Venetian Left.

Venetians come under fire.

Annoyed by losing his guns at the start of battle, King Louis orders his wing forward.  Having overrun the French guns, the Stradiots briefly tangle with the Swiss before retiring in search of a way out of the bind in which they find themselves.  These horsemen make a long ride behind enemy lines!

The King sets his wing into motion.

Stradiots' long ride behind enemy lines!

In an effort to counter the King's movements against the Venetian Right, Alviano begins the laborious process of bringing his cavalry across the ditch.  Having successfully brought his light cavalry over the obstacle and while making its way through the woods, Alviano's light cavalry come up against enemy cavalry.  Before clearing the woods, the Venetian horsemen are attacked by the King's mounted crossbow and driven back.  Sticking with them, the crossbowmen scatter the enemy when pursuit leads to rout.

Having dispatched the Venetian light cavalry, headlong pursuit brings the pursuers face to face with Alviano leading his MAA over the ditch.  Still disordered from their fight with the terrain, Alviano easily sees the light cavalry off.  The French light cavalry retreat after having suffered heavy casualties.  Alviano takes up pursuit of the pursuers and continues forward into more French light cavalry.  By now, Alviano's attacks have run out of momentum, and he orders his MAA back into the woods to recover. 

Light cavalry clash in the woods...

the French pursue...

but are thrown back when Alviano brings his MAA up.

Exhausted, Alviano retires back to the safety of the woods. 

Carpi's Italian pike blocks continue taking crossbow fire as the rightmost block turns to face a potential threat from the King's French pikemen.  Carpi keeps his heavy gun in action by pounding the Gascons in the vineyard.  Neither army is anxious to cross the ditch to bring the fight to the enemy.

Looks like a stand-off in the center.

Back on the French Left, the King takes advantage of Alviano's reluctance to emerge from the woods.  If the Italians will not come out, the King will go in!  Given the difficulty of the ground, the odds are about even as the French Gendarmes move into the woods.  In a brief clash, Alviano is sent backwards into the ditch.  At the head of his Gendarmes, King Louis sets off in pursuit, but the nature of the ground prevents him from catching the fleeing Italians.  In fact, the King completely misjudges the direction of retreat and completely bypasses the enemy in the woods! 

Alviano attacked...

and driven off by the King!

In the confusion, King Louis pursues past Alviano.

After peppering the central Italian pike block with missile fire, the French pikemen enter the ditch to take the fight to the Italians.  In a lengthy pike scrum, the Italians are pushed back.  Losses mount.  

Over the ditch...

and into the Italians!

Like the King's heavy cavalry attack against Alviano on the Venetian Right, on the French Right, Chamont leads his Gendarmes against the Venetian Left into an attack on Carpi and his MAA.  In the swirling melee, Carpi and his Italians are driven off with Chamont in pursuit.  Both bodies of Italian heavy cavalry are in retreat!  The security of Alviano's flanks is crumbling.  

Chamont vs Carpi

Carpi is defeated and retreats!

Back in the center, the French victory against Carpi's pike block is short-lived.  Having finally come down from the high ground and crossed the ditch, one of Alviano's own pike blocks smacks into the French pikemen.  While the French suffer heavy losses, they stubbornly maintain their ground.  Alviano's Italians are tossed back into the ditch!  

Italian pike block attacks...

and are repulsed!

French pikemen hold their ground, worse for the wear,

much worse for the wear.

As the rain begins to fall with more determination, and the ground is getting heavy, the third French Battle of Tremoille arrives onto the battlefield.  On the Venetian Left, Carpi is coming under increasing pressure as missile fire is concentrated upon his pike block that remains positioned defending the ditch.  With Italian MAA dispatched and Chamont leading his Gendarmes off to the Italian rear, these pikemen could be in serious jeopardy.      

Tremoille and the rain arrives.

The noose tightens.

To relieve pressure on Carpi, Alviano's Provisionati pike block crosses the ditch and crashes into the remnants of the French pike block.  The French are pushed back to the ditch with the Italians in hot pursuit.  Not only are the French dispatched but an adjacent body of Gascon crossbow are driven back as well.  Immediate results are promising but success is fleeting.  The King's Swiss erupt out of the ditch and drive the Italian pikemen off.

Into the French...

scattering them before they can escape.

Swiss drive off the Italians!

The Venetian Army is wavering from setbacks all across the battlefield.  In rapid succession, the French decisively turn the tide of battle.  First Tremoille's Gendarmes ride down the Venetian light cavalry marauding in the rear.  Then, the King dispatches Alviano's MAA before they can get out of harm's way.  Finally, Chamont's Swiss come up out of the ditch to push the Italians back.  These final acts are just enough to break the Venetian Army. 

Finishing off the renegade light cavalry.

Scattering Alviano's MAA.

Swiss attacking out from the ditch.

Venetian Army ready to break!

This battle is over and Alviano must extract what is left of his army from the battlefield.  

Victory to the French, Mark, Chris, David C.!

Butcher's Bill

A glance at the Dead Pile shows that in terms of stands lost, casualties were about even.  What really cost the Venetians was the loss of both units of MAA.  Without losing the Venetian heavy cavalry, the battle may have lasted a turn or two more.  Alviano may have actually been able to hold on long enough to run out the clock before Tremoille could get his Battle firmly into the fight.  With rain coming down, getting Tremoille into battle would be no easy task.

Great job guys in a battle well-fought.  Midgame, it looked like the Venetians had a solid chance to overturn the historical result, but it was just not to be.

Very exciting battle to watch unfold.  As the Italian Wars armies are cleared from the table, next time, something completely different will show up for a few games.