Another 'holiday game', in which the 25mm Napoleonic armies (Spanish and French) fought an encounter on the Peninsular. The armies were 3000 points strong, and the battle fought using our Volley and Bayonet rules. In setting up the table, I tried to create more open space (I tend to 'overpopulate' the table with terrain. I thought it would be interesting however to put down a river, with a couple of pieces of 'marshy bank' clearly marked. The river however completely shaped the battle, allowing the French commander (Jon) to adopt an unassailable position formed as he 'refused' his right flank after the initial deployment. Certainly it was beyond the power of the linear Spanish infantry to assault the French, which passed the initiative to the French.
Jon assaulted on his left, where he redeployed two brigades of French Guard (M6 Shock troops) in response to a Spanish attack. The Spanish division deployed on their right withstood the first assaults, but then fell apart to the French attacks. One telling factor was the relative movement speeds of the linear infantry versus the massed infantry. This allowed Jon to act more quickly than we could manage.
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| The battlefield, French on the left, Spanish on the right |
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| Spanish infantry take a town on the Spanish right, hoping to make this a bastion to hold up the flank, while another divisions attempted to hook around the French left |
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| The flanking Spanish can be seen on the right of the photo, but Jon was able to redeploy troops quickly to counter the threat, and prepare for his own attacks. The stone walls became 'hasty works', offering the Spanish some protection |
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| The view from behind the Spanish in their 'hasty works |
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| The Spanish left has wrapped around the French right, but the French have used the river to refuse the flank |
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| The Spanish on the left of the photo threatening the French. However an assault across the river was tricky, as the mass of the French cavalry reserve was sitting behind the infantry ready to counter attack an attempt to cross the river. |
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| The Spanish attempting tp hold on their right after the first French Guard assault had been repulsed |
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| The Spanish right after an entire division has been carried away |
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| The Spanish left . moribund!! |
The terrain entirely shaped the game, so there was less fighting than we would have liked. However ot was still good to get the troops out on the table.
The figures are however now so old that 'metal rot' is setting in, and horses in particular are now beginning to break off at the 'ankles' (if horses had ankles, but I think you know what mean). This is a diminishing force, as I won't be investing in replacements. It is simply too expensive.
