Mon dieu .. ou est l'artillerie? France 1914

"L'artillerie est disparu"... such was the cry from the battlefield that echoed through the halls of the Elysee Palace as mothers mourned sons, wives their husbands, sisters their brothers. Calls abounded for heads to roll (never a good thing in France even in 1914) as the magnitude of the loss became apparent after another failed attack in the forests of the Marne Department

This week's Great War Spearhead game was set in the early days of September 1914 as two understrength French divisions counterattack attempting to push the German advance back from a river obstacle. This earliest period has slightly different characteristics. In particular the artillery is not yet using either preplanned fire, or counter battery fire. All field artillery was also on table. As the German player I chose to brigade two regiments with a FO, while the other regiments of guns were deployed as separate batteries in amongst the defending infantry. Each of us had a regiment of heavy Corps guns (150mm) available, and we allowed their deployment off-table.

The battlefield from the north, German positions are on the left behind the river, the French attacking from the right. The terrain is heavily wooded.

The French plan of attack

Initial German dispositions. Only three of the division's regiments are present, albeit with a full complement of divisional field artillery. Two infantry regiments are deployed, with the third held off table in reserve.

The action begins, with initial fire, taken from behind the German lines

This turned out to be one of those very one sided games from the 'dice' perspective. As the German player, I secured all of my artillery on their very first roll. Murray, as the French player, failed all of his rolls until turn three. This meant his attack lacked any artillery support as it contacted the defences. His die rolling in other fore attackes proved ot be equally as disastrous. Sometimes 'lady luck' is just perverse.

The French attempted to outflank the German left. The German die roll to call in the 150's (which were in General Support and so available to any regiment in the division) was successful and these guns were allocated to the German left flank to stop the French flanking attack. The effect was immediate with heavy French  casualties

The river had two fords and two bridges which allowed normal movement. We determined that the river was crossable anywhere else, but at a cost of 3/4 of each stand's movement.

The French push towards the central ford but come under heavy fire.

The advance also pushes ahead towards one of the bridges. The markers make clear just how much fire they are taking

The view from the German right

The French right flank attacked crossing the river (we use white markers to indicate stands that have combat moved, and red for those that have moved further and so cannot fire at all - our memories are just not that good - while the green markers indicate  stands that are calling in fire)

And still the French push ahead towards the central ford

There's an absolute curtain of fire falling around the central bridge

One company of French have made it across the river and into the words, potentially threatening the German left, but the regiment has already take such heavy casualties that it has tested at 50% (and passed) and is about to test for 2/3 casualties

The centre French regiment is making progress, although the German defenders have taken their first casualty .. Murray had finally succeeded in calling in artillery support - maybe the dice Gods had relented?

The French reserve, held on their left, is ordered forward to apply pressure on the German right and is similarly met with a hail of fire.

The French right flank attackers caught mid stream in the river

A general panorama of the battlefield at the end of play, with the French attack clearly running out of steam.

This was not an historical scenario, but rather a fictional battle in which I attempted to capture some of the characteristics of the action in the early days of the war. This is the approach I most usually take because accurately representing the terrain of historical battlefields is too hard with my terrain configuration. The terrain is often just too complex. The artillery scandal mentioned in the introduction reflected the fact that Murray misread his 'roster sheet' of forces and so left out of the battle an additional two regiments of 75mm field artillery, which seriously weakened his attack. These would certainly have made the defence much more vulnerable.

In circumstances like those faced by the French in this scenario using short command arrows, for example to take the advancing regiments up to the river, and also placing a company out front as 'recon' (or even the divisional cavalry.. that was their role, after  all) in order to locate enemy (which in Spearhead is often referred to as 'reconnaissance by death), is possibly the best approach. Once the enemy is contacted, the attacker would have been able to start the fire fight before pushing across the river. In this scenario the attacker did face a turn limit, which made things difficult. The French were required to get one regiment across the river, without it having taken a morale check (i.e. fallen below 50% strength), in ten turns.

Overall the scenario design left the French attack too weak to have much chance of success .. a scenario design flaw. However it was one heck of a game.

We fought the battle using my 6mm collections, all figures from the Irregular range.

On the highest peaks: a Great war Spearhead game set in the Carpathians 1915

During the Great War the eastern and Italian fronts saw fierce fighting across rugged and mountainous terrain. Our preferred WW1 rules system is Great War Spearhead. In his scenario book "Our sons as well', intended primarily (but not exclusively) for use with these rules, Robert Dunlop created a very simple mechanism for simulating some of the difficulties of fighting across this terrain: crossing all terrain contours costs a stand half of its move. Given the nature of the terrain, and inspired by visions of Italian troops using rope systems to hoist gun batteries in to positions in such rugged terrain, for this scenario set in such terrain I added the stipulation that during the battle itself any gun batteries deployed on table could not mount beyond a second contour on any hill terrain.  As it happens, these scenario specific changes had a more profound impact on the way in which we fought the battle than either of us had anticipated (and I hasten to add, it 'felt' as if these scenario specific rules meant that the action was much closer to the difficulties troops and commanders faced when fighting in such mountainous terrain).

The Austrian forces included a mountain infantry regiment. To what purpose, we wondered? Perhaps we could represent their mountaineering skills by making them exempt from the half move penalty imposed on others when cross a contour.

The Russian divisional commander had just taken over this sector. His predecessor's forces had managed to dig some deeper trenches in the rocky terrain, and protected them with wire obstacles. They had also managed to build one bunker and several pillboxes defending some of the highest peaks. They had managed by a feat of human ingenuity to get one gun battery into their bunker on one of the highest peaks.

Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/HistoryPorn/comments/klwp7q/italian_soldiers_hoisting_a_crate_dog_and/

This all just in time, as the Austrian command had an offensive planned using a fresh division well supported by artillery. So fresh was the reformed division that two of the regiments were still green. Similarly in the Russian division one regiment had just been brought up to full strength with new recruits, and so was rated as 'Green' in GWSH terms. The Austrians had 12 turns in which to cross the river and take the highest peaks.

The battle was fought using my 20mm armies. The figures and guns are from the HaT range.

The Austrian plan. I tried something new by photographing the table and printing that so commanders could draw their plans on the print. 

The battle begins to unfold, Austrians advancing from the right, Russians defending on the left

The Austrian objective was to cross the river line and take the four and five contour heights

The Austrians advance on their right against Russian forces holding the heights and occupying some of their limited level 2 entrenchments protected with a small belt of wire

Part of the Austrian attack in the centre

The mountain infantry regiment, foolishly (s it turns out) advancing onto the table and going into reserve).. not my finest moment in the context of my games

The Russian bunker, protected by wire obstacles

Action opens on the Austrian right.. immediate casualties for the Austrians

The Austrian attack against the bunker

The Russians opposing the Austrian right flank are supported by a battery of field guns

The weight of the attack on the Austrian left against the bunker is evident here

Austrian Pre-planned fire from a supporting regiment of 250mm mortars falls on the etrenchments on the right.. 

Pre-planned fire falling on the bunker suppresses the gun battery

The Austrian attack pushes around the flank of the bunker

A second round of preplanned fire against the Russian entrenchments facing the Austrian right eliminates all of the defenders .. these are BIIIG mortars

Fierce fighting is erupting as the Austrians attempt to push towards the river. The Russian entrenchments subject to that devastating pre-planned fore can be seen on the right of the photo. We use the red markers to indicate stands that have moved more than a combat move and so are ineligible to fire. White markers indicate stands that have combat moved (and so can fire at a later stage in the fire phase)

There is a fierce artillery battle going on as well.. The Austrians managed to get support from all of the artillery regiments, but then two of their observing stands were eliminated. There was also a counter battery battle going on. Apart from their heavy counter battery regiment, the Russian artillery was proving less responsive.

Attempts to advance against the bunker resulted in heavy casualties, although the Russian infantry supporting the bunker were paying a price too. 

The red dots on the Austrian stands mid-right show stands attempting to move against the Russian defences

The defences facing the Austrian right emptied of defenders, although there is a line of Russian defenders on the hill contour immediately behind, coming under Austrian field gun fire

Again, the red dots give a feel for the attempts to advance on the Austrian left

The Russian forces on their right facing the Austrian left flank advance - at this stage the fire fight appears to be going in the Austrians' favour

A video panorama (about 32 seconds) of the battlefield from Austrian left to right at the end of turn 8 of the game.

The red dots show the Austrian regiment trying to move to apply pressure against the centre Russian regiment, and get across the river

Close-up of the move towards the river and a possible crossing

The advance against the bunker on the Austrian left comes under heavy fire and stalls

Overview of the move against the bunker complex

The en trenchments on the Russian right are hit with preplanned artillery fire

Austrian units advance to occupy the entrenchments , and the Rusaian defending regiment fails its morale check after heavy casualties and is forced to withdraw

Finally, the entrenchments are taken

The firefight continues across the river

The Austrian reserve, the mountain troops, is committed in an attempt to cross the river

More fire against the Russian right/Austrian left. The bunker complex can be seen at the top of the photo

The Austrian right flank regiment advances against the retreating Russian left flank regiment

More fire comes down on the central Russian defenders at the top of the photo, but the Austrian stand acting as 'observer' is eliminated

The Austrian reserve pushes forward, but immediately takes casualties

The Austrian left flank regiment has successfully pushed a battalion around to the extreme left to occupy the woods that lie between them and the Russians. Finally they will be able to apply pressure on the Russians from the left 

Couldn't resist this table top view of the action at the end

The Austrians had 12 turns to get across the river and take the heights. At the end of the 12th turn despite having driven off the Russian left, and being in a position to break their right, they were nowhere near being able to force the river crossing nor take those heights. The Austrian artillery had more limited ammunition, and so was restricted to six fire missions per regiment. Most had expended the available ammunition by the 12th turn. Of course this was in part due to the fact that all of their regiments had indeed been able to respond to calls for their support, whereas the Russians had been far less successful in that regard.

As the Austrian commander I started with a flawed plan. I failed to make best use of the mountain troops. Apart from 'General Incompetence', I had also failed to anticipate the impact of the movement restrictions on this rugged terrain. The half move penalty for crossing a contour, combined with the complexity of the terrain generally, meant movement was slow and difficult. I struggled to maximise the number of stands able to fire in any given turn because of those movement difficulties.

This simple scenario specific rules tweak was remarkably effective in presenting the players with an understanding of the difficulty of fighting in these conditions. This was perhaps the most complex GWSH game I have played.. and wow, what a blast as a gaming experience.