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.