Black Powder

Wednesday 10th October 2018

Fun game tonight, random forces and command ratings.

French were trying to attack down the table and the British, starting from about 3/4 way with 1/2 their army deployed to hold them off.

As it turned out, all the command ratings were about 7, which in Black Powder are rubbish and French struggled to get going.

It didn't help on the random unit allocation the British gained a lot of quality troops.

Still was a fun night and an easy British win.

Napoleonic Club Campaign

Wednesday 5th September 2018

Not much gaming was done between July and September. The next outing was the club napoleonic campaign.

My Portuguese and Jack's British were shadowing Arthur (now Bob's) command as they left Leon and were heading away to the north.

Arthur did a quick turn and performed a dawn raid on the British and their supplies.

The battle ended in a French victory, in that they managed to destroy a lot of supplies, however the arrival of the British reinforcements caused a lot of French casualties.

Due to the smaller nature of the forces we used 28mm this time instead of the usual 20mm.

Wargame Shows - Phalanx 2017
June, St.Helens

I organized the demo for our club this year so decided on the War 1812 in America.

This is a conflict I've always wanted to do and gave me an excuse to collect and paint the figures.

The battle I choose was a small one from the Niagara campaign ans was featured in Wargames Illustrated.

Battle of Cryslers farm was the battle - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Crysler%27s_Farm

There was only about 8 units a side, with the Americans suffering all day with poor command rolls, whilst the British had the dice on their side.

The battle went well and looked good on the day, with a overwhelming British victory.

Campaign Game

24th April 2017 saw another campaign game.
This time I was asked to command the Spanish.

In this battle I wish I'd read the objectives properly. We were tasked with holding ALL buildings, however i assumed we had to hold the town and stop the French from crossing the river.

All the Spanish had to do to win the game was stay in the buildings, so we lost the game.

Battle was good, and the Spanish held up quite well.

Deployment -

The main Spanish deployment was around the town including across the river, with cavalry protecting the flanks.
The French also concentrated in the centre with some flanking forces looking for fords, which they found and poured across.

These flanking force overwhelmed the Spanish and along with the centre attacks the Spanish were defeated.

Campaign Game

Going back to 2016 for the first of these.

21st December 2016, Anglo-Portuguese (Bob & myself) have pushed the French (Arthur) back over the last week campaign weeks from Corruna, through the mountains and have finally caught them crossing a river.

The French are out-numbered and their mission is to escape across the river, we need to stop them.

The Portuguese deployed right and British left. My plan was to engage to the front whilst sending a flank force to block the road. My large collection of artillery to the front.

My Plan -

Deployment -

The French advanced to stall us and it partially worked, I had to swing the flanking brigade to deal with the advance, but the French paid dearly for doing so.

French Advance -

The French suffers from the flanking fire -

And eventually fall back -

The British initially suffered from an aggressive enemy, but eventually pushed them back, whilst on the Portuguese side the French suffered heavy losses and inflicted a few also, but allied cavalry and infantry found a ford and were crossing at the end of the game. However, the road ans bridge were still in French hands and so they gained a win.

Because loser have a worse chance of regaining losses Portugal lost 3 units of Infantry, can't recall French losses, but they regained a lot of their losses as winners.