Waterloo at Joy of Six - the second practice game - 30 May, 13 & 20 June

 Having played Waterloo once, in preparation for Joy of Six, we then replayed the battle but swapped sides, with Mike as Napoleon and myself as Wellington and Blucher.  See the AAR for our first battle here

We now had Mike's terrain and some more troops created for the game so battle commenced!

Here's the map, orientated so that it matches the pictures:

As we had recently played Waterloo on the other side, we organised our opponent's troops for them to deploy - here is the French army ready to march North:

The "drone shot"

Guard to the left, D'Erlon's I Corps in the middle

Initial deployment - The thin red line

Here's how it looked from my side - these are my troops on table but not yet deployed.  The orange roads are the sunken roads - they give some cover from cannon fire and in the assault.

The Allied right 

The Allied left

Turn 2

At the start of turn 2 (our second day of play) I had brought my stock of hedges, so I had something substantial to defend (? hide behind!).  Mike sent forward his left hook to take Hougoumont.  I appreciated how skirmishers, devastating fire, being in a fortified manor in a wood improved my chances of survival considerably!  On the right of the picture Mike pushes down the ridge towards my Brunswick & Hanoverian Landwehr...

On the left, Mike headed for Papelotte.  The Guard waited....

Turn 4

By the end of turn 4 we had achieved stalemate on the Allied right.  Mike couldn't take Hougoumont and his left hand flanking manoeuvre had not broken through.  For most of the Allied line it was a case of "hurry up and wait".

In the middle my troops were mainly waiting patiently for the French to arrive, except at Papelotte, where multiple French piled in to take the fortified village.  To the left the first Prussians arrive, whilst the French Guard, static till turn three, fill the gap on Mike's right.  Mike had learned from my earlier slow response to the Prussian threat.  Tired from their yomp through the forest, the Prussians slowly advance...

Turn 6

At this point things were going OK.  Mike still hadn't taken Hougoumont and his left hook had been stopped by various raw units - they had gone spent, but then so had Mike's infantry, so he wasn't't able to break through on his assaults.  Mike had established a gun line just out of musket/canister range of La Haye Sainte and destroyed my unit defending it.  I begin feeding units to my right as I'm not sure if my spent units will hold. 

On my left Mike holds Papelotte, however his main concern is more and more Prussians emerging from the woods.  He builds a defence line consisting entirely of Guard.  His artillery amuses itself by long range counter battery fire, which is why there are two guns in the foreground of the picture.  They will recover and return to the firing line in due course.

Turn 8

On my right I now stretched my line thinly to hold Mike's spent units at bay, whilst the survivors of the two spent units went into the hedge lines to recover.  Mike's assault on Hougoumont had been unsuccessful, so he had pulled back his troops to recover.  He had, however, removed one of my better units from the field of battle.

On my left the Prussians put pressure on the Guard.  At the top of the picture A Prussian column heads down the road towards the French rear, it looks like Mike's flank has been turned.  In the middle Picton assaults Papelotte with everything he can, Mike scrambles to react to this threat... 

Turn 9

We played turn 9 through enough to decide the key combats and determine a winner.  

On the right I advanced my line to support the gallant defenders of Hougoumont.  Mike's final assaults here were not able to break through.

In the middle Mike occupied La Haye Sainte on his turn 9.  I assaulted and won using the whole of my middle troops.  Not even the Grand Battery could save the French defenders.

On the left you see the results of the Prussian massed assault.  The Guard started to take losses, but well placed artillery meant that the Prussian column on the road went spent and moved no further,  The defenders of Papelotte did hold out, but the Prussians had broken through and driven off the French relief force.

Conclusion

I am pleased to report that it was another Allied win.  Mike, as Napoleon, didn't repeat some of my mistakes, however he was not getting high enough die scores to breakthrough at Hougoumont.

It's hard for Napoleon - as Wellington all I had to do for half the game was wait for the French and keep my troops from being blown away.  Mike had to win big against me early on and then win big against the Prussians.

When I did go onto the offensive, at the end of the game, the fragile and raw nature of much of my force showed up in failures to charge home and units quickly going spent.

We both thoroughly enjoyed the game and it's been great to play on our bespoke terrain.

All that remains is to welcome you on the day at Joy of Six on 13th July in Sheffield - you are welcome to take a turn or two or stay longer.

Waterloo at Joy of Six - the terrain

 Mike has spent the last couple of weeks creating the terrain for Waterloo at Joy of Six, Sunday 13th July in Sheffield.

Here's a sneak preview of the terrain set up yesterday, as we prepared for our second refight of the battle.

It will be nice to have purpose built terrain to fight on!  😀

  We left the gaps to help us work out how the jigsaw goes together.  Looking forward to seeing some of you on the day!

Update - here's the terrain with more features added:

Looking South from Allied position - Hougoumont chateau in the middle, La Haye Sainte farm on the road in the left centre.

Centre of the battlefield - Papelotte village on the left - it counts as a town and is an objective.

The left side - forests and trees to be added

Fleurus - 24th June 1794 - refight 14th July 2024 at Joy of Six, Sheffield

As regular readers of this blog know, this year I have spent an increasing amount of time lately preparing to put the Battle of Fleurus on the table at the Joy of Six Show in Sheffield.

I have helped others put on games at shows, this was my first go at doing it myself.  After researching, writing, painting, varnishing, testing and tweaking, the game went live yesterday morning.

My thanks go firstly to Mike and Ned, stalwart members of the Leeds club, who volunteered to help me on the day.  Mike gets a "mention in dispatches" for kindly hosting the two play tests.  Thanks also to Chris Pringle and Mark Smith for encouragement.

Finally a massive thank you to Sarah, my wife, who has become a "Fleurus widow" over recent weeks, who offered to drive me there and back on the day and who has been super encouraging.  She produced the map!  On the day she brought a book to read....

The After Action report:

Ned and Mike helped with the set up and Sarah offered to take the Austrians until such time as a new player wanted to take over and she could read her book.

Sarah has known about BBB, the rules set that we use, from it's very early days, but has never played a game before.  So, this was her baptism of fire, as she handled 4 of the 5 Austrian/Dutch assault columns.  Ed from London had seen the game advertised, is interested in the the Revolutionary period and decided to give it a go.  Ned took the remaining Dutch column and helped Sarah, Mike took the French left and helped Ed with the French right.

In brief, on the actual day of the battle, 1 column of Dutch and 4 columns of Austrians attempted to break through the French troops encircling Charleroi, held by the Austrians.  The day before the battle the Austrian garrison had surrendered, so all the French attackers could be deployed to halt the Austrian relief columns.  After several hours fighting the Austrian Commander, Saxe-Coburg decided to order a general withdrawal, despite the Allies having gained a lot of ground.  His withdrawal ended the Austrian attempts to hold Belgium and led to the successful French invasion of the Netherlands.  The French victory was followed by a coup against Robespierre and the end of the reign of terror.  French Generals no longer had the shadow of the guillotine over their every move....

Here's the map of the battlefield - start positions are roughly where the troops are at 08.00

The refight.  

Mike and Ned were opposite each other, with Mike having already played two battles and won both times.  Ed was in defence and Sarah tasked with winkling him out of a series of villages and woods.  

As Ed and Sarah had never played before, there was a lot of initial questions, but once they got a rhythm going they got stuck in to the battle.  It is a tribute to BBB that you can work off one QRS (Quick reference sheet) and a lot of the rules are intuitive.  

By the end they were seasoned veterans......   roll the dice, work out if anything happened, consult the rules if needed.  

The French outnumbered the Allies 83 : 53 but suffered from troops that were raw - so casualties immediately hit morale.  A couple of Ed's units fled after combat and at least one fled before combat!

As the game progressed Ned's Dutch ground Mike's French down and successfully launched an assaults on Roux and Marchienne-au-Pont, which enabled him to take Charleroi.  Sarah's Austrians also ground the French down as she pushed through the bulk of the French forces.  

In this game, with most of the French raw, passive & fragile, once they had taken one casualty they were harder to motivate and more susceptible to running away.  We had also added a scenario rule that french Generals had to be in contact with the units they wanted to add +1 command bonus on die rolls, rather than having a sphere of influence.  This was to reflect the revolutionary nature of the French forces, with the need for leaders to get alongside units to motivate them, rather than directing the wider battle.

By the end of turn 6, having gamed from 10.30 - 3.30 with only minor breaks for food, the French and Austrians agreed it was an Austrian win, with 4+ objectives held.

The game generated interest in passers-by (and see the many JoS reports to see the other stunning games on offer) and proved to be a highly enjoyable day for the 5 of us who played through the day.  It has to be said that had we played the last two turns, the French may yet have turned it around and saved the day - once again the game was in the balance right to the end.

Mike and Ned enjoyed the day and Ed and Sarah had a lot of fun!  

Umpiring for me was also a real pleasure as the game unfolded, though my voice got a little hoarse!

Pictures:

Set up

Looking West

Centre, looking South

Dutch on the Allied right

Allied Centre & Left

As the game progressed, I took some photos, enough to give a flavour but not a coherent timeline!

Charles in the woods at Fleurus on the left, Wenzel in the middle put pressure on the French

Ned's Dutch head for Roux.  In the background the Dutch head for Charleroi!

Beaulieu in the foreground and Archduke Charles assault the line of villages and woods.  The French are getting broken (blue counters = spent)

Towards the end of the game - the Austrians have taken one VP

The Dutch are in Charleroi - the French assault is about to be thwarted by the Dutch heavy artillery to the right of the picture

The French balloon, deployed near Fleurus, watches over the mounting pile of casualties.

See earlier posts for details of some of the figures painted /created for this game here , there , here again and also here .  It was nice to get the troops out!  Sarah didn't get to read her book....

  

Dutch troops for Fleurus and Flanders 1793-95

 Here is part of my Dutch army for Fleurus 1794 at Joy of Six on Sunday.  Figures are a mixture of Baccus 6mm early Prussians, Austrian Grenadiers, Spanish & Prussian Hussars in Mirliton and Generals of various nationalities...

I will do a proper army page soon... honest!

William V, Prince of Orange - leading the first column on the day.  His escort is an officer of the Timmerman Hussars.

Timmerman Hussars - a mix of Spanish & Prussian Hussars in Mirliton with added shabraques

Fire support - Dutch 12 Pdr artillery.  Prussian Artillery, with a Spanish officer, firing an Austrian gun.  I went with red for the gun carriage.

Grenadiers - Austrian SYW Grenadiers left over from my Neerwinden '93 project.  See here for the second play test and here for the Austrian army page.

Finally, light infantry - Prussian skirmishers and some British AWI in roundhats...

Please bear with any blurring in the photos - the figures are really quite small, photography is not my strong point!