Borodino for Joy of Six - Defences & Houses

 In just under two weeks time Mike and I will be hosting Borodino 1812 as a participation game at Joy of Six.  I needed to make some defences and some houses - here's how I did it, I hope it encourages you to have a go yourself!

The defences - these consisted of the redoubt and the big and little fleches.  These were very recent earthworks, so needed to be mainly soil with reinforcing timber.  I have some mdf trench sections, so I used these for the timber reinforcement and built up the terrain using lengths of lolly stick, suitably cut to size!

The formers:

Note gun ports cut once formers are finished

Redoubt to the left, Fleches to the right

A close up of the Fleches former

This is what they look like when polyfilla has been applied, followed by covering in basing sand, painted and highlighted with earth colours.  Even tough it was summer I reckon the earth would still be dark.

Here are the finished articles - matt varnished and flocked.  

The Houses Pendraken produce a very nice 6mm Russian Church, so I needed 8 more houses to be able to fight the two Russian scenarios in the Napoleon's Bloody Big Battles Scenario book.  This is the basic shape for a 1 storey building.

The next step is to clad the building in logs - in this case 0.4 mm round plastic strip.  Half way through the process I switched to 0.4mm half round strip.  The roofs got strip as well.  All of the buildings have a 2mm strip of stone to simulate the base that the building sits on.

They got a blast of primer and then a coat of acrylic black.  The church is from Pendraken and is also a simple wooden building.

Here's what they look like finished, basically lighter and lighter shades of grey to get that weathered silver timber look.

The most painstaking bit is the creation of the log walls, which need individual strips gluing on, but it doesn't take too long per house.

 

Borodino for Joy of Six - forces preparation - the Army of Westphalia

 Ilkley Irregulars will be presenting the battle of Borodino, Russia 1812, at Joy of Six in Sheffield 4 weeks today.  See how our first playltest went here.

My defensive earthworks are done and I have made some suitable Russian buildings, these are for another post.

I also decided, after the first playtest, to create Junot's Westphalians (VIII Corps).  I looked on Pinterest and found this extremely helpful picture:

I also found more pictures covering the drummers, all the infantry regiments and the Marshals and ADC uniforms.

The Westphalian artillery were almost indistinguishable from the French (unless the guns are a different colour, in which case send me a comment!) so one of my existing gun stands will be fine.

So, six stands of infantry, two with flags and a Marshal to create.  About this time I had a couple of bouts of illness, so it's taken a while to get them finished, but today's the day they had their portraits painted and they relocated to a storage box to await the big day!

The figures are Baccus 6mm - French line infantry 1806-1812 for the most part, NCOs are Elite line infantry 1806-1812, skirmishers French light infantry 1806-1812 and Guard Infantry are French Guard infantry (obvs).  Based for the BBB rules.

Their white coats and bright facing colours will make a nice contrast to the dark blue of the French line and Poles who will be fighting along side them.  

Flags are home prints from originals taken from the now defunct Warflag/Napflag free flag internet site.

Marshal Junot is from one of the Napoleonic Command Packs (Austrian?) and the ADC is French with the addition of a big plume (yellow, in this case).

So, great little project and a nice unit to field 4 weeks today!

Berezina, 26 to 29 November, refought 6 & 20 December 2024

Berezina is the next battle from Dr Mark Smith's "Bloody Big Napoleonic Battles" Scenario book.  I had played it before as part of a playtest, my regular opponent Mike was new to this battle.  It's an interesting battle, with two separate areas of combat, logistical challenges and many strategic decisions to be made.

The French army has retreated from Moscow and is now heading West through the snow.  The French formed army is disintegrating and is accompanied by a huge number of military stragglers and civilians.  

The French task is to cross the Berezina river and avoid being trapped by two Russian armies.  The river is not passable, but two emergency bridges have been created.  One bridge can carry infantry and cavalry, one can take all forms of traffic.  The scenario has 6 bases of transport, representing the logistic train that needs to cross the river.  The bridges keep breaking down and must be diced for each move to see if they are passable.

The Russian task is to take a number of locations on the ground and to stop the French withdrawal of combat & logistic units.  The French thus need to get the transport across the Bridges to gain Victory Points, which requires troops on the East bank, but are penalised if these troops are still on the East bank at the end of the game.

Here's the map:

Set up

Here's the table as set up, with troops in their initial deployment.  The Russians can choose to use the road and go straight North, or take Borisov (to the left) and loop through the countryside to hit the bridges.  

As the French, I needed to take Strakov (centre of photo) and hold on (or retreat slowly) on the West bank whilst screening the mob of troops/stragglers on the East bank.

Move 2

To the South, my right, The Russians pushed up the road to seal the Western bridge exits.  Mike, as Russian, also stormed over the bridge and threw his troops at the brave French defenders of Borisov, wiping them out.  I advanced Victor's troops to the South, hoping to buy time for the rest of the army to escape.

The battle for Stakhov commences, with New and Oudinot making a defence line North of the village in the woods and Marsh, not being fast enough to get to the village before the Russians.

Victor's troops form a defensive line.

Davout takes up defensive positions and the Guard cross the river to bolster the Western French forces.  One wagon can be seen on the road heading north for the exit.

Move 4

On the West bank, the Russians main thrust goes up the road.

Into the French defenders!

With Guard in support

On the Eastern bank, Victor's troops have been beaten by the Russians - destroyed or run away...

The Eastern bank 2nd line gets ready...

Whilst the stragglers/transport mill about as the bridges fall apart - again!  5 units wait to cross.  The purple "1" indicates a broken bridge.

Move 6

By move 6 the Russians had closed up on the Eastern bank and were advancing to the French bridgehead.  My rubbish die rolls meant I could extricate some infantry and cavalry, these were deployed to the South West, where both sides were extending their lines.  I could not get any artillery or transport across, however.  The Guard with artillery and cavalry were deploying in the West bank woods.  

Move 8

By move 8 the Russians had worn down the Eastern Bridgehead, taking losses but demolishing the French defenders.  On the West bank, both sides fought hard in the woods but no real progress was made.

The Western woods - hard fighting

The bridgehead - one transport unit (Austrian forge wagon, bottom left) has crossed the bridge.  Davout's command is down to one viable unit.  The French heavy cavalry is positioned on the North bridge.  Mike and I agreed that the Russians could not attack them as there were still thousands of carts, wounded and dead in the way!

Move 9 - end of game

At the end of the game the French firmly hold the woods on the Western bank and stalemate has been achieved, with neither side able to decisively defeat the other.

At the bridgehead the Russians are now having problems concentrating too many attackers against the French rearguard.  The Heavy cavalry continue to use the stragglers as a barrier.  The forge wagon heads North.

Conclusion

It was a tense game to the end, but my poor bridging rolls meant that the transport elements were trapped on the East bank at the end of the game.  This, and my failure to get and hold Stakhov, meant it was a Russian victory.  

I was pleased with the West Bank troops and deploying the Guard there early on meant the Russian assault up the road stumbled.  

On the East bank, my troops were able to slow down the Russians, assisted by the much further distances Mike's right hook needed to travel.  It was only towards the end of the game that he threatened the bridgehead.

I thoroughly recommend this as a challenging game for both sides - one I am very happy to replay!  Thanks to Mike for two days of excellent gaming, banter & bacon sarnies, thanks to Dr Mark Smith for the balanced & challenging scenario.

xxxx