French Revolutionary Wars GdB

In the absence from blogging I had the pleasure of taking part in a couple of FRW games put on by Des and Martin using their lovely collections of figures.

The first game was a cracking evenings entertainment with the glorious sons of the revolution (guess what side I was on) trying to overcome Austrian and Piedmontese troops somewhere in Italy. Des had devised a seemingly straightforward mission for the French, advance to take control the villages from the clutches of the Austrians and Savoyards. It certainly was a tough fight with the flank being held by the Austrians putting up a good defence, even though they were eventually pushed off of the ridge that they held initially the French losses were so bad that, if I remember correctly, they were pushed back by a counter attack (let me know if that is right chaps and I’ll edit it later!). Meanwhile over on my flank I had more room for manoeuvre and got ahead quickly only to be attacked by the Piedmontese aggressively handled by Martin and after a brutal fight that swung both ways I just held on to my target village (I think, again, sorry details vague so let me know if wrong someone!). A draw was declared and it was a cracking battle, Des’ figures were lovely and even Daren enjoyed it and he usually never dallies in the horse and musket period. Here’s the customary slideshow of 18mm goodness, figures from Des’ collection I believe with maybe a few from Martin’s?

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The second game was equally as good and even had some pre-battle movement which added to it greatly. Martin contacted me a few days before the game and asked me to split a force to cover some passes and also to denote the composition and placement of a reserve. He had also asked the attacking Austrians to do similar for their attack therefore our decisions would impact what forces were present on the table. The resulting battle was brilliant fun. A plucky French covering force (led by Andy) at one of the passes, above a broad plain surrounding a town, was pressed in front (by Des) whilst being outflanked by an advancing Austrian column (Martin). Help was on the way though as the French reserve column (moi) was also making its way to the point of crisis and along a parallel course to the outflanking Austrians. This led to the fantastic sight of two opposing forces marching virtually alongside each other whilst being totally ignorant of each other.

Once they both debouched onto the plain a fantastic swirling fight erupted as more and more of mine and Martin’s units entered the fray whilst Andy’s units covering force skilfully disengaged and retreated to join my column, all the while making things difficult for Des’ kaiserlicks to push through onto the plain too. The fight swung both ways all through the battle and I believe a draw was called at the end as although the French were forced back on the town the Austrians had received a bloody nose and would have had to retire to regroup. We all agreed that it was a cracker and discussed maybe doing it again but maybe extending the size to fit another pass in and to have more time to fight to a definite conclusion. The scenario could also be used for many other periods, Wellington vs Soult in the Pyrenees came to mind straight away. There is a Revolutionary Wars campaign being planned for this year and I can’t wait to get involved.

Here’s some eye-candy shots from the game, click on them to see a bigger version. I haven’t got any decent ones of the bigger picture I’m afraid (either my phone was out of juice or I was too busy dealing with all those Grenadiers!) but enjoy Martin’s lovely figures all the same!

 

Marengo at Martins – GdB AAR

Right, now that is off my chest time to start catching up on some of the stuff I have to report on during my wee ‘sabbatical’.

Back in November I had the honour of visiting Martin’s house to take part in a large General de Brigade game. We would be refighting some of the action from the Battler of Marengo and I was looking forward to it very much as, as you know, I reckon you can’t beat a grand scale Napoleonic dust up. The game was played in Martin’s lovely shed o’war that was a fantastic venue to spend a days gaming, indeed I could have quite happily spent the time looking at his figures and checking out his great library – I’m glad I don’t have a garden as I would definitely be suffering from shed envy!

So, to the battle. I was on the Austrian side along with Ian and Martin and we faced the dastardly French led by Andy, Des and Paul. Unfortunately I can’t remember the details but it was a very tough fight for us Kaiserlicks having to force a crossing over a stream to our front that was short on crossing points and defended with skill by our opponents. Ian did manage to get across over on the left as the French forces here were not very strong although he was hampered by the size of our units that slowed the movement across the stream to a crawl as a hefty jam formed at the crossing site. Once across though a massive cavalry action ensued in the extreme open left flank which the French won resulting in a general withdrawal back towards the stream.

Lovely big Austrian Cavalry

French waiting for us

French heavies

The enemy prepares

Our advance begins

More foes await

In the middle I was trying to cross the bridge into Marengo village itself (not sure if it was Marengo actually, hopefully one of the chaps could put me straight here?) which I only managed to do late in the day finally getting a few battalions of Grenadiers across which broke the defenders but then got absolutely smashed by a timely counter-attack from some fresh French units causing us to lose control of the bridge again.

Martin on the right flank was also having a terrible time getting across the stream, the French defenders had cleverly retired from the woods along the stream which although it surrendered the far bank to us it caused untold problems to our troops getting across as they took a while to get formed up again after crossing. Although we did make some headway for a while here we couldn’t make enough headway and the French line, although battered held on.

So in the end the French held on, and history was (sort of) repeated but most importantly we had a cracking days wargaming as usual played in the correct spirit among some proper gentlemen. To top it all off Martin was a fantastic host, we had a lovely Chicken Marengo for lunch, very apt and the icing on the cake as it were. Hopefully it won’t be too long before the next visit!

 

Banned from The Miniatures Page

I managed to get myself locked out of TMP just before Christmas.

To be honest I’m not that sad, I can still look at the site when I want, I just can’t post there anymore – it will reduce the traffic here somewhat but I reckon that is a price worth paying.

I had started to find the behaviour of the odious toad that runs it was not to my liking: the man’s a misogynistic, trolling, egomaniacal, anti-Semitic, racist, homophobic, contrary turd. Indeed he does seem to be losing the plot somewhat these days as evidenced by his latest shenanigans over the sacking of the editors. He also has a Trumpian handle on the truth swearing blind in many posts that what everyone else knows to be the truth isn’t and his view is the only one that matters. I hope it costs him more of his supporting members and advertisers.

During a thread in which some people were stating their disgust over the continued allowing of racist language from some of the good ole boys on the site Armintrout obviously banned those who were protesting and after I sarcastically mentioned about his even handed approach to moderation I was banned too. Apparently it is OK to call for the death of people based on their religion, post links to holocaust denial crap or any other vile shite if you are one of his mates as that is that persons right due to freedom of speech but that same right doesn’t apply if you disagree with them. It shows him up for what he truly is.

To paraphrase a placard from the London Women’s March this weekend:

Bill Armintrout: I’d call him a cunt but he lacks both depth and warmth.

2016 round-up.

I know I am late with this and that the past years wargaming shenanigans are documented here on the blog but I just wanted to say a few things about the last 12 months and what there is to look forward to over the next year.

First up I have had an absolutely great year on the gaming front, it has really helped me get through the sometimes awful crappiness of being stuck at home especially when not feeling great. A huge part of this is down to the great chaps who I’ve had the pleasure to have played against, and a special mention has to go to the denizens of ‘Historical Corner’ who have become more than opponents, they have become proper mates. It has been an absolute pleasure gents, here’s to more of the same this year.

So highlights of this year:

Vapnartak Show in York – a great weekend away with the chaps and a great start to the year.

Des’ Big Game Saturday games – the Leibertwolkwitz game was truly a thing of beauty and an absoluter pleasure to be a part of, the ACW one was tough fight but also a great day and the recent Quatre Bras game didn’t disappoint either (more about that later…).

Chain of Command – possibly one of the best rulesets that I’ve ever played, and getting people involved in games and playing in them has been a lot of fun, even making the models hasn’t been too bad (thank you Plastic Soldier Company).

Marengo at Martin’s – this happened when my laptop gave up the ghost and I will be putting a report up over the next few days, but a great days gaming in Martin’s fantastic shed o’war and another magnificent spectacle.

Getting banned from TMP! More of that coming up next…

Things to look forward to this year:

I am helping Daren put on a 6mm Cold war game at Salute this year which we will be taking on the road to a couple of shows – aiming to go to the Joy of 6 in Sheffield and at least one other show to be decided on soon. I’m really looking forward to this as it will look the dogs nads!

I’m now involved in a ACW campaign at the club and after taking part in one battle so far can’t wait to get stuck into those damn Yankees again!

CoC campaign against Des. We plan on tackling the Scottish Corridor Pint Sized job from the Lardies and are due to start soon, hopefully I can do better than last years mullering I received from Mike in Operation Martlet.

I forgot yesterday – me and the mem are off to Vienna sometime in the spring. I’ve been before and was immensely upset when visiting the military museum there that the 1800’s gallery was closed for refurbishment so that’s deffo on the to do list. If possible I might see if I can finangle a trip out to Aspern-Essling or Wagram too.