Cheerin' when you're Beeren - Battle of Grossbeeren at HAVOC

I ran my Grossbeeren game with Snappy Nappy this past Sunday at HAVOC from about 10 AM to 2:30 PM. The weather on Suanday was as nice as it was bad on Saturdfay; driving home the temperature got up as high as 65 degrees near Hartford. This was the first time I have attended HAVOC on a Sunday (as a result of staying overnight at a hotel in Worcester with Greg on Saturday). Despite the much improved weather, attendance was exceptionally light. I'd imagine that most attendees for Sunday stay overnight on Saturday, so if they didn't come on Saturday...

Setup as of the start of the game. We played the game with all HAHGS members - Greg as Bertrand ("French", although the bulk of his troops were Italians and Wurttemburgers) at the top of the picture vs Brian as Tauntzein (Prussian), and James as von Bulow (Prussians) vs yours truly as Reynier (French and Saxons) at the near end of the table. 

Hal;f of von Bulow's Prussian Corps. If we had had three players, this would have been the command of a single player.

The other half of von Bulow's Corps. About 1/3 each Prussian regulars, Prussian Reserve regiment, and Prussian Landwehr for the infantry. 

Tauentzein's Corps deployed around the village of Blankenfeld, with Betrand's Corps ready to advance upon their positions. 

Tauentzien's troops are almost all Landwehr (except the artillery), so Bertrand has a qualitative if not quantitative advantage.

Bertrand's boys ready to move out. 

Reynier's Corps started in two bodies, Saxons to the left and French (with the Wurzburg Regiment of the Rhine Confederation) to the left. Given the small number of players, I decided not to throw in the possible reinforcements from Arrhiggi's small Cavalry Corps. Speaking as Reynier, they certainly would have been useful even late in the day!

Close up of the Saxons...

and French/Wurzburg troops. 

Bertrand's first move.

and Reynier's 2nd move - the artillery have forced the lone Prussian Jager battalion out of Grossbeeren (single stand with the white "casualty rings" on it. I made von Bulow's Prussians sit out the first move otherwise; historically, they arrived even later.

von Bulow's Prussians moving out. 

Tauentzien redeploys around Blankenfeld village. 

Battle is joined between bertrand (Greg) and Tauentzien (Brian)!

Reynier's French and Saxons set up a defensive line using Grossbeeren and the windmill hill (represented by the wheat field) as strong points. However, they are significantly outnumbered by their Prussian adversaries, and have but a single unit of Cavalry. Their open left flank is likely to prove a problem before too long!

Von Bulow's (James') Prussians move into position to begin their attacks, hampered by some traffic management issues!  Meanwhile the Jagers have reclaimed Grossbeeren... for now!

Bertrand and Tauentzien come to grips. 

Von Bulow's right flank column threatens the open left flank for the Franco-Saxon position, while the French artillery establishes itself on the Windmill hill. 

Prussian Traffic Jam inhibits von Bulow's ability to bring his superior numbers to bear upon Reynier's troops. 

Fighting near Blankenfeld. 

Saxon Jagers expel their Prussian counterparts from Grossbeeren for the second time.

von Bulow cites his guns carefully.

Pussian Landwehr cavalry manage to charge the flank of a French regiment. Even Landwehr Cavalry can win when hitting a flank!

French artillery fire routs the Prussian Uhlans. Von Bulow demonstrates the Bernadotte style of command, galloping off to get ahead of his routing troopers... and it works no better than it did for his new C-in-C, now styled as Crown Prince Johann of Sweden. 

Von Bulow's Prussian continue to maneuver to prepare their attacks. 

Reynier continues to hold the game objectives - the village of Grossbeeren and the Windmill hill... for now!

Uh oh; that Prussian Grand Battery on the French left flank can't be a good thing!

Bertrand and Tauentzien continue to duke t out; the superior quality of the "French" troops is starting to tell.

Close up of the hard fighting in the woods outside of Blankenfeld. 

Von Bulow's Prussians are breaking through the Saxon held center, and trying to turn the French left flank.

The Saxon Royal guard, resplendent in their red coats with yellow facings, prepares to throw back some Prussian regulars. Reynier (moi) had prepared a cunning counter attack to drive back the Prussians and buy some additional time; however,. I lost the initiative roll and the opportunity passed. With many (? most) of my units with 4 hits (Panicked), I thought it best to get out of town while I still could. Amazingly, not a single one of my units routed (removed from play); the same cannot be said for James, but he could much better afford losses than I could. 

Around Blankenfled, Betrand is gradually gaining thje upper hand, but is still too heavily engaged tio even think of trying to assist Reynier. At this point (about turn 9/12 max) we called the game, which had played out pretty close to the historical outcome - Bertrand defeating Tauentzien but not assisting Reynier, who was forced back by von Bulow after a long hard day of fighting. This battle ended French hopes to take Berlin and possibly drive the Prussians out of the war.

All in all it was a fun and colorful game, and helped James, Greg, Brian, and myself refresh our memories for playing Snappy Nappy in advance of the big "Campaign in a Day", coming in about 2 weeks (Sunday April 23, in Manchester CT). 

When Assyria was in Egypt's Land: HAVOC game 1

The snow on Friday and Saturday of HAVOC this year had a huge effect on attendance all three days, although the forecast was worse than the reality for points SOUTH of the site, as related in my last post. Thus I felt fortunate indeed to six players for the game, none of whom had ever played To the Strongest! before although about half the players were at least aware of the rules.

The players, from far to near were:

Assyria:             Egypt:
Nate                    Greg
Caleb                  Bob
Leif                     Dan

In the early going Nate, Caleb, and Lief on the Assyrian side look on while Greg and Bob maneuver their Egyptian troops. 

The Egyptians have a much more coherent line at this stage!

The very powerful Assyrian 4 horse Chariots try to try down the their lighter Egyptian opposition, but Dan keeps making the card draw for Evasion successfully!

Nate's Assyrians have largely over run Greg's Egyptians on this flank; Ramses' boys are running very low on victory medals... although both the Egyptian and the Assyrian C-in-C in this game were lost in battle!

In the infantry battle, the better armor and quality of the Assyrians didn't seem to be enough to make for the larger numbers of more lightly armed Egyptians.

By the end of the game, though the calculus had reversed, and it was Assyria who proved to be The Strongest this time!

Thanks to all of the players who braved the elements to attend! Everyone seemed to enjoy the game despite the one major error I made at first handling formed archers in melee, to Caleb's disadvantage. 

Hayl, Hayl, the Bale's all Here

Along with some other recent purchases from Scenic Express, I got these rather nicely done hay bales.

As you can see, there are about 5 large round bales

ad about 20 oblong bales.

Round bales with some 25mm peasants for size comparison - I believe the figures are Hinchliffe. 

They were painted at lest 30 years ago.

Square bakes with a different batch of peasants. 

Speaking of Hail and Bale, I was scheduled to run my Egypt vs. Assyria game with To the Strongest! this afternoon at HAVOC in Shewsbury, MA. New England got hit with a late Spring snowstorm. he weather wasn't bad for our area, but snow up to 10" or more was forecast for Eastern Massachusetts at one point. So it was with much hemming and hawing (and multiple weather forecast and radar map consultations that I decided to go ahead with the game rather than bailing out. Fortunately, although the 2nd half of the trip was marked by snow and sleet all the way, it was too warm to stick and the roads stayed clear, so I made the trip safely and in good time. Thus the game went on as planned  (a report on that anon, of course).  

ADD: While I had these figures out, I gave them a coat of dark Magic wash. These are the "after" shots...

Maybe the medium would have been better, as it made the tunics look rather dirty. 

On the other hand, they ARE Peasants. so maybe dirty is right!

The second unit has predominantly shades pf ghrey for their tunics.

The dark wash worked better here, I think.

The usual view one gets of Peasants forced onto the field of battle!