The Wargaming Erratic

Yep crease lines show up in pictures – at least I know the centre line of the battlefield though.

This battlefield is a take on a few where a road junction provides the focus of the action as forces collide due to poor scouting. I quickly drew a map looking to create a bottleneck to be fought over.

Narrative

Savelonia has been wracked by insurrection and revolution. Nothing new here as the region has been fraught with instability. Sabaudia and Savelonia occupy the western lands of the Empire which had seen better days.

Yet the Emperor Raymond has seen his fortunes improve in recent times and feels compelled to show some strength in the region.

Meanwhile King Nikola of Sabaudia sees opportunities to expand his kingdom and influence.

The provisional government of Savelonia had already appealed to King Nikola for assistance so it was easy to frame his response as coming to the assistance of downtrodden peoples still living under the hard boot of the Imperialists.

The Emperor ordered his forces to mobilise.

General Gutenstein marched south and west through the Crownlands of Pommardia and through some minor duchies before reaching the borderlands of Savelonia. It is a pity his majesty had not thought to build his very new fangled railways where the army needed to march, the General thought, as his forces struggled through the mud under grey and darkening skies.

He had sent ahead General Hartmann a promising young officer. General Hartmann had 2 battalions of riflemen along with 2 squadrons of light cavalry plus 2 horse guns.

His orders were to seize the road junctions around Moulet-Arles. Local guides informed him the area was known as the “Gap of Moulet-Arles” owing to a dense forest to the west and some high ground to the east. three roads came together at Moulet-Arles and just one road led south west into the Savelonian heartlands. Hartmann noted that his maps did not show these features as significant. He pushed his men on as the grey clouds dispersed a little.

To the South West General Forlan cursed the weather, the people, the roads and the Kings Logistics Corps or rather lack of one.

His forces had been late leaving their concentration points and then the revolutionaries in Savelonia had been creating havoc. At least he had corralled the rebellion to just the three major cities in the Grand Duchy. This had given the Provisional Government some order. It was little time in which to prepare for the inevitable response by the Empire.

Now he had word of Imperial forces gathering to the north east. He had sent General Ducrot forward to secure what looked like a key road junction at Moulet-Arles.

General Ducrot was your average time served officer of the Empire who had opted to make his later career with the kingdom and frankly this explosion of activity late in the year had not been to General Ducrots’ liking with his plans to enjoy the spa towns of the Drabzan Mountains now put on hold.

And the weather was turning bad it would seem.

General Ducrot considered his orders again. Take the two road junctions of Moulet-Arles driving off any enemy. His battalion of Chasseurs were key and were supported by 2 squadrons of light cavalry and 2 battalions of line infantry. His one horse gun left him vunerable but from what he had heard the Imperialists were only “demonstrating” – a bit of sabre rattling.

As he came within sight of Moulet-Arles the rain seemed to intensify, it certainly darkened despite it being late morning already.

Heavy rain now sweeps across the battlefield and movement all but ceases. Both armies main forces are coming up but with the light fading fast General Hartmann concludes that his day is done. Leaving a battalion of riflemen in Petit Moulet-Arles he withdraws a little way away and seeks new orders.

Later that evening the Imperialists retire leaving General Ducrot and the Sabaudian forces to enjoy the dubious delights of Moulet-Arles on a very wet and sodden ground.

The Wargame

The narrative was built largely from the wargame outcomes with only the naming, origin of the war etc. being necessary additions.

Setting up the game

With my latest wargames fad being post Napoleonic warfare I just had to get some games in.

So there was a degree of improvisation necessary.

Currently I am painting armies for the 1850’s and with none complete that could not be my starting point. Help was at hand through Charles Wesencraft’s Practical Wargaming (WPW). While I was looking at his Franco Prussian rules I realised they were a build on his Napoleonic rules in the same book. Added to that I had some Napoleonic Figures ready to use and the decision was made.

This was a Faux Napoleonic game. Thank you Renaissannce Troll!

The idea for this game was the Franco Prussian scenario set out in chapter 14 of section 6 entitled “how many generals?”. And the book was Donald Featherstones Advanced Wargames (DFAW).

The scenario written for multiple players sees two forces collide having sent out advanced gauards. The question is who can feed in their main elements and rear gaurds most effectively.

Also objectives are defined by the ongoing campaign – so you don’t play fast and loose “one game” tactics.

The Imperial Forces were

Advanced Guard led by General Hartman (+1) with Staff Officer Kroos (0)

• 2 Battalions of Jagers (M2, M2)
• 2 Squadrons of Light Cavalry (M2, M2)
• 2 Horse guns (M2, M2)

Main Body led by General Gutenstein (+1)

• 1 Battalion of the Imperial Guardsmen
• 2 Squadrons of Heavy Cavalry
• 7 Battalions of Line Infantry
• 2 Field guns

Rearguard

Not specified

These forces had become broken up and were all heading on different roads which converged at Moulet-Arles.

In the “WPW” rules staff officers provide some variation and control when playing face to face opponents giving each staff officer a temporary +1 on die rolls with the unit they are with. I tweaked this by making staff officers themselves variable to introduce some more friction for solo play. And Generals were included to account for any decisions they made.

• General/Staff Officer 6 on a D6 = +2
• General/Staff Officer 4 or 5 on a D6 = +1
• General/Staff Officer 1,2 or 3 on a D6 = 0

So the Imperial forces were well blessed with leaders

Turning to the Sabaudians we had

The Adavanced Guard led by General Ducrot (0) with staff officer Hautois (+1)

• 1 Battalion of Chasseurs (M3)
• 2 Squadrons of Light Cavalry (M2, M2)
• 2 Battalions of Line Infantry (M2, M1)
• 1 Horse Gun (M1)

The Main body led by General Forlan (0)

• 2 Battalions of Guard Infantry
• 5 Battalions of Line Infantry
• 2 Squadrons of Heavy Cavalry
• 3 Field guns

The M and number value for each advanced guard unit denotes their morale classification on the day. WPW assumes that top notch units can underperform and raw units out perform themselves on any one day. This helps with Campaigns or the sort of narrative gaming I do. Not much use to the “lists” gamers though – far too confusing.

So M3 denotes a unit in top form, M2 average condition and M1 – well you need to roll your dice high when testing morale!

I diced for all the units in the main bodies – when they would arrive and by which road (3 options for the Imperial forces!)

In the event the game ended swiftly because of some timing decisions and the weather.

Now there has always been something different to me about Charles Wesencrafts’ rules. Maybe it is because back then my wargames rules were from basically one author – Donald Featherstone: Gavin Lyall, Terry Wise and Charles Grant all passed me by for example.

Anyway WPW gives you a package – nothing outrageous – it is a complete package and everything has its place. With Donald Featherstone I always felt I could emphasise rule aspects sacrificing others with little thought to the overall game. With WPW I basically take them as presented and play them. Yes I do tweak a bit because solo play requires that extra friction in the absence of another human player.

Well the weather started off wet and just got wetter. I had also randomly found the action started part way through the day. So instead of say the example 12 move battle duration shown in the book I reduced it to no more than 6 moves. And once the rain had set in with the Sabaudians in possession of the crossroads it just seemed logical that the Imperial forces would withdraw and consider their options.

So that ended my first post Napoleonic wargame. And was it a damp squib? if you play only the individual games then absolutely. If on the other other hand you play for campaigns and narratives it was good and in fact immediately suggests other courses of action.

Will the Imperialists now exploit the fact that the Sabaudians have concentrated on the road junction. Maybe they will attack from a new direction. Or maybe mask this position and attack elsewhere to draw the Sabaudians from the crossroads altogether. Maybe the crossroads are now no longer important to the Imperialists.

Finally I will cover a few other points about WPC.

Firstly I used written orders – well simple pictograms and crucially I wrote them at least one move ahead. This immediately adds more friction for the solo game as well as making the staff officer element of the rules even more pertinent.

The rules were for their time, in my view, very good in approaching control and morale. The text at 180 odd pages is quite heavy when the basic rules can be condensed into just a few. This is especially so when you consider the rules cover 6 key periods (ancients, medieval, pike and shot, Eigtheenth Century, Napoleonic, ACW/Franco Prussian). Add to that three variations – two large scale game options and a skirimish option.

The point is the whole book is also the design philosophy into the bargain with explanation alongside the relevant part of the rules.

The rules are therefore stripped of unnecessary features yet have the right blend of “kept rules” so you get a good feel for the game.

The figure removal technique in the game, with what was then an unusual multi figure basing approach, is easily replaced with a value solution such as promoted by the Neil Thomas AMW or OHW rulesets. This allows the figures to stay on the table and as Charles Wesencraft says himself it is not obvious which units are degraded until they do something. Here his morale rules take care of that – so be prepared to move units to the rear rather than just remove them. And it follows rallying can still play a part with those staff officers effectively representing the efforts of all the leaders of the army at whatever rank attempting to keep men in the line.

You can still buy these rules here being part of the John Curry Wargaming Project.