We have refought this action (based of the Might & Reason scenario so with units equating to Brigade formations) several times with various rule sets and it is one of my favourite battles to recreate.
We used FOB3 mainly as it was still fresh in our minds and being such an enjoyable game system.
For a change I took the Prussians and Stephen the Russians with no real rule changes other than Prussians having first initiative and a Move card in hand (sort of standard for attackers in our games).
We stuck with the historical deployment areas for the commands of both sides which probably favours the Russians a tad.
So Freddies lot duly opened hostilities with some ineffectual long range bombardments by his guns and equally paltry Russian artillery response.
And in a change to historical action as Kanitz command first occupied the Stein Busch prior to Dohna's command attacking the Observation Corps with Schlormers Cuirassiers supporting his right.
What a disaster this proved to be as Dohna's infantry were completely pummeled by the Obs Corps in particular their 2 Grenadier Brigades !
I know one ought not to complain about dice rolls but Stephen (in full 'dice demon' mode) simply rolled stellar dice, he rolled a D12 5 times achieving 3 rolls of 12 and 2 of 10 and then 2 D10 rolling 10 twice, simply staggering degree of luck !!
Of course I consistently rolled low in response as per normal.
And as in last game he then had fortuitous card sequence getting a melee card just when required to charge into my battered units which had been Forced Back with hits and no chance to react.
I had by this time pushed Mantteufel's 2 Grenadier Brigades forward on my left and these too suffered this time from Russian cannister shot.
To add insult to injury the single unit of decent Russian cavalry the Horse Grenadiers charged and routed 2 units of Dragoons under Bieberstein.
With all this carnage I had 5 units Routing and 3 destroyed and was in serious trouble.
The Prussians did manage to pull 3 Leadership cards out of 5 cards (after a reshuffle) giving them lots of opportunities to Rally but they could only rally 3 units and recover a couple of hits.
On an Army Morale card things just turned to a complete shambles for Prussians as I had to roll for risk to 4 of my Commanders and managed to kill 3 of them with rolls of 1 on D12s, what are the chances !?
Thankfully they soon returned on one of the Leadership cards but damage was done.
Soon after this further losses saw the Prussian morale sink inevitably to zero and I conceded as three quarters of my foot units gone and Russians pretty undamaged (only 1 unit Routed)
Seydlitz who was historically very much the saviour of Prussians at Zorndorf did not manage to get involved today at all, in fact bar the Horse Grenadiers and my 2 Dragoon units the cavalry of both sides took no part beyond some maneuvering about the place.
But again what a fun game with FOB with so many decisive outcomes and a strong narrative (albeit of solely of Prussian calamity and disaster) that very few other game systems generate in such an exciting fashion, definitely not a rules set for 'control freaks' but damn it feels like a proper battle action.
Somedays aren't so rewarding, but your opponent surely used up his good die rolls for the week in the game. Good looking table!
ReplyDeleteIf only that was true we do not call him the ‘dice demon’ for nothing :-)
DeleteGreat game report - love those rules!
ReplyDeleteYes always a fun and eventful game with FOB
DeleteOne of those games where it's still kind of fun watching the drama unfold... but it would be better if it were the other guy's drama! :-)
ReplyDeleteThe self inflicted toppling of my three Generals in one fell swoop was a laugh out loud moment :-)
DeleteInspired by your superb AARs on Seven Years War games with Field of Battle 3, I pulled my as-yet un-played copy of the rules off the shelf and am organizing armies for a game of FoB 3—thank you! While you are obviously a fan of FoB 3, it is clear that you will, from time to time, add a house rule or two to enhance a particular scenario or better model the history of the period. That is why I am surprised to see no evidence in your SYW games or in anything from Brent Oman himself of a particular house rule that I thought would be an obvious choice for the SYW Prussian army of Frederick the Great, at least in the early years of the war: adding one or more “Infantry Fire” cards to the Prussian command deck. The idea, of course, would be to simulate the decided edge enjoyed by the Prussians in infantry rate of fire, a fact widely reported at the time and since. I also wonder about adding an additional Move card to the Prussian command deck, in order to model the relative Prussian marching efficiency instilled by Frederick’s ferocious training of his infantry. As it stands, your FoB 3 games pit equivalent Prussian and Russian infantry forces against each other, when the historical Prussians, at least in the early years of the Seven Years War, were a far superior force. Your thoughts?
ReplyDeleteHi, I have indeed used just those card Deck house rules you mention with the Prussians on occasion. The extra Move card is most appealing to emphasize Prussian drill advantage. Not so sure the historical record supports the extra Firepower card as whilst they were capable of extra rounds per minute no real evidence that this translated into extra impact on targets ? Note Prussians usually have better deck quality than Russians and CinC and Commanders usually higher quality as well which certainly ‘helps’ the Prussians as more likely to get 3 moves on Move cards. Also Russian Inf are generally rated as d8/d8 (stolen from Peter Anderson) so less effective shooters than Prussians but more ‘stoic/hardy’ when in close combat, which seems more fitting. You will find that you can add these sorts of touches to FOB without breaking the system and to reflect your own views on armies etc, but over time I have come to minimize the number of house rules I use.
DeleteIf you join the Piquet/ FOB Facebook page my house rules and QRS sheets for SYW are in the files section f you want to see the various amendments I have tried
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