L'Art De La Guerre Rennaisance - two games

Another double outing for LADG Renn today with Stephen.

We played a couple of Thirty Years War games with early and late versions of Stephens Swedish army and my Imperialist Catholic army.

Both very enjoyable games although my dice rolls were truly terrible once again, so bad in second game Stephen was apologizing to me for my dice rolls !!

Think we have these rules pretty well down now with the only query we had today being with rear support rules, as it seems a single base of cavalry can support up to five infantry units lying in its front 'zone' which seemed rather potent.

Early period game (1631AD) with Imperialist infantry arrayed in Tercios and Later tercios 

Imperialst Reiters and Pistoleers face more numerous Swedes mounted wing

These Tercios were shot to bits (with little reply) by Swedish artillery and muskets

Later period game with pike and shot units in lieu of Tercios

Imperial lines

Swedes with Regimental gun attachments

Art De La Guerre Renaissance rules again - French vs Late Catholic 1643

Another outing for AdlgR using a later version (1643+) of my Catholic army against Stephens French.

So gone are the Tercio foot and Caracolle cavalry with Pike & Shot and Pistols in their stead.

Also got to try Dragoons and Commanded Shot (a marker on a unit).

Dragoons had us head scratching a bit as noted as being mounted Light Infantry Skirmishers we treated them as a LI type but they perform more as a sort of Light Medium Mounted, with 3UD shooting range (compared to 2 for other Musket armed light foot), 3 Cohesion and are not auto killed in open if caught by heavier types, you only really learn by trying them out on table.

Another fun and interesting game that had nice period feel combined with the overall straight forward play of Adlg system.

The Catholics of course lost mainly due to their shooting being awful..............

Renaissance version of ADLG tried - TYW Early Catholic vs Swedish

Had a run out with new LADG Renaissance supplement today against Stephen using my Thirty Years War Catholic army against his Swedes.

We choose to use early (pre 1632) versions of these forces to test Tercios, Late Tercios and Caracole Cavalry along with Salvo Foot and Regimental Guns.

We found this to be an excellent (not just because its free) addition to the LADG rules and felt very like FOGR with its match ups and outcomes, but with much less rules overhead. 

Bit different having Battle Units which are essentially 2 standard units acting as single entity for movement and cohesion but shooting and fighting with separate dice but works fine in play.

Only real bind was having to refer to standard LADG rule book for bulk of rules which are not amended, but still played pretty smoothly.

Swedish Foot are pretty mean (just as in FOGR) not so much with shooting here but with the excellent Salvo trait which gives them Impact and Furious Charge at contact (charging or charged) and small added bonus from Regt Guns.

Tercios are not self supporting units as they are in FOGR but have highest cohesion level in game (8) giving them some added durability.

Support somewhat works differently but easily through formation groups including a chequer board formation which he period feel well.

Caracolling Cavalry was interesting option although mine were overwhelmed by more numerous Pistol types, and was very interesting to note that they can actually evade (which is very plausible although not intuitive for heavy armoured units)

Some different costs for PIP usage and of course much more shooting in game with all the muskets but all worked seamlessly and gave plausible outcomes overall.

A very enjoyable game and expect we will use these a good deal in future.

Field Of Glory: Renaissance - Thirty Years War - Swedish versus Early Catholic

Another game at Stephens and he selected FOGR again having just read a book 'Lion Of The North' and wishing to field his Early Swedes.

I fielded my Early Catholic again this time with 3 Average Early Tercios.

I took a huge risk putting two units of Cuirassier a Reiter and a Field Commander on a Flank March as I know that my army is outclassed in a straight on stand up fight.

The Swedish Brigades are simply awesome especially when Superior (Stephen had 4 Brigades with 3 Superior) and with Regimental Guns and they usually (ie always) steamroller my Tercios with their Impact and Salvo traits.

I also selected Woodland terrain in attempt to disrupt Swedish advance but Stephen managed to remove two of four Forests with rolls of 6.
Although with the way heavy Infantry set up in the center in FOGR avoiding these Brigades is a tough proposition.

With fully one third of my force off-table at start it was always down to if or when the Flank march appeared.

With a Field Commander I needed to roll a 9 on 2d6 but consistently (ie every bloody turn) rolled an annoying 8 so........................

This meant I was fighting with only 9 units but thankfully I had decent dice rolls today and did manage to hold up the Swedish mounted on both flanks.

I had a 3 gun Battery that fired 7 times rolling 2 Hits every time which I could not complain about but of course Stephen 'demoned' his way to passing all but one death roll and  Cohesion Test caused.

The crunch of game came in center as my 3 Tercios were engaged by the 4 Swedish Brigades.
I did remove a couple of bases from firing but lost a couple myself with neither side suffering any Cohesion tests so all fighting 'Fresh' at Impact
Two Brigades hitting one was a hiding to nothing as at Impact the Swedes rolled 6 dice needing 3 and 1 dice (Regt gun) coupled with Superior status generating re-rolls this is awesome stuff.

Two of my Tercios (those facing Superior Swedes) went Disrupted then Fragmented and soon Broke in short order.
My other Tercio with a General in fronk rank managed to withstand the Average Swedish Brigade and eventually Disrupted then Fragmented it but failed to Break it.

By this time my wings had collapsed and game ended in another abject defeat.

++ Note to self - if trying an outflank send the tatty Reiters not your Cuirassier and maybe just 1 unit not 3 !! ++

A tale of too much risk for no reward, but it was a fun game all the same trying to remove 'nuts from the fire'

First game out of 'lockdown' - Field Of Glory Renaissance

First face to face game since Covid Lockdown back at start of March (that seems sooo long ago !) today........yee hah......

At Stephens and he chose to use FOGR with a Selujik Turk force against which I used my Thirty Years War German Catholic 1618-1632 (being as it is only Renaissance army I have) with Later Tercios.

After a lengthy catch up/waffling session and bitch about the world we finally got down to playing and very enjoyable it was too.

Solo play is great for rules learning but nothing beats 'competitive' play.

With late start we failed to finish but Turk firepower was coming to the fore as my Horse units struggled to contact the evading Turk Cavalry.
I did catch one unit of Saphis with my Cuirassier and gave it short shrift but the Janissary Infantry are potent shooters and had decimated a unit of Reiters and my Dragoons and I had lost a Tercio to Turkish guns.

FOGR is a decent set of rules which has nice interaction of troops types and period specific formations and is very playable.
The FOG family of rules lack any real form of inertia/chaos (mainly due to being competition biased I suspect) compared to newer systems (ie no orders, no Pips, no activations or cards), but they do what they say on the tin and the lists are always fun to play around with within the points system.

We were playing with the last batch of updates and all played pretty easily as nothing truly radical in terms of changes for the armies we used.

Game booked for next week at mine and likely to be a try out of FOB3.

All pics from early stages as my phone died mid-game

Field Of Glory Renaissance - Imperial Catholic versus French

Game at Stephens today using FOGR (he was inspired by games at Warfare) which we have not used for ages.
I fielded my Early Imperial Catholic force and Stephen choose French.
A very good game with a set of rules that whilst on the complex side of things generates a very plausible Thirty Years War game.
Terrain fell ok for me which allowed me to place my Field Guns in newly acquired Redoubt (Field Fortifications).
I massed my mounted on my left hoping to break his flank which was mostly Impact Horse whilst sending my Late Tercios to contest center and essentially refusing my right flank.
Things actually started well once contact made with Stephen suffering from several Death Rolls but tellingly he managed to pass associated Cohesion Tests and I could not break through his mounted wing.
On my right it was fairly static until one unit of French Shock Foot routed a Tercio despite being down to 4 bases.
This seemed to inspire his other foot how took out my center Tercios in a couple of turns (my horrible Cohesion rolls not helping as I went down 2 levels in a couple of key combats).
Try as I might I could not get rid of his horse despite out fighting them with my Kuirassiere.
I did manage to Fragment a couple but at this stage my Army was defeated.
Enjoyable game overall and surprisingly we had no issues recalling rules despite several changes (all for the better we both thought) to troop interactions and suchlike.