General D'Armee scenario played

Another game at Stephens using General D'Armee rules this time adapting a Gen De Brigade scenario from battle of Bautzen 'Frequmounts Attack'.
This pits French Division attacking a Prussian Division in 1813.
OOB varied to fit with GDA.
A good game again with these rules although we still found artillery using the Artillery Assault order to be very potent.
We have decided in our games to make use of this order cost 3 ADCs instead of the standard 2 to cut down on the frequency of its use especially when a Brigade of Artillery is present.
This worked quite well especially once battle was joined as just so many other things to do with limited ADCs.
My dice rolling in this game was amongst the worst I have ever suffered (and that is saying something !!!!!)
French routed a Prussian unit (via tremendous Skirmishing rolls and of course Artillery) which forces a Brigade to falter.
I then 3 turns in a row allocated the required ADC backed up by a second ADC to re-roll any failure and managed to roll 6 ones or twos seeing the Brigades 5 other units flee the field !!!
Meanwhile I charged an isolated French battery with Dragoons and thought woo hoo when the guns only inflicted a single casualty in defensive fire.................however in the charging sequence the guns rolled a reasonable 2d6 result of 8 whilst my Dragoons managed a minimum double 1 !!! this saw them Retreat with and additional 3 Hits.....unreal !!
Even my Artillery was poor after an initial decent roll.
The French (well actually a Wuttermburg unit) took possession of the key town area and even whilst Unformed while forming Garrison formation I managed to fail with two separate charges by two fresh units.........
Of course the 'dice demon' suffered no such horrors maintaining his usual ratio of both high and timely rolls including 4 double 6s when firing with Skirmishers resulting in not only 2 hits but Discipline Tests on my Skirmishers !!

Lady luck may be fickle but she is also a bitch and anyhow ALL DICE HATE ME..................

Maneouvre a nice little board game

Acquired Maneouvre by GMT games and gave it an outing at my Dads.
It is an abstract war-themed game but by gad its fun !
A fast play card driven game with nominally Napoleonic flavour.
There are 8 nations to chose from France, Britain, Prussia, Russia, Austria, Spain, Ottoman Turk and USA (last 2 not tried).
Each nation has 8 units a mix of Cavalry and Infantry types (Artillery is done via cards) and each has their own unique 60 card deck.
Game is played on a 8x8 square grid made up from 4 tiles (out of 36 ? tiles) with various terrain types thereon.
Decks vary in types of card, with Leader cards and HQ (ie special action) cards plus 5 cards per unit which have varied combat, shooting and defence strengths.
Leaders have various rolls they can perform, add to Combat, Rally, some have special abilities and most can very usefully allow units to support attacks.
Units fight using either single or double versions of D6, D8 or D10 dice.
Combat is resolved by totaling defence vs attack and the ratio determines if hits and/or retreats (and who gets to choose) or outright destruction.
Some units have Volley ability and Artillery.
Units are rated strength 5-8 with a reduced rear side.
Infantry move 1 square and cavalry 2 with no diagonal moves or interactions.
Cavalry can pursue retreating units
One wins or loses by destroying 5 enemy units or achieving a territorial victory upon nightfall (when both decks exhausted).
As per above you can see its indeed abstract and simple but it is not simplistic and with the varied nations types and decks and their inherent strengths and weaknesses it means their are various tactics and strategies one can perform/attempt.
Games take about an hour and so its easy to play multiple encounters of an evening.

I got so engrossed I forgot to take more than 1 pic

General D'Armee game played French vs British

Game at Stephens using General D'Armee rules.
Stephen used his Peninsula British and I fielded a French opponent.

We used points system at 2000pts although turns out Brigadiers are now costed (in update) so both were foelding 2300pts
We had 4 Brigades each being 3 Infantry and 1 Cavalry and both had 2 Batteries of guns so fairly similar (British had 15 units French 16).

Stephen had set up the terrain beforehand to save time.

Been a while since we used GDA but both found it was a fast playing game with good period flavour and we had only a few queries that were easily resolved.
It has a fairly arbitrary Command System (not unlike Black Powder in some ways) with Brigades being Hesitant on 1-1 on a D6 although one can get re-rolls by use of ADCs.
The availability of ADCs is however also arbitrary (ie dice dependent) but it all works overall.
Whilst no strict orders system as in Gen De Brigade/Over The Hills/Principles of War the Line Of Battle and Re-Deployment rules effectively make 'on the fly' maneuvering pretty much impossible anyhow.

I of course prefer some level of chaos/inertia in my games and feel the rules do generate a nice narrative (not as dramatic as FOB but close).
Like Black Powder the Brigade Morale rules can be brutal as a single Routed/Destroyed unit (or 2 Retreated units) forces a Brigade to Falter.
And as I found today even the loss of a Skirmish unit can cause the Falter.
We both had several extreme dice rolls (12 on 2D6) though of course balance feel in favour of the dice demon.
This saw a British Brigadier cut in two and a British Artillery Battery cause crippling causalities to a Veteran French column.
My poor dice seemed to be reserved for generation of ADCs (or more accurately lack of) and then seeing several Brigades become Hesitant !

But a fun game overall with a slick rule set although I still think Artillery needs limited as it could dominate a game at this level if Batteries too numerous..




French centre

French right

Wellington loves his central hill locations

British right

French advance on right

French Conscripts advance on left

And central Brigade moves forward

Skirmishing battle on right

Later on right with French assault repulsed

French Cavalry reserve unleashed (eventually) and then stuck Hesitant !

Central French Brigade has been Demoralised with remnants forced back

Field Of Glory II PC game and a couple of other purchases

Made a couple of purchases on Ebay and a downloaded PC wargame (been ages since I looked at PC games)


First up 3 sets of miniatures rules.
I had always heard good things about Corps d'Armee so was glad to see this available the other two I know nothing about but when has that ever stopped me !

PC game purchase (via Steam) is Field Of Glory II from Slitherine/Matrix
It is a port of the miniatures (although I think 1st version was a more direct port) rule set but with some tweaks for the PC environment.
It has a nice manual (PDF version sadly) but if you have played the miniatures game then its pretty intuitive.
I have only played initial tutorial and set up a 'luck dip' type custom game but quite impressed with this, good solid game play with a host of scenarios and campaigns and of course the custom battles and it sports 2-player/Pbem mode (not tried this).
The animations and battlefields are very nicely done with lots of viewing options including a top down view.
The interface is easy to use and seems to run on fairly low spec.

Here a couple of screenshots from ongoing Gallic vs Roman game showing a couple of the views available.

Seasons of Battle/Field of Battle solo Napoleonic Campaign ends...................

Managed to finish of the third battle of my Seasons of Battle campaign today.

French succumbed after a hard fought action.
Prussians pressed forward resolutely and relentlessly.
French firing was poor must have been damp powder supplied !?
The Prussian Cavalry on their left destroyed their counterparts in short order and this led to the rest of French Corps retiring.
French losses mounted and as in previous battles their morale collapsed (ie all morale chips expended) and they yielded the field.

Another enjoyable outing with SOB and FOB in solo mode.











Routing French on their left wing but they did rally

Central hill defended 

Young Guard come out to play but unable to stem the flow Note remnants of French cavalry wing on right

Overview of end with French withdrawing

First Morale Card had French rolling their General 12+1 dice (Blue) versus the standard D12 (Red) and this occurred ! as French needed to beat the score it was defeat.............

Seasons Of Battle/Field Of Battle 3rd solo encounter (and a bit of Principles Of War)

Started next battle in Napoleonic Campaign solo again.
Bit of an odd terrain map with two waterways (one of which is difficult Class III the other ClassII) but interesting.
French got a minor forward deployment and ability to re-deploy after set-up (not a biggie when soloing)
Prussians got Morale Boost (Strength) and could force French to deploy a Command (again not a biggie when solo)
French really need a decent wing here to restore their fortunes as any loss will see their National Will expire and end the campaign.
Action still ongoing with Prussian coming at the French and managing to steal their way across the major rivers bridge.
Not much in way of damage although one French unit in Rout.













Initial deployments with major and minor rivers showing 1 dense wood 1 moderate wood and two open (orchard) types with 1 rough hill and other gentle

French deploy on central hill mass

Prussians opposite

Prussian Reserve Division in march columns on their right flank

And the whizz to the bridge behind thrust of colleagues

French defending hill line giving town to onrushing Prussians

Struggle begins on French left (note 1 Legere Regt deployed as 2 small Skirmish units)

French Cavalry push forward on right. Young Guard waiting to counter attack

Prussian left wing cavalry moves up

Good old 3rd Prussian Grenadiers in fray again and have routed a French Line Regt !

Also got in another game (well sort of) of Napoleonic Principles Of War today at Stephens.
I tried my 1812 Russians again (this time with a Cossack Brigade) against French.
Very interesting rules these, stylised and abstract in some ways and I still dislike the lack of Elite/Veteran feel to better troops, but the do have a good Napoleonic feel to them.
But in game terms the poorly led Russians are a nightmare to use  as the French can literally run rings around them and seem to have every advantage.
Seems Russians cannot co-ordinate an attack (plausible) but nor can they defend very well in orders system (not so plausible).
We spent a lot of time discussing the merits of POW system vis a vis other sets we have tried (to detriment of actually completing the game once more) but the discussion was enjoyable of itself, nerds do love to be nerds :-)
Russians (again quite historically) would appear to need to maximise Artillery so they can counter French skirmish advantage whilst sitting stoically still in a defensive posture.
And as their Artillery is slightly stronger than French this is viable.
They struggle to take the offensive across the board so will need to try to use short term counterattacks and their guns to annoy the French.