The concluding episode from a couple of days gaming with three friends.
Game 3-of-3 (see previous posts for the other two games)
I had been intrigued by the comments on the 'Hinton Spieler' blog about the use of Neil Thomas' Napoleonic Wargaming Rules (henceforth NTNWR) and as I often play Napoleonics with my friends, I thought we should try them out. My thinking was that they should at least be quick and allow us to finish a game before everyone had to leave for home.
As three of us have 6mm Napoleonic armies, that was always going to be what we would use for this game, with Martin's Bavarians and my French taking on Steve's Austrians supplemented by a few of my Prussians to make up the numbers.
To save time we used the existing Hexon terrain layout from the previous games, minus the mountains and with the trees replaced by my smaller woods and some built up areas.
The deployment of the four 8-unit armies (one each) is shown below.
While that looks like a lot more than 8 units each, we were treating each NTNWR 'unit' as Brigade of four units ('bases' in NTNWR), each of four bases ('hits' in NTNWR). Thus, instead of keeping a record of hits (or using markers) until a base was lost after four hits, we simply removed a base for each hit. I knocked up some simple, but in the event quite restrictive, rules for how a brigade would deploy, depending on the formation (if Close Order foot).
The brigades (less Martin's Bavarian cavalry and one of Steve's Austrian cavalry, both out of shot), that effectively constitute what is called a 'unit' in NTNWR are shown below.
As you can see, if you count them, we each have eight units, allowing for those just out of shot. But using lots of 6mm figures in place of 28mm makes for armies that look far more Napoleonic in scale. We also used the ranges and movement distances as in the rules.
I took few photos during the game and made no notes so I won't attempt a narrative of the battle. Instead, I'll include a few more photos then go on to record my impressions of this my first experience with these rules.
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| The early turns were dominated by artillery |
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| With no interpenetration brigades were awkward to manoeuvre |
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| The Bavarian battery and troops in the built-up area looked formidable |
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| The Austrians tried - and failed |
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| Cavalry found it difficult to get past their own infantry |
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| The Imperial Guard hung back all game to avoid getting hit! |
In the end the Austrians were defeated and had to yield the field, although to be fair it was because many of their actions were driven by the spirit of play-testing, i.e. attempting the difficult to see how it worked out in the rules.
Post-Game Punditry
First, and probably most important, the game ran pretty quick, but lasted some time because, not only were we unfamiliar with the rules, but we had quite long discussions about how every new encounter played out. So, while there are some big simplifications in the rules it has to be born in mind that addressing some of the observations below risks slowing the game down, and I do want my games to run to a clear decision.
Pros (quick play is a given)
1). I very much liked the ability of infantry to easily repel frontal attacks by cavalry while fresh without forming square. The way this degrades as the units become worn, and need to be in square to survive, punishes the use of cavalry against any but sorely tried infantry (unless of course you can hit them in the flank).
2). The difficulty of manoeuvring units due to the prohibition of any form of interpenetration stops armies from being overly responsive. This together with, IMO, the relatively slow movement (infantry columns move 12cm) goes a long way to making up for an I-GO U-GO sequence and the absence of any command-and-control (C2) mechanism (the player has freedom of action to move each unit as he wishes).
3). Our reading of the rules was that units cannot change facing to their flank and that formation changes did not include a change of facing. This was very restrictive but on balance I felt it was a 'Pro' as, in the absence of a C2 system, it forced one to live with the consequences of earlier decisions.
4). Counter-battery fire was, to me, pleasingly ineffective.
5). The differentiation in range between rifles and muskets seems over done but the reduced hit rate of Light Infantry (and only they have rifles) compensates for this.
Cons
1). The inability to pass through friends in any way makes it very difficult for second-line units to advance to attack if the first-line unit is defeated. That and the second-line has to be some way back or the first-line when defeated will lose heavily if its retreat is obstructed by the second-line troops. On top of this, the retreat distance being only a half, or full, move means defeated infantry will take some time to clear the way for any follow up troops. Without any clear idea of the time or figure scale in the rules it's hard to judge whether this is reasonable, or not.
2). Artillery, unlike any other troop type, has nationality modified effectiveness that make the best (French & Russian) twice as lethal as the worst (British & Spanish). This sits uneasily with the simplified approach to other troop types, where all infantry, from Levy to Elite (the latter including Old Guard), fights on exactly the same factors, the only difference being in their respective morale tests.
3). Artillery is also equally effective against all target types, the only saves coming from being in cover or an artillery (dispersed) target. Infantry in line are therefore just as vulnerable as infantry in square.
4). The lack of clarity over whether you can charge through a battery to attack the Close Order infantry unit protecting it meant we just avoided doing this. But reading some of the voluminous pontification surrounding the rules makes me think this is what should happen.
5). Close Order infantry being unable to charge other Close Order infantry unless stronger than them seems sensible if restrictive. But it is not made clear about what happens if the defensive fire reduces the attacker to the point where this is no longer the case. As the defensive fire only occurs because the charge takes place, we decided that the charge would go in regardless.
6). There is no concept of disorder, i.e. temporary loss of effectiveness; units are ready to act immediately after a mêlée. All loss of unit effectiveness (apart from tactical and terrain effects) is permanent. But this simplification no doubt speeds play and reduces bookkeeping.
7). Morale tests only result in the loss of unit strength (troops) and never a Retreat, this kept things simple, but combined with the 'bloody' nature of combat in these rules meant units once committed would get ground down to nothing rather than flee.
8). The Army Lists are a bit 'gamey', Austrian Grenzer in 1809 having rifles and Prussian Jäger in 1813 having muskets? I think this is because NTNWR assumes the units are an amalgam of units and therefore Austrian light troops include Jäger and Prussian Jäger include some musket skirmishing troops?
Conclusion
Despite having written more under Cons than Pros, I definitely intend trying these again, as looking back on the game they are growing on me. Many of the aspects that seemed problematic often only appeared so until something else happened that seemed to balance things out.
I think some house-rules are inevitable, I'm an inveterate tinkerer, but hopefully I won't overcomplicate it and spoil their simplicity.
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