Sleepwalking through MeG & ALDG

This is just a very quick post, more of a 'diary entry', on a weekend spent trying out new rules, namely Mortem et Gloriam (MeG[1]) and Art de la Guerre (ADLG).  I also intended to try out another homebrew set but more on that later.

After a largely sleepless night on Thursday, it was down to Martin's in Brighton for a Friday evening in the pub together with Steve who'd also driven over for a gaming weekend.  A different pub this time, but still Harvey' s Best Sussex and beautifully kept into the bargain - went down a treat.

Probably not the best start, as I never sleep well after a beer session or in a strange bed.  The result, another largely sleepless night.

So, the Saturday dawned and Martin's friend John arrived with his delightful Italian Wars collection and his experience playing MeG to help us through a bath-tubbed refight of the Battle of Pavia, 1525.

Mortem et Gloriam

I took the Imperialist left wing with some Jinetes and Landsknechts (two pike blocks with attached light guns and two units of skirmishers).

Facing off against me was Martin with some Swiss (eek!), Genitors and cannon.

While outnumbered, Martin had the possibility of another Swiss pike block arriving later in the game - spoiler alert, they didn't.

My men took one look at the opposition ...

... and promptly stepped out towards them to try and finish them off before any more arrived.  Meanwhile, our respective cavalry units crashed commenced what was to be a long-drawn out mêlée.  Martin's cavalry, with their spears had an edge to start with but things evened up after the initial impact - luckily, they were not as fearsome as the Ottoman Dellis who were standing in for them.

A few turns later the first of my Landsknechts finally got stuck in, the other was lagging behind, delayed by the Swiss cannon fire.

The cavalry mêlée rumbled on, but only Genitors were taking losses ...

... as my second Landsknecht unit came up and ...

... joined in the Swiss-bashing session.

And then suddenly it was all over; first my Jinetes, still at full strength, routed what was left of their opponents ...

... then, as they came up alongside my Landsknechts the Swiss were gone[2] ...

...and all that was left was for Martin to ride over and sue for ransom.

While all this had been going there had been plenty of frenetic cavalry action taking place to my right.

But I had taken little of this on so just a couple of photos will have to suffice.  Firstly, the swirling cavalry fight which went to the French ...

... and finally, the arrival of the Spanish infantry whose firepower finally decided the combat.

Art de la Guerre

I was already starting to fade as John packed his Italian Wars armies and departed while Martin readied his 15mm armies on table for a game based on the Battle of Kleidion, 1014, between the Byzantine Basil II the 'Bulgar Slayer' and the Bulgarian Tsar Samuel.  We went for a fairly basic set up as time was short and as ADLG 'newbies'[3] we wanted to keep it simple.

This was played as a 'chit game'[4] so we had each picked a personal identity from among the commanders in the field and during the game took it in turns to pull out a name of a commander to play during each game turn.

I only took a few photos during this game as:

1. I wasn't enjoying it, this is not an indictment of ADLG, as I often dislike rule sets on my encounter with them; and,

2. I just couldn't stay awake and had to sack it early.

So, just a couple of choice pictures of Martin's nicely painted troops.

The Cancelled Game

The following day I was to run a game with my home-brewed rules for 6mm Napoleonics, albeit heavily based on a set of Napoleonic Rules for Large Scale Wargaming.

Unfortunately, worrying over those were really for a play-test kept me awake most of the night.  Now seriously sleep-deprived I had to apologise to my friends, take some Nurofen and go and lie down in a dark room.  

While I 'wimped out', Steve and Martin, like true gamers, broke out a Thirty years War game using Liber Militum Tercios[5] with the French taking on the Spanish.  As I didn't play in this game, I won't attempt to describe how it played out and will just post a few photos I took later in the day when after I was feeling better.

The French infantry dares to take on the Spanish Tercios, and wins!

The Musketeers ran away!

And finally, Martin's desperate attempt to get two '6's on just three dice to stop the Cardinal's Guard from breaking and fleeing the field.  He only threw three '6's on just three dice!  A 1-in-216 chance!!!

Post Mortem?

So, what did I learn from the weekend?  First and foremost a need to manage my sleep better.  But with regard to the rules, both MeG and ADLG are similar to the DBx series of games but have tried to steer them in different ways: MeG with multiple elements/bases as units and more sophistication to the unit activation actions and costs; and, ADLG with the slow attrition of units in place of just recoiling and kills.  From my limited sampling of these, I don't feel either adds much to game yet both, for me, seemed to increase complexity.  

In particular I felt that the way MeG breaks down the fighting to base against base defeated the value of multi-element unts and the rigidity of the battlelines in ADLG, due to units not moving in combat while they grind each other down, was (for me) too mechanical.  That said I enjoyed the MeG game and will have to try ADLG again as my first impressions are often short-lived.

Notes:

[1.]  To be honest I had tried a small game of MeG before, as you might've spotted in a previous post (link), really hadn't got much of a feel for it - but I was a complete virgin when it came to ADLG.

[2.]  Actually, there are still a couple of Swiss in the top right of the frame.  These are marking where their reinforcements were due to arrive, only fate determined otherwise.

[3.]  Martin had played a small club game of ADLG once before and had a copy of the rules, Steve and I had never even read them, let alone played them.

[4.]  A previous post (link) describes the 'chit game' concept developed as a way to cope with uneven numbers of players and players arriving late or leaving early. 

[5.]  We're all familiar with these rules having played them often e.g. (link).

A Cornucopia of Away Games and Mistakes

The cabin and painting desk have been deserted lately as I went to my friend Martin's place for a couple of day's gaming.  Well, perhaps 'mainly gaming' is a better description, as on the Tuesday evening we just went down the pub for a few pints of Harvey's Sussex Best.  Much like most of the later games I was too absorbed to take photos so this stock photo from the Interweb will have to suffice.

The following morning, when we got our act together, we had a game of 'Mortem et Gloriam', aka MeG, not something I had played before but I was keen to try it and Martin had played it several times as it's a popular rule-set at his local club and he wanted to get some more practise.

The game pitched my Normans as Sicilian Normans, with additional 'Sicilian' types being provided by Martin ... 

... against his Nikephorian Byzantines.

With a newbie (me), guided by an inexperienced player, unfamiliarity with rules saw this game run through to the early afternoon when, as the inevitability of a Norman win became apparent, we called the game.  The rules worked well in terms of outcomes and command structure, with commanders forced to prioritise their actions, but I didn't feel they offered anything new compared to existing rule-sets.  In particular I felt the focus on the files within units felt like a half-way house that was neither unit nor element focused and the separate charge and mêlée phases seemed to slow the game down.  However, these are just first impressions and I need to try them again sometime as I've often disliked rule-sets on first encountering them only to appreciate their virtues with more games.

The next game was a Thirty Years War clash using the 'Liber Militum Tercios' Rules, our favourite for this particular conflict.

These rules use order cards that are placed face down next to each unit with players alternately activating units to perform the order given them.

Looking to play something a little different we opted for an entirely mounted French force seeking to destroy a Spanish infantry force (plus one unit of horse); all troops being provided by Martin.

This proved a really interesting tactical conundrum with the more agile French horse looking for an opening that wouldn't involve frontally charging pike and the Spanish trying to deny them that opportunity.  In the end the French managed to charge a couple of the Spanish tercios in the flank (sorry, this is the only photo I have) ...

... but in both cases the Spanish, while taking many hits just survived being broken and with some French units refusing to charge managed to rally.  The French losses from these combats and Spanish musketry and cannon fire eventually saw several units break and the French conceded the field.  While a fun game with rules we've often played, we still made a number of mistakes that probably drove the outcome.  We also discovered we had always interpreted one rule incorrectly, luckily that error had no real impact on the game.  

So, onto a third game in the evening using Maurice; no picture of the rules so another image grabbed from the ubiquitous web-thingy.

This game used my 1745 armies (15mm Essex Miniatures) and some modifications to the rules to try and bring out a bit more conflict specific flavour.

No rule cock-ups this time, but I still haven't quite got the balance right between the two armies, and the Highlanders rolled over the Hanoverians without loss!

The following morning, we set up a DBM fight between the Rus (me) and the Bulgars (Martin), albeit the armies had to take some liberties with the Army Lists as we didn't have everything needed.

This game, like the earlier Tercios game, saw the Rus desperately trying to stop the Bulgar cavalry getting round their flanks, as they were fairly impervious to cavalry charging them frontally.  The Rus axemen ('Blades' in DBM-speak) were the least effective against cavalry so were held back as a reserve to plug any gaps that appeared as in the photo below - and contributed to the Rus' success in defeating the Bulgars.

The figures in this game were all Martin's beautifully painted 15mm Minifigs, so nice in fact that for once I took some decent photos, this time of his Byzantine Varangians being used to represent Rus Axemen.

Again we made a mistake!  This time over the PIP cost of moving irregulars but luckily corrected in Turn 2, so it had minimal impact on the game.  When this game ended it was lunchtime, after which I wended my way back home.  

So, four games in a day and half, lots of fun but lots of mistakes.  I'm not sure what the lesson here is, but I suspect I need to play more games with fewer rule-sets as it seems that, like so much in life, practise makes perfect, or at least less imperfect.

Battle of Adwalton Moor

John came over today for an ECW game using my 25mm Hinchliffe collection and my rules which are a mash-up of: Command and Colours (C&C) for the combat dice which also covers morale; Victory Without Quarter (VWQ) for the card-based activation; and, Brevis Tercios for the movement.  And, as it makes a nice headline photo, here's a rather nice photo of my siege gun that John sent me after the game.

Gog or Magog?

Looking for something a little different I opted for the Battle of Adwalton Moor, 1643.  This pitched a smaller, but better armed (mostly musket) force under Lord Fairfax in a good defensive position against a larger Royalist force under the Earl of Newcastle.  Newcastle had fewer foot (but more pike) but twice as many cavalry.  Accepting the Wikipedia estimates (there are others available), the two sides consisted of:

I had enough figures to fight this at a scale of one figure to 25 men.  For terrain I based my table on the map below taken from the British Battles website (www.britishbattles.com) clipped and with a 10x5 grid superimposed to show how I mapped the battlefield onto my 10'x5' table.

The following photos show the terrain set-up with the armies in their starting positions.  First, Newcastle's view of the Parliamentarian defensive position behind the hedges of the enclosed fields and the disused open coal mining pits...

...and then, Fairfax's view of the oncoming Royalist juggernaut.

The low sun coming through the windows didn't make for very good photos so, here's a few closer ones of the troops all ready for the off.

One troop type I was short of was Clubmen, a single element having to represent the fairly large crowd that accompanied Fairfax.

However, as these had little impact on the real battle, and in my rules are pretty ineffective, we decided that it wasn't going to significantly affect the game.

The first few turns went pretty quick; the Parliamentarians simply moving up to line the hedges...

...while their dragoons quickly abandoned their exposed position to nip behind another convenient hedgerow - soon to become notorious as the 'bloody hedge'.

Their opposing numbers, who had intended to take this key piece of cover, rapidly advanced to contest possession.   

In the ensuing scuffle, the Royalist dragoons came a poor second and fled.  But, before the victorious Parliament dragoons could recover, a regiment of horse came crashing over the hedge, broke them and cut them down in pursuit.

However, what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander, and the pursuing Royalist horse were hit by a fresh regiment of enemy horse who promptly drove them back the way they had come.  The following photo shows the position at the end of the turn, with the fleeing Royalist horse about to recross the contested hedge and the Royalist dragoons (white guidon) who started it all still in retreat - but they'll be back.     

Also, visible in the above, is the main body of the Parliamentarian foot unleashing a few volleys against the Royalist horse approaching the hedges.  The dice determined this shooting to be ineffective, but it was still a bit scary up close.

In the next turn the card-driven randomised move sequence handed the victorious Parliamentarian cavalry a chance to charge before their fleeing opponents could act, and so caught them in the rear and up against the 'bloody hedge' and wiped them out.

Further along the line the Royalist horse attempted to force their way into the hedged enclosures.  With the first few attempts being rebuffed.

But in the next turn, with the defending musketeers caught unloaded after repelling one attack, and courtesy of the fickle card-driven activation sequence, a subsequent charge managed to break in.  Not only did they manage to fight their way in but some spectacular combat dice saw them destroy the musketeers, but left them badly disordered (as shown by the small pile of green markers behind them).

While all this has been taking place all attempts by the Royalist artillery, including the mighty demi-cannon (32-pounders!) Gog and Magog, to soften up the Parliamentarians had been frustrated with their fire being repeatedly blocked by their own troops (as turned out to be the case throughout the game).

In the next turn, the fighting around the 'bloody hedge' continued with Crisp's Royalist troop ignoring the odds and plunging into the Fiennes' regiment of horse.  Things looked promising until their opponents threw four 'Flags' in the combat!

One in a Thousand!  (actually 1:1,296)

This saw them retreat all the way back to Adwalton; the next photo showing them disappearing into the distance along the old Roman road.  It was only because we were playing lengthways on the table that their 61" retreat didn't see them gone for good. 

But, once again, the more numerous Royalist horse had another unit ready to step in, and Loughborough's horse promptly threw back Fiennes' who sought shelter behind a friendly unit of foot.

But this time the Royalist pursuit was unable to remain in contact and, surprisingly for once, didn't pursue any further. 

Whether it was this that spooked the horse of Parliament's Sergeant Major General of Foot's horse is not known.  But (in a random event) he was thrown and consequently unable to exert any influence on the battle for a turn. 

Apart from the return of the rallied Royalist dragoons to the 'bloody hedge'...

...a lull settled over the rest of the battle where the exhausted troops stared each out as they sought to recover their breath (and order) ready for another effort.  The exception being another commanded shot unit, no longer benefiting from standing behind a hedge, being destroyed by the Royalist horse that had previously broken in (the enclosure now belonging solely to the Royalist horse).

Some early end-of-turn cards from the sequence deck saw little happen in the following turn.  But, the very next turn saw the 'bloody hedge' live up to its soubriquet with the Parliament horse charging and destroying the dragoons lining it.  It was all over so quick there was no time for a photo...    :o(

The value of reserves was again proven as Parliament's victorious cavalry were caught while pursuing and thrown back over the 'bloody hedge' by Caernarvon's horse, while yet more cavalry on both sides advanced alongside them.

Over in the enclosures, the Royalist horse started to press on into the next fields.

The following turn was dominated by Meldrum, who, in a random event, decided to launch all his available troops in an all-out counter-attack against the Royalists.

This saw his foot foolishly attempt to charge the Royalist horse, who promptly counter-charged and caught them while moving, throwing the foot into disorder.  Despite this and taking some heavy losses in the fight they threw back Loughborough's horse who can be seen in full retreat at the bottom of the next photo.

The cards then ended the turn before much else could happen, other than another random event saw Meldrum (again!) inspiring his troops to recover their order following his wild counter-attack.

In the next turn, the Earl of Caernarvon, now reduced to a single effective unit, his own regiment of horse, decided it was time to intervene in person.  So, eschewing any attempt to rally his blown regiments he attached himself to his regiment and charged.  This proved an inspired decision[1], as he destroyed the enemy horse to his front and the resulting pursuit saw him almost capture Fairfax, who fled the field to save his skin.  His pursuit also took him on to one of the Parliamentarian cannon whose crew decided, that rather than die for Parliament, they would fight for the King, and promptly changed sides.

What was happening elsewhere you ask?  Well, Newcastle had finally prompted Crisp's troop to start the long trek back from Adwalton to rejoin the fight.

And the fight for the enclosures had bogged down into an inconclusive slugging match, but the Royalist infantry had at last come up in support of their cavalry to break the deadlock.

The next turn was again a short one with little taking place beyond the massed Royalist pikes finally getting close enough to pressure Parliament's left flank.

And so, to the end-game as the sun sank slowly in the West (our time limit being reached with John having to leave).  The battle petered out with the turncoat artillery failing to inflict any harm on their erstwhile comrades - some say they weren't really trying.

And on this sorry note, with no decisive combat elsewhere, the battle drew to a close.  

But who had won?  The Royalist horse had successfully broken into the enclosures and were now being backed up by their foot...

...while at the other end of the field Caernarvon's horse were loose in Parliament's rear and the Royalist massed pike were about to make their presence felt.

This and a score of 9-5 (losses inflicted) in the Royalists favour, while not a clear victory, looks a lot like a winning draw to me, but then I would say that wouldn't I as I was the Royalist commander.  No doubt John will point to that fact that he did better than his historical counterparts and claim that as a win.

Perhaps we'll have to fight it out again?

Notes:

[1]. The inspiration was actually John's, as he suggested that was what Caernarvon ought to do - I decided to follow his advice, no doubt John wishes I hadn't!