FoG:R Renaissance in Britcon 2012
Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German vs Later Swedish
Game 1 Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German vs Thirty Years' War French
Game 2 Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German vs Early TYW Swedish
Game 3 Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German vs Later TYW German Catholic
Game 4 Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German vs Later Swedish
Game 5 Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German vs Early TYW Swedish
Game 6 Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German vs Imperial Spanish
Surprisingly after 4 games the French sit sort of in mid table, with north of 40 points so far. That isn't going to win gold, but a placing might be on the cards with a following win and some favourable results in the next few games, so a sensible evening and a good night of sleep is clearly in order.
The lists for the Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German and Later Swedish from this game, as well as all the other lists from the games at Britcon can be seen here in the FoGR Wiki.
A quick ask-around in the pub at 1:30am establishes the fact that the 5th game starts around 8:30am the following morning, so after the third consecutive breakfast of cereal and a sausage sandwich (careful…!) (Oh, And "Red Sauce" in case you listen to 5-Live on a Saturday Morning) the Submarine Strategy is in full effect. Yet again the French find themselves on the same side of religion in a Protestant Civil War. The TYW was a right dogs breakfast, however this much Protestant on Protestant action is starting to get a little wearing, especially as it involves yet more Salvo-armed Swedes - making the French infantry's Impact Foote capability looks a little underpowered by comparison.
The terrain is also horrific, with a super-massive steep hill dominating the middle of the table and plenty of clutter elsewhere which will dramatically limit the Swedish advance. The French weight their infantry to the left hand side where the Swedes are almost obliged to deploy the bulk of their Foote, and brace for impact. The Swedish army is the opposite of the one faced earlier, with on few high quality units rather than lots of average ones. It also has a remarkable amount of Horse which are playing on the right of the table.
The French start with the traditional attempt to occupy rough terrain and use Dragoons as if they were ancient era Light Horse, as the Dutch Pike and Shotte look on in disappointment. The Swedes facing them comprise most of the Horse and Dragoons, a couple of Salvo Foote Commanded Shot units and a proper full octane full leaded Swedish Pike and Shotte formation
The Germans are also on the same flank, allowing the Cuirassiers to operate together and meaning all 4 Dragoon units can get themselves into trouble in the same area of the field
On the French left, both Guard and Petits Vieux infantry sit and wait patiently as the rather rubbish French Horse think about sneaking off for a Gitane and trying not to participate at all after their embarrassing attempt at combat in the previous game
The French Foote push up cautiously, attempting to draw the two Swedish infantry formations apart so they can both gang up 2 on 1 on a Swedish unit … although a far better option would be if they can avoid fighting altogether. The Swedes also have a harquebusier unit floating around on this flank, but it seems unlikely to add much to the battle as the terrain and a swift advance by one of the Petits Vieux has already blocked off any chance of sneaking around a flank.
The Swedes are feeding all of their Horse to the far edge of the battle line, and the Dutch and German Cuirassiers move up to meet them. German and French Dragoons appear for once to be doing a reasonably competent job of slowing the enemy advance, but of course the one unit supported by its General has been shot by artillery and has gone DISR already.
German Dragoons make a dash for the woods on the Swedish deployment zone, where they encounter a 2-strong unit of Commanded Salvo shot - who are unable to fore back, generating the sort of odds the Germans can actually feel happy with.
The German Pike and Shotte unit has pushed up almost ahead of the 3 units of allied Cuirassiers, and suddenly the Swedish mounted attack is facing overwhelming opposition. The French army starts to feel sufficiently confident of the position it has gotten itself into that the French general attempts to withdraw the Dragoons before anything too bad can happen to them
FoG:R hint -Infantry in a wood only shoot with one rank, and as Salvo Foote need 2 bases to get one shooting dice, they cannot actually fire when in a wood.
The German Pike and Shotte unit has pushed up almost ahead of the 3 units of allied Cuirassiers, and suddenly the Swedish mounted attack is facing overwhelming opposition. The French army starts to feel sufficiently confident of the position it has gotten itself into that the French general attempts to withdraw the Dragoons before anything too bad can happen to them
The other flank is a very tidy line of Frenchmen staring at some rather tentative Swedes. Every time the Swedes move forward, the French extend their line further to the left, threatening the Swedes flank should they dare to advance further
Suddenly the French Commander realises that the reason his artillery unit have been underperforming all game may be down to the fact that the gun appears to have been glued onto the base the wrong way round - so the cannon-ball holding man and the blo9ke with that giant cotton bud thingy are both at the back of the piece, whilst the commanding officer is pointing backwards, not at the potential target to the front. A swift piece of super gluing later and order is restored…
As the French attempt to withdraw their Dragoons, the Swedish Salvo Foote get in a few shots and manage to break - as usual - the French Dragoons, who rout back towards their own lines, much to the consternation of their accompanying General who was sent to the front with them precisely to prevent this sort of thing from happening.
The German Pike and Shotte, together with the many units of Cuirassiers are forming a reception committee for the Swedish mounted wing. With Dragoons actually doing what they are supposed to do, supporting their own Horse and sniping at the enemy, this appears to be a potentially successful defensive attack that is developing as the various arms of service all are working together as they should
The French Foote are where they want to be - a long way from the two Swedish Brigades !
The Swedes deploy out their Finnish Hakkapelita Horsemen and ready themselves for a blood-curdling charge - which the German and Dutch Cuirassiers and German infantry are actually quite looking forward to. On the far flank, a unit of Swedish Carabiniers has ended up facing off against one of the Cuirassier units and looks dangerously exposed..
French Dragoons rout back past the rather bemused Dutch, who are usually deployed on the opposite flank to the Germans and so rarely get to see the depths of the debacle that the 2-string Dragoon units inevitably get themselves into.
German Cuirassiers tee themselves up for a charge against Swedish Reiters who are unable to evade - even the inevitably DISR German Dragoons can see that they will enjoy spectating this one.
An enemy base gone at Impact and things are going swimmingly for the Teutonic heavy metal merchants - in melee their advantage will continue and the Average Reiters are surely not going to be around for long, knocking a sizable hole in the tiny 12 unit Swedish army already
Blam! The Reiters rout, and are cut down in pursuit as the Cuirassiers revel in the spectacularity of their dramatic victory. Not pursuing would have been nicer, but at least a 1 for 1 trade is good when you have 16 units to the enemy's 12, and in any case 2 Cuirassier units and one unit of Pike and Shotte should be more than enough to beat the Hakkapelita
The Germans and Dutch form a remarkably coherent line - leaving the exuberant Finns with little choice other than a noble Death of Glory charge relying on their advantage at Impact to carry the day
On the same flank an incompetent log jam has paralyzed both sets of infantry, as both the Dutch and the Swedes have conspired to pin each other's Dragoons in front of their battle troops in such a way that it is impossible to extract them. A Dutch-Swedish-Mexican standoff ensures, confusing enough from a military standpoint, but potentially mind bogglingly horrific were it to ever result in the setting up of a three way fusion food restaurant in an affluent suburb of Stockholm.
Yep, both sides are still inching towards each other on the other flank. No change there so far….
The newly re-energised and refocused French guns are in full effect, and having started pointing the right way actually do some real damage - getting two hits and then destroying a 2-strong Salvo Foote Commanded Shotte unit that the Swedes had had lurking in the rough ground. That knocks another cheap unit off the Swedish break point, and removes a threat to the German Pike and Shotte Formation who had been a little nervous about the prospect of being hit by a Salvo unit along with the Hakkapelita
The Finns go in, against a wall of Danish steel, whilst a German Dragoon unit executes a successful evade against the other Swedish Commanded Shotte unit. The Danes just need to stand at impact and then the tide of battle will surely swing in their favour.
The Danes prove to be steadfast in the face of Finnish exuberance, and in fact it is the Finns who suffer a base loss - the Cuirassier wall is now a POA up across the line, has more men fighting and generally are hard as nail. This is how things are supposed to work...
The situation gets even better as the Finns lose another base in melee. The Cuirassiers are exercising relentless Dutch Courage and German efficiency in their lager and competence fuelled grinding down of the Finns
The rest of the Dutch contingent is making as good a fist of things as they can with a clever defensive formation - which suddenly is uncluttered by French Dragoons as they explode and are removed from play.
The Finns are being knocked down like ninepins (although there are only four of them) but one particular Dutch Cuirassier unit is finding it heavy going too and is by now DISR. Unfortunately it is the one right in the middle of the Dutch line !
To make things even more challenging for the Finns, they decide to let their Commander be pulled from his horse and captured by the Dutch - a move which spreads dismay across the Swedosh lines like shrimp paste on a crispbread
With things unravelling fast, the Swedes start to get desparate and throw in their own Cuirassiers too
And it works! The Dutch drop even further to FRAGGED
On the less exciting part of the table, the French infantry were maneuvering slowly in their rather transparent attempt to gang up 2-on-1 on the Swedish Brigades - and were experiencing some success in their perambiulations, if not in actual shooting and stuff
With the Dragoons safely out of the way, the 2-on-1 idea was also catching on with the Dutch too, as the third Swedish Brigade inched slowly forward
But the Horse battle was anything but slow, as everyone rolled as many dice as they could safely lay their hands on and set about each other at close quarters with duelling pistiols. The Finnish Hakkkkkapelllllitttttaaaa were by now down to just two bases, but one of the Dutch allied Cuirassier units was also by now fragmented - and the Swedes had committed their own Cuirassiers, and even the German Pike and Shotte were in on the dust-up
Suddenly, units broke and fled on both sides - with the Swedish Cuirassiers taking it a lot more personally than most of the Dutch and German units on the French team were doing
Finally, the first Swedish Brigade charged home against the French Guardes and Petits Vieux. All that movement was not wasted after all...
And all the hanging around had obviously done absolutely nothing for the French infantrys readiness, as they rolled abysmally to get battered in the Impact phase. the Swedes were now in their stride..
DISR markers sprouted on the French units, and bases went skittlong away back to the box at a rate of knots
Another bad development - if not an entirely unexpected one - as a unit of French Dragoons breaks and flees as it is sniped by long range artillery
But the battle looks like it will be decided shortly by some good old fashioned Pike and Shotte action, as the Germans chew slowly through the cohesion states of the enemy Cuirassiers. text
Not wanting to miss out and hoping to claim some glory, suddenly the French Guardes make amends for their earlier shambolic display and hand a caning out in the melee phase to the shocked Swedes, who had surely felt they had already done all of the hard work in this combat
Massive crossfire then puts paid to another Swedish unit, as their Dragoons learn the lesson that the French ones have been trying so hard to demonstrate - Dragoons are suceptible to being shot!
And with that, and the fall of another Swedish Brigade, the game is over
The Result is a 22-3 win
Click here for the report of the next game in this competition, or read on for the post match summaries from the Generals involved, as well as another episode of legendary expert analysis from Hannibal
Post Match Summary from the Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German Commander
Vive le France! Our special Gallic form of Protestantism is kicking ass and taking names all across Europe, and soon we will have Puritanism with a hint of garlic and a foil-wrapped square of high quality butter on the side across the North European plain!
My boys fought bravely here, and even better I was able to protect the actual French troops and let the Dutch and Germans do all of the dangerous fighting, thus ensuring that the sartorial elegance of the French Guards and Petits Vieux was preserved, which is an important consideration given we are rapidly approaching an era where finely embroidered lace sleeves will become the enduring image of a swathe of warfare spreading like an unfurling tablecloth across half a continent.
Noticing that half of my artillery park had been firing backwards for the previous 4 games also helped, and as with the previous game, this art of co-ordination between Horse, Foote, Dragoons and Guns is starting to take shape nicely. If only the competition lasted for another 6 games after this I would be more than happy - although the stench of Eau du Wargamer in this room would probably become utterly unbearable around the middle of game 7, and may actually manifest itself in physical form and enter the Mid War FoW competition using a quite nicely painted DAK army by the end of game 9.
Le Strategie du Submarine is also now in full steam ahead mode - having reaped a near maximum this game I can almost see the medals podium with a similar score in game 6. That would be a turn up for the books eh?
Hannibal's Post Match Analysis
I doubt there will be a turn up for the books, as it appears ever more like your army has a Turnip as its General, and fortunately for you the Swedes failed to mash you up as their brethren had so successfully done in the previous games.
You fluttered like a moorhen's heart and were again forced into a successful strategy through your lacklustre deployment and the rigorously executed but somewhat misguided policies of your opponent - so no credit can go to you this time as the plan was planned, executed and conceived by your enemy. This was a game they lost, not one you won.
The terrain had left a board cluttered beyond imagining, and there were but two channels down which it was possible to press an attack. You still gambled by placing all your cavalry eggs in one basket, and only fortune and your opponent's decision to also attack with a mounted strike force on that wing allowed you do meet Horse with Horse. If the Swedes had adopted a more even deployment and pursued any sort of quality mounted strike on your left, the rather rubbish French Horse could have been swept away, and with them the flank of your whole army and your best troops.
The one thing I can give you credit for is the way you failed to move much on the left - but even you are not foolish enough to advance swiftly to combat against troops who are blatantly better than you in quality, numbers and skill. So, you failed to do something staggeringly incompetent on the left, and you set up a solid line and let the opponent attack it on the right. Bully for you…
Click here for the report of the next game in this competition
That's the end - so why not go back to the Match Reports Index and read some more reports?
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Game 1 Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German vs Thirty Years' War French
Game 2 Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German vs Early TYW Swedish
Game 3 Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German vs Later TYW German Catholic
Game 4 Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German vs Later Swedish
Game 5 Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German vs Early TYW Swedish
Game 6 Thirty Years' War French, Dutch and German vs Imperial Spanish
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