THE JOY OF SIX: A NINE YEARS WAR BATTLE REPORT

The initial French position as seen from the steeple at Longchamps.

My friend George had been looking into gaming the wars of Louix XIV and/or the late 17th Century.  As such, we had been talking for some time about getting together for a game using my Nine Year's War miniatures and Volley and Bayonet variant to give him a feel for the system and whether it would suit his intentions. Last week we both found that we had Labor Day free and so decided to seize the opportunity to get it on the table.  In this game, I  put together a reduced scale version of my scenario for the hypothetical Battle of Longchamps, described as follows:

In June of 1692, William III marched south to break the Sun King's siege of Namur. Marshall Luxembourg marched north with his 60,000 man Army of Observation to block him. Heavy rainfall and swollen rivers kept the two armies from colliding in what would have been the largest open battle of the Nine Year's War. This game clears the skies and allows that pitched battle to happen.  [A complete game folder for this scenario is available on my Nine Years War page; there is an earlier post on the full version of this game, and a convention Batrep as well.]

In the original game, each side had three wings (left, center, and right), with a substantial reserve.  In this game, I cut out 1/3 of the table and dropped the French left/Allied right wings, and reduced the reserves.  I took the part of Luxembourg (the French) and George took up the baton of William III (the Grand Alliance). As usual, you may clix pix for Big Pix in this report. 

 The French: Must Hold 

The Grand Alliance: Must Force the French Position

(Above Left) Divisions in VnB have exhaustion levels. Rather than rosters, I use on-table camps to track these. The color coding on the camps corresponds to the division colors (Above Right): Units have strength points, for which I use magnets. These are color coded by division. When a strength point is lost, one pulls a marker off of the unit and places it on the division camp (and so you are able to track losses).  In the above picture, Grand Alliance Division Bellasise is denoted by yellow strength point markers. On the back of the stand, I have the unit IDs, morale grades, and some other unit information.   The blue tape marks each army's baseline, which must be guarded.  There is a more full explanation of the system on my aforementioned Nine Years War content page.

(Above Left) The view from behind the start position of the Prussians (ne Brandenburgers) and Hessians of Div Heiden on the Grand Alliance left. (Above Right) The Wild Geese (Clare and Lee) with French Rgt Limoison placed in depth anchor the French right. 

George kicks off the ball by marching smartly forward on Grand Alliance left, forming a line along the road.  Meanwhile, the Colonel General Dragoons holding Leuze brace for the coming onslaught.  

The Grand Alliance Right marches across the field, drifting towards the French right/center: what's George up to?

Next move, the Prussians assault Leuze, and rout the Col Gen Dragoons. So much for hopes of slowing down the allied advance here!

Meanwhile, on the French right/Allied left flank, the cavalry lines begin to jockey for position. The right wing artillery stiffens the line while Rgt Limoison (partially out of picture to the left) is positioned to counterattack Leuze at the base of the hill. 

The view from the French position on the left as the Grand Alliance divisions maneuver to their front.  The I decide to continue holding the line given that George can still shift effort.

A long view of the situation as it continues to develop.  French Rgt Limoison has retaken Leuze (near the center of the photo), but will be ejected and routed in the next turn by the Eppinger dismounted dragoons and Kurprinz regiment.  The gap behind Leuze is held by the depleted (and permanently disrupted) Col General Dragoons, the original garrison of Leuze.  George has pushed the English Fitzharding dragoons into the gap, and has now committed the Grand Alliance foot of the right towards the Leuze gap. The French reserve, the Fuziliers, have been released and are heading to the gap (just visible to the right/center of the photo behind the circular army command stand).  With the Grand Alliance hand now showing, the French Div Segurian, the second line of units on the Hill  (blue markers), will be sent marching to the Leuze gap. It will be a foot race!

The french guns disrupt the allied march across the front (disrupted units have yellow square markers), buying critical time.

Meanwhile, out in "Marlborough Country" on the French right/Allied left, the cavalry lines are mixing it up...

...with the French eventually getting the upper hand, forcing the Grand Alliance horse to bend back to refuse the Grand Alliance left. 

In the center, Lord Cutts and Col. Cambon (Huguenots in English service) draw the lot to mask French Div D'ussol and the artillery on the ridge while the big push goes in at the Leuze gap. 

Div Segurian (blue markers) begins to arrive: the Rgt Du Roi has secured the right flank of the line on the hill while Rgt Normandie and the Swiss Guards continue to march to extend the line to the right of the Fuziliers (blue markers with white crosses). The Col General dismounted dragoons are thrown in as stop gap in front of the Grand Alliance mounted and dismounted dragoons to buy time for them to complete the move.  Meanwhile, Grand Alliance Division Heiden continues to advance past Leuze and the Wild Geese (on the right) are bent back to make a stand against threats from two directions.

The crisis of the battle arrives: the Celts (Lee and Clare) in a last ditch defense on the French right are assaulted by the Teutons of Division Heiden from two directions. The Wild Geese would wind up repulsing division Heiden's all out assault (luck o' the Irish!), which would then reel back down the hill with loss.  The doughty Fitzharding dragoons and Eppinger dismounted dragoons finish off the remnant of the Col General dragoons, but not before the French would be able to establish another line to block the gap. This concluded the "high water mark" of the Grand Alliance advance, and we decided to call the game and go on to the next phase: Chinese takeout!  But it was a near run thing, indeed.
.
.
Although we achieved a result in about 3 hours, the win:loss parameters were always more a framework than an end unto themselves... 

 George, otherwise known as the daring William III

...the game was more about exercising the system and giving George a feel for the rules. It has been some time since I had taken out my 6mm Nine Years War armies and I was reminded of the attractions of gaming in this scale and in this colorful era. One thing I was quite pleased about was the organic "friction" this "old school" system generates without the use of mechanics like activation rolls, activation points, or card draws.  For instance, George's gambit of feinting an assault and then turning aside to march across the front of the French position was, in real world terms, a complicated and risky endeavor.  It could have delivered big results, but in the event it was disrupted by the French artillery, which was luckily placed at a critical point in the line. The guns did not blow units off the table, but their  overall effect was to foul up the clockwork-like interactions among the Grand Alliance formations necessary to pull off a coordinated attack at the point of decision--an impact that seemed quite appropriate and grounded.  There were other similar actions/reactions throughout the game (and in other games I've run in the past).  Playing with my League of Augsburg collections again gave me a renewed interest in finishing the final design in my  Nine Years War "cycle" of scenarios: the Battle of Neerwinden (also known as Landen): perhaps a winter project (there's no shortage of things to do!).

If nothing else, it provided a splendid afternoon of pushing toy soldiers on a day off from work:  Mission accomplished!

Excelsior!