FINAL APPROACH TO GAME DAY

This is just a quick post to keep things alive in these parts. My time has been taken up with preparation for our club's Game Day, which will be happening this weekend! Above is the situation (the map is from the Columbia Games Napoleon block game). The Penguin (in case you were wondering) is the mascot of our club. Here is the situation:

The Game Day battle is premised on an alternate version of the 1815 Campaign.

15 June, 1815. Napoleon has crossed the frontier and concentrated at Charleroi, pushing back the Prussian pickets. He orders Ney to take command of the left wing of the Army of the North and press north up the Charleroi–Brussels road towards the Anglo-allied army to "drive back the enemy" while Napoleon drives up the Fleurus road to do the same to the Prussians.

The Prussians are concentrating in the vicinity of Fleurus (Ligny), while Wellington, who has been “Humbugged,” gives orders for the Anglo Allied army to concentrate at Nivelles (these were the actual orders). The Prince of Orange and Bernhard of Saxe Weimar, as they did historically, move to Quatre Bras on their own initiative to block the French.

16 June, 1815. Wellington, not recognizing in time that the French are not flank marching towards Hal, fails to reinforce Quatre Bras. Ney follows his orders more effectively than in history and breaks the unsupported Anglo Allied Force at Quatre Bras. French pursuit disrupts the Anlgo Allied attempt to concentrate at Nivelles. Napoleon decisively smashes Blucher at Ligny.

17 June, 1815. Isolated from the wrong-footed Anglo Allied army, the shattered Prussians are forced to retire towards Liege. Blucher, who was overidden in a cavalry action, is wounded and out of action. Von Gneisenau assumes control of the Prussians. Napoleon shifts the main effort towards eliminating the Anglo Allied Army. He turns to Grouchy and detaches a wing of the Army of the North to pursue and complete the destruction of the Prussian Army of the Lower Rhine.

18 June, 1815. Wellington, gathering together his forces Hal, is obliged to retire, with Napoleon in pursuit. Meanwhile, the pursuing Grouchy collides with lead elements of a Prussian force advancing from Hannut. Apparently, Gneisenau has rolled the dice and brought the only remaining Prussian forces in theater forward. A meeting engagement is developing in the Ramillies Gap between the Mehaigne and Geete rivers....on to Game Day, October 14, 2017!

Today, I will concentrate on putting together the "game box" to run the game (the dice, rulers, markers, terrain markings, etc, etc).  Here's what it looks like after two weeks of preparation....

The terrain all stacked and ready to be inventoried one last time and then stuffed into tubs and boxes for the trip to set up on Friday night. With two 18'x5' tables and one 20'x6' table, the multiple game mats are a major item (there are two more rolled up in the cardboard box, on loan from a fellow club member for the occasion: thanks, Bob!)...

The Prussians and French sorted and placed in boxes organized by command, and stacked ready to go. Last step will be to add some identifying information to the boxes that don't have them.

Above left, the "game box" stuff still spread out and waiting be inventoried and packaged. It sounds quite anal, but having 20+ people show up on a Saturday and then not having something like enough dice  to run the game would be no joke. Above right, all the documents sorted and ready to go.

Above, one last minute project that worked out beautifully. I needed more town blocks than I had, I realized, and was at something of a loss--no matter how hard I stared at the 4 that I had, they didn't expand to 13. I wanted a uniform look, so didn't want to gather the extras from among the group (who would have been happy to contribute). I hadn't realized how short I was on this particular terrain item until it was too late to order something through the mail.  Then it came to me: the Interwebs! Of course! A Google Search for "Cobblestones" brought up many options. Here is just one search result for printed cobblestone patterns. In short order, I had downloaded a likely pattern, printed it out, mounted it on mat board, cut it out (x13), and "poof"--end of problem. Furthermore, these will be a nice addition to my collection for future use! But...

...there was one project (above), longer in the planning, that didn't work out. I had an idea for the army commanders to be able to designate a "main effort." I had these spare figures about, so thought that I could facilitate the idea with special stands (which would be really easy to use in practice: plunk the thing down and there ya' go: "Main Effort Here"). Of course the definition of "main effort" in game terms remained vague...

...and never got fully developed in time for the Game Day. As you can see from the above, the concept revolves around assigning a number of bonus dice (up to 6 fit on the stands) to the main effort. Exactly what these dice would do, however, remains undefined (lots of ideas, none of them workable). I also could use chits or some other kinds of markers (other than dice), but once again, not in time for this Game Day. So, I have some neat special stands that will have to wait for another day to see the table.

In the meantime, the practice games have been done. The key players have been briefed. Their battle plans have been prepared. And now I must finish up the last bits of prep and packing.
 
Then, on to Game Day!

FRIDAY NIGHT AT THE FIGHTS: RAMILLIES, 1815, GAME DAY PRE-FIGHT

On Friday night last (29 September) I ran the final tune up game for our upcoming October club game day event. The hope was to get as many core members of each of the sides together for a final practice with the rules and to run a scale version of the game under the same victory conditions so that everyone would be versed in the situation, troops, and mechanics. Unfortunately, life hit several of our members in the forehead at the last moment, so we didn't have a full turnout, but it was still quite good, with six players. 

Playing for Team Prussia, above left, were Mike (white shirt), Bob, and AJ (just out of picture), of AJ's Wargaming Blog. Playing for Team France were, above right, from left to right, Earl (otherwise known as "boxcars"), Ralph, and Pete--who was on loan from Team Prussia. The game was held at AJ's (who graciously offered to help) on his big game table: 12' x 6'. One of the major objectives I was after, aside from the earlier ones, was getting a look at the figure to space ratio on a larger table...

 ...the main table on game day will be even bigger: 20' x 6'.  I  downscaled it onto AJ's 12' table, and deployed roughly 2/3 of the troops to see how things fit.  I was concerned about not having enough troops for the space on game day. As can be seen above, the troops quite handily filled the 12' table, with space to maneuver.  I now don't have any worries about having too few figures for the larger table on game day!  There will also be connecting tables on each side to add depth to the game as well (but more on that in the AAR after it happens). In short, the exercise achieved its ends--oh, and it was a fun game on a Friday Night, too!

 

Continuing from his streak on the last game night, Earl's dice were red hot. If he keeps this up on game day, it will be "game over" for the Prussians!  Given the number of troops, we didn't get to a conclusion, but still got a good feel for the flow for game day.  

If you're curious about the title of this post, Ramillies, 1815, the scenario is based on an alternate version of the 1815 campaign that I concocted---mainly to justify putting all of my Prussians on the table against most of my French--don't we all strive to have a game where we can lay out all of our stuff? I'll give full details in my game report in the wake of the event. So patience, dear readers, until then...

Excelsior!

 

AUSTRIAN INFANTRY 1850-59 (OR THEREABOUTS)

 I've been very involved with preparation for our club's upcoming October Game Day, so blogging has lagged a bit. This has taken up much of my time and attention, as far as hobby activities, but I do have some news to report on my Chocolate Box Wars project.  The last of my Austrian contingent has been completed: the infantry.  

I wanted my Austrians in white, and so I decided to capture the natty look of the 1850-59 Austrian army (above). These pictures are all from the New York Public Library Vinkhuijzen Collection of Military Uniforms (a resource that you must visit if you haven't already).  Naturally, I couldn't just acquire Austrian infantry....

...Instead, I went back to the Perry British Intervention Force line of figures, specifically the BIF 7 and 8, British Line Infantry Marching in 1855 Shakos--which seem to me to be an excellent all purpose figure that could be used for any number of the mid-century forces. These figures fit in well with my other conversions, particularly the Austrian Grenadiers and the Honved Grenzers--the latter I will probably now switch over to Austrians, given that they are also Perrys. (Which means my Austrian Grenzers will move over to the Hungarians, since they are Steve Barber figs that will fit in with my Steve Barber Honved infantry). But back to the current topic, the Austrian infantry. They look the part of Austrians, to my eye.

I cannot take credit for anything other than the basing and a bit of touch up (finicky creatures that we all are). These figures I had painted for me by the superb Brush Too Far painting service, and a wonderful job  they did, too!  I'm very pleased at how they came out. 

 When I get a chance, I'll do a "pass in review" post for my Austrians, as I have for my Prussians and Danes.  In  other news, I've recently heard from Steve that more of the Hungarian/Honved figures will be coming out soon.  With luck, I'll be able to complete my Honved force soon! 

We now return to our normally scheduled programming. I have a game coming up this Friday, and if things don't get too involved, there should be some Napoleonic eye candy coming in the near future.