Early Renaissance in Usk 2014

Italian Wars French vs Ming Chinese

Game 1 Italian Wars French vs Ming Chinese

Game 2 Italian Wars French vs Scots

Game 3 Italian Wars French vs Caroline Imperialist

Game 4 Italian Wars French vs Ottomans

Match Reports Index

Usk - this year with less snow, and with a Renaissance theme that also included some tweaked and updated armies that were refugees from the end of the FoGAM period - which was probably for the good, as the number of FoGR players now outnumbered those in AM by some distance.

A dreadfully early start involving leaving London around 630 was only briefly enlivened by an unromantic interlude in a Costa Coffee in the M4 services just outside Bristol, and then the intrepid band of four Central London warriors were across the bridge and into the land of mountains and dragons - sort of like in the Hobbit, but without quite so many, erm, hobbits… although come to think of it, Dave is a little short, definitely likes his breakfast …and none of us have ever seen his feet.

The lists for the Italian Wars French and Ming Chinese from this game, as well as all the other lists from the games at Usk can be seen here in the FoGR Wiki.

The draw had been, erm, sort of random, and therefore we dived headlong into unhistorical combat as our post-High Medieval European army found itself facing a Ming horde of Asiatic warriors, recently having invented gunpowder and having clearly embraced it far more enthusiastically than the French.

The table had a fair amount of terrain, most of which fell on our opponents side, leaving the Chinese little option but to do what they probably would have done anyway, and deploy all of their troops in a massively wide line just over 6" from the back of the board behind a wall of artillery. The French tactic was unsubtle - charge home, survive the shooting and then batter the Chinese in close combat. Not clever, but hopefully within our capabilities to execute, even off the back of a 5am alarm call.

The right wing was heavily mounted - the French Gendarmes and Reiters were vulnerable to shooting by the Chinese artillery, but they would close quickly, and as long as a couple of units made it into contact they should cut through the loose formation Chinese foot like a hot knife through soft and overly fermented artisanal cheese.

In the other gap in the terrain the Landsnechts were steaming forwards - no artillery facing them, just a lot of shooting units all with regimental guns (or probably organic light artillery, the Chinese being unlikely in my estimation to have copied the idea from Gustavus Adolphus' Swedesn some one hundred years in the future)

Alongside the Gendarmes charged the Swiss, straight at the artillery. The deployment order meant that the Chinese had actually deployed the artillery park after the Swiss had been placed, but in any case a huge resilient unit that moves faster than normal foote was probably not the worst target we could wish for the artillery to have chosen.

With a luxury of targets the Chinese artillery were struggling to make a decision as where best to aim - but the lead Gendarme unit was taking the initial brunt of firing, losing bases and cohesion as they galloped towards the orientals front line, encouraged by one of the four French Generals. Even if the Gendarmes were battered they could at least contact the artillery and prevent it from firing at the second wave of French troops.

On the far left of the table the French faced denser terrain and less opposition. Unsure as to whether they might actually be totally pants, the French Reiters and Carbine armed Light Horse advanced cautiously towards a small European town garrisoned by Chinese skirmishers, as in the distance some Chinese Cavalry also tried to work out if an average 6-pack of pistol armed Horse was something to fear or pity..

The main force of the French army had been advancing unimpeded and was now nearing charge range. The lead (or possible an alloy, however you'd need to ask Naismith what they are cast from) Gendarmes were now reduced to 2 bases, and peeled away to the right in order to try and survive at least into contact with some of the Chinese pedestrians as the waves of other Horse rode onwards, as did the Swiss who had suffered fearful casualties as they closed on the enemy guns

The Landsnechts were having an easier ride, with no artillery facing them - but as soon as they inched any closer they would be subject to a furious barrage of light artillery and arrows from the countless numbers of Chinese infantry. The French generals dithered as to whether the French arquebusiers could play a useful role in absorbing some enemy shooting and helping the Landsnechts get in..

Everyone was now poised to go in - it would be a fearsome clash, and one which the loose formations of the Chinese foot would be severely pressed to withstand the dense blocks of French Horse and Swiss foote.

The two lines clashed… although by now the 14-stong Swiss block had been reduced to just 10 bases.

Luxuriating in the sheer spectacle, I took the opportunity to take another shot from a different angle of the incredibly neat and tidy Chinese line. The Reiters and Gendarmes are in contact in the foreground, with the thinned out Swiss next, and over the hill the Landsnechts too are ready to go in.

On the far side the Reiters had finished reading the rules, and were pushing forwards against the confused Chinese cavalry. Whilst reading the rules on their own combat capabilities they had also stumbled across a section on LH vs LF combat and LH move distances in Difficult Terrian, which they had passed onto the grateful yet still somewhat surprised LH Carabins, who were as a result chasing the Chinese LH back through the village in tandem with some Landsnecht handgunners!

The Landsnechts themselves were ready now for combat, and had fared far better than the Swiss, with the whole unit still being intact as they got to nostril-snorting range with the Chinese bowmen opposing them.

The charge of the Gendarmes had unsurprisingly ridden straight through the lightly armed and armoured Chinese infantry, and all 6 surviving bases were now in full pursuit of the tattered remnants of the units they had been fighting and were gleefully heading to the supporting lines of units cowering behind, hoping to catch a couple of Chinese generals on the way.

The Gendarmes were unstoppable, in the way that troops who are +2 POAs up in most phases tend to be. They rushed onwards riding down anything in their path, not even worrying about going into rough terrain as they clamoured to cut down more Chinese infantry

Like the Swiss however, the Landsnechts were making heavy going of beating their opponents, even though their pikes and armour were giving them similar levels of advantage In combat to the Gendarmes.

Rather irritatingly and improbably they found themselves losing bases and cohesion against a theoretically inferior foe.

But the Swiss were doing even worse - admittedly they were facing Heavy Weapon armed troops who were counting ++ for the overlaps, but even so this was not going according to plan. The big Swiss Kiel was now hanging on as a Fragmented marker made a surprising appearance

The Landsnechts continued to struggle as well, as their commanded committed himself to the front line in an attempt to stop the rot

But the rot afflicting the roots of the oak tree of Swiss Pikeness was proving to be so pervasive that the only saving grace was that William Tell was not using it for archery practice that day, as the Kiel turned and fled with only 7 bases left out of the initial 14 - at the very edge of Autobreak, and not a single base loss inflicted on the Chinese in return!!

In a vain attempt to try and make the report more interesting than a long series of photos of the same two lines of units locked in stationary combat, enlivened only by the appearance and removal of the occasional marker the French had moved up their Arquebusiers to add a little variety to the composition. Taking this role altogether too seriously they immediately added yet more interest to the "spot the difference" competition by themselves picking up a DISR marker from the Chinese shooting. Ouch!

On the far left the Chinese LF had now retreated clean through the village in the face of the French LH, and the Reiters were locked in a rather ineffectual death struggle with the Chinese cavalry facing them. If the Chinese cavalry could be beaten, three units of light gunnes lay in the path of the Reiters - a chance for the unfashionable pistoleers to play a decisive role in the game perhaps?

Finally the Landsnechts, perhaps hearing from their own handgunners how well things were going suddenly decided that the time had now arrived to make hay in the Chinese suncshine. As the strains of Radiohead's "Fake Plastic Trees" from the classic album "The Bends" swelled to a crescendo whilst writing thus very sentence, the Landsnechts made one huge extra push, and brought the unit acing them to the brink of autobreak! This would surely open up a huge hole in the Chinese lines through which soon they surely would be advancing, no doubt marching to the tap tap of the keyboard and the epic rock vibrato guitar chords of track 5, "Bones"…..

Bloody Hell! In a near-unique example of "Practice" following in the well trodden footsteps of "Theory", the Reiters had also selected this moment to achieve a decisive breakthrough against the Chinese cavalry - their better weapons, armour and 50% advantage in numbers finally telling as the Oriental horsemen lost bases and cohesion - something they, in their general-less state were never going to now recover from! Like a favourable 5th round FA Cup draw for Fulham in which the winner of the replay finds that they will get a home game against lower league opposition whilst the top 4 in the Premier League are all drawn against each other, the path to the Chinese artillery park was now a veritable road to Wembley almost tangibly within the grasp of the previously unfancied Reiters

Whilst "FA Cup Glory" now appeared to be the destiny of the Reiters, at least the French Arquebusiers were still upholding their end of the overstretched metaphor by emulating Fulham's EPL (that's for any American readers) form and had failed to survive the peppering of archery and had now turned and broken.

But as the proto-musketeers fled, the Landsnechts had finally gotten over the finish line - the Chinese facing them gave up their stubborn resistance and routed, to be pursued by the jubilant Germanic mercenaries who now also saw a soft Chinese underbelly appearing before them, ready to be crushed under the teutonic boot !

The Gendarmes too had finally gotten bored of running down 2nd string peasant formations, and had gotten their sh-t back together sufficiently to reform, and turn their attentions to rolling up the Chinese infantry who had proved so successful against the Swiss earlier in the game. The Chinese had done well, but the Gendarmes were a different proposition entirely,,

The Reiters continued their spectacular cup run with an away win on the road against an under strength light artillery unit who were by now saving their ammunition for an upcoming midweek league 6-pointer, their cup dreams of a win against the Reiters sacrificed for the long game of avoiding relegation back down to FoGAM.

With the Gendarmes now rolling up the Chinese line from right to left, the Landsnechts also turned left and started their own Chinese carpet rolling trick. Things now looked bleaker than a bleak thing on a bleak night in Bleak House on Bleaker Street for the Ming.

Here's the same sort of photo again, just in case you missed it last time.

The Gendarmes were busily making sure the Chinese deployed all of their available cohesion markers as they drove the enemy infantry back behind the line of by now extremely worried Chinese gunners

The Chinese Halberdiers were already exhausted from their exertions against the Swiss, and proved only a minor obstacle for the rampant French Nobility. They turned and fled, leaving the gunnes undefended

The Gendarmes gratefully took advantage of the open goal and racked up even more APs in their grand ride through the Chinese rear echelons

Finally, in a glorious foretaste of Wembley in May of this year, the Reiters threw off their patchy league form and lifted the final AP trophy in the form of the last Light artillery unit to send the 23 BG Ming army spiralling to defeat!

The Result is a 21-4 victory for the French!!.

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

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?

Game 1 Italian Wars French vs Ming Chinese

Game 2 Italian Wars French vs Scots

Game 3 Italian Wars French vs Caroline Imperialist

Game 4 Italian Wars French vs Ottomans

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