Field of Glory Renaissance in Britcon 2011
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It's a sensible night of not too much drinking, tempered with a rather unwise highly spiced kebab.. and at the ungodly yet reassuringly rain-soaked hour of 830am the 2nd stage in the Campaigns of Louis XIV are underway... This time it's a more traditional Swedish army
All the lists can be seen here. (Any videos in these reports are all pretty short - well under a minute)
In the photos of this battle my troops have bases which are mixed earth and grass, my opponents are similar, but have unpainted edges showing the wood they are made of. All the Swedish figures are I think from Testudo.
Terrain fell with a big forest in the middle of my deployment forward zone, perfectly designed for dragoons to go and do their dragooney stuff, adding more weight to the adoption of "Do Dragoons go in the woods?" as a proverb or aphorism or somesuch
The enemy tried to hide their troops with a bit of sneaky hand action....
The Swedish army, as usual, came colour coded for easy assembly into Divisions
The French were in a quandry - should they advance or not? The French gunners threw dice at the Swedes, but they fell short
Dragoons started to do their dragooney thing
The French Horse were outmatched, and facing better armoured Impact horse - so they decided - having seen people do this before - that they might benefit from moving dramatically across the table behind their own lines, leaving French foote to face off the Swedish mounted wing.
Look-it is possible to redeploy!
Over on the other wing, the French were already confident they had enough troops at their disposal to keep the Swedes at bay - and in turn, the Swedes showed no propensity to advance
The French had put together as good a formation as they could muster to face off the advancing Swedish Brigades,and the French Horse were now split on both flanksof their Foote
All the Superior Guard units were lined up braced for impact, and the unit of 4 shooters were moving behind them to provide rear support
The French line opened up to fit in yet another unit of infantry as the Swedes closed inexorably on the thin blue (and red and grey) line
Taunting the rather unit-lite Swedish army, the French Dragoons rushed out of the woods and dared to stand in the open - in the face of almost no opposition.
Oyez! Come and have a go if you think you are hard enough!!
The Swedes had gotten themselves in a bit of a traffic jam, and had not left enough time or space to unpick their formation before the lines closed to shooting distance.
The French, sensing an opportunity, moved forward
The shooting as balancing out - the Swedes were knocing bases off the French, but the French shooting was causing disruption to the Swedes
The Swedish traffic jam started to unpick itself as the two sides trades musket fire at dangerous ranges
The French Horse had by now found a gap in the lines, and reappaeared on the right of the French main battle-line
A decisive moment was looming - and the French had set hemselves up as best they could to receive the Swedish charge
The Swedish horse charged heroically forward and clashed with the French foote and Line horse
The initial Swedish charge went in - and the French line rocked at their impact - bases were lost and, even with hundreds of Generals at their disposal, the French lost cohesion along the line.
The two units holding the centre of the French line were taking an almighty battering, however the two shoulders of French infantry were much more resilient
The Swiss Guard collapsed, and Swedes rampage through the middle of the French army
And to add insult to injury, here comes the Swedish Yellow Regiment to charge into the fray.
The whole French game plan has unraveled at a stroke...well,more like at a Salvo followed up by robust and aggressive use of the charge to contact..
With a mightly salvo, the Yellow Brigade hit home, and evaporate their opponents - the French army has nothing left in the middle
The only good news for the French is that their Line Horse on the right have, as expected, smashed a unit of Swedish mounted carabiners
But the pursuit leaves them dangerously exposed to a unit of Swedish foote.
The French army is now in Une Monde Du Pain (or more accurately Une Monde do Mal, as Une Monde du pain would actually be a World of Bread)
The game is almost up for the French, so it is the time for heroics - the Line Horse throw themselves at the Average Swedish brigade, hoping that the General-led super superiority of the Gallic Horsemen will prevail. But disrupted at impact is not the ideal start..
The Line Horse bounce off - only to see the Swedes follow up and advance, pinning the Line against the back of the Swedish army
Whilst the battle was raging, a desparate struggle was also going on - two units of hard-hitting horsemen were knocking seven bells out of each other, and had been whittling away at each other - now, as skill had been massaged out of the game, the next casualtly would win !
In fact, that "whittle away" thing seemed to be afflicting the French army across the entire width (or height) of the field, as many of the French units were shedding bases at an alarming rate. This might well end in tears... and quite soon!
The French Dragoons had already seen enough - they knew that the middle of the French army was close to collapse, and so did a Dragooney thing and scuttled backwards like directionally challenged crabs to get out of the way of what surely would soon be a spiralling pit of catastrophe
Ah-hah! Exactly as predicted, a spiralling pit of catastrophe opened up and swallowed some of the French Kings best troops
Well, at least the pattern of events was now consistently spread across the park, and another French unit collapsed... and with them the entire nation of France stumbled to subjugation at the hands of the dastardly Swedes!
The Result is a 21-4 DEFEAT for the Frenchies...
Post Match Summary
To be honest, it was all a bit early for someone as Regal as myself to be expected to get out of my boudoir at all - never mind to actually fight a battle
So, whist things initially started to go well, my aversion to all things Swedish I guess was always going to cause a problem here.
Clearly what I need to do is to give my Guards Regiments a stiff talking to, as they had every opportunity to impress my Royal Regalness when they found themselves facing off against some peasant Swedes, but they abjectly failed to impress upon the furniture-assembling unwashed herring eaters that breeding counts more than an additional +1 POA at impact
Which, in my book, means I will mark this one down to bad luck
Hannibal's Post Match Analysis
Thous art a most pathetical nit, to think that this defeat was anything more than brought upon yourself as surely as you not expected to end up knee-deep in random slabs of MDF had you tried to assemble an Ikea sideboard without a 6-sided allen key
To imagine that you had a plan is to imagine that it was no better than an index and obscure prologue to the history of lust and foul thoughts that befuddle your head. How many times have I tolde you not to take on the enemy's best troops - and especially not to do so at a disadvantage. Never mind whethere the Swedish Foote were Ordinary - they were better than you, and had more endurance too due to their extra bases. Try and win where you have an advantage next time - you may find that it worketh much better.
When I look upon you I see not a King, but instead as ass head and a coxcomb and a knave, a thin faced knave and gull - and one who gambles an entire game plan in a -1 POA combat. Varlet of the highest order.... God Help Us All...
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