Seven Years War battle Saxe-Bearstein vs Stagonia

 The vague plan was to have some sort of battle including some part of the collection of Jeff Bluebear about once a year.  The COVID issue messed with that, along with some moving houses along the way.

It has been a few years since the Seven Years War era "imagi-nation" of Bluebear's Saxe-Bearstein took to the fields of Mars.

Cod and I managed to get them into action in a meeting-engagement, that was super interesting, in that maneuver was also part of the action - something that gets missed often in the 'big battle' line-em-up and shoot.

a key moment in the battle for a hilltop

We had the venue of AJ's Games for this event and it worked out well.

the game space formed our backdrop
as patrons came and went exploring the
game shelves next to our setup

we were using the same scenario as
the ECW game from the last tabletop
action at my home (see previous post)

time-lapse camera was set-up
after we had built up the tabletop terrain

I brought along a couple of guest observers
from the Alpian Wars set by Jeff
partly for discussion about the
BloodAxe miniatures we were using

The time-lapse covers the marching action well.

Essentially Stagonian forces managed to snag a hilltop, seen center right, and from there poured fire into the advancing Saxe-Bearstein columns.

With 2/3 brigades broken the Saxe-Bearstein army withdrew.

as usual dice rolls were critical
in Black Powder rules
you need a mix of low and high
rolls ... 

sadly for Cod, running the
Saxe-Bearstein forces
he rolled opposite many times

This opposite rolling made for a very stop-start affair for the Saxe-Bearstein force getting into the battlefield, or worse caused one infantry force to be left alone facing three times their numbers with artillery against them.

seen in the bottom right corner of the
time-lapse, this was the only
ground that Saxe-Bearstein was
to take this battle

Forced into the small 1/6th of the battle area, with little room to deploy, it was good effort that caused the Saxe forces to take down 1/3 of the Stagonians, who started with slightly more cavalry and less infantry than the Saxe forces had.

One of the neat parts of the random forces for the tabletop is that you get the more nuanced uneven engagements that happened in real life.

Again a great game from Jeff's troops!

Victory Without Quarter, ECW set - the Scots take the field for the first time!

 With the coming game of 7YW with Jeff's minis, the plan was to use Scenario 11 in "Programmed Wargames Scenarios" by Charles Stewart Grant.  So I decided that the likely last tabletop game here (move still in a limbo) would be to learn about the scenario before doing it in front of folks at the AJs game store.

panorama of the field

one of the Scots arrival road

the other

mostly a straight forward sort of scenario

set up as two advance guards
'meeting engagement'

I did up a Royalist force

and a Scots force

Fun time to share with my eldest son, he commanded the Scots and won a straight forward victory!

 

Scots Command stand

Royalist Command stand

again the 'clip 2 comic' feature is fun to use

Next up will be the much anticipated return of Jeff's Seven Years Wars game set.  Then likely a final painting project completion from this location, another few space ships for my middle son's collection.

Valour & Fortitude Playtest in 15mm ACW

 An opportunity came to be able to put the new Confederate cavalry to use in a playtest of the Valour & Fortitude rules set.

Valour & Fortitude Rules
Army List

Confederate Army List 

Union Army List

These lists and rules have already been updated, as I was using version 2 in my playtest.

 The rules are only four pages long, with a half-dozen 'army list' pages to round out to 10 to run a game.

The scenario is only one page (single side) so, we are really talking about a simple rules set.

I ran the game solo, so as to focus on the system more than trying to explain it all to someone else.

I was able to put my random tabletop cards to good use:

Prior to the game, the armies need to be put into order of battle, since I was only wanting a simple game I kept it to 200 points per side, also managing to keep a more historical 'feel' with the Union side having guns and the Confederate having some more experienced troops.

With the general map data, I then needed to set up four 'objective' terrain spots for each side, this put my 'alphabet' stars on the table again, with great effect.

the crossroads in town

Union control of the open ground along the river

the all-important fording space on the river

a hill-top in the Union sector

here's the map 'doodle' with the letter locations noted

terrain all set out, awaiting troops

Again I was going to capture the game action via a time-lapse and, this time I took a couple of photos to show my set up:

the old Iphone in use as the time-lapse camera

the position relative to the table

V&F uses a really simple turn system of U-go-I-go:  Fate -> Fire -> Move/Act -> Melee.

Fate= draw a fate card (use it right away if called for, otherwise you can hold as many as you wish)

Fire= shoot the troops you wish to shoot, you must shoot at the closest target (so sometimes positioning is key) - & if you shoot you cannot move or act (such as rally).

Move/Act=move troops, those that did not shoot

Melee=close combat action.

There are no figures/stand removal in this game system, once you hit the tenacity number of casualties, then any more call for a 'saving throw' ... fail this "Tenacity test" and your unit flees (off the table).

When units flee, then a "Valour" test comes for the commander, fail that and the brigade formation is done for an a 'victory point' is scored by the opposing side.

Total victory points (for the test failures and any objectives) at the game end - which can come in the number of turns or a time limit (real world time) and you have your winner.

Yes, this does 'gamify' the historical elements somewhat more than other systems, yet sometimes all you want is to get a result within a certain time limit at the tabletop while getting your minis out from the cases.  This system gets to put all that into action with a bit of random (the die rolls) and unpredictability (the 'Fate' cards)

Confederate defenders

got deployed

the new Cavalry force

along with their dashing new commander

Union attackers then deployed and turn one rolled into action

simple U-Go :: I-Go sometimes makes for a faster
moving game

the vital river crossing was the main objective
for both sides really, yet the objective placement
rules do not permit the two to be within 9" of any other
since I was using 15mm minis, this mean every " (inch) was
1 cm (centimeter)

I got going into the second turn
though the time limit of 4 hours was my
aim in this game

I was called out on a volunteer fire rescue call
during turn two ... maybe my 4 hours was optimistic?

I was able to return to the game in less than 30 mins

the Confederates got a great card for punishing
the Union across the river ford

then the Union got the card that permitted them
to bring back the lost unit!

Confederate changed the value of the crossroads point
now worth 2!

Union turn to punish a unit.

that the rebels quickly replaced

though the tide of battle was definitely
NOT going their way ...

luck was not the rebel's friend either

Union line was solid and delivered consistent hits

final score was 5 vp to 4 with the Union
having one unit down while the Confederates
were at three units down
a solid Union victory

the river line was more controlled by
Union than rebel

giving a Union victory

Confederate manpower losses were greater
and
they had less value in terrain control

table overview at end

Union panorama

Confederate panorama

I will definitely play more Valour & Fortitude, maybe even using some 25mm Napoleonic troops ... though a larger table is called for if that scale is to hit the field.

Once again a time-lapse, set to music for your enjoyment.