Time for another Quarterly Wargames Day. Richard of ShedWest is a big Marlborough buff , so a good chance to try out the latest iteration of "From Pike to Bayonet". I reckoned we could do a large refight We've refought Blenheim and Ramillies before, so I was going to do Oudenarde. However, it's more awkward to sort out, so Ramillies is what I settled on.
We had four players, me, Chris K, Phil & Richard. This might be the most ambitious game I've run with these rules. The playing area was 14 squares x 10 squares. I should probably have moved the end board and gone a bit bigger, but that would have needed six players, I think. The figures ratio was about 170:1. The Franco-Bavarian army had 21 foot units and 13 mounted, the Allies had 23 foot and 16 mounted. The figure count was 342 French and 366 Allies. Over 700 of the little plastic guys on the table is probably a record.
Chris and Phil took the Allies, on the right. I partnered Richard for the French. We had eight command figures a side, two "Wing" Generals, each with three subordinates. To simulate the superior Allied planning and command and control they had more command chips per commander than we did.
Opening turn. The Allie advance to pin us in place on the left. Artillery starts to pound Ramillies.
A fierce fire fight broke out in the centre of our infantry line around the village of Offuz.
Prussian infantry force its way up on to the ridge line
Finally charges break out on my wing.
Alas one of my commanders succumbs at the moment of his triumph. We had a high commander bodycount through out the game.
We are soon driving deep into the heart of the Allied cavalry position.
Here's the battle in full swing. We're holding on along the ridge, mostly, and have the upper hand in the cavalry fight. Looking good for us at this stage.
The struggle for Autre Egilse (Chris: "Was it really called Other Church?" - answer Yes. It was.)
The Allies seem slow to commit around Ramillies.
The infantry fight is generating a lot of smoke and fury.
Phil is running this wing, and is making steady, if gradual, progress.
The time has now come to switch the Allied right wing cavalry reserve to the left.
Fighting round the villages is proving to be intense
The British finally take Ramillies.
We seem to have the upper hand on my flank.
However the fighting continued to intensify. The allies had fresh cavalry squadrons to throw into the mix.
"Mon Dieu! Le Marechal Villeroi est mort!!" It really is dangerous being an officer today.
The Allies are up on the ridge on Richard's flank now. The number of troops available to us is thinning quite alarmingly.
Ramillies is sucking in troops. The story is a bit mixed for us.
As the cavalry fight swings to and fro the Elector of Bavaria is caught in the crossfire.
Allied win.
A truly epic game. We played for 6 hours, including a lunch break, and we went at it at a sedate pace. It was warm, and of course we all need time to catch up on life, the universe and everything.
It was a tough day for Generals, as noted above. This is the grave yard. We lost this fight 5:2. The role of commanders is really important in keeping your army together and making little differences that will tip the game one way or the other. We were weak in this area from the start (by design) but having so many killed in combat didn't help.
We then headed over to the patio for a quick try out of "My Oath Sire!".
I made each element equal to two game pieces for this game. It did not go well. Most everyone doesn't like rolling for move distances (especially having rolled for activation).
We kept getting failed activations, which is frankly annoying.
We played three turns or so, and got in a bit of shooting and fighting. With an increasingly grumpy group of players we wrapped it up and went down the pub for a pint and a meal.
It took me most of Sunday morning to put the Ramillies game away. Told you it was epic.
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