Another set of Napoleonic eye candy

Another weekend, another play-test game. Played on the same terrain (we couldn’t be arsed doing a new table and it still looked okay) but with bigger forces and a revised initiative system (a bit of fine-tuning that worked really well).

Along for the game was Battlefront staffer and former club president/editor/driving force Wayne T. As per usual it was very much a social gathering but we managed to play the game to a 7 turn conclusion within 3.5 hours – not back for this bunch of gossip mongers. With five of us, the game was always going to be a tad longer than a two player game (my rule of thumb is that each multiple of two players adds 25% to the overall playing time) but it really did flow. Wayne had his new Nikon Dsomething DSLR there which took some nice photos compared to my puny efforts, and they should appear here later once Wayne mails me the CD of images.

So here are some photos:

I had a somewhat mixed command – two infantry division of threebrigades (1 Portugese, 4 British ( 2 Highlanders), and 1 Spanish – the latter carefully situated on the ridge to the rear ) and a Cavalry Brigade with attached Horse Artillery.

My troops are in the foreground: from L to R: Spanish, Highlanders, Brits, then the front line is Artillery, Portugese, Artillery, British Line and out of picture Highlanders. Facing my troops are three French Cavalry brigades, Cuirassiers, Carabiniers and more Cuirassiers, with the evil Foreign division (The Corpse-robbing Croats and Humourless Swiss at the extreme right of shot)

Not only did I have to face the pesky Cuirassiers et al, The Garde were in Reserve and could easily be brought up to force the issue:

Here’s what it looks like for the Spanish – Hopefully the Spanish wouldn’t have to get any closer to the action:

More photos to come over the new year’s Day break as I reconstruct my notes to match the photos.

P-J

Going retro

Occasionally I’ll come across a mention of rules that I once played or were referenced in old club newsletters. When this happens I ponder trying to obatin them just to see how my tastes have changed or have they indeed done so?  Normally I can pretty much put the idea of acquiring said rules out of mind, but lately I’ve been thinking about revisiting my original proper wargaming period (Modern 1/300th). And so I checked through my old copies of rules: Engage and Destroy: Close Action; WRG 1950-1985; Challenger in its various iterations.

Unfortunately the one rules system I’d often considered I don’t have and is pretty hard to find: Enola Games’ Combat Commander/Battlefield Commander and the WW2 version: GI Commander. I’ll probably try and track them down via eBay and the like or get them via Navwar if I can be arsed dealing with their 1960s ordering system.

I can’t see myself doing much gaming with them to be honest, but it’d be nice to do a couple of retro 1970s and 1980s Central Front type games just for fun again.