Like most wargamers we tend to spread ourselves too thin. We have
many wargame periods in mind or in progress, lacking only the necessary
research for armies to be readied, be they incomplete, unpainted or just
plain unbought. The odd thing is that it is the
completed periods that seem to be thought about and played the least. I don't think it's just us.
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| Spot the deliberate mistake. |
One such period is the English Civil War, for which we have, according to the WRG
De Bellis Renationis
(DBR) Army Lists (Vol 2), about 400 points each of the respective
Parliamentarian and Royalist armies (1641-1648), which is near enough
complete
as makes no difference. These are 1/300 Heroics & Ros figures,
mainly painted by Geoff sometime last century, but supplemented by some
Scots musketeers, cavalry and artillery train added by me in more recent
years.
The last time we'd had a game from this period
was about 15 years ago and we used WRG DBRv1.1 whilst working our way
through the smaller scenarios from the
De Bellis Civile books (published by
The Keep).
However, for this game we didn't use any particular scenario but
decided, just like in the old days, to generate the terrain using the
rules, line up opposite each other and see how we got on. Anyway, the
set-up turned out like this, with Parliament (blue) defending.
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| All terrain made by me, including houses from polystyrene offcuts & cardboard |
Forces were as follows, each split into two commands:
Parliament
1 CinC Pi(S) 1 Sub Gen Pi(I)
1 Pistols Pi(S) 10 Pistols Pi(I)
16 Shot Sh(O) 3 Dragoons Dg(S)
8 Pike Pk(O) 1 Galloper Art(F)
2 Sakers Art(O)
Royalist
1 CinC Pi(S) 1 Sub Gen Pi(F)
12 Shot Sh(O) 12 Horse Pi(F)
6 Pike Pk(O) 2 Dragoons Dg(O)
2 Sakers Art(O) 1 Galloper Art(F)
Rules used were actually DBRv2.0 which, we discovered, had some subtle but significant differences when compared with DBRv1.1.
Anyway,
my plan (i.e. the Parliamentarian plan) was to hold the left secured
against the hill, whilst trying to sweep around the right with my
Pistols Pi(I), i.e. the Roundhead cavalry, pivoting on the village which
would be occupied by one regiment of foot and some dragoons. The left
wing comprising mainly foot was supposed to stay where it was and be
stiffened by the sakers positioned above them on the hill.
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| View of Parliamentarian lines from the Royalist left. |
The thing is that defending passively doesn't come
naturally to me, so almost immediately I commenced advancing my infantry
on the left. My cavalry on the right meanwhile started to move towards
the enemy's position, where his cavaliers (Pi(F)) were climbing up the
far side of the hill.
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| View of Parliamentarian left, with sakers on the hill |
On
the left I was having issues. I realised that my sakers on the hill
were poorly sited because being uphill from the target reduces their
fire effect (presumably as the cannonballs tend to bury themselves when
fired downhill, or something), and the regiment of foot up there really
wasn't going to do anyone any good.
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| Parliamentarian foot in the BUA, dragoons to the fore |
In addition, my infantry started to take casualties from the Royalist
guns sitting being the marsh, whilst the regiment of foot that I had
positioned behind the village was unable to move through it at any great
speed.
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| Familiar foot advance |
My Parliamentarian foot continued to advance to try to contact the
Royalist foot that was moving up opposite, all the while taking casualties from the
guns and then Royalist foot, both sides starting to lose cohesion but without my troops able to damage the
Royalists enough.
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| Ebb and flow on the left as shot exchange fire |
Meanwhile on the right, the Roundhead cavalry
advanced to the foot of the hill accompanied by a galloper gun and some
foolhardy dragoons.
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| Roundhead Pi(I) advance on the right |
As the Roundheads reached the foot of the hill the
Royalist cavaliers come over the crest and down the hill but are checked
by fire from the Pi(I).
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| Roundhead cavalry push up to the hill |
However, the fire from my cavalry dishcarging their
pistols momentarily checked the cavaliers, but was not enough to
discourage them and they charged down the hill into the Parliamentarian
ranks, surrounding and overwhelming them within a few moves. My cavalry
command was therefore quickly demoralized (although for some reason I
neglected to take a picture of my cavalry surrounded and reduced to a
single element in about two moves).
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| Stalemate on the left, but the cavaliers are coming... |
Back on the left, the Parliamentarian foot were being
gradually depleted but weren't quite able to get into phyiscal contact
with the Royalists, the desired for 'push of pike'. However, with my
right wing effectively wiped out, it would only be a matter of time
before the cavaliers were behind me and that would be that.
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| Cavaliers about to sweep away my galloper |
Overall it was a fairly decisive battle, although we
did notice a few signficant changes from DBRv1.1 to DBRv2.0. The
earlier set encouraged the use or separate units of foot (i.e. 4
elements wide with a block of pikes in the middle) but v2.0 was more
like DBM where you could have an infinite line acting as one group if
you wanted to (and had a table long enough).
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| View from behind Royalist lines |
However, the main issue was that the Parliamentarians
(me) made some basic errors, such as wasting a regiment of foot by
placing it behind the BUA and another one on the hill so that neither
could get into the action, which was an inefficient use of troops,
particularly as I had chosen to advance off the hill and out of cover
anyway.
Further, placing my sakers on the hill made
them less effective and my dragoons (Dg(S)) were not used properly to
hold the BUA and woods. Next time I think I will keep the Pi(I) in
reserve behind the foot and make the enemy come to us!
