OHW Scenario 19: Blow From The Rear

With the third heatwave having finally broken, I managed to snatch a free few hours whilst SWMBO was out, to get another game of Honours of War in. Having had it set up for nearly a week, it was nice to finally have the time and motivation to get it played.

The Scenario

This is based upon the Battle of Krefeld 1758, but has been tweaked for the OHW rules, with further tweaks made by me to try and make it work for Honours of War.

The Blue General is defending two river crossings from what he thinks is a numerically inferior Red force. His complacency will be shattered when an additional Red force arrives in the Blue rear area.

Victory Conditions: The Red Force will win if there are no Blue units within 3" of either river crossing at the end of Turn 8.

OOB Austrian (Red)

2 x Infantry Brigades, each - 3 x Line Infantry, 1 x Medium Artillery

1 x Light Infantry Brigade - 2 x Light Infantry

1 x Cavalry Brigade - 2 x Cavalry

- 50% of the army starts to the North of the river.

- On Turn 3, the other half of the army arrives on the Western table edge.

OOB Prussian (Blue)

2 x Infantry Brigades, each - 3 x Line Infantry, 1 x Medium Artillery

1 x Mixed Brigade - 1 x Light Infantry, 1 x Medium Artillery, 2 x Cavalry

- 1/3 of the army is in reserve and cannot move until Turn 4.

- The army is in a defensive posture and cannot move North of the river

The Set Up

Once again the game was played on a 3' x 2' table, with deployments etc seen below:

An overview of the table. Blue is to the left of the river, Red to the right and the top.

One Blue Brigade defending the bridge, saddled with a Dithering commander, requiring the General to be in attendance.

Another Blue Brigade defending the ford.

The Blue Mixed Brigade in reserve.

The Red Cavalry Brigade, ready to act to pin some Blue units in place, just by their presence.

A Red Brigade ready to contest the ford.

The Red Light Brigade ready to move through the woods and into the Blue flank, with a Dashing commander to aid speedy progress.

A Red Brigade ready to advance into Blue's rear area, saddled with a Dithering commander.

The Game

As always, the captioned photos should give an idea of hos the game played out:

The end of Turn 1. Red made an Admirable move to the river, allowing them to deploy, as well as gaining the fire intiative. This saw Blue lose a Line Infantry unit, which had to fall back to reform. Both sides took further hits but to limited effect.

Blue already pushed back from the ford.

The end of Turn 2. As the Red Cavalry moved to the flank to try and get out of artillery range, both sides exchanged some devastating fire, each losing a Line Infantry unit. The ford was in danger of being lost by Blue already.

Blues' Line Infantry that had just moved forward is routed, leading to the Artillery unit having to limber up and retire to try to reform.

But Red had also suffered an early loss, but was in a better position than Blue by the ford.

The end of Turn 3. As Blue began to pull back from the ford to try and form a defensive line, the Red force suddenly appeared on their left flank, with devastating consequences. The Blue right flank began to try and react to this sudden appearance by Red, but the Dithering commander was not quite sure what to do.

The Blue Dithering commander begins to try and move to meet the threat on his left.

The Red Line Infantry appear from the corn.

The Red Light Infantry move with ease through the woods...

... and pour a devastating volley into the Blue Line Infantry, routing them.

The lone Blue Artillery unit still pulling back to try and reform.

The end of Turn 4. The Red force from the West continue to push aggressively forward, forcing a Blue Line Infantry unit back to reform. The Red force North of the river forms into line to prepare to begin to cross, but the Cavalry fail to move.

The Blue right flank slowly forms into line and column to move towards Red.

The Mixed Brigade spurs into action.

The remnants of the Blue left flank.

The Red force North of the river ready to cross the ford.

A view from the West and the Red force threatening Blue's rear.

The end of Turn 5. The Blue right flank meets up with the few reamining left flank units, but the Mixed Brigade fails to move up in support. Red tries to push forward, which the Light Brigade do rather aggressively, whilst those North of the river struggle forward. Both sides have one of those 'barn door' phases on the shooting front.

Red pushes forward as the Blue line begins to coalesce.

The end of Turn 6. As the Blue defensive crust begins to harden, Red continues to push forward, but once again the 'barn door' issue raises its head!

The Red force North of the river tries to move forward to attack the Blue line in the flank.

The Blue 'defensive crust'.

The Mixed Brigade moves forward but is still too far behind.

The Red Western force struggles to find space to deploy as the Light Brigade engages Blue in the centre.

The end of Turn 7. With a rush of blood to the head, the Light Brigade commander charges forward with his troops into the Blue Artillery and Line Infantry, as both sides close up as best they can. In one of those 'MAD' moments, the Red Light Brigade is destroyed, but so are the Blue Artillery and Line Infantry! Yet again ineffective and desultory fire ripples across the front.

The charge and its effect...

... and the aftermath after the smoke has cleared.

The end of Turn 8. There is little movement from Blue due to holding a good defensive position, so Red pushes forward, but come under devastating fire (at last!), losing two Line Infantry units. In response all Red can manage is to rout an Artillery unit and force the Mixed Brigade Light Infantry to move back to reform. 

Losses on the right...

... and on the left.

The Red Cavalry Brigade finally begin to cross the bridge.

End of the Game

And with that the game was over after an exciting and eventful 8 Turns. Technically a Red victory as per the original scenario, given the Blue had no units close enough to either crossing of the river. However looking at the state of play, Red would struggle to prosecute the attack, with Blue working on interior lines. What might have swung it decisively for either side would have been a cavalry clash, with the winner certainly help gain control of the Field of Mars.

The Butcher's Bill was pretty even:

Red: 3 x Line Infantry, 2 x Light Infantry

Blue: 3 x Line Infantry, 2 x Artillery

Post Game Thoughts

Another excellent game of Honours of War, and certainly one with fortunes swinging one way and then the other! A few musings as always:

• Red got off to a flier on the shooting front, only for this good luck to tail off, with Blue getting that final effective volley in Turn 8 almost on the last dice throws.
• The Red Light Brigade's charge was certainly risky, some might say foolish, but I thought it was worth the gamble, which sort of paid off, but at terrible cost.
• The scenario was certainly interesting and another good challenge and in a sense nicely followed on from the previous one. I think it needs a tweak or two to make it work better, but maybe that's for another day.
• Having 'Dithering' commanders was fun again, but tied up both commanding Generals for most of the game. That random roll for all commanders at the start does add a wonderful level of friction and unpredictability, perfect for the solo gamer.
• When the game moved to the short table edge as it were, both sides really struggled to find room to manouevre, which caused a few problems and moved the game to one more of attrition, with no real chance to turn a flank etc.
• Both sides Artillery were less effective with this much more mobile battle, due to having to move so much. 
• My rivers are really too wide for these rules, but luckily I have some new ones in progress, which will make for a better game IMHO.

What Next?

Well I think that's it for Honours of War for a while. With the weather being much more conducive to painting and gaming, I hope to get more of the former in so that I can resume my 'French-Canadians in Normandy' mini-campaign. Life is busy on the 'real life' front, so it might be a few days before I can get things set up, but with SWMBO away for the weekend, I aim to get the next game in...

As always, thanks for reading and commentating, plus of course any comments greatly appreciated!

TTFN.