And in the table at our side... Later Imperial Spanish vs Caroline Imperialist. Yeah!Deployment of both armies was standard: tercios in the center and mounted at the flanks, save that I put all the cuirassiers on my right... just in front of his artillery! As they were relatively unprotected I decided to go for a glorious (or suicidal) charge against them, as fast as I could, using the average cuirassiers as a shield for their superior comrades, hoping that at least these ones reached the artillery. Flander´s Army veterans are like that.
Initial deplyment, my troops on the close side of the picture.
Charge!
My dragoons, benefiting from a difficult terrain, face enemy mounted and dragoons.
On the center, infantry gets closer. Brother against brother!
On the right flank the charge continues. Artillery fires furiously at the wall of steel that comes over it, producing casualties at the shield cuirassiers and putting them at the verge of annihilation.
On the center and left flank the troops continue advancing. Not much action yet.
Half a league half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred:
'Forward, the Light Brigade!
Charge for the guns' he said:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
Or like Iron Maiden would say...
You'll take my life but I'll take yours too
You'll fire your musket but I'll run you through
So when you're waiting for the next attack
You'd better stand there's no turning back
The bugle sounds as the charge begins
But on this battlefield no one wins
The smell of acrid smoke and horses breath
As you plunge into a certain death
The cuirassiers take a final bombardment at point blank... and hold! Both batteries are rolled over and captured.
Infantry keeps advancing. On the left, enemy cuirassiers caught up my evading dragoons and broke them. Fortunately the difficult terrain protected my artillery from the victorious cuirassiers. A general will try to rally the intact but broken dragoons to no avail.
On the center we get into firing range and... what happens? Altough I have more groups I can´t concentrate fire. With the same firepower, the bigger size of late tercios protected them from taking as many morale test as I had to take. I begin to loss cohession and take casualties. Time to charge!
On my right flank I win the fight of mounted but just barely, not before I get to make a rear charge.
On my left flank enemy cuirassiers go into the difficult terrain to avoid one of my tercios, but they get stuck and are destroyed by artillery fire. My dragoons take cover behind a wall. My artillery is finally safe.
The infantry clash goes horribly wrong! Two broken tercios and the rest are disrupted or fragmented. Aren´t they the best infantry in Europe? Oh yes, enemy´s the best too
Just one of my tercios wins its combat, the rest is broken or fragmented. My victorious mounted wing comes to the rescue, but maybe too late? The situation is critical, both armies are one point from breaking.
My artillery punishes his reiters and finally break them. Victory! It has been a close call, a hard and epic battle, but it was the least you could expect from two spanish armies, wasn´t it?
