Slitherine

A well-deserved win for deadtorius! I could never quite hack him to bits in any one spot! He did surprise me with the LH and LF as well as dragoons (that's 5 BG of light troops). The tercios only started taking cohesion tests when they lost combats. It seems the best strategy, if you can't shoot them up, is to just get into combat with the beasts.

Catholic army:
CinC Great Commander
3X TC sub generals
Vet early Tercio: 6 HF pike armoured, 6 MF shot, superior
Vet early Tercio: 6 HF pike armoured, 6 MF shot, superior
Vet later Tercio: 3 HF pike 6 MF shot, superior
later Tercio: 3 HF pike 6 MF shot, average
2X Dgragoons: 3 Dragoons ,musket Average
Schutzen: 4 LF Superior musket
2X Bandalier Reiter:6 Horse armoured carbine pistol for melee, average
Kuirassier: 4 Superior heavily armoured horse
Kuirasser: 4 elite heavily armoured horse
Musket Kompanien: 6 MF shot average, musket
Medium Artillery: 2 Med guns average


Deployment from left to right was:
Left flank: Bandalier Reiter, with Dragoons out front of them and Schutzen on the steep hill.
Kuirassier with LH out front on other side of the steep hill
Center: Vet early Tercio, Vet later Tercio, Musket Kompanien (set up in the brush) Vet early Tercio. The Average later Tercio was deployed behind the first two Tercio's as rear support.
Right flank: LH, Bandalier Reiter, Dragoons deployed out front of my elite Kuirassier.

The battle opened with the Protestant Dragoons rushing forward to try to shoot up my artillery, and also to top some rounds into the early tercio on my right.
MY artillery and the Musket Kompanien shot up the Dragoons before them and broke them. On my left the LH and Bandalier Reiter shot up and broke the other Dragoons, killing one base. Those Dragoons would not be back but the center ones would eventually be rallied.
The Protestants sent forward their 2 Kuirassiers and their Bandalier Reiter towards the Catholic left. The Catholics responded by sending forth their right hand early tercio, the LH the Bandalier Reiters and the Dragoons. On the left the Protestant Kuirassier used Division moves to clear the brush, so I sent in my dragoons to shoot them up. Either the Dragoons or the Reiters managed to kill one base of one of the Kuirassier, but those were there only casualties till the end of the game. The Schutzen on the steep hill moved up to shoot into the Kuirassier but most of their shooting resulted in misses or the lucky Kuirassier made their death rolls so shooting did not do much there. Eventually the Dragoons evaded into the Reiters, had to roll a 6 when I last wanted one , and they went disrupted just before the Kuirassier charged into them. The Reiters lost a base in melee, but were able to rally as one of my generals was there. They broke off and tried to shoot again to no effect so the general joined the dragoons who had moved off to the right and had turned to shoot the overhanging Kurassier to no effect. In the end the battle on the Catholic left saw the Reiters broken after a second charge, the Schutzen on the hill were eventually shot to break by a pike and shot unit that had moved down with the Kurassier, and the Dragoons kept at least 3 MU in front of the Kuirassier for the remainder of the game, shooting them, reducing one unit to 2 bases and evading every time they were charged. The Catholic left had fallen to the Protestants but they were unable to exploit it.

As the Protestant left advanced the Kuirassier seeing a nice big shot unit out in the open advanced, using the LH to screen them from the artillery they advanced. The LH had to contract into a column as they got close to allow the Kuirasser to charge in, and the MF opened fire on the now exposed heavily armoured horse killing a base. The Kuirassier charged in and eventually defeated the shot. Meanwhile the routing Dragoons were rallied by their great commander and turned about to threaten the LH that was now screening 2 guns from shooting at the Early Tercio as my center had decided it was time to move forward.
The Dragoons were contacted by the Kuirassier during their pursuit of the MF shot and decided to stand and fight, they passed the CMT, but were eventually broken. The infantry that had been supporting the guns moved forwards into overlap with the Dragoons blocking the artillery and leaving it unsupported. The Dragoons broke and the Kuirassier found themselves in the Protestant rear with a pike and shot to their right and a 4 base pike unit moving up on them. The pike and shot contracted into a column allowing the arty to shoot the early Tercio that was moving up. The Kuirassier turned to face the pike and shot and the pikes that moved up on their flank. The pike and shot turned to face the Kuirassier and on the next Protestant turn both units charged in. The melee lasted until the game was called, with the Kuirassier losing 1 base but holding on.

In the center both sides had been holding their positions, with the Catholic artillery managing to kill 2 bases of a pike and shot unit that turned 180 and moved back out of range, then picked a new target that did the same. With the collapse of the giant shot unit the Early and later tercios (superior) both moved out. The early tercio was hammered by the Protestant artillery losing 4 bases as it crossed the table, but finally being able to charge the guns that were now unsupported. The rear supporting average tercio would have moved out but with Kuirassier moving in on their left they decided to stay put with their rear out of charge range by the table edge.

Don't even ask me how many bases I lost to '1' rolls on death. I stopped counting around 10!!

On the Catholic right the Bandalier Reiter had broken the Protestant Reiters and now found themselves with the Kuirassier on a gentle hill to their right and turning to face their flank. The Dragoons and LH had both evaded successfully and the farthest Protestant Kuirassier charged into the Catholic elite Kuirassier. The Catholics lost a base and went disrupted, pretty much how the remainder of the fight would go for them. They managed to break off, were charged again, lost a base and eventually were auto broke and routed off the table, so much for elites
The Bandalier Reiter on the other hand stood to take the Kuirassier charge, having turned to face them and this melee lasted for almost the entire game. Both sides had generals, and the Reiters managed to disrupt the Kuirassier at least twice while being rallied from disrupted at least once themselves. Neither side was able to do anything to the other and neither side was willing to break off till almost the end of the game when the Reiters fragged and broke off, then rallied to Disrupted. They were going to get rear charged by a foot unit and frontally charged by the Kuirassier but the game was called before it happened. The Kuirassier that had broken the elites turned and for the remainder of the game was harrassed by the Dragoons, who evntually fragged it from shooting and would have likely broken it the same way.
The Early Tercio and the shot unit that were in my center moved forward, taking shooting hits from an enemy tercio and pike and shot unit. They charged and eventually fragged the tercio and pike and shot unit, but were broken, the first tercio to break in the game. The shot unit charged the now reduced Protestant tercio and broke it from the charge. Their break disrupted the poor foot that had been their rear support, broke a unit that had just rallied from fragged (they rolled a 2 for seeing friends break )
Meanwhile the later Tercio had just moved up to the last of the big 8 base combined shot units and had lost 2 bases so charged into them, fragging them.
At this point the game was called, it looked like the Catholics were going to pull off a mild win, as the Protestant artillery was going to be gone next turn and most of the Protestant foot was routed or going to be routing soon.

Thanks for the Pictures Blathergut, didnt realize I could have saved my fingers from all that typing while you posted them.
Good game and I have to admit I like the LH, can be quite useful, but those bloody lucky Kuirassier, I keep shooting them and they keep not dying. I was glad I finally managed to frag and was likely to break that one that was off on my right, but it took all game to do it
Good game and I look forward to trying this army again next time

Really love the pictures with writing hope to see more AAR's like this in the future. Which company are the figures from if I may ask?

Warlord

lonehorseman wrote:Really love the pictures with writing hope to see more AAR's like this in the future. Which company are the figures from if I may ask?

Thanks for the comments. Nice to know these are appreciated out there! I didn't really try to show off figures this time around, more BG placement and such. The built-in camera flash was harsh on the colours, to say the least. Next time around, I'll use natural lighting and zoom in a bit, if that's of interest to souls out there.

Blathergut wrote:

lonehorseman wrote:Really love the pictures with writing hope to see more AAR's like this in the future. Which company are the figures from if I may ask?

Thanks for the comments. Nice to know these are appreciated out there! I didn't really try to show off figures this time around, more BG placement and such. The built-in camera flash was harsh on the colours, to say the least. Next time around, I'll use natural lighting and zoom in a bit, if that's of interest to souls out there.

It is of interest to souls out here.

I appreciate the problems with (flash) lighting but also that it's a challenge to paint minis both for being viewed at a distance of 3 feet by human eyes or for the camera. You can do one or the other really well or compromise between the two. Anyway the photos look good to me, but I can't compare to what they look like to the human eye. So I will assume the figures look even better in real life.

appreciate the effort it takes to put a report like that together.... well done!

and the figs look good to me.... can see that some are a work in progress..... and IMHO flash lighting rarely makes the figures look better than IRL only ever worse...so Im sure they look great on the table!

more!

I may try to return the favour and photo my own game this thursday night....then you really will see some bad moves!

Thanks all for your comments.
A few afterthoughts

Tercios are very vulnerable to artillery, only needing 4's to hit them they took a lot of hits, Blathergut scored 3 hits per turn for about 3 or 4 turns. Screening the artillery was good move on my part.

Light Horse is quite useful, they can screen troops moving up behind and if facing a target that can't shoot back (as my LH and Dragoons did on my right against that Kuirassier unit) they can be quite a pain without any risk. Just make sure to keep lots of open room behind them as they can not interpenetrate.

The LF did not really do much, they were safe from charges on that hill but were still in range of shooting that eventually sent them routing, also they lost 1 base. Only getting 1 or 2 dice and needing 5's to hit was hoping for too much, even if they were superior. Next time they will be screening my tercio, if anything shows up to chase them off the tercio can deal with it and the lights can keep the artillery fire off them. Too bad I can only have the 1 unit. Some time I hope to get some nice fully armoured figs and try out that unit of armoured foot knights, I will base them as heavies and see how they do.

This was one of the first times we have seen cav fighting pike and shot. Considering my Kuirassier lost a base on the way in against the 8 shot, their 3 remaining bases held their own, breaking the dragoons a second time, then standing and taking shooting for a turn then facing off a charge by a pike and shot and overlapping pike unit. Although I was down dice, only 3 to 5 I managed to hold my own and disrupt the Pike and Shot unit. If my Tericio's had moved out one or two turns sooner they might have been able to flank charge the infantry and smash the rest of the Protestant center, but I had waited a bit too long to start moving them in. The Elite Kuirassier that went one on one with a Superior Protestant Kuirassier did not fare as well, they lost 2 bases and were eventually broken. Bad dice can't help troop quality that's for sure.

Now all I have to do is try to remember these lessons for our next bash, it will be a bit smaller at 800 points so time to see what I have to remove from my list for next time

**Knows what he's adding!!!**

Remember: Artillery can shoot over friendly and enemy light foot as long as it's more than 3MU away from the artillery. (p. 109)

"shoot over", think that requires a hill. If that is not the case perhaps the LH will be staying out front and they will continue to screen my Tercio's, might have to keep all of them as Blathergut does not like the thought of sending his mounted into them
That is one experiment we have not tried yet.

Where did you get the flags?

If you mean the two at the start of the posts, I made them.

Found the eagle image on wikipedia. Used Adobe Illustrator to size them to 35mm x 35mm. Bars are easy.

Printed.

Then dipped with the rest of the figure. The dip gives the flags a weathered look which I like.

wikipedia is an excellent source. Just search "cities in hungary" or TYW...many of the emblems/flags have their own file page.