Slitherine

We ran a successful and enjoyable demonstration tournament at the New Zealand National Convntion over Easter.

10 armies took the field, these being 3 British (2 Waterloo and 1 Peninsula), 2 Austrian (1809), Dutch (1815), Russians (1807), Franco-Italians (1809), French (1812) and Poles (1809).

Congratulations to Philip (1815 Dutch) who won, with Kit (1815 Brits) and Al (Peninsula Brits) coming 2nd and 3rd.
There were no great issues with the rules and the games ran smoothly - although this was no-doubt helped by over ½ the players having been involved in play testing.

21 games were played. Each round was 4 hours (including terrain and deployment). About ½ of the games reached a conclusion with one army breaking, the others being timed out and decided by points (we used those available for download on the FoGN site). As far as I recall, the concluded games were all 30:10 or 40:20 results (see page 74 of the rules). It doesn’t seem very likely that a side will be able to inflict 50% losses on their opponents in a 4 hour time period.

The only ‘modification’ we made to the rules was that the deployment movement restrictions (the 5 bullet points at the bottom right of page 94) only applied when the attacker rolled 3+ on the initiative roll (ie when he had an extra unit). We made this modification mainly because of a general consensus that the games were less fun for a defending player when not allowed to move outside your deployment area in the first two turns, and also because it was almost universally felt that the game (for tournament purposes) is unbalanced in favour of the attacker when using first-two-turn movement restrictions.

We used the errata and clarifications that Terry has indicated will be adopted.

The guys at the Battleline (our local figure manufacturer) trade stand reported good sales in Napoleonic figures – largely as a result of interest in the rules – which is promising for the uptake of the rules as a tournament set.

Anyway, lots of fun was had, we’re looking forward to the next outing at the Nicon tournament here in Auckland in June.
Cheers
Brett

Dutch I presume is a beta list. From 1815?

Would love to hear either battle reports, or tactics that seemed to work.

Yes, it's a beta list called "Army of the Netherlands, Dutch-Belgian Reserve Corps 1815".

Because Phillip had not painted enough Dutch in time, he had an attached Brunswick allied division (form another beta list) so it was actually a 1815 Dutch-Brunswick army.

Lots (and lots!) of conscripts and poor troops. I'll post some comments on tactics that worked (and didn't) at some stage.

Cheers
Brett

I had the 1807 Russian army. It was based on Gallitzin's wing at the Battle of Friedland. Due to not having painted up enough infantry, this was a good list as it had 2 infantry and 2 cavalry divisions. I had 6 infantry (including a Jager and a Grenadier unit), 6 cavalry (2 heavy, 2 light, 1 cossack) and 2 artillery units. The Jagers was the only large unit. All other infantry was unreformed.

I timed out all 5 games each one being a draw, but was denied a victory in two games by lucky last-turn cavalry charges (one by Kit, the second place getter). I was also one turn away from getting a victory over Philip's Dutch and had the upper hand against Al's Brits. I was the attacker in every game getting the extra unit 3 times - twice the opponents bacon was saved by getting the +2ACV.

With so much cavalry I couldn't lose but with my plodding infantry that needed the enemy softened up with artillery it was hard to get the winning punch in the time.

Tactics: Supports! Use triangular formations with rear supports. Unreformed infantry needs to be in large units so they can absorb more hits when they are going in. Artillery is difficult to attack with but I generally had the 2 infantry divs side by side with the 2 arty next to each other aimed at a bend in the opposition's line. Not many units stand in front of 12 dice for long. My heavy cav had artillery attachments which, with rear supports, negated the effects of shock cavalry and gave them a bit of a crack against squares.

I was quite please how I went. The 13 competition points I lost due to 2 lucky cav charges would have seen me higher than 4th but considering I was playing offensively in every game, I thought I did pretty well. A good competition but I'll use my Prussians next time.

Kendall actually did really well, and he didn't even need to resort to his cossack cheese! (skirmishing LC tying up enemy infantry by standing 5mm from them with immunity) - which I understand (and we played) is being errated out of the rules.

If Kit had managed to roll anything but handfuls of 5's and 6's with his British LC, Kendall would have replaced him in 2nd place.

My Austrian infantry 2nd his large-units-when-unreformed-are-the-go.

When you cannot skirmish you need to close to 2MU of the enemy - and in doing so will always take a close range volley before you can reply. Ignoring the first hit as a large unit makes closing easier.

Cheers
Brett

The only ‘modification’ we made to the rules was that the deployment movement restrictions (the 5 bullet points at the bottom right of page 94) only applied when the attacker rolled 3+ on the initiative roll (ie when he had an extra unit). We made this modification mainly because of a general consensus that the games were less fun for a defending player when not allowed to move outside your deployment area in the first two turns, and also because it was almost universally felt that the game (for tournament purposes) is unbalanced in favour of the attacker when using first-two-turn movement restrictions.

An interesting observation.
We always intended to try to create the attacker/defender situation that most Napoleonic battles had. It can be a problem with equal points armies because both sides are theoretically equal.
Our 3,000pts per side game on monday proved that to an extent. Based on Austrlitz, we found that with equal points per side the French had significantly less troops than they had historically - which made it much more difficult for them to be as agressive in attack.
The example scoring system we have published is only a guide, to be used or not as competition organisers see fit. Any suggestions as to how it can be improved, and for modifications to 'standard' deployment etc more suitable for tournament play will be gratefully received.
I'm looking at trying a different system for Roll Call - depending on how many player register.

I think the method of scoring gets a good spread of results. A smashing victory gives you lots of points but a close win gives you less. I would like to see a graduated level of attack-defense depending on the difference in the dice at the start. While it is true that many Napoloenic were set-piece attacks, there are also many that are evolving battles with more troops arriving all the time. These could be considered the "encounter" battles. I was thinking that with difference of 1 (encounter) both sides move from the start, difference of 2 the defender is pinned for 2 turns and difference of 3 defender pinned for 2 turns and gets +2ACV, attacker gets extra unit.