Monday, June 14, 2010

Queen's Birthday Black Powder

Joe & brother Matt's French
v.
Mark's Prussians

The French covered their centre with a massed battery & an infantry brigade & put their other infantry brigade on their far left.   They divided their cavalry into 2 brigades on their right.  The Prussians put all their cavalry on their left, and their infantry in the centre.

The French tried to outflank the Prussian cavalry with one brigade while pinning their front with the other.  The Prussians pushed back the pinning brigade, failed to get orders through to meet the flank attack and were partly rolled up. 

Part of the French infantry in the centre advanced into the cornfield to pin the Prussian right, but the French left flank commander turned out to be hopeless & the planned flank attack stalled.  The Prussians counterattacked in the centre & although a grenadier got carried away & got slaughtered by the guns, they broke the centre brigade.

On the other flank Prussian infantry deployed out of the village to help the cavalry out  and a blast of Oakie dice finished off the French cavalry.  With both cavalry brigades and 1 infantry broken, the French failed their army morale test.

Pic 1: From behind the Prussian left.  The French left is milling about doing nothing.  The Prussians are counterattcking the cornfield in the centre.  The French cavalry is sweeping down the far flank.
Pic 2: The brothers Dexter survey the carnage.  Their centre broken, their left still not fully involved & their right running out of steam.
Pic 3: Oakie triumphant as the French cavalry break under the weight of musketry & hot dice.

Black Powder continues to impress - it's easy, fast & exciting to play.  I might even like it better than my own rules.  Like FOW the luck element can be scary, but there are ways of dealing with it and ways to win anyway if you're smart enough.  I  want to try it out with my 6mm Napoleonic troops - I think it should work well for big battles with only a few special rules.

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