Hammfest 2024 - GdC Battle of Friedland (pt 3/end)

 

 The Russians have been surprised by the timely arrival of the Corsican Ogre. What looked like defeat in detail for the French has turned into a bit of a pell mell dash for the safety of the far side of the river. While this initial picture makes things look well in hand for the Russians, it's a bit more nuanced. The crossing goes through the town of Friedland, which restricts the speed and capacity of movement. There's going to be bunch up and the French will have time to engage. Furthermore, despite there being fixed movement, units moving anything other than mostly forward, do move slower so that it's possible to have them be caught. 

The Russians are down to 2 cavalry units (1 fresh) versus at least 3 fresh french ones in a unified cavalry corp. Once the Russian infantry are forced into square it's a safe bet that formation is doomed. Morale is brittle so there are real risks to sacrificing units.

To the Russians benefit, their cannon emplacements across the river have been doing great work. To avoid cannon fire entirely would delay the pursuit, so the French have been forced to weather the storm. If I recall correctly the Russian artillery dice were a bit hot.

We know see the rush hour traffic building up at the bridge. French are in close contact with the Russian rearguard.

Not great, but probably manageable. Doctorow's reserve corp is doing exactly what they need to be doing.

Ah crap. The continued fallback of General Peter (RU) on the right and general attrition of cannons there has freed up the French under General Kevin again. 

The pressure is developing for a move across the river into the rear guard flank. Stress!

 

Command ranges and low rolls for pips to move troops I think stymied the french a bit. The hot russian cannons didn't do them any favours. It's possible they failed a morale check and fell back for a turn (about 30 minutes real time). 

That breather essentially cinched the rest of the game.

The forces consolidate back towards their lines. I believe we called this one a minor or marginal win for the Russians. Mostly as Napoleon failed to deliver a punishing blow to the Russians when given an opening.

 

 

Another fun game of GdC. While we keep thinking the rules are in their final shape there is some contemplation of having units that go to 0 strength not leave the table. This would mean

1/. they would continue to be traffic problems. 

2/.they would require commands to evacuate (so command of the corp doesn't improve as you lose troops, which is kinda a thing that happens right now....I'm not pip starved when I have no troops to command!)

3/. Exist on the table to continue to use as a punching bag for the enemy to incur further moral losses and tests (so it's more likely for the whole corp to go poof. Currently it can be hard to attrition the corps enough and force enough tests to make that happen).

2+3/. They are a liability to have around and thus make a more interesting set of decisions for the players.

UPDATE: Play testing has shown that keeping troops on the table is less fun. There's a proposal to requires some PiPs to make them disappear, so that they are still a (more limited) liability, but won't be a continual fun draining hassle.

Hammfest 2024 GdC - Battle of Friedland 1807 pt 2

In our first instalment we saw the Russians aggressively move on the 'isolated' French corp and attempt to destroy them in detail (on the Russian Left). The Russian Right demonstrated in front of the French Left while slowly moving back behind the river (because general Peter is wise). Our cliff hanger moment sees the arrival of some French on the Russian Left.....the cavalry (also infantry) riding to the rescue of the beleaguered french corp under General Seth. 

 

 Indeed there are so many french it's going to take some turns for them to march on . We dickered a bit about the teleporting french and just how close to the Russians they could arrive. The Russians felt it was unsporting to have them be within one move (i.e. move into contact on arrival). This was acceded to. 

The main challenge we see is the Russians are grossly outnumbered now, and have a long CIRCUITOUS route to return (the ford is the town in the bottom left, and the river to the left is otherwise unfordable. Thankfully the Russians have some covering artillery from the safe side. My scant command of grenadiers and some cavalry moved up the middle to support General James. We have a classic Napoleonics traffic management problem, under enemy pressure, and needing to choose who to sacrifice. Don't run men, there's plenty of bridge space for you all (cough cough).

Hammfest 2024 GdC - Battle of Friedland 1807 (part 1)

 The main event on Saturday for Hammfest 2024 was a General du Corp (fast play corp scale convention rulseset) game of Friedland. Historically Friedland sees a Russian force under Bennigsen spotting an isolated French force (under Lannes) and deciding to beat it up. Sluggish command sees a slow/poorly developed attack which is well held off by the french while the Corsican Ogre marches to relieve Lannes. Then a great smackdown of the Russians ensues as they have (the opposite of) cleverly placed their forces with their backs to a river. 

 

James, Peter and I played the Russians and decided to attempt the historical attack...but better. With 20/20 hindsight (and warning at the start of the game) we knew that a kickass level of French were going to show up. We were hopeful we could break the French corp quickly. The Russians had a number of static artillery batteries stuck on the East sides of the Alle river....perfect to offer us good covering fire when we decided to conduct a fighting withdraw. As we would. Seth, Ron and Kevin (and eventually Doug himself with the Imperial Guard were our perfidious opponents.

Enfilade 2018 - Eylau. Doug Hamm. General du Corp.

Saturday morning at enfilade we played Enfilade. Doug has been organizing these games for quite a few years now, and he sends a group of us an email and demands to know which command we are planning to take and when we will have our troops painted up for it. It's worked very well for my collection and productivity to be honest.


This year I elected to take the Imperial guard in it's rather abbreviated state. Finishing my figs roughly a week before go time. The French were facing an impressive amount of Russian troops....most concerning to use was the disparity in strength points AND artillery. Later in the game I realized that the Russians also had an artillery reserve that was replenishing their depleted batteries. Zut Alors!

 My small command to the left, just behind Eylau. To the right is the impressively large Cavalry Reserve.

Soult was the French left flank, just to my left. He faced multiple waves of Russians and did a very credible job of blunting their attack. 

In the Centre I held back as I was meant to be a reserve. Being a small force it's pretty easy to force morale checks so I tried to stay out of cannon range. As is typical the moment my guard entered gun range, everything that could fire at them did.
The right wing was far away from me so I didn't collect a lot of info. It was the main event of the battle.

Once again on the left flank we see Soult has consolidated further left to try and cut down on the cannon fire and troops able to hit him at the same time. It's opening a gap that the guard shuffled up to fill. Another Russian corp is moving straight at Eylau. 

 The French cavalry reserve is now forced forward and rapidly comes under punishing cannon fire. The guard meanwhile continue to do their best to hold back.

Top right of the photo you can see a fresh french corp arrives. This was handled by Doug himself, who admits to having terrible dice rolls and questionable tactical ability. It's nice to have a fall guy to blame for defeats. 

 On the left we see the guard finally enter combat. They successfully manage to break the Russian morale of one corp. Soult is wavering and very solid rolls keep him in the line.

The centre Russian corp is also close to some critical morale checks.

 The french cavalry has force a number of units into square, which the limited french artillery punish. They are setting up to hit the centre Russian corp and could easily knock it down in conjunction with the guard. Things are looking tough, but manageable.

 A fresh Prussian corp arrives to bolster the Russians. Soult has done great service and stands little chance of even slowing down the german threat. 

A critical die roll is flubbed. The French cavalry reserve throws a 1 on a morale check and begins to break. They have one more chance to avoid complete disintegration, needing a 6 on their check the next turn. Alas, they vaporize as a force leaving a gaping hole in the centre. Soult is a spent force and even the guard strength is running out fast. Both Russian and French corp on the (french) right have been failing to advance or recoiling due to morale effects. Mid top of the picture shows the untouched Russian reserve moving towards the 'rupture point'.....it's clear that the Russians have score a victory, most likely major at that.

Debriefing: Doug takes pride that his scenarios often yield very close to historical results. He was a bit put off by this. Historically the French crashed through the Russians when they engaged with their cavalry. It was noted that the Russians did a lot of standing around and were unwilling to engage due to terrible visibility (snowing) and uncertainty re: french strength.
A number of us felt that the Russians probably had too much strength (each base was on par with the french, but the Russians had far more bases).
Everyone seemed to have a good time. I think the French probably stayed together longer than was expected (Soult in particular had some solid morale rolls), so a bit 'tuning' of the scenario is probably called for. We may see Eylau featured in this blog again.

Columns from the East.....More Perry Russian Napoleonics

Marching out of the painting pile, I have a host of Russians (plastic and metal Perry figs) reinforcements for my 'General du Corp' Russian Army. As mentioned before these rules are convention fast play set by Doug over at Dots of Paint blog.

Hoping to one day have enough figs of my own to host a game I long ago decided to aim for enough figs for '3 corp'....ish.  Looking at the OOB of the battles makes me realize it's very helpful to have friends contributing....I am often impressed by Doug's wisdom in his approach to gaming.

Above are the old style grenadier with the 'busch' style plume (pipe cleaners I think some call them). 

The remaining 5 bases are regular line infantry.
I FINALLY used the flags from the plastic box set. I can see with future expansions (if any) that I'll need to score some more flags to avoid duplicates (or use the plain white regimental flags a lot more.



These fellows are my 'lazy line', as the standard bearers have shouldered their kit. Even the drummer and officer are taking it pretty relaxed. The standard emblems have an unfortunate tendency to fall off and didn't make it into the picture prior to repair.

The final base with a single metal fellow wiping his brow. Painting is hard work!
 

Russian to the front....

Pardon the terrible pun, but I managed to finish my cossacks literally seconds before stepping out the door to catch a ferry to the enfilade convention.

 Doug (Dots of Paint) convinced 6 of us to all paint contigents of troops to help populate his Borodino battle field. After promptly finishing off my first allotment of troops, I went for a stretch goal and added a number of troops including these cossacks. Many have fallen by the wayside, but not these fine fellows.

Front Rank Russian Jaegers (28mm Napoleonics)

The last of the group of front rank Russians I recently completed. I've previously painted up the Perry version of skirmishing jaegers, and I didn't want to duplicate what I had. I also was intrigued by the musician with the french horn/cornet. Apparently these instruments were not very popular with light troops and often 'lost' quickly.

The posture of these guys are pretty fun. Again, you get a lot of choice from the front rank website. The faces look a bit muddy in these pictures, and the pants might be a tad muddy, but generally I'm pleased with how this base turned out.

Front Rank Russian Pavlov Grenadier (28mm Napoleonics)

Another 28mm offering set up for Doug's General du Corp fast play convention game. This project was a temporary casualty from the move but I've managed to finish it off. I'm quite pleased the with quality of the front rank miniatures. They cleaned up nicely and were very easy to order (and choose the exact poses!). My old mistake was a typo that got me some more infantry instead of riders for the horses I bought. Ooops.

Like most napoleonics the details of what colours to use are quite confusing as it covers a period of 10 (or more) years, with numerous organizational changes. In this case the flag was most confusing (yellow or orange seemed to be the real question). I ended up printing off a flag from the interwebz, and then going over it with some paint to enrichen the colour and cover up some of the pixellation. This was mostly driven by the ink jet starting to get clogged and running slow on certain shades. I'm pleased with how it turned out. 

My one complaint/criticism is that the standard bearer only came with a metal rod, so there was no device on the top. I tried sculpting one in green stuff, but it's a bit large/bodgy which will be much more noticeable when with other standard bearers.

Front Rank Russian Horse Artillery (28mm Napoleonics)

At last I've managed to finish off these figs. They were 'under way' when I totally fell off the 6mmrpc wagon as I geared up to move. It's great to be getting some painting done again, though still a bit challenging with all the time demands of living in a new town/home/job.

There seems to be a curious absence of Russian horse artillery produced by the big players (Victrix, Perrys, Warlord) so when I finally found a producer, I snapped up 2 sets. The guns are actually from my box of warlord russian artillery, as I felt a smaller calibre made more sense for the horse. The foot ended up with a big cannons that I also ordered from Front rank.

Overall the castings were varied, easy to clean, and seem pretty crisp. Fun figs to paint up actually, and having a distinct set of headgear will attract some attention I'm sure.

6MMRPC Week 12: Warlord Russian Napoleonic Artillery Battery

I finally finished a project that had been on pause for numerous weeks. Here we have 3 guns (batteries in Dougs General du Corp rules) of Russian Guns. Only the smallest gun, on the left, is actually Warlord, the other 2 guns I bought from Front Rank as I had other plans for the small 6lbs (4? lbs) guns. It's probably noticeable, as I forgot which greens I used, and the smallest gun is positively fluorescent compared to it's larger brethren.

6MMRPC Week 5: Warlord Napoleonic Russian General

A day behind on my week review. I managed to finish off this fine fellow, to add to my slowly growing Russian force for Doug's convention rule set General du Corp (Dots of Paint).

The generalissimo comes in a set which includes another (foot) officer, and a musician, both of whom were also finished this week. They will remain under wraps until based up appropriately, which means painting more figs, so it may be a while. 

 The model was a 3 part casting if I recall correctly. There were 2 or 3 options on the arm (handing off a document being one of them). My biggest (sole?) complaint is the weird horse pose. Look at it. WEIRD. It's like it's scared of it's own image in a mirror and backing away. *Not* a natural horse pose, and I know very little about horses.

I grapple with the decision of whether to highlight the greens of my Russians lighter (their green was very very dark). I'm also slightly critical of my horse highlights, lack of markings (socks, spots on head), and the golden shoulder boards maybe should be more gold in the recess?

Fairly pleased overall though.

6MMRPC: Week 23 Perry Miniatures Russian Dragon & Cuirassier

I've managed to polish off the last of my Perry Miniatures (wave 1). Much of the work was done at the same time as the officers, but last week I got antsy and finished off the officers to show some progress.








I'm rather happy with how these guys turned out. I must say the smaller pics look much sharper than when you zoom in across the whole computer screen.

I think my favorite horses are the rather orangey ones. They do, however, manage to avoid getting to an unnatural tone.





From the back the figs do look a little bland, as the regimental colours (blue) are a lot less obvious.










The cuirassier I decided to choose a festive colour of pink. It turns out I only have about 3 shades of pink, and one is positively neon. I may need to try and expand the range a bit (or even it out), but honestly, one doesn't get to paint with pinks very often. I may have to track down some girly figures to create a paint need.







The red lining on the armour was a bit tricky, and therefore got a little sloppy. I'm also not entirely happy with the coppery colour on the side flask. But these are fairly minor quibbling. I'm sure they will look just fine on the tabletop field of battle.





Outstanding items for pretty much the entire force are:
-Add some chunk foliage to the bases to make them more interesting.
-Add an identifier colour to the bottom of the bases (so i don't lose my figs when the lot of us join forces to play Borodino).
-Varnish my figs. I noticed, in particular, some chipped primer off the metals very early. I'm not sure if I didn't lay down a think enough layer of primer, or should have rinsed with soap and water my figs before hand. I'd like to protect the paint jobs from the rigors of handling/gaming. The great fear is the frosting effect, so I do need to wait for a low humidity day....which in the pacific northwest may occur briefly in july.  *sigh*

6MMRPC: Week 22 Perry Russian Officers

Well another week slides by between posts. This week I have finished up my command figures for the Russian Napoleonics. These two fellows are lead/pewter. Surprisingly (mostly to myself I suppose), these are the first horse figures I've actually painted. I agonized and stressed over the horses for some time (I did 11 at once, as I worked on these guys and my other Russian cavalry (dragoon and cuirassier)) at the same time.






I'm reasonably happy with how they all turned out. The basing will need to be tarted up a bit with some other vegetation, but I'll probably treat all my bases at once when I'm done everything.
There's an intentional space for the name of the commander (small paper stuck with blue tac to allow changes). I think once this is on there it will look less sparse. It's more noticeable on a small officer base than the double sized troop bases.



The fellow above I can't tell if the camera has washed out his mustache, or I need to bring it up a bit with something more yellow. This could definitely enhance the look at range.

Mr Swords face looks a bit shrouded in shadow,  and his gorget looks awfully grubby, but I suppose these will be less obvious at range.

I managed to get in a game of DBA at the beginning of the week. Hopefully I'll get a post up shortly.

6MMRPC:Week 15 Russian Infantry Complete!

I'm late with the posting, as this is actually the start of week 16, but I wanted to finish the last few steps this earlier this evening so I wouldn't stretch these guys out another week. I'm finally completed all the Russian infantry figs I received right before starting the challenge. Considering October was completely taken up by zombies, that means it took about 10 weeks to finish. Pretty bad actually, although I was distracted by various other items and a second job (taking me over full time).


I noticed as I was laying these guys out to photograph them with the earlier figs that I went through the effort of painting the edge brown when I'm supposed to paint it black. DOH! Wasted paint AND time. Such weak-sauce.

These are the contents of 1 box of plastic russians, 1 artillery pack (licorne), and 2 metals packs (jaegers skirmishing & grenadier command advancing).

I still need to paint up some command figs for these guys, but it's nice to be mostly done.


A bit of background here....Doug from Dots of Paint blog, convinced a number of us to all paint Russians to set up for a big borodino game. He posted the OOB broken down into the required bases. I took Tuchkov's 3rd corp, which only requires 2 grenadier, 1 line, 1 jaeger, and 1 artillery. I've overshot by 1 line and 1 jaeger. If I can finish my cavalry requirements in a prompt fashion, and the other members aren't overally productive, I may claim another corp to work on.

Of course, there is the reduced hobby activity related to the holidays. At least a few nights have been taken up with decorating, having a party, and christmas cards.

My wife has some degu's as pets (they are dessert rodents from South America). She makes clever holiday pictures to print on the cards and send out. Considering these beasties chew everything and can't tolerate sugar (being naturally diabetic) it's actually quite tricky to pull off. I have been drafted (willingly) to assist for the last two years.

Hope you are all having a good (and productive) holiday season.