Game AAR - Franco-Prussian War...or, How the French stopped Bismarck

Saturday, I played in a game of 28mm Franco-Prussian War using the Larry Brom's Chasspots & Needleguns.  Blake had us over at his place for the game and provided all of the figures and terrain.  I have mixed feelings about the mechanics of the rules, but it didn't help that my dice rolling was horrible.  Glenn & Curtis played the French, each with a regiment of French Foreign Legion.  Curtis was also running an artillery battalion and a battalion of light cavalry.  Blake and me where pushing a regiment of Bavarians and a battalion of artillery, plus I also had a battalion of heavy cavalry.  The game end with a massive French victory.  Now, on to the pictures...

Glenn and Blake faced off against each other on the left side of this picture.  Blake is advancing in Double Line formations.  I am facing off against Curtis.  I am advancing in Field Columns as I am trying to get to the town first and occupy it for the fortification. 

This picture shows the German heavy cavalry and the heavy siege guns under my command. Notice the nice clear firing lane down main street for Curtis' artillery...the bane of my existence.
So, here we see the French guns are still not shot yet, but the French cavalry has moved and moved quite well for speed!  In response, I did the proper tactic of forming square with my flank battalion.  Note the middle battalion prior to the firing for the first turn.

Now, the French cannons fired, I took heavy losses and was forced back...way back!  This was running back and forth was pretty much the rest of the game for me.

Blake's forces are suffering losses to French Chasspot rifles with greatly out ranges our Dreyse needle gun rifles....like 24" to our 16" range!  Notice also that Blake's artillery is not anywhere where it could fire...yeah, there is a reason I am mentioning this...

Turn two, I change formations to get out of column and the French cavalry charges my square!

Freaking French artillery!!!!  Turn two's firing hit my lead battalion causing them to withdraw all the way back past the rear battalion.  Compare the locations from the prior picture.

Still on turn two, my square shoots up a quarter of the French cavalry, then fails their morale and runs away!  Seriously?!?!? 

Turn three sees my two battalions that have not routed wheel to face the right flank.  The ashamed battalion that routed from a square has retreated to just out of the the picture on the left, but they are still in the game.  Curtis advanced one battalion of infantry in Field Column to support his light cavalry.  I decided to charge my heavy cavalry into this column of infantry before they have time to change formation and the French light cavalry counter charged me on the flank.  That is what the big mass of figures are at the top of the picture.  In desperation, I fired my siege guns into the melee causing one hit to all three units, but everyone passed their morale.

The French won the melee, barely!  I had beaten all of the light cavalry and almost beaten all of the French infantry before my heavy cavalry's bottle failed.  So I had to route and the French held.  The heavy cavalry was later routed off the board by the French cavalry.  That was pretty much it on my flank.  For the rest of the game, I tried to get out of the line of site of the French artillery, but couldn't.  Every time I advanced, I was forced to recoil the same distance back...sigh.  But what about Blake's flank?

For those unfamiliar with the curse of Blake, he has some of the worst dice rolling known to man!  He never could get his artillery to where it was need to shoot because he regularly failed his command rolls to move!  For an example, the pictures above and below are from the same turn in which he tried to use the free action card to do something too... He only needed to roll an eight or less on a d10...

So his infantry advanced into the jaws of death unsupported while the French danced all around him...

Yes, that is a French battalion that behind Blake's force.  Yes, the French moved that fast!

I didn't look at what the total losses where for both sides, but we started off with 46 stands (I think the French had 43 starting.)  At 20 stands lost, the game is over.  At the end of turn 4, we had lost 19 stands!  I am not sure how many stands we lost in turn 5, but it was several.  The French, I think, lost maybe five stands total?  I know I got killed two cavalry and one infantry stand, and might have gotten another.  Blake might have gotten one or two infantry stands too.  Just thank goodness that we left our flags back in Munich. <>

Be seeing you

Sapper