Monday 15th September 2014

Campaign Game

The Anglo-Portuguese army had skirted round Madrid after the last battle and headed north.
After a hard march through the mountains the hungry army came to a bridge with a road heading north towards Valladolid.

The path was blocked by the French and they refused to surrender. Game on!

Got to admit it was a hard battle in terms of the allies being a bit nervous of charging across the bridge and attacking the buildings.
NOT helped by rubbish command rolls by Brits and rubbish searches for fords by both allies.

The Dragoons were eventually burned alive as they held off the Brits, the French unit on the other side of the road felt the full force of 3 batteries of Portuguese 9lbers firing canisters at close range.

The allied cannon were short on gunpowder and only had 4 shots each for the whole game, hence the Portuguese waiting til canister range before firing.

Once the Portuguese found a ford, they enjoyed a great set of commands, for several turns gaining 3 moves with each order and enabled them to quickly cross and deploy before the French cavalry arrived.
Even when rolling a blunder (whilst trying to advance) the blunder roll forced them to advance!!!

Near to the end of the battle the main French force arrived behind the allies, but too late to stop the allies crossing.

It was surprising how easy 3 units of Infantry, 2 4lber cannons, 1 unit of Dragoons and 4 units of Hussars can stop a force from crossing a bridge until fords are found.
As stated the allies were nervous of crossing under a hail of fire and assaulting buildings. Also low supplies for the artillery and the army suffering -1 morale due to hunger.

The result was a win for the allies with no units lost (Portuguese only took 2 casualites all game) thanks to some really poor French cannon fire. How many times when firing at medium range can a commander rolls a 1 & 2?

The Portuguese have turned to face the French, whilst the British head north to find supplies and a defensive position to allow the Portuguese to pass through once the French are slowed. And then the British will battle whilst the Portuguese return the honors.

Lets hope a bigger force than the French had can hold the river just as well.

Some pics below
The Allied deployment 

 
Dragoons hold the South bank and receive some attention

Cannons and infantry holding the North bank

Portuguese firing line and finding the ford

Portuguese fly across the ford and form up to face the cavalry

The Brits  finally find a ford and start to cross the bridge, just as the French army arrives to their rear, including the Guard!

Final table, most of the Portuguese are across to the bottom and Brits are just starting to cross, whilst the French Guard can be seen top left arriving on table.