Marginano, 13th September 1515 - v2.0

 Hi all, its was time again for a 28mm Renaissance game, this time I choose Marginano again, but with a little enhancements for the Swiss and the French, basically to make the whole thing a bit more entertaining. (28mm, Pike&Shotte v1 with some house rules), Bart, David and me on the French side, Gordon, Tim, Angus and Mike fighting for the Eidgenossen. I was CinC of the French, Francis the I, while Tim had his debut as CinC of the Swiss as Captn. Uli Fruehli.

To cut it short (pun intended), in the real battle and last time the Swiss were uncoordinated attacked in piece meal garden variety and were defeated. This time I told them and they knew it. The Italian Sforza flank with Angus and Mike were running into Bart Gendarmes and even though a part of bart men-at-arms were looting a hamlet nearby (one of the entertainments I introduced), Bart managed to disorder Angus Pike block and subsequently attack it with his gendarmes and annihilate it. I had victory points allocate to commanders and units - the French were on a winning streak. It looked good.

But then me and David mishandled our guns and 2 of our 4 guns exploded. Embolded by that Gordon and Tims Swiss pike blocks stormed vs my French king and did quite good damage. I lost a pike block and men-at-arms and nearly my king, but then Gordon overstretched and thought the camp was the objective (historically, yes, but not in this version) and I blasted his pike block away off the field with my last operable field gun - pheew!

Then we had to close because of time (in real life) and in the game I introduced effects of the fading daylight, visibility was reduced to 14" and shooting minus 1at this point. the Swiss tally was 7 points (even when we count the two self-blown off guns of the French it would have been 9) vs the French 14 points - a clear French victory as per points - but I would give them a morale victory as they actually managed to break into the French camps (huzzah, Gordon!!), and I nearly blown the victory away as my French King was for turns just with his shaken gendarmes in front of the Swiss mob... live dangerous, they say!

It was loads of fun, even though the the disorderment of the pike block had a very decisive effect on the rest of battle. In those days I presume, shot, or even guns, were very effective against crammed pike blocks, but more so probably psychologically. The same goes for Gendarmes, if you catch in these rules somebody's unit disordered, you have half way beaten them!

Initial set up

King Francis I, his gendarmes d'Ordonnance and some Bande Neri

The rest of the camp ...

The Swiss, the Schwyzer and the Baseler approaching!

Mikes Sforza cavalry!

The Berner center...

My second gun blew off ...

They are coming!

the Bande neri retreats ...

My men-at-arms did not made it over the fence in time ...

Barts gendarmes cought Angus pike disordered - Ouch!

My flank starts to melt away ...

Bart has problems to capitalise on his victory ...

The king holds the line ...

The Swiss and the bande neri clashes in a bad war push of pike!

The Swiss are in the encampment!

The Baseler mega pike block is in as well!

I got a little help from the centre with another pikeblock ...

King Francis I, with his shaken knights ...

The second Swiss pike block retreats ...

424 BC - Delium PLUS - the Spartans should have stayed home

A totally fictional refight of the Battle of Delium, but just with the Spartans and a nice wall to protect the temple of Apollo - because we had them. 28mm, Hail Caesar, my miniatures (Warlord Games or Victrix).

Bart, John and Alisdair fought for the Peloponnesian League, While me, Tim and Gordon fought for the Delian Empire ... errm Athenians. The Spartans had the first move, divided their units the king to block the left and the rest to stop us from flanking them. I had a division just made out of skirmishers and I would harass them just after I would have destroyed their pesky few helots and men on horses...

BUT Bart killed my skirmishers with charging my peltats ... and basically swiped them all away in one or two turns. Yes, this was the first game ever, where I could leave the field not doing anything (I switched to umpire).

So then the Spartans turned the tide and swept around our flank and Alisdairs  phalanges attacked us but came too short ... so we attacked and destroyed them, now that was a piece of luck as that was actually what was winning the battle (we would count the units costs points). So Congratulation, Gordon! Your division broke the Peloponnesian neck!

In the meantime Tim did the best taktic and kept his best, but still inferior Athenian elites out of trouble and pestered and harassed the two Spartan units - successfully with peltasts to the point where only one was not shaken!

And in the end our 5 units charged the 2 of the Spartans for the endfight. We didn't break them, but we got them shaken and or nearly so, they would not survived another round. BUT we didn't killed them.

John ( the king of Sparta and CinC of the line) was  so gallant to accept the defeat - a truly new era was ushered in. So again Congratulations Gordon and Tim, Especially for the absolute right taktic that was the only successful one vs the Spartans. A Delian victory!

The initial set up ...

Barts light flank ...

Our Athenian centre ...

A posh overprotected Apollo temple ...

The Spartans split and came down hill ...

Gordons centre forms up to meet them ...

It could get ugly quite quickly ...

The left the hills like in history ...

And charged my skimishers ...

While the Spartan King waited ...

Unfortunately thats were my light division was deleted ...

Our centre was with an open flank ...

But Tim just continued to harassing the Spartans ...

Meanwhile Gordon destroyed Alisdairs division ...

Gordon formed up again to meet the threat ...

And then retreated to the rest ...

The Plan was to concentrate and to attack ...

Before the Spartan King would be coming with the rest of his army ...

And coming our way he was ...

But the other unit was getting shaken ...

And the Athenians all clogged up ...

Until they formed line ...

While being in phalanx ... (scenario rule)

Time to strike ...

But Time didn't made the order successfully ...

Valuable time for the king ...

Athenians dither ...

But then finally clash ...

Two units got thoroughly thrashed ... end of game.

1940 - The hunt on the Scharnhorst ...

 ... or how the Royal Navy lost by points.

Well, after my death ride of my Tirpitz last game seem to have made a veritable impression of the fans of the RN - it wasn't allowed back on the table again, what a bummer! 

So the scenario was that, I don't know ...  go get the British (Tim, Peter, Alisdair and Gordon) again, even though they were already concentrated on the centre of the table and we (da Germans - Bart, me, Andy and Mike) came in from all four corners of the winds ...

What could possibly go wrong.

The Brits tried to concentrate on Mikes Scharnorst and tried the whole time to sink it - while we Bart and me shot some smaller vessels at the periphery and f*** off while we had the chance. Mike wanted to fight with his Scharnhorst, but really couldn't because his, well, everything was blown away from board... BUT

... they didn't get him in the end. He made it to the table edge. 

Remember, guys to concentrate fire! And to throw better! The rest of the Kriegsmarine left the table mildly amused.

Point wise a German victory. Strategy wise a German victory. Gunnery wise a German victory. But the British catering was a exquisit.

The Royal Navy huddled together ...

The Kriegsmarine coming in for the kill ...

Scharnhorst under attack ...

The RN in line to catch and destroy it ...

But the Scharnhorst is still capable ...

They did not hit well today ...

So we left with a point victory the field ...