Mea Culpa

 Club last night and Seven Years War again, but this time in 28mm and a much smaller game than with Dan's legions and with Honours of War rules not Black Powder. I would be introducing the rules to Dan, Matt and Simon.

With a bit of spare time I found a scenario I could use, the French were besieging a city somewhere in the distance and had set up a heavy artillery piece to batter the walls, the British sent a force against this gun with the intention of making it inoperable. The French had seen the approach and had turned the gun around to face the attackers, they also had a Forlorn Hope (Scots Guards) behind walls on a nearby hill which was a secondary objective for the British.

Dan would hold the main hill with the gun while Matt would advance his brigade to assist the Scots, I would lead the attack on the gun position while Simon would support and possibly take the secondary objective. As I advanced I blocked the fire of our two artillery pieces until I could get safely out in front of them, Simon meanwhile moved on the Scots Guards and sent the rest of his troops forward to meet the advancing French. There was a crash of musket fire and Simon's men started to suffer, my own came under fire from the French heavy artillery as pipes played and drums beat the advance.

 Quite quickly as I pushed my men forward Simon came under increasing pressure and deadly fire, so deadly two battalions fled the field. I now managed to get my men up after some delays but again the firefight went the way of the French, as the British line shuddered Dan took the opportunity to charge my own Scots on the extreme left but was knocked back, the only piece of good luck we had last night. It was not good enough however and losing another couple of battalions the British started to withdraw with the French sensing victory. Being very close to our army morale breaking and the French having suffered at worst a few headaches I called a French win.

 

A very one sided affair which mainly came about by the accurate and deadly fire throughout by the French and the almost useless response by the British. It did not help either that I failed to use my two medium guns advantageously, I got a brain freeze with them, but in my defence whenever they did fire they hit nothing. The good news is the game gleaned interest from the rest of the club and Dan was pleased with the rules so I expect to do some more 28mm games at the club next year, so much to play and so little time.

 While I was setting up the game twenty minutes after arriving at the club I got a text from my car telling me it had been in a collision, I dropped everything and ran out to inspect it. Expecting the worst, maybe a door stove in or wing missing I could see nothing, so back to the club and the game. When we finished and putting the boxes in the boot I saw where it had been hit, it had been scratched at the rear near the wheel. In the daylight it proved just that, a scratch but enough I think to cost around £100 to get fixed, one of my customers has a business fixing these kinds of annoyances and is expert at it and I have used him a couple of times through the years.

My Crusader SYW figures turned up and they had indeed put in an extra couple of standard bearers for me, so gold star for them. The figures are very nice so once Christmas etc. is out of the way I think I shall order up the remaining four battalions from them. I haven't managed to get around to cleaning and priming yet, but no big hurry.

Club Christmas game next week and then that will probably be it until January, Dan is running a large Black Powder game at his place on 30 December to which I have been invited so will look forward to that. 

It's my birthday today so I am giving way to sloth, I have finished all outstanding map work so have no need to draw at the moment either, an afternoon reading and watching YouTube military lectures lies ahead, hopefully without too many customers.