Swiss Cheese and Other Stuff

 As you know it has been some time since I have played a game of Italian Wars but I have been giving a bit of thought to the almost unbeatable Swiss. In Furioso it is very difficult to beat these mercenaries, so much so that it can unbalance a game, so I decided to look into things rather than simply take it "that the Swiss are the best infantry in Europe". Their reputation is warranted for their superb victories against the luckless Charles the Bold, but should it carry on for the next forty or fifty years?

For the Italian Wars we kick of with Cerignola 1503, the Swiss attack with their usual disregard for what else was happening, they did not wait for the French rearguard, but were unable to break the enemy front and harrassed by arquebusiers and light cavalry were driven back with heavy casualties. Next up is Agnadello 1509, although a French victory against 'B' team Venice the Swiss did not cover themselves in glory as they failed to get to grips with the enemy due to the terrain. Novara 1513, just like the old days, the Swiss heavily defeat a French army fighting on their own behalf with the Duchy of Milan.

Two years later at Marignano 1515, on the second day after some success the night before the Swiss made a determined attack on the French, cut to pieces by artillery and flung back by Landsknechts the Swiss managed several other assaults but had to withdraw in the end. Now we come to Biccoca 1522, usually described as the nail in the coffin of Swiss hegemony, a self confident Swiss contingent came on in the same old way to be met with a hail of cannon and gunfire from behind fieldworks, to be eventually pushed back by the hated Landsknechts, their casualties being horrendous. After this we have Pavia 1525, where the Swiss contingent of the French army is thoroughly trounced in a stand up fight against the Imperials. Some kudos was regained at Ceresole 1544 as they took part in the French victory but this was in conjunction with the French infantry and it had been a hard fight against the Imperials.

So, what do we have, one complete victory at Novara, a lacklustre performance at Agnadello, Marignano, Bicocca and Pavia are defeats two of them heavy and a combined victory at Ceresole. Granted they were never hesitant at throwing themselves at the enemy but this tactic began to fail in the face of artillery, guns and fieldworks along with modern tactics evolved by the Spanish. In light of this I am going to reduce the effectivness of the Swiss in Furioso and drop them to a combat factor of 4 from 5, this leaves them with an edge but one which can be blunted, and more realistic.

It was ACW at the club this week, Fran had set up the battle of Wilson's Creek from the Black Powder scenario book, I took the Union centre on Bloody Hill and saw no reason to hazard the end result by unhistorically attacking the Confederates, Ed on the right was going to do the same while Ian on the left did have an opportunity to attack if Franz Sigel's flank march turned up in the right place. The Rebs on the other hand had no leeway and had to attack.

The battle begins.

The Union right.

 

My boys on Bloody Hill.

The Rebs close in.

The Federal left.

As the gray masses approached the heights volleys were traded and the enemy lines shuddered, it did seem that the Federals were going to be overwhelmed and I thought about moving my two reserve regiments to the flanks in case Ed or Ian required help. For a time it looked like the Union were going to beat off the enemy attacks, Sigel had turned up albeit not in the best place but very soon the flank attack combined with some bad luck for the Rebs ensured that the Union left would hold. Ed was now being heavily pressured on my right and was pulling back, my boys also began to suffer and although fighting bravely simply could not hold against superior numbers. It was about this time that Ian's aggressive moves went wrong and his original brigade now broke as did all the Union forces on the hill, only the flanking brigade was left. It had been so close but in the end the Rebs won, as they had done back in 1861.

For the first time in a while I managed some painting and completed a set of Looters and one of Villagers from Warlord Games as scatter pieces for the Italian Wars, it has taken me a while but I got there in the end. I have just received some Early War Germans from Crusader, a squad of infantry and a couple of 5cm mortars just to beef up my forces for the upcoming Gembloux Gap scenario which I hope to start once the dust has settled from the building works. That is all I am planning for now and have still to make my mind up as to my way forward on the Italian Wars armies.

Preparations are now being made for my take over of the old shop as work nears completion, at least on the inside. I am going to stain my work desk to a clour more suited for the new room, not something I will enjoy no doubt as I detest any kind of DIY, but it will save me a nice bit of dosh. I got a new paint holder for all my GW contrast paints, I sprayed it black as well as my Vallejo rack and they do look nice. Book cases are on the way and shelving for the troops will be ordered after Easter.

 

 I am a cantankerous old git when it comes to appreciating historical movies or series and whine about every wrong piece of armour or where the movie people deviate from my historical take on things as I flaunt my knowledge to anyone who will listen. No more, I have learned my lesson. With nothing to do this afternoon I sat and watched Paul Woodadge of WW2TV interviewing Stephen Rosenbaum, the visual effects supervisor on the recent "Masters of the Air" series and I was humbled. The detailed knowledge and hard work of Rosenbaum and his crew and their efforts to make the action and more as real as possible is a tour de force and a very exciting watch, your jaw will drop. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hl2EYqcFXsE&list=PLDG3XyxGI5lDOO3mMgk4SAy31XjqUxqey.

The Rain In Spain

 I have recovered from my 'special' day last week and for now am back on an even keel, in so much as I can be in this madhouse of a world.

A flurry of activity in what I am beginning to call my 'Fortress of Solitude' this week, the floor is in, most of the woodwork is complete and the bathroom is also done. The shop front has now gone, well almost all of it so that leaves the new wall to finish and a garden wall to be built, obviously I am more interested in the inside and when I can annex it to my wargame empire. To this end I have now ordered bookcases, shelving, chairs etc. so light at the end of the tunnel and maybe a wargame or two.

New floor.

New front, almost.

Old Front.

This week I was introducing Fran to Chain of Command with the intention of kicking off a small campaign once everything is ship shape, I chose The Gembloux Gap as it is small and I can get my French troops out for a run. So I put something together for the game and off we went. I was the French and Fran took the bad guys, he took an extra squad and a PzIII, I had a Panhard armoured car and a 60mm mortar, which I forgot all about until the last turn.

Normally I would have waited several turns before putting my defenders down but that would not serve to introduce game mechanics so I popped a couple of squads and my grenadiers on fairly quick, the Germans managed to get most of their troops on and started to heap some hurt on my Frenchies or sit on overwatch waiting for the rest to turn up. I did not have a lot of luck and thankfully there were a few times when Fran also annoyed Lady Luck, I brought on the Panhard and traded shots with the PzIII to no avail, although I did catch its attention. 

As the time ran out the Jerries at last made a move towards my line but we stopped the game and packed up, Fran had had a decent run at the rules and is happy to give the campaign a try once I am ready, so I shall look forward to it.

This morning I headed north to Penrith and Matt's Dungeon, I asked if we could give WWII a miss and could he put on something colourful. I arrived to fight on the plains of Spain as two Arab armies faced off against each other at some point of the Dark Ages. We both had typical armies of the time and I also had a contingent of Christian mercenaries, Matt also had mercenaries, Turks I think. The object was to have more troops on the far side of a small stream at the end than the enemy, along with killing more enemy than you lost and thirdly there was an enemy camp which could be captured.

We were using Kings of War, a set of rules which I have never played and never had any intention of playing, simply because I have War and Conquest for my pre-gunpowder armies. It was going to be a sharp learning curve.

My first plan was to use my Christians to smash Matt's left flank and then turn in towards the centre and the camp over on the enemy right. This did not go so well and about three moves in I had a large gap in my line as I lost a couple of crossbow units and had had to withdraw my heavy cavalry due to enemy missile fire, it looked like an early bath for me.

 

The battlefield somewhere in Spain.

The bad guys.

The good guys.

I now made an effort on my left with horse archers and some medium cavalry and managed to see off the enemy horse on that flank, I now sent my infantry towards the enemy centre while Matt reciprocated, my right was only just hanging on and I sent some infantry across to stop my camp falling into enemy hands. Slowly, very slowly I began to get the upper hand on the right although things were still messy as both sides strove for an advantage. Then, out of the blue things swung my way and in the dying light of day I held my right, and smashed the enemy centre, the enemy were left with two units and the casualty roll was in my favour while my troops had secured the far bank.

My long suffering Christian cavalry get their own back.

I ford the stream and attack.

More troops are drawn into battle in the centre.

The game was different but exciting, the combat worked well but I had the impression that archery was too strong, now this might just have been because these armies relied a lot on missile troops and had plenty, Matt also assured me that it worked fine in the end, the jury is still out on that one. The rules are fast and easily picked up, I would be very happy to play them again, especially with the lovely troops and battlefields provided in the Dungeon.

I have to admit I am hooked on Shogun and this week I managed to get that tin of bog standard beer and enjoyed it with the latest episode last night, although I still can't get cheese and onion square crisps. I also got two new books having finished the two volumes on Rorke's Drift, due to my renewed interest on the bombing campaign against Germany I settled on 'Dresden' while my eyes also lit upon a history of the emperor Justinian. I should have looked at the latter closer, I make it a policy not to buy history books without maps or using BCE/CE rather than BC/AD, yes daft, but hey, that's me. Justinian has maps but I missed the other bit, grrrrrr.

View From The Window: Special Edition

 "Let's go to Lancaster" says the missus as our house is again home to the builders, cue the rain. We can stop by Bathroom Supplies for a toilet roll holder, towel and soap holders, fairy snuff says I as I only have some details to put my latest, large, map project to bed. Enters what seems to be an empty shop, ten minutes later we form a search party for the owners and set off. Having at last succeeded in tracking someone down we swiftly wished we hadn't as the price for the three everyday items came to around £200. We left sharpish.

We decided on lunch before some shopping, we normally go to a basic but excellent chinese restaurant, it must be because all the Chinese students eat there, but instead walked a bit further to 'German Doner Kebab' as we had been intrigued by the name. I looked at the professionaly taken photographs of what was on order and chose the Doner Quesadilla, the missus had a Doner burger, yep, seems you can put anything between a roll. My meal turned up minus the lovely looking pot of salsa on the photograph, I made my way to the counter, you forgot my salsa says I, there is no salsa with the Quesadilla she says, yes there is, there it is on the photograph, no, that's just a photograph she insists, yes but one with a pot of salsa on it. Does the Doner Burger come without the burger because it is just a photograph I enquire but watch my caustic remark fly over her head and disappear behind the drinks machine. I rarely complain about food, I leave that to my sons and my wife, but this time I am going all the way to Glasgow, yes, that's where the head offices of 'German Doner Kebab' are!

What I got.

What was promised.

Then as we walked back to the city centre I ran the gauntlet of morons texting while expecting oncoming normal people to move aside, the sheer amount of these creatures leaves me without words, well I actually do have words but this is before 9 pm. I also do not move from my intended path.

Things were not improving, the wife bought one item in a store where only one of the six tills had a server at it, and who would be there at this till but a Gen Z'r texting while the assistant passed a large family's clothing allowance for the year through the zapper while her mother ran to and fro collecting even more clothing. I tried to get the missus to leave the growing queue on the basis they didn't really want money or there would be more people.

Coffee and a cake then home the Memsahib promised. We found a table, hunkered down and I waited to be served hand and foot while she went to get the drinks and eats, wait, on the opposite table sat a guy with a glass of water taking up a table of four seats piggy backing on the cafe's wifi while doing god knows what on his laptop for free. This annoyed me, I tried to appear interested in what the wife was saying but my eyes kept straying to the free loader next door, hoping someone would force him to buy something or move. That doesn't happen these days, I do remember when I had the paper shop and someone would blatently pick up a newspaper and leaf through it, I would quietly sneak up and whisper, this is not a library!

At last we headed home, I felt the urge for some beers, just bog standard British beer with an alcoholic kick as a change from zero as it might put a smile on my face, but mainly to sit and sup with some Walkers square crisps, cheese and onion while catching up on the latest episode of Shogun. The supermarket had every beer or lager from Paris to the Urals but no bog standard booze, the only square crisps they had were salt and vinegar, so back to zero alcohol for me. Then I tried to pay for it, the 'fast' checkout had a queue of 10 patiently and not so patiently waiting for the new assistant to speed up while, yes, only one of the six tills had someone in attendance.

A poll this afternoon in Lancaster.

So endeth the day.

Volksgrenadiers Again And Some Entertainment News.

 Every now and again I get a run of decent TV and I seem to be hitting the mark at the moment. Still engrossed in Korean drama for my staple but recently came back to 'Fargo' (Prime) having caught up with Season 4 and started Season 5. Superb stuff, not a dud amongst them, I like to think of Fargo as TV for grown ups, rightly or wrongly.  'The Gentlemen' has kicked off on Netflix and the first episode was thoroughly enjoyable and is set to be a typical Guy Richie 'Allo Geezer' wheeze full of colourful, larger than life characters. I am still following 'Masters of the Air' (Apple) although it seems to have morphed into more of a POW drama and just by luck it would seem I will get all of it before I am cut off, with only a day or two to spare. Now, 'Shogun', (Disney+), I was determined not to like this from the trailers showing the woman slaying Ronin in droves but I was stuck one evening and gave in, so far so good, the whole Samurai vibe is hard to resist and it has been very well done. So there you go, for once the televisual famine has receded but the movie famine continues, but really with all the above, where would I have the time to watch one for more than the usual ten minutes before searching for the remote.

Rob offered a game and we decided to go for the Ardenne 1944, I again brought my Volksgrenadiers, four squads, sniper, MMG, mortar, Sdkfz 222 and a Flakpanzer (38t), oh, and a panzerschrek, the full Monty for 1,000 points while Rob took three squads of American Paratroopers with two mortars, MMG, bazooka and an M5 Stuart, a total of 700 points. The Yanks were Green and in a quiet area and dug in when the Battle of the Bulge took place, they had to defend a small hamlet and stop the Germans taking it to facilitate their planned armoured breakthrough.

I sneaked through the wooded terrain keeping away from the edge and also brought on my armour taking care to keep it away from the M5 which although not a great tank it was better than mine with their 20mm cannon and paper armour. I had planned to hit both flanks but in the end attacked the centre and right of the American position, my armour managed despite the entrenchments to weaken a squad defending a hill and the road. While this was happening I lost my mortar spotter so the thing had to be run to the front so it could actually see something to shoot at (it's Bolt Action), my sniper who had been rushed to the front without doing the sniper course hit nothing all game and I was too frightened to move my MMG into the open.

Dug in Yanks.

Brave defenders of the Reich.

Lt. Gruber's little tank.

Nevertheless it was time to close the deal, my squads marched into assault rifle range of the American positions and casualties began to climb among the Ami's. Some of my squads took hits and although one stayed Green the other two turned into regulars, as I said, it's Bolt Action. The sheer volume of fire now hitting the Yanks brought down several squads and teams, enough for Rob to raise a white flag as the grenadiers got ever closer.

Rob's little tank.

Flakpanzer in action at last, lovely 3D print.

The end as the Volksgrenadiers move in.

The entrenchments were a real pain and I was having to throw a six then a second one to score a hit, thankfully my dodgy German themed dice for once did not let me down, and I slowly whittled down the opposition until I got closer. Rob may have been able to counter with his third squad and the M5 but his men were vulnerable to fire once they had left their defences, the M5 actually hit the Flakpanzer but only stunned the crew, a very lucky escape for me. So another agreeable game with Mr M.

Much like the richness of TV programmes above map work is now heading my way at a steady pace, I am finishing off a mini atlas type project and have some maps for French Armies of the Thirty Years War up next along with additions to Bloody Streets: The Battle for Berlin, concentrating this time on armour, artillery and assault groups and the flak towers, with a new series on the Eastern Front later in the year from the same author.

I almost forgot, a journalist is up in arms (of course he is) and asking why there are no black people in the TV series Shogun, set in Japan in 1600AD, one wag answered with "Because they were in Africa", it tickled me. 

I have given in and ordered up some new figures, time to get the paints out again, nothing earth shattering, just some looters and villagers suitable for the Italian Wars to use as interesting vignettes and scatter.

Ein Volk, Ein Rubbish.

 Bolt Action this week against Michael's Yanks, not an army I would use myself as I find rules make excuses for them, much like Romans and Normans as if they do not want to offend with an intimation they might not be as good as the general public and movie makers think. I had this mindset when I read my first set of rules back in the olden days, WRG 1925-1950, and could not understand, having been brought up with Hotspur, Valiant and Commando comics why the British would need to take a morale test, and horror of horrors even fail!

I digress as usual, I decided to do something different and took a Volksgrenadier platoon supported by a Brummbar, veteran squad (for which I used my Kriegsmarine in order to only take one box) and a panzerschreck. This was out of my comfort zone as Bolt Action does not do justice, in my opinion, to Volksgrenadiers and their organisation is not historical. They are green and of course carry a fair number of assault rifles whose range is much less than rifles and therefore need to be carefully husbanded yet manouvered close to the enemy. I have the figures so why not.

The scenario involved an aircraft about to crash on the battlefield with important papers aboard, whoever had the most troops closest to the plane at the end would win, where the plane crashed was unknown to both sides. I actually have a nice shot down FW190 but at the moment cannot get to it, a shame. I deployed troops at both ends of the table to use the available cover to get close to the enemy, completely forgetting the plane was likely to come down in the centre area. Michael was more spread out and covered the centre with two squads, he had an anti-tank gun opposite my left and a Sherman opposite my right. I was quite aggressive and moved my men up quickly deciding to take losses in order to hopefully take advantage of my assault rifles to even things up.

My less than enthusiastic boys.

Yanks.

 Bolt Action has this rule whereby troops which, although green, may contain more experienced men, so when a green squad loses a casualty you roll a die and they can suddenly turn to regulars or even veterans, they can also take more pins so it is not all good news, but the odds are you will suddenly have a regular squad at your disposal. Anyway as the bullets flew both my right flank squads became regular, I smirked inside.Then disaster struck, both those squads now failed morale tests and for two of the games' six turns did nothing, on the other flank my heavy assault gun opened on Michaels right hand squad and caught them all under the template, only throwing ones would save them, out of eight dice I got five ones! The scream of an aeroplane engine now rent the air and down came the wounded bird, almost right in the centre where I had nothing but close to several Yankee squads, I stared defeat in the eye.

Volksgrenadiers.

Brummbar.

A very cautious Sherman.

In the Navy.

I now pushed the heavy tank along the road in order to wipe out any Americans near the crash site while attempting to move some men to the site despite their lousy morale. Twice the tank shrugged off hits from the anti-tank gun but just as I needed it to survive and move it succumbed. The game limped into one extra turn and this allowed me to get my panzerschreck team to dispute the objective, but only just, if Michael had assaulted them instead of trying to shoot them he would have wiped them out and won, instead I had managed to tip the scales to a draw, not a very satisfactory one for me though, my report card said 'should have tried harder'.

The Volksgrenadiers were very good and their firepower offset their inexperience, but if the enemy get a shot in first it can really hurt them as they die on a three, I was lucky to turn two squads to regulars but their failing their morale twice meant disaster for me, that and as usual trying to kill the enemy rather than taking note of what I had to do to win.

Last week it was another miserable night and a swine to park for some reason with cars all over the place, we only have one back street at the club, by the time I got somewhere I thought it would have been easier to walk to Lancaster, I had thought of staying in with my feet up but I had told Rob I would take part in his Muskets and Tomahawks game so being a man of honour I drove into the dark to navigate the myriad roadworks affecting Lancashire at the moment. 

I was British and in command of four units of irregulars two of which were Scots, I had to make my way to the opposite end of the table where some boats were being protected by a small force of Regulars and Milita and this would earn me points. In between were some American Militia and opposite me at my end of the table were some Indians and American irregulars. I decided to swamp the latter force with superior numbers then make my way to the boats, I was helped in this as Ed (seemingly bouyed up with enthusiasm by the Happy Fairy) split his forces, two units towards me and a couple towards the boats.

Scots wha hae!

Save the boats.

Ed's boys.

I was very aggressive and threw caution to the wind and it paid off, first the Indians were cut down followed by a colonial unit, I was decolonising you see. Michael, defending the boats was having a hard time and for a while it looked like the Americans were getting the upper hand. Somehow Ed's flank attack was held and pushed back, a boat which had been damaged by artillery was repaired and despite the loss of a couple of units Michael weathered the storm. Meanwhile I now pushed my men to attack the rear of the American Militia which had the added bonus of taking pressure off our stalwart boat defenders. The Happy Fairy had seen which way the wind was blowing, left Ed and settled on my shoulder as I gave a poor rendition of British Grenadiers as I finished off Rob's uppity Militia. A British win.

And we are off.

Scots on the other side.

An excellent club game but very brutal and bloody, the sheer number of unique figures Rob can bring to the table always surprises me, especially the irregulars and indians, very impressive and fun to play with.

On the very quiet painting front I completed the final three artillery pieces which were given to me by Dan at the club, the crews are from Casting Room Miniatures as a change from my usual TAG gunners. Now thanks to Dan I have a very useful artillery train for the Italian Wars, I can also put a decent baggage train into the field as well, although I might get a few more wagons. Friend Charles Singleton is building a French army based on the battle of Bicocca 1522 and as he was in the area dropped in for a chat and to show me his Francis I command stand, almost a unit on its own it is very impressive, beautifully done.

Francis I.

More artillery.

Most of the heavy work is done on the War Room, it is now all the other jobs which have to be done and fall into place, electrics, bathroom, flooring and painting, also the old shop front is still there outside, I don't know when that is going. I suspect we might run into May before I am ready to get a game. 

My Apple TV subscription runs out a few days after the last episode of Masters of the Air thankfully, I have actually enjoyed this series and it has brought home the horror of flying heavy bombers during WWII whether RAF or USAAF. You know me, I could moan about some parts but have decided not to, I am keeping that for Shogun.

I see that Dr. Claire Millington, who? Has declared the new and popular Roman Legion exhibition at the British Museum fascist and sexist (of course it is) and, wait for it, "almost exclusively about the soldiers", who would have thought? Another university education not wasted.