Aaaargh!

 Back on the treadmill, its been almost a month since I had a game against a live opponent, I usually rely on Matt Crump and the odd visitor but both he and myself could not align the stars due to real life and holidays. That has now ended and I went for another Italian Wars battle, Agnadallo 1509, between France and Venice, I have fought this a couple of times at least but I now have three books on the battle, two of which offer scenarios and as is normal all do not quite agree. 

I use Furioso rules so I have to make allowances for this in respect of the size of each contingent, this needs work but I did what I could, also the terrain is quite wet but as it was the same for both sides I did not spend a lot of time fretting about small streams, granted I could have slowed movement but I didn't. I also introduced some changes to the units more in line with reality, the Venetian troops for instance put up an excellent resistance better than they are listed in the rule book. The battle is a bit complicated as each side had one 'battle' either arriving late or not at all, I had these on the army sheet but decided in the end not to bring them on, there was enough fighting to do. 

Venetian left.

French right.

Venetian army.

I set both armies up and offered Matt his choice, however we instead diced, I got the Venetians when I had half been expecting to get the French, the better army. I decided to quickly advance my left which seemed to be my strongest force, I would hold with the right and hope my guns would damage the enemy before they hit my line. My Initiative scores were dire and nothing got more than 3, my left started fairly well and managed to breast the ditch to their front in good order. Matt held back his right but came on very aggressively on his left. Very soon his cavalry had taken out my shot and a gun, on my left my infantry crawled towards the Swiss to their front, on men, on!

Venetian left not at all keen.

French left advance.

Venetian right in trouble.

Eventually the infantry of both sides got into action and I was being overwhelmed, I thought that one more push could cause me to retire. I now managed to beat one Swiss block on my left and engage the other while capturing the commander on that flank, only to have him rescued and again captured and again rescued, this time to stay free. It looked like there was a slim chance of a Venetian fight back but it was not to be, I received a hazard and several men deserted, a cruel twist of fate, the pendulum swung away. My army was broken.

Venetian left looking good.

Centre looking dodgy.

The end approaches.

Granted the Venetians, like the real thing, needed a bit of Lady Luck to win this but a slew of low initiative rolls meant I was on the back foot for most of the battle, at the same time I made some mistakes and Matt fought better. Oh, in my defence Matt once again borrowed dice and yes, mine were so bad I changed them, not that it made much difference, my average throughout the battle was one hit on the enemy.

I am adding halberdiers and sword and buckler men to some of the pike blocks and while doing so went through my lead pimple, I am loathe to have more figures than I need, but to my surprise I managed to fish out quite a few to add to my new purchases to build the stands I want along with another couple of generals. So something to while away the long winter evenings.

I have just about finished 'Plunder' by Max Hastings, very good, sad in places and especially so in the last weeks of the war with many pointless deaths and dubious operations being carried out by the Allies. TV looked up with 'Last Seen' an excellent thriller on Apple (I think), I am now reduced to looking at the BBC for something, that is how low I have fallen.

I have offered my son a Chain of Command campaign in order to try out a couple of minor changes to the rules, one which I have fought before and proved to be decent, The Road to Bremen. Strangely enough the attack on Bremen as reported in 'Plunder' was one of those operations which were pointless. All being well I should be heading North to the Dungeon next week.  

Scannagallo 1554

I was supposed to be at Matt's last week but came down with a nasty cold so it was best to hunker down in Casa Anderson, it has proved to be a real pain. I decided therefore to get the Italian Wars on the table and went for a game loosely based on the battle of Scannagallo between the French/Siennese and Spanish/Florentines from the Helion book "All is Lost Save Honour." There may have been some non pike units or reduced pikes but I just used what I had, so overall pike blocks, just some better than others. The river or dry ditch was not a great obstacle so I amended the disorder roll for crossing this and units would have to be unlucky to be disordered.

Spanish/Florentines

French/Siennese.

I decided the French would advance their left and sit back a bit on the right in order that their massed artillery could damage the Spanish as they advanced. The Spanish right had drawn a Rash commander so set off as fast as they could to engage the enemy left, the Spanish left was a bit slower and wanted their left flank cavalry to pressure the French right once across the ditch and in position.

Spanish right advances.

French left.

French guns masked.

Despite the French left being heavily outnumbered they completely surprised me and the Spanish by halting and pushing back the enemy pike blocks. The better troops on the French right now advanced as their artillery had been worse than useless and masking the guns would be no great loss. The Spanish guns had been only slightly better but had to cease fire as their men got closer to the enemy. 

Spanish try outflanking the French right.

Battle at the ditch.

Things suddenly took a bad turn for the French and their allies, as the Tuscans and Papal troops began to seriously fight back, although this did not stop the rout of one of their pike blocks. As the victorious Siennese took stock of their success the Spanish gun line turned on them and cut swathes through the close packed troops, so much so that the Italians fled to get out of the firing line.

French right in trouble.

Surrounded the French surrender.

Both lines now clashed around the dry stream bed and the flow of the battle now favoured the Spanish. The French cavalry protecting their right flank now found itself in a life or death struggle with some Italian light cavalry, neither side willing to give way, this continued until the end of the fighting,  a magnificent effort from both. As the fighting continued the French lost more infantry until only one French pike block was still standing surrounded by the enemy, Spain had won the day.

How AI saw it.

I fought this over a couple of days using Furioso, even though it was a solo game I found my sympathies lying with the French, which is fair enough as even in a solo game I went down with a loss. Furioso is perfect for solo games as once you dish out character traits to your generals the battle pretty much fights itself, especially if you are fighting a real battle in that you have an idea of what is supposed to happen, then it is all down to the dice.

I see Victrix have produced yet another Dark Age/Medieval skirmish rule set for half a dozen figures  to fight over a cabbage patch. I just don't get the attraction.

We took a small road trip to Skipton in the Yorkshire Dales, the town was mentioned in the Domesday Book and became the home of the Clifford family (boo, hiss) who were important against incursions by the Scots and at times were Wardens of the Marches. The first lord was killed at Bannockburn. The castle is small and compact and worth a visit, it would make a nice model on a battlefield. The town itself was busy with tourists enjoying the many interesting shops, the local canal and pubs, we were fortunate that the weather was nice as well. The Castle Inn does an excellent lunch. 

Imposing entrance.

The Clifford rag.

I found myself with nothing to read which is unusual for me, well that is not entirely true I have Pritt Buttar's book on the Soviet assault on Berlin but just wasn't in the mood for it. So after watching a couple of documentaries on 7th October I got a book on the attack, at first it did not grab me but the more I read the more I could not stop, I do not regret buying it. Yesterday Max Hastings' new book "Plunder" turned up, Max has only disappointed me on one occasion and I have almost all his books 

TV and Film have been dire up until the last month or so, Israeli spy thriller Fauda made a welcome return and dealt a bit with 7th October, an excellent series. I got hooked on How to get to Heaven from Belfast, not in a good way but the way a snake mesmerises you before it strikes, so so. I also caught up with Reacher, the new one I like, he is more vicious and unforgiving than in the last two series, he is still a big bit of wood, but he does the job. Silo (I have read all the books) has gone way off the rails and now bears little resemblance to the original story, but it has still held my interest. This leaves The Gentlemen and Lucky, the former is well done but is more like a graphic novel than TV, some of it is just complete nonsense guv'nor, the latter is watchable and the heroine is very Lucky in that she is a better escapist than Houdini. (no, gave up with it). Why do TV cops never, ever put men at the back door when they 'surprise' the occupants, I will say that the FBI DEI programme is working very well, when was the last time you saw a white boss? Lastly I have Mobland and Slow Horses on standby. 

I have now completed the extra troops I needed to bring my Yanks up to Chain of Command specs. I really like these despite being plastic, it sounds daft but they seem more human than the metal figures, the proportions are spot on and the poses equally realistic. I would still never go all out for a plastic army but I was pleased. 

I didn't need the heavy weapons.

I am now approaching the end of my work on the Atlas, I think it has been at lease 18 months and only small tweaks are required before it goes to the publisher.

Next weekend I am off down South as my son booked a talk at the Royal Army Museum on Napoleon's Marshall's by Andrew Roberts for me, I also had the choice of Max Hastings and his new book but went with the Emperor's men.

Claymore 2026

 Ken Reilly, more famous as the Yarkshire Gamer, asked for volunteers to play in his award winning 1499 Siege of Forli game and I decided to jump in with two feet. As you know I have armies for the Italian Wars and play Furioso rules which is convenient as Ken also uses them.

My missus insisted on coming with me and I insisted she did not drive so we booked for a couple of nights on the Leith waterfront. Our journey north was halted for an hour or more at Langholm as it was their Common Riding, a tradition of horse cavalcades enacting the old custom of inspecting the town boundaries, which involved closing down the main A7 road, I was slightly miffed. The whole town was also closed apart from the pubs so we stopped at Hawick for lunch, our second disappointment began. I expected more of such an historic town. We eventually arrived in Leith and dinner on the waterfront was very nice, although the range of alcohol free beers was pretty poor with stuff I had never heard of, no matter, an early night as I had to be at Claymore for 0800.

I was last at Claymore two years ago, maybe three, before that it was when it was being held opposite the Museum of Scotland and I couldn't even guess how long ago that was. I arrived on time and met Ken and the other six guys  who had agreed to help, the table was stunning, some 2,300 figures in technicolour, banners flying and harnessed for war. Ken introduced the rules as four of the players had never played before (Andrei had come from Croatia to play) and we took our places, I had a mixed force of Landsknechts and Italians in the centre opposite Jason who commanded the Swiss, I knew just how dangerous these men were, Jason did not. The whole point of the day was to showcase wargaming the Italian Wars, the amount of gaming we could get in was simply a bonus.

As the game kicked off around 1000 hrs everyone's cavalry leapt forward while the infantry found their way to the front blocked by the horse, I did not have a lot of cavalry and neither did Jason, certainly nothing like the swarms on both flanks, I was also happy not to rush my foot forward and be crushed by the dastardly cash greedy Swiss. I did however hope to sweep away the Swiss cavalry and their Italian mercenaries and although starting well the combats bogged down and I eventually basically lost. Jason had got one huge pike block closer than the other and seeing there was a hedge to its front I knew from experience that there was a good chance it would not move through it without being disordered, my plan was to position one of my blocks to hopefully take advantage of this possible mayhem.

It was not to be however as by now there was only about fifteen minutes to go until the show ended, so we finished off that round and called a halt. It had been a long day with an hour off for lunch, Ken didn't get much time to himself as he did a sterling job fielding all the questions and visitors through the day, a lot of people were impressed and my lasting memory will be of a young lad and his sister staring in pure awe with mouths open at the spectacle, grabbing at his fathers arm to see what he had seen. Hopefully a convert in years to come.

A huge thanks to Ken for allowing me to take part and to the other six lads who were a pleasure to meet and play against.

Claymore was far better than I remembered and it was busy, there were lots of games in the same mould as Forli, large set pieces to showcase the hobby, there were also many smaller games and quite a few participation games, all in all a diverse mixture. I had the good fortune to run into some of my Old Guard from our big ACW game of a few weeks ago, Robert, Billy and Davy, the bus load of Groupies Robert had promised sadly never turned up, I knew 'Wargaming Celebrity' would not fly and tried to tell him.

Some of you will know I have been taking a fiver to shows now for several years, more than I can remember, so I decided on a heartfelt plea from Ray Rousell 'for gawd's sake spend that fiver' to do just that. I admit the M8 Hellcat cost more than the fiver and the pain was almost unbearable, but I am now officially skint. 

A great experience and I need to get my own Italian Wars back on the table.