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.