2nd Battle of San Juan AAR

On Super Bowl Sunday, my friend, Richard, and I played the 2nd Battle of San Juan, using the Perfect Captain's Spanish Fury:Actions rules. We now use these exclusively for our Renaissance gaming. Perhaps when Pistolado 2 is released we will give them a try.

The Boqueron Hill, before the fight.


The Spanish defenders; only two units fit behind the meager entrenchments.

My wily English opponent set up heavy on his right, hoping to flank me.

On the first turn, the English rolled an extra Saker for reinforcements and advanced their line. Long range shooting put a Terror marker on one of my militia units. I began to move units from my right to strengthen my threatened left flank.
On turn 2 the repositioning of troops continues for me. The English sakers put a Terror marker on my Saker. The English Shore Parties on their left move toward my fortifications.

During the third turn, the English kill a stand of militia. Their Shore Parties continue to close the distance.
On the next turn, The English shot trimmed another stand from my already suffering militia unit. Their Shore Parties began climbing the hill, putting themselves into charge range

Both English Shore Parties attempt to charge, but fail their morale roll. My three stand unit of Spanish Pike turn to face the enemy. It has been a while since we've had Spanish Pike in a battle and my over-confident opponent has forgotten how powerful they are. If I can charge his shot units, I should be able to blow a hole in the middle of his line.
I have not made a single successful roll for reinforcements. Richard has picked up two additional Sakers and two Shore Parties, which are hugging the table edge and closing the range on my Saker.
During the next turn, fire from my Shot drove off one of the Shore Parties. My Saker put a Terror on the other. The English Shot killed one of the stands in my Spanish Pike unit; a bitter loss. Then my Pike take another stand loss, and then charge to glory against the Sorsair Shot; and get a locked result. The battle quicly resolves in the next couple of turns. One of my Militia units with an Heroic leader charges the English Shot at the edge of the hill. The Shore Parties overwhelm my right flank. My belated reinforcements of a Militia unit and Militia Horse arrive too late to make a difference.
With the English turning bloth of my flanks, overrunning my Saker, and my attacks stalled, I concede.


Altogether, another fun game of Spanish Fury:Actions. To balance the scenario I think I will double the amount of Spanish entrenchments and limit the reinforcements to one of each type. We are already planning the next game.

2nd Battle of San Juan Scenario

It's a snow day; sent home from work at noon yesterday and local government closed today!

I have been thinking about a scenario for this battle since reading some posts about in on The Miniatures Page. Spanish Fury:Actions seemed like a good choice of rules for an action this size.
I will be playing this game on Sunday afternoon, before the football game.

The Second Battle of San Juan, the Boqueron Hill, June 18, 1598

George Clifford, Earl of Cumberland, left England on March 6, 1598, with a large force; 20 vessels in all. He sailed for the Americas, intent on attacking and capturing San Juan. He would not repeat Sir Francis Drake's mistake of attacking via the seaward approach. Cumberland landed his forces a day's march from San Juan. A four gun battery on a hill at Boqueron blocked his approach. John Berkeley led the English attack. As the land forces moved up the hill, an English ship was grounded on the shoals facing the battery and opened fire.


English Sir John Berkeley

English Veteran Shot 6 stands
English Veteran Shot 6 stands
English Veteran Pike 4 stands
Corsair Shot 5 stands
Corsair Pikemen 5 stands
Shore Party 4 stands
Shore Party 4 stands
Saker

Reinforcements:
1 Saker
2 Saker
3 Shore Party 3 stands
4-6 Nothing


Spanish Antonio de Mosquera

Spanish Musketeers 3 stands
Spanish Pike 3 stands
Colonial Militia 4 stands
Colonial Militia 4 stands
Colonial Militia 4 stands
Saker


Reinforcements
1 Saker
2 Colonial Light Horse 2 stands
3 Colonial Militia 3 stands
4-6 Nothing

The terrain is quite simple. On a 30” by 40” table, set up an 18” hill in one corner. This hill is the Spanish deployment area. The four gun battery is not deployed on the table. Any two of the Spanish units are placed in entrenchments.
After the Spanish have deployed, the English set up anywhere on the table, but must be at least 12” from the Spanish and must cover a fron of at least 18”.

The English must drive the Spanish from the hill.

Reinforcements:
At the beginning of each turn, each player rolls on die and consults their reinforcement list. The same reinforcements may be rolled and placed more than once per game. The Spanish place their reinforcements in the corner edge of the table behind their hill. The English place their reinforcements 6” behind their start line.

Design Notes: This scenario is designed for the rules, Spanish Fury: Actions, by the Perfect Captain, http://perfectcaptain.50megs.com/captain.html I have used troop types from both Spanish Fury:Actions and Spanish Fury:Voyage.

The English outnumber the Spanish by two-to-one. Their quality is also superior to the Spanish. The actual troop types and number of stands are conjecture; your guess is as good as mine. The reinforcements are non-historical; something thrown in for fun.

Marshall Massena

I have had this miniature for years (decades!) I decided to paint it as there is always a need for more French Generals on the table. It's from one of the Old Glory French Marshals packs.

One of my goals for 2011 is to learn to take good pictures with the camera.

Battle of Dennewitz

We recently played the Dennewitz scenario with Volley and Bayonet. A six player game, we played for 5 hours.

The brave Allied defenders, Chris, Kyle, and Brady.


The bold French attackers, Jim, Ted, and Dan


All of the French allies, except the Bavarians, were supplied by Dan; Italians, Poles, Wurtemburgers, and Saxons. It's been 5 or 6 years since Dan has been at one of our games and we are glad he was able to join us.

Bertrand's IV French Corps pins the Allied left. The French plan was to seize the Windmill Heights and Gohlsdorf and exhaust the Allies as they attacked.
The Allied plan was to reinforce their left before the French could overwhelm it and take the Windmill Heights and exhaust the French as they counterattacked.


Both sides in this game get reinforcements for the first five turns. A meeting engagement of the historiacal kind. Here French reinforcements move up the Leipzig Road toward Dennewitz.


The action was hot and heavy on the Allied right as the two armies fought back and forth.





In the last half of the game, control of the Windmill Heights changes several times. The heights and the town of Goehlsdorf are victory points for the French.




By the end of the game the reinforced Allied left attacks the French as well.


This game ended in a French victory, 75-22. This is one of my favorite Napoleonic scenarios. Created by my good friend, John Holtz, I've played in it five times and GM'ed it once. Each game is different and exciting. It's easy to understand why Frank Chadwick included this one in the rule book.

Johnny Con 3

I attended the first day of JohnnyCon 3. Here's a couple of pictures of me playing in Dean West's Freiburg game.



For a full report of all three days of the Con, see http://pavelft.wordpress.com/

Link to Knotel Prints

http://www.grosser-generalstab.de/tafeln/knoetel.html


I found this link to a nice selection of Knotel prints on Gaming with Chuck,
http://chuckgame.blogspot.com/?expref=next-blog.

Might be time to paint some more Napoleonics.

Or at least look at some prints.

Front Royal

I started playing Johnny Reb in the mid '80's. I have probably played close to 200 games of this system, but only a few games since the turn of the century. Since I plan to attend Johnny Con in a couple of weeks, I needed to play a game to refresh my memory of the rules.
My friend Ted had never played Johnny Reb, so I invited him over so we could play a small learning game.
I setup the Front Royal scenario from the original version of the rules. Three Union regiments and one secion of artillery vs. two small brigades of Rebs. The Union troops are protecting the two bridges over the Shenandoah River, (I need to build some bridges!) If they cannot protect the bridges, they should burn them.

The terrain and Union setup at the start of the game.


On turn one, the Rebs march on.
The Louisiana Tigers are here and there is a scenario rule that forces them to roll a d6 each turn to see if a train enters the board. If it does, the Tigers will immediately charge the train and plunder it.

The small Union battalion moves toward the second bridge to cover it; or burn it.

On turn two, as the Rebs continue to advance, the front most US unit disengages. The small Union battalion continues to move toward the bridge.

Turn three, Reb Artillery on First Fire.


The lead Rebel unit comes out of march column and forms on my right flank. I move my unit that disengaged, and is still in disorder, toward the threatening unit. I fire at it and miss!


The 6th VA Cavalry rides on and heads for the northern bridge, (the one the small US battalion is trying to reach.)

On turn four the Tigers charge. They catch the disordered unit forming; never a good thing for the defender. The first US unit routs. The Tigers threw a large charge move bonus, so they hit the second US unit and routed it as well. Both Union units were now routed and within the range of the Tigers charge move. They both picked up.

Here is the situation after the initial routs of my two units.

The Tigers were now positioned perfectly to pounce on any unsuspecting trains to enter the table.

On the other end of the table the 6th Va charged the small 8 figure battalion. Again my opponent rolled very high for his charge movement bonus. I rolled pitiful for my defensive fire; no casualties. My last infantry unit routed and was hit again as it tried to escape.





A quick game and a new player introduced to Johnny Reb. We'll play this one again.