The Battle of Castelnuovo del Garda 1796 - A 6mm French Revolutionary Wars Batrep.

 

The Rejects got together for the second week in a row , but this weekend it was to play a game using Richard's 6mm MDF French Revolutionary figures, from Commission Figures, using Volley & Bayonet rules 2nd version.

Richard's blog.......click here. Lee's take on the game, here

Pinched from Richard's blog....

The engagement is a "what if" set piece battle set two days after the Battle of Rivoli.  Which in this alternative universe did not take place.

The Austrians have launched an attack to break the French siege of Mantua.  Once achieved and reinforced by the large number of troops there, they are to push the French westward towards Piedmont.

Hoping to hold Alvinczy’s Austrian forces at Rivoli, General Bonaparte and his divisions, nonetheless, failed to move quickly enough to reinforce Joubert who was guarding the approaches down the river Adige.  Consequently, Joubert was compelled to withdraw his troops south and rendezvous with the forces of Generals Massena and Rey.

Thus, Alvinczy was able to complete the junction of his three columns on the Rivoli plateau.  After a day’s rest, he set the Austrian army in motion south to defeat the revolutionary Army of Italy.  As he approached Castelnuovo del Garda, Alvinczy got news of the French beginning to deploy.

Bonaparte, now certain that the approaching Austrians represent the main strike towards Mantua – not the feint that Augereau is holding back around Verona - he is determined to strike a blow against Alvinczy at Castelnuovo del Garda.

One player per side went out into the shed and drew a map of the battlefield and to spy on what the enemy troops were. Steve drew the map for Dan, Colin and myself, the Austrians. On the map we drew out our line of battle. As did the French, Surj, Lee and Postie.

The set up.

A couple of close up's of Richard's brilliant 6mm MDF figures!

In our deployment we chose to put all of our Cavalry on the right flank, where there was a lot of open ground. Thinking  (well hoping) they would do the same. BUT, in true Fog of War style, Steve had made a mistake, spying on the French, He wrote a Brigade down as Infantry, when it was infact Cavalry. This kinda buggered up our plans, which were to march forward and attack, now on our left we would have to stand and defend against Surg's cavalry.

Surg, surges forward with his cavalry, our flank is in jeopardy first turn!

We also moved up, but tried to keep out of charge range.

Dan in the centre followed suite.

While Steve on our right moved faster as he had all of our Horse, the plan was to get around Posties flank and cause mayhem.

The French cavalry, on our left.

Steve moved his Infantry up and our Cavalry up to flank Postie.

Hmm? I don't like the look of this!

Postie moves some cavalry around the back to nullify Steve push for the flank.

Almost our entire line went on defend orders which makes you cavalry ready. That's what the little stand is by the bases. This should make it harder for the French to attack.

But that didn't stop them trying!!

As we're attacked all along the flank by Horse and foot.

But luck was on our side, we managed to beat the Cavalry back.

And most of the infantry, we pulled our Grenadiers around the flank on top of the hill, ready for round 2.

This time we attacked first.

Dice rolling from both sides was utter rubbish, we had to check the dice to see if they had 6's on them!!!

Out on the right, I took a few photos, but can't really remember what was going on?

Steve and Postie just began battering each other with anything they could.

Back on our left flank, we seemed to be holding.

Steve abandoned going round the flank, to attack Postie, frontally.

What a bloody mess!

All along the lines there was a mass of fighting. Some we won, some we lost.

Against my advise Steve sends all his infantry over to attack Postie, but that left Dan in the centre quite vulnerable.

Vulnerable enough for Lee to take a chance and attack Dan's troops.

But Lee's dice let him down and away he went, back where he came from.

The dice are still awful for both sides.

Surj attacks again.

The French Cavalry fail their morale and end up exhausted.

I think we're gonna hold on here????

In we go!!!

In we go again, amazingly we lost this fight, even though we hit the French in the flank....bloody dice!!!!

Dan goes in for the coup de gras, he hits Lee's troops in the centre who are already disordered when they retreated last turn.

Back they go again, Lee's units can be seen fleeing down the road. This caused another test as the brigade became exhausted.

Back you go Mr Frenchie!!

Gawd know what was going on on the right, half our army was attacking Posties small command?!?!

In the end Steve's Brigade managed to inflict enough casualties on Posties troops to make their morale collapse but in doing so was left exhausted himself, meaning he force would be ineffective as an offensive force.

On our left me and Colin fought like demons, especially our heroic Grenadiers, who fought the French too exhaustion, but we were not much better ourselves! But their centre was gone, running off down the road.

There wasn't anytime for another turn and the game was basically over as both sides, weren't in any condition to carry on the fight. Richard totted up the points and us Austrians had won by the narrowest of margins.

But we took the win, thank you very much!

Conclusion

Another great game in the Shed O War. Volley & Bayonet really do work as a set of rules, giving you that big scale game feel. 

What did we do wrong, how could we have done better?

For one, Steve buggered up deployment the poor lad, by not seeing Surj's Cavalry, would we have deployed differently, Yes. I said after seeing the game set out, Steve's divisions should have been in the centre with all the horse behind in reserve, that was a daft mistake by us. Our plan was gone as soon as we entered the room, seeing the cavalry on our left, we couldn't attack??? And had to go on the defence instead, giving the initiative to the French, which they used to their advantage. But the dice gods clearly had plans to stymy us all.

Great game, Great mates, Great fun, what else can you ask for in a game!