BLB - Vienna 1683 - Bavarian Schutz Cuirassiers

 

Staying with my Vienna 1683 project for another post, that you may or not see?

I followed Jon's advice on the link below, it has worked on some other blogs but not all, including my own?? So go give Jon's post a read. Also thanks to David at The Ragged Soldier for his additional advice.

 https://palousewargamingjournal.blogspot.com/2026/09/bring-in-cache-buster.html

If you want to add my blog to your Blog Roll please use this as my address.

http://onelover-ray.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default

We have 2 Squadrons of  Bavarian Cuirassiers

From the Schutz regiment

During the historic grand charge down the hills of the Wienerwald on September 12, 1683, the Bavarian heavy cavalry fought alongside the Imperial Austrian and Saxon cuirassiers on the left-centre wing of the Allied advance. They clashed heavily with Ottoman Sipahi cavalry and pushed through key defensive pockets near the village of Nussdorf.

Ottoman Army under Grand Vizier Kara Mustafa Pasha

1st Line (Independent Commands)

Irregular Tribal Raw 12 figs

Irregular Tribal Raw 12 figs

Irregular Tribal Raw 12 figs

Irregular Tribal Raw 12 figs

2nd Line indie command

Timariot Sipahis Blade, Lance Drilled 6 figs 

Timariot Sipahis Tribal, bow/carb drilled 6figs

Timariot Sipahis Blade, Lance Drilled 6 figs 

Timariot Sipahis Tribal, bow/carb drilled 6figs

(Already painted before the Challenge)

3rd Line indie commands 

Sekban musket, loose Raw 12 figs 

Tufeckci musket, loose Drilled 12 figs 

Sekban musket, loose Raw 12 figs 

Tufeckci musket, loose Drilled 12 figs 

Janissary Brigade & Brigadier

Janissary Orta All Musket Drilled/Elite 12
Janissary Orta All Musket/Flintlock Drilled/Elite 12

Janissary Orta All Musket/Flintlock Drilled/Elite 12

Janissary Orta All Musket Drilled/Elite 12

Reserve & Brigadier

Sipahis of the Porte Blade, Lance Veteran-Elite 6 figs

Sipahis of the Porte Blade, Lance Veteran-Elite 6 figs

Vizier's Guard All Musket, Flintlock Guard 6 

Great Gun Drilled 1 model 

Great Gun Drilled 1 model 

Holy League under King Jan III Sobieski

Polish Cavalry Brigade

Lipka Tartars Tribal Cav now Raw 6figs

Pancerni Bullet, armour Drilled 6 figs XXXX

Pancerni Bullet, Lance, armour Drilled 6 figs XXXX

Hussar Banner Blade, Lance, armour Veteran-Elite 6 figs

Polish Cavalry Brigade

Lipka Tartars Tribal Cav now Raw 6figs

Pancerni Bullet, armour Drilled 6 figs XXXX

Pancerni Bullet, Lance, armour Drilled 6 figs XXXX

Hussar Banner Blade, Lance, armour Veteran-Elite 6 figs

Imperial Cavalry Brigade 

Dragoons Regt Dragoons, Flintlock, Drilled 12 figs

Cuirassier Regt Bullet, Armour Veteran-Elite 12 figs

Bavarian Cav Brig

Dragoons Regt Dragoons, Flintlock, Drilled 12 figs

Cuirassier Regt Bullet, Armour Drilled-Elite 12 figs

Saxons Cav Brigade 

Dragoons Regt Dragoons, Flintlock, Drilled 6 figs

Cuirassier Regt Bullet, Armour Drilled-Elite 18 figs

Field gun 1 model

BLB - Vienna 1683 - Saxon Cuirassiers, Leibgarde-Tebanten zu Ross

 

I wonder when and if this post will appear on anyone's blog list? I'm posting this on Monday 14th  at 0840 in the morning. Let me know what time you see it appear, if it does?

I thought I'd give you, dear reader a break from my 25mm wagons, so its back to my 15mm 1683 Siege of Vienna project.

Here we have 3 Squadrons of the Saxon Leibgarde-Trabanten zu Ross Cuirassiers.

There are 3 units of Cuirassiers to paint up for this project, 1 Bavarian, 1 Imperialist/Austrian and this Saxon. The first 2 have the blackened helmets that you'd usually associate with Cuirassiers but the Saxon's wore floppy hats. Much like the later Nine Years Wars figures, I previously painted.

I've no idea what the flags of any Saxon Cuirassiers looked like for this period, so I've used a later looking flag, but don't tell anyone?

And here's Barry Hilton's army list for the Battle. There's not many units to go!

Ottoman Army under Grand Vizier Kara Mustafa Pasha

1st Line (Independent Commands)

Irregular Tribal Raw 12 figs

Irregular Tribal Raw 12 figs

Irregular Tribal Raw 12 figs

Irregular Tribal Raw 12 figs

2nd Line indie command

Timariot Sipahis Blade, Lance Drilled 6 figs 

Timariot Sipahis Tribal, bow/carb drilled 6figs

Timariot Sipahis Blade, Lance Drilled 6 figs 

Timariot Sipahis Tribal, bow/carb drilled 6figs

(Already painted before the Challenge)

3rd Line indie commands 

Sekban musket, loose Raw 12 figs 

Tufeckci musket, loose Drilled 12 figs 

Sekban musket, loose Raw 12 figs 

Tufeckci musket, loose Drilled 12 figs 

Janissary Brigade & Brigadier

Janissary Orta All Musket Drilled/Elite 12
Janissary Orta All Musket/Flintlock Drilled/Elite 12

Janissary Orta All Musket/Flintlock Drilled/Elite 12

Janissary Orta All Musket Drilled/Elite 12

Reserve & Brigadier

Sipahis of the Porte Blade, Lance Veteran-Elite 6 figs

Sipahis of the Porte Blade, Lance Veteran-Elite 6 figs

Vizier's Guard All Musket, Flintlock Guard 6 

Great Gun Drilled 1 model 

Great Gun Drilled 1 model 

Holy League under King Jan III Sobieski

Polish Cavalry Brigade

Lipka Tartars Tribal Cav now Raw 6figs

Pancerni Bullet, armour Drilled 6 figs XXXX

Pancerni Bullet, Lance, armour Drilled 6 figs XXXX

Hussar Banner Blade, Lance, armour Veteran-Elite 6 figs

Polish Cavalry Brigade

Lipka Tartars Tribal Cav now Raw 6figs

Pancerni Bullet, armour Drilled 6 figs XXXX

Pancerni Bullet, Lance, armour Drilled 6 figs XXXX

Hussar Banner Blade, Lance, armour Veteran-Elite 6 figs

Imperial Cavalry Brigade 

Dragoons Regt Dragoons, Flintlock, Drilled 12 figs

Cuirassier Regt Bullet, Armour Veteran-Elite 12 figs

Bavarian Cav Brig

Dragoons Regt Dragoons, Flintlock, Drilled 12 figs

Cuirassier Regt Bullet, Armour Drilled-Elite 12 figs

Saxons Cav Brigade 

Dragoons Regt Dragoons, Flintlock, Drilled 6 figs

Cuirassier Regt Bullet, Armour Drilled-Elite 18 figs

Field gun 1 model

WWII Batrep - The 129th Brigades Attack on Hill 112 - Operation Jupiter 10th July 1944

Five Rejects got together in Posties Shed for a game of Rapid Fire, Reject Dan was the Ref and we were using all his great looking 15mm figures.

Both Postie and Steve had already played this scenario at last years Replay Show, they were the brits on that day, so for this game they swapped sides, giving me and Colin the British for todays game.

Our orders were take and hold the 3 objectives, the Crossroads and the 2 wooded areas

Dan had been a very silly boy, he'd forgotten to bring along all the Turrets of our Churchill tanks!!

So they all look a little bit bald!!!

My Command of the left, with my bald Churchill's!

Our centre, split between myself and Colin.

More blad Churchill's!

Colin's command on the right.

Our plan was pretty simple, there were no German's on the table at the start, but the loads on blinds, so we didn't know where they actually were?

My 4th Battalion Wiltshire regt - Commanded by Lt Col Edward Luce advance through the fields.

What to do with my anti tank gun, when there's no enemy tanks to shoot at?

My artillery observers.

Lets kill me some cows!!!
As we got within 12 inches of a blank, they had to be revealed, out came an Infantry Platoon.

Up the hill the tanks go in the centre.

While without much cover to be had, Colin crosses the open ground.

Our first casualties, we lose the Carrier for our anti tank gun, in the centre.

Our Spotter plane spots........nothin!

But as we've moved up within 12 inches, more Germans are revealed. On the hill on our left a 105mm Howitzer is revealed as well as more infantry in the woods, just left of the crossroads.

Also more German infantry the other side of the crossroads.

Now i have to admit, I'm a tactical numpty, when it comes to WWII, I was struggling with what the weapons were, what I could fire at with which weapon and such. I think I need to do a bit of reading before our next game!!!

I moved up my infantry to shoot at the German's behind the hedge, Dan asked if I wanted to assault them, why they hell not I thought, then Dan laid done the defensive position behind the hedge.....Doh!

We're moving as fast as we can with our infantry.

But its slow going.

Back to my assalt....

Ooo, its a big victory for the Brits, what was left of the German defenders run to there closet cover which is the woods in the centre.

Our dice were as per usual pretty crap, we couldn't hit a thing, luckily nor could the Germans!

Keep going boys!

I finally set up my machine gun on the right, gotta get rid of the Panzerschreck behind the hedge.

Now I missed the opportunity to take a few pic until this moment, after beating the infantry on our left, I swung the flank heading towards the woods, when....

Two bloody Tiger tanks appeared on the tabletop behind my tanks!!!

Oh what joy!!!!

We do doing so well, up to this point????

But its ok, we've got another chance to do something with our Typhoon.....but missed again!

I've never seen Postie with such a big grin. But he missed every shot, except his machine guns, knocking off some of my infantry.

Now your really taking the piss!
Another 2 Tigers enter the table on our rear!!
Now Postie unbelievably missed again with the guns but shot my infantry to pieces, forcing a morale check. I went and threw a 1, which meant my troops surrendered, which c=basically was the end of the game!!

When will my dice improve? Soon I hope?

Conclusion

Ignoring the Tigers turning up where and when they did, this was a brilliant game. I do love the rules, even If I don't fully understand them yet. Steve and Postie told us what they thought we'd do, which was charge up the road with the carriers and scout the area more quickly and maybe do some damage quicker, which kinda makes sense. I'll have to remember that tactic for our next game.

Well done to Dan for producing a quite brilliant game, and well done to Postie and Steve to the win, even though they both couldn't hit a barn door! Much like me and Colin!

Oh well, onwards and upwards!

Later that day, Dan sent me a pic, he'd found the missing turrets!!

I think we'd have won the game hands down if we had them! 

LOL!

The Battle of Soria - A 15mm Napoleonic Batrep

 

 Or The Battle of Why do the Dice Gods and Postie hate Ray & Lee!

When we entered the Shed o War the battlefield looked superb, loads of 15mm French and Spanish laid out on a 10x6 table. Then Postie announced a few rule changes........more on those a bit later!!!

Me and Lee were unlucky and picked out the French, now usually I don't mind playing the French, especially as we were up against the Spanish, who in Posties rules are a weaker force in both morale, numbers and melee.

Lee's command above had to cross the river, there was a ford between the red bushes.

The  French centre, mine on the left, while Lee, who was our CnC on the right, he had 4 units of Elite Legere!!! We faced a weak Spanish army, on the hill, with reserves behind.

On our left, there would be a big cavalry scrap. The Spanish had 5 units of Heavy Horse while my French were made up of 7 units, 1 Cuirassier, 2 Dragoons and 3 Chasseurs/Hussars.

First move I moved up my Horse.

We both moved up our infantry in the centre. Lee moved the Legere to push the gap between the marsh and mountains.

On our right we soon realised there was no chance in hell crossing the river. Steve's Spanish were aligned in an arc, meaning he would get multiple shots on any unit crossing. That includes 2 artillery pieces!!!

It was about now that Postie told us the rule changes, he had included opportunity fire, which we took out of the rules many years ago, because the French columns could never make it into contact, because any and every unit available would fire at it! This used to cause soooo many arguments in our old games

We weren't very happy about this news!!!!

The second change, which wasn't really a change, but something Postie does now and again. The winner would be decided by who killed most casualties, Now I don't like games like this, it makes people play a different way than they really should, but hey ho, lets see how we get on.

For the French to charge, to try and make sure you win you need to try and get 2 columns onto one enemy unit, now that would be difficult in the game as the Spanish only had 12 figures instead of 16. Which meant only a 6 man frontage. Now fairs fair, I didn't think that would be a problem, but the opportunity fire would be.

I manged to squeeze a third unit into my front line. My plan was to only charge the right most unit of Dragoons, to offer my flank to the Spanish, but Chris moved up as well, kinda blocking what could have been a flank attack.

Even though we outnumbered the Spanish, it was still going to be difficult to take the hill.

We won the first turn which meant we get the first choice of charging. So I tried to charge across the front line, unfortunately the middle unit didn't like the colour of the Spanish Dragoons and refused to charge!!!

So Chris got to charge me at the halt while the other 2 units met their Spanish foe in the middle of their moves. 

Now here's were it started to go tits up!

Meanwhile in Soria itself a mob of men appeared. I thought they were Guerrillas, but was told to guess again????

Surg started to move troops into the fields next to Soria, to threaten our left flank as we moved forward.

With the movement to our left, that made our main attack a bit less forceful.

I think the french can handle this problem.

But not this one, Lee was getting battered, Steve hit with every artillery shot!

Now back to the cavalry!!!!

I lost each of the 3 melees, only by 1 each time, but I lost 2 colours in the defeat and 2 units actually routed, well that's what you get for throwing 2 2's on a D10!. Not only that, but each of the routers disorganised the units behind.

At the start of the next turn I had one chance to save the 2 routing units, I threw 2 D6 for each unit needing a combined score of around 6 to save them, so a 50/50 chance. I threw Snake eyes on one and 3 on the other, so both units were removed from play counting as casualties. The third unit was caught in the rear and destroyed to the man!

So 4 melees down and I'd lost us 36 figures!!!!

Lee charges on the right of the hill, everything else is still to far away.

Hang on, where did they come from?

2 large units of Spanish Guerrillas appear on the mountain and rain down shots on Lee's columns.

Now this will make you laugh, you know what I said about dice gods earlier on?

Lee managed to get 2 units of French in column onto 1 unit of Spanish on the hill, Lee will smash the Spanish into the ground!!!!

Errrr, Surg threw 5 D6 needing 5's and 6's and scored a 1 hits. Lee had 20 D6 and needed 4's 5's and 6's......guess how many kills he got?

1.

The laughter and merriment from the Spanish was hard to swallow!!

Then as the melee was a draw they had to fight again, Surg remarkably hit with all 5 dice, Lee had 18 D6 and scored 2 bloody hits!!!!

The air was blue and the French morale plummeted to an all time low.

My cavalry capitulation was bad enough, but Lee's 38 dice and 3 hits just one us in.

I wanted to quite the game there and then, the dice gods not only left us, but took a massive dump on our heads!

But we carried on, trying to get something back, our luck would surly turn around???

After a turn reforming I moved up and charged in with one unit of Hussars.

This made us feel better, a massive charge across the hill.

We won some and lost some.

And I won the Cavalry fight as well, I wanted to carry on the charge but failed the test to do so.

We were nearing the end of the game as time was running out. We hadn't quite taken the hill, but would have done the next turn and the Spanish centre collapsed.

Lee's Elite Legere punched a hole between the marsh and mountain.

But Steve was immoveable on our right, we couldn't get near him.

So there the game ended, with a massive 31 points to 13 victory for the Spanish.

What a massive pile of steamy doggy doo's that was!!!

Conclusion

Why Postie added in the Opportunity fire I'll never know? Yes it gave the Spanish a chance, but really didn't work, just like in the first versions of Posties rules. Steve, Surj and Chris's dice were on fire......mine and Lee's weren't,  in fact if it wasn't for the crack and laugh we all had, most of it at my and Lee's expense, it wouldn't have been worth turning up!

I think we need a drastic look at the rules we use for Napoleonic's, just gotta try and bring that subject up with the Evil one?