Face to face gaming - The First Carlist War

Today the group got together for our first Face to Face game at Barry’s place for a couple of months. The era chosen as the First Carlist war 1830ish - Barry, Rick and I took the loyalist Isabellina forces, comprising Spanish, French Foreign Legion and British Auxiliary Legion troops, whilst Mark, Paul and Chris took the Carlist forces of the pretender to the throne.

The Carlists were holding a small town on the far side of a river that was fordable at all points for everything except wheeled guns. The Isabellinists aim was to take the town.

Our plan (mine mainly as Rick was a dissenting opinion) was to concentrate as many units as possible in the left centre of our side of the table and attempt to refuse our right flank, held by Barry with our best troops – FFL and the Spanish Guards (who were classed as trained, whereas most of the other troops on both sides were raw). I would lead the attack with the BAL – four raw battalions and one small battalion of British Royal Marines supported by a small battery, a troop of cavalry and a rocket battery. We were prepared to lose this command to pave the way for a secondary assault across the river by Barry’s command. Rick was on the extreme left flank with most of our cavalry, not the best position as he was confronted by a densely wooded area.

On the other side, Paul was occupying the woods opposite Rick on the Carlist right, Chris held the centre and Mark had the cavalry and some infantry on the left wing with the empty half of the table to exploit with his horsemen.

Rick struggled to get going with a number of poor activation rolls and did not get to grips with Paul until well into the second half of the game. For some reason, the Carlists were allowed to deploy a brigade well forward, on our side of the river and this hampered Barry’s movement from the start. The advance across the central plane under constant artillery fire went as well as could be expected and our support fire from guns and rockets whittled down Chris’s defending forces. Marks sweeping advance across the empty half of the table meant Barry had to deploy a number of units in a defensive screen but it proved to be insufficient, and Chris added to his discomfort with the brigade that had started on lour side of the river.

It was basically a battle of attrition where both Barry and I got to a point where under the rules, we were required to do a brigade morale test on the same turn and we both failed. This left Paul in a very bad state as Rick had the upper hand, the majority of Chris’s command gone from the field, but Mark coming in from Ricks rear with several units of fresh cavalry. As with many games, the dice decided things in the end – if Barry and I had held on another move or two, we might possibly have crossed the river and taken the town.

 

 

Initial layout showing the town on the far side of the river – all buildings scratch built by Mark

 

The Isabellinist deployment on the left of the road dissecting the battlefield

 

My command – troops are all mine bar the gun, Royal Marines (at rear), cavalry squadron and officers

 

The Carlist force defending the small town that was our objective

 

Barry deploys in a defensive posture – note Chris’s Carlist troops in the middle distance – they started the game occupying the small built up area

 

Pauls forces moving through the woods to confront Rick

 

Marks infantry cross the river on the Carlist left to march against Barry

 

First line of the BAL brigade close in on the river

 

The FFL wait for the Carlist onslaught

 

Close up of some of the FFL figures – everything we used in the game bar my four BAL battalions were supplied by Mark

 

Rick finally got some decent activation rolls and managed to deploy to engage Paul on our left flank

The wide open space on our right that was exploited by Mark with the Carlist cavalry

 

The BAL Scots battalion fires at the Carlist defenders across the river

 

The Carlist defenders advanced across the river and engaged in a close range fire fight with my BAL brigade. The eventual outcome was one Carlist unit quit the field, another routed and the third pulled back, but they did some damage to my units too

The struggle in the woods was going Ricks way for sure

This looks impressive for the Isabellinists, but in reality, all the troops in this image were on their last legs..

…as can be seen in the next image, where a couple of our units have quit the field

Rick was triumphant in his fight with Paul and was all ready to throw some cavalry across the river to complete his victory….

….but Barry and I both needed a brigade morale roll of 6 to hang about – and this time, both of us failed.

 

One more work week to go – then a three day public holiday weekend, Labour day here in NZ – and then we are off to Lake Tarawera by Rotorua in the central N Island for our week long annual wargaming retreat – yeeha!