San Miniato (1494) - Charles VIII's Italian War campaign game #3

On the heels of the victory at Volterra, the Italians move to press their advantage and harangue the French army.  Near San Miniato the two met again.  Using the random forces table, the Italians (the attackers) had 3 men at arms and a stradiot, 2 landsknect pike units, and 2 crossbowmen and an arquebusier unit. The French rolled poorly and had 2 gendarmes and a mounted crossbowmen unit, two Swiss pike units, and two crossbows. Short five SP, the French purchased five 6" segments of earthworks, which could be placed 18" (3 squares) from the French board edge. The French commander was cagey, and placed his fieldworks so they straddled both of his quarters of the board.  

Initial randomized setup after the free French redeployment move.

Another error for the eagle-eyed: I completely neglected to fetch the Italians their third Men at Arms unit. This may or may not have been a big deal. 

Initial deployments viewed from the French side.

The Italians advanced, thinking to soften up the sconce with crossbow and arquebus fire. The stradiots hoped to harass and perhaps weaken the French gendarmes before the Italian men at arms charged home.  The French moved into their positions in the fieldwork, with the cavalry protecting the flanks.

Italians advance upon the ensconced French.

Both sides exchanged missile fire with little effect. Italian landsknects charged the sconce but became stalled in front the earthwork.  Then the French scored a hit on Italian rightmost crossbowmen and the arquebusiers. 

Situation before the charge of the French gendarmes.

Since crossbows only have 2 SP, the French gendarmes plunged into the gap square between the crossbows and the Italian men arms, and attacked the crossbowmen in the flank, and destroyed them. They then continued on and attacked the arquebusiers in the flank, and destroyed them.

French gendarmes in front of the fieldwork, after dispatching Italian crossbowmen and arquebusiers.

The Italian infantry was now underpowered for its attack on the fieldwork. The other French gendarme unit on the French left took 2 SP in melee with the Italian men at arms and fell back. But the French mounted crossbows attacked the leftmost Italian landsknechts in the flank and the Swiss pikes sallied out from the sconce to destroy them. This ended the game in short order.

End of game. Swiss pikes have counterattacked from the sconce. French gendarmes now in extreme back of Italian positions.

The French won this game handily, 4-1 (the Italians scored a point for occupying a quarter of the board).  As noted above, the Italians were inadvertently shorted an extra men at arms unit - with three they may have been more aggressive in charging early on, which could have pinned down the French gendarmes and prevented the sweeping away of the Italian missile troops in the center.

Victorious French.

Allowing the defender to buy field works if outnumbered seemed to work well and allow these kind of attack-on-a-fortified position games into the mix in a balanced way.  I'm increasingly thinking missile troops need to have their SP increased to represent that these are large companies in close order, and not skirmish-y troops which can easily swept away.  In the Portable Wargame ancient rules, close order archers have a SP of 4, but do not count as heavy infantry. An easy trade off would be for them to be SP 4 but ranked as poor quality for combat results (so they would lose a SP on a 1-4 and have the retreat option only on a 5-6), but I fear forgetting to apply this rule. 

Italian men at arms who never really had a chance to even charge.

This is the last of the "small battles" on the campaign board, so perhaps the "medium battles" can have higher SP values for missile troops? Light cavalry at 2 SP but a movement of 4 seems about right, and I'm mostly okay with gendarmes/men at arms at 3 SP but with cataphract attack bonuses from the ancients rules, although this might make them too efficient in flank attacks against pikes, so maybe just try them as straight heavy cavalry next game?

I really liked that gap that the Italian lines that the French gendarmes exploited to win the game. This encourages players to keep solid, continuous lines of troops so as to protect flanks, which is easy to do on a grid, and will look great as well.

On the campaign board, the French roll a six, and pass the narrative point of having passed by Rome on the way to Naples. The Italians roll a five (in the photo, they are on wrong square), and then the French roll and 2 and advance as attackers to the next battle square (and into the new year) - a "medium battle" in the vicinity of Naples in February 1495.