Barletta (1502)

I'm running a game based on the battle of Ravenna at this upcoming Enfilade, for eight players, the set-up for which was, sadly, too large for my own gaming table setup! This also meant it was too large to playest. Since Ravenna heavily featured Spanish infantry defending earthworks from French attackers, and the clashes between the Spanish and French ten years earlier in southern Italy also featured earthworks, I decided I could at least playtest rules for earthworks, Spanish pike and Spanish bucklermen, and certain victory conditions using a smaller engagement. Once again I turned to Peter Sides' Renaissance Battles scenario book, and decided on Barletta (July 1502).*

The French were deployed with Swiss and landsknecht pikes in the center, each flanked by culverins, crossbowmen, and Scottish longbowmen. Behind the French left, three companies of Gendarmes lay in wait. Across from them, the Spanish lurked behind their earthworks, with a concentration of arquebusiers and culverins in the middle with pikes on the flanks. On the Spanish right were three companies of Ginettes and on the left two of Spanish men-at-arms.

(Above: starting positions) 

(Above: Spaniards behind their earthwork) 

(Above: Spaniards behind their earthwork) 

Victory conditions were as follows: if you had more units than your opponent on the "platform" of the earthworks, you scored 3 points (2 earthwork sections, so 6 points maximum); if you drew a line out parallel from the "platform" to the table edge, and another one perpendicular from the outside end of the earthwork, you got a large "flank quarter" on each side, each worth 2 points; the entire area behind both earthworks was worth 2 points; also, for every enemy leader killed or routed, you received 1 point; and finally, the side that destroyed more units received a 3 point bonus. The game would stop when cumulative combined units lost by both sides totaled 10.

 (Above: French Landsknechts move out from behind the Swiss) 

The French decided to ignore history and not charge their Swiss right up the center, instead sending the Swiss, longbows, and Gendarmes left and the landsknechts and crossbows right. The Spanish attempted to run their Ginettes in front of their own earthworks in hoping of slicing up the French center to destroy guns and fall upon helpless archers. Instead they took too long and became pinned against the earthworks by aggressive Swiss pikes, who destroyed two of the three ginettes without much of a fight. The Spanish countered by sliding their mounted men-at-arms from their left to the right.

(Above: Spaniards behind their earthwork) 

(Above: Spanish ginette light cavalry rides out) 

(Above: Swiss pikes in French service advance) 

(Above: Spanish ginette light cavalry about to get pinned by the Swiss) 

(Above: the white skull counters are an experiment with tracking ammunition for the artillery - it had no effect on the game so will probably not try again) 

The fiercest fighting then proceeded to unfold on the Spanish right, with the Swiss pikes getting the better of two Spanish pikes and the Gendarmes getting the best of the Spanish men-at-arms. But eventually the Spanish began to push back or rout some of the Swiss.

(Above: the Swiss push the Spanish back off the earthwork)

(Above: Spanish artillery at work!)

(Above: the Swiss have now been pushed back out of the earthwork by fierce Spanish counter attacks)

In the end the Spanish lost eight units (including one leader) and the French three (including two leaders!), so the French picked up the 3 point bonus for destroying more enemy units.  However, they had only secured one flank and none of the earthwork platforms, so along with the one point for a killed enemy leader, their total score was only 6 points.  The Spanish picked up 10 points (2 leaders destroyed at 1 point each, both earthwork sections at 3 points each, and the rear zone at another 2 points).  The other flank zone had one Spanish and one French unit, so neither side received points for that.

(Above: that's a lot of casualties!)

(Above: end of game)

If this had used less complex victory conditions such as "first to lose half, they be the loser", this would have been a crushing defeat for the Spanish.  Instead, on a points basis, it was a major victory.  Retrospectively, it was decided the French should have concentrated all ranged attacks on a single unit if possible rather than along the Spanish line as a whole, and the Spanish should have utilized their light cavalry better.  The Spanish should probably also have sallied a sword and buckler unit out of the earthworks to fall upon the melee-poor(er) archers and crossbowmen.

Next up: Isola della Scala and Ravenna at Enfilade!


*NOTE: I am slightly doubtful of the historicity of this scenario – there was a rather light siege of Barletta in the summer of 1502, but I can't find anything documenting the "bloody rout" of the Swiss mercenaries in French employ described by Sides. In fact, the Barletta scenario is so similar to the Cerignola (April 1503) scenario (itself a very well documented event) that I think the Barletta one is some sort of misunderstanding of the source material, and that Sides mistakenly inflated the events at Cerignola into two battles.

Ambuscade! And Tekumel!

The third annual Ambuscade historical miniature gaming day was held last weekend at Guardian Games.   Attendance was again strong, with 34-36 people over the course of the day (three sessions).  This is about the same as last year, although many people who attended as year were not here this time, which means we had a lot of substitution with different people or first-timers showing up instead. I sat out the first session because it's hard to participate in a game when you are having to get up and direct people to their tables or collect donations or what have you.

In the second session I ran my Isola della Scala game which I will also run at Enfilade next month. The game was a productive playtest, resulting in me making some more tweaks for the game next month. 

(Above: my Isola della Scala game)

(Above: the French advance on the village of Isola della Scala)

At prior Ambuscades we did not have a third session because it would have to be a shorter session due to store's closing time of 10pm, but people asked about it last year so I added one this year. The only game I played in this year was Hugh's Tekumel game, with his many splendid Aztec, Mayan, and Tekumel miniatures and scenery.

(Above: Hugh's Tekumel game, starting positions)

(Above: Tekumel game in progress)

(Above: Tekumel game in progress)

This was possibly the single most intriguing and innovative game I have ever played – there were five players and each player used a different variation of the FUBAR simple rules, and players also made agreements or negotiated certain elements of the rules to their liking. The result was I was playing the rules in one manner on my left and another on my right (for example: the players on my left were counting all figures from each unit in the melee as engaged and thus generating a dice, while the players on my right were only counting the first rank), and all the while players were citing rules which did not appear on the playsheets of the other players, including morale rules not written anywhere at all! Talk about fog of war!  Regardless to say this generated a very dissociative, surreal experience for all involved – which is very atmospheric and fitting with the Tekumel setting. I understand Hugh is running this at Enfilade and I highly recommend it as it's an experience like no other!

Isola della Scala (1512)

This was a playtest of the French attack at Isola Della Scala game which I am planning to run at this year's Enfilade as well as at Ambuscade. Previously, I was going to simply run a battle of Ravenna twice at Enfilade, but then further research on the subject of Gaston de Foix's 1512 campaign in Italy, of which Ravenna was the culmination, turned up this tantalizing gem:

The French armies in Italy were under the command of Gaston de Foix, nephew of Louis XII and brother-in-law of Ferdinand of Spain – a young nobleman of remarkable talents, whose short and brilliant career astonished Europe and acquired for him the title of the Thunderbolt of Italy. By a swift and determined movement he threw his army in Bologna, which the allies were then besieging. The forces of the Holy League [comprised of the Papal States, Venice, Spain, the Holy Roman Empire, and England] at once fled; and Gaston de Foix strongly guarded Bologna and then rapidly marched into Lombardy, where he ascertained that two cities had driven their away French garrisons or taken them captive. He defeated the Venetians near Isola della Scala before dawn by the light which the stars reflected from the snow. He took Brescia by storm and gave the city up to plunder and massacre. Bergamo escaped a similar fate by prompt submission and the payment of a ransom.

The King of France [Louis XII] now ordered his victorious commander to fight one decisive battle, and, if victorious, to march upon Rome, depose Pope Julius II, and dictate terms of peace. In executing this plan, Gaston de Foix marched toward Ravenna, driving the allied army before him. The great battle of Ravenna, which was fought April 11, 1512 [Easter Sunday as it so happened], has been described as "one of those tremendous days into which human folly and wickedness compress the whole devastation of a famine or a plague."*

Defeating the Venetians "before dawn" sounds an awful lot like a surprise attack. A few other references seemed to place it as occurring in February 1512. So now I had a potential "winter" battle in Italy (which matched the Enfilade theme of 'winter wars') that was also part of the same campaign as Ravenna (spoiler: the French would win at Ravenna but de Foix would be slain there as well). Information on Isola della Scala was also so thin that I could pretty much build a scenario from scratch. I used the basic set-up from the Novara game I played last year (which involved the French caught off guard by Swiss mercenaries), but used slight variations of the force composition from the battle of Agnadello, and used the pre-dawn/dawn rules, the units-waking-up rules, and the tent/camp burning rules from the 'Beating Up Quarters' scenario in the Pikeman's Lament book.

(Above: the Venetian heavy cavalry asleep in the village)

(Above: the Venetian infantry asleep in their camp)

Almost all of the Venetian army (played by me) woke up on their first turn, and although I thought that might be too easy, we realized that the net effect was that the French (played by Gabe) got two moves before the Venetians started moving, which is about right for the element of surprise. One set-up error was the Venetian stradiots and some arquebusiers who served as "sentries" on the Venetian left (and thus do not start the game "asleep") were too close to the French at the start of the game, and either came under crossbow/bow fire or were attached by Gendarmes on the first turn, cause all three of those Venetian units to be destroyed by about the 2nd turn. In future re-plays these will be spaced better so they are not attacked immediately at the start of the game.

(Above: French gendarmes ride into the village.)

(Above: Venetian men-at-arms face advancing French Landsknechts.)

The rest of game was closely contested, as we put on our best "be ruthless and play to win" thinking caps, since that line of thought can be useful in detecting flaws in the scenario. The downside to this was the game went maybe slower than usual, and we would end up stoping the game at 11pm after 3 hours of play. At that point the French had set fire to one tent and one building, and had units in place to set fire to two more buildings. This would results in 4 points for the French and 6 for Venetians.

(Above: Venetian center.)

(Above: View of the game from the table edge. The French pike unit in the center is about to set fire to the small building.)

However, the Venetians still needed to destroy or rout another four French units to "stop the clock" so there possibly another 30+ minutes of game play left. The French right was in complete control of its side of the table, it center was not great but still had some functional units, and its left was roughed up but had largely pulled back to safety. The Venetian left and right were both in tatters but the center was very strong. Clearly the game would have been decided by the performances of the French right against the Venetian center. Since the Venetian center had already taken some initial casualties and the French right was largely fresh and unharmed, and included 3 Gendarme units with the "Terrible" rule (reroll missed hits) I'm tempted to give the French the advantage.

(Above: End of game. French right can be seen streaming towards the center at the upper left corner of the picture.)

See you at Ambuscade! on April 6!



*John Clifford, The Standard History of the World (1907), p.2560.

Battle on the River Glein (c.493)

We played a very fast game of Lion Rampant using some Arthurian/Late Roman variations I had generated after having gotten my hands on the old (and quite informative) WAB Age of Arthur supplement.  I had previously painted some Old Glory "migration period" Saxon infantry, Irish infantry and a few Romano-British infantry for use in Saga warbands, and had thankfully not sold them at Enfilade last year.  I accumulated a few more OG packs, along with some Footsore Miniatures, and finished painting up the whole lot in December (including rebasing some of the individually based earlier figures to multi-base). 

(Above: starting positions, with the Saxons on the left and the Britons on the right)

The "core stats" for almost all units is the foot yeoman from the Lion Rampant book, whom moves 8" and has an armor of 2.  He is a "fighting man" of his day, which is to say, he can more or less handle a sword, a spear, a shield, a bow, or a horse in equal measure if needed.  I got this idea or approach from reading Guy Halsall's excellent Warfare and Society in the Barbarian West 450-900 (2003) (which I acquired through my local library's Inter-Library Loan program!).  From this basic profile, I adjusted some stats up or down, and added special rules inspired by the WAB supplement.

(Above: the Saxon right, led by a Hengist or Horsa type fellow).

The Saxons had just two unit types:

Saxon Geoguth (“Doo-guth”) Points 5
Attack 6+ Attack Value 5+
Move 5+ Defense Value 4+
Shoot 6+ Shoot Value 6”/5+
Courage 4+ Max. Move 8”
Armor 2 Strength Points 12
Special Rules:
Raiders (re-roll all melee dice rolls of 1); counter-charge vs. foot; Javelins (shoot 6+, range 6 hit 5+); Impetuous Charge (see below); Gregarious (see below)

Saxon Gedriht (“Yedtrict”) Points 7
Attack 5+ Attack Value 4+
Move 5+ Defense Value 4+
Shoot 6+ Shoot Value 6”/5+
Courage 3+ Max. Move 8”
Armor 2 Strength Points 12
Special Rules:
Raiders (re-roll all melee dice rolls of 1) [note: this was based on the "Saxon Buckler" rule from the WAB supplement, and represents a fast, aggressive style of combat]; counter-charge vs. foot; Javelins (shoot 6+, range 6 hit 5+); limit 1 per army [note: this is a sort of "hearthguard" or "companions" type unit]; Impetuous Charge (see below); Gregarious (see below)

The Saxons were aided by Irish allies, with the following stat block.

Irish Ceithern Points 5
Attack 6+ Attack Value 5+
Move 5+ Defense Value 4+
Shoot 6+ Shoot Value 6”/5+
Courage 4+ Max. Move 8”
Armor 2 Strength Points 12
Special Rules:
Fleet footed; Javelins (shoot 6+, range 6 hit 5+); Fearsome Clash (in the first melee of the game only, this unit my re-roll any missed hits) [note: Fearsome Clash is based on the "Mixed Weapons" rule from the WAB supplement]; Impetuous Charge (see below); Gregarious (see below).

IMPETUOUS CHARGE: At the beginning of this players turn, roll a dice for each unit with the Impetuous Charge rule. On a roll of 1, they will move their full move toward the nearest enemy unit and attack it if it is in range (see Wild Charge rule). On a roll of 2-6 the unit may be activated normally.

GREGARIOUS: At the end of a melee, this unit will receive a +1 bonus to any courage check resulting from that melee for every additional Strength Point it outnumbers its opponent by AND it will receive a -1 for every STR PT it is outnumbered by the enemy for. For example: if at the conclusion of a melee a unit of Saxons has 9 Str Pts and its opponent has 8, the Saxon unit will receive a +1 bonus on its courage check (if one is required). If fighting against cavalry, double the cavalry unit’s STR PTs.

(Above: the Briton cavalry on the move)

The Britons had fewer special rules but more unit types at their disposal.

Mounted Commanipulares Points 7 ("Mounted Companions")
Attack 4+ Attack Value 4+
Move 5+ Defense Value 5+
Shoot -- Shoot Value -
Courage 3+ Max. Move 10”
Armor 3 Strength Points 6
Special Rules: Counter-charge; Limit 1 per army.

Mounted Milites Points 6
Attack 5+ Attack Value 4+
Move 5+ Defense Value 5+
Shoot -- Shoot Value -
Courage 4+ Max. Move 10”
Armor 3 Strength Points 6
Special Rules: Counter-charge.

Milites Points 5
Attack 6+ Attack Value 4+
Move 5+ Defense Value 4+
Shoot -- Shoot Value --
Courage 4+ Max. Move 8”
Armor 2 Strength Points 12
Special Rules: Shieldwall (may form on successful Move. -1 to hit from shooting and melee attacks, can’t move).

Pedyt Archers Points 4
7+ Attack Value 6
5+ Defense Value 5+
6+ Shoot Value 5+/18”
4+ Max. Move 8”
2 Strength Points 12
Special Rules: None.

Both sides had three commanders, and all commanders had the "Commanding" rule, so they could reroll one failed activation if a unit under their command was within 12".

(Above: the combined Saxons and Irish advance on the left).

The game's objectives were have a unit on both the bridge and the ford when the game ended.  The game would end when one side had lost more than half its units - when this happened, the other player would get one more set of activations and the game would then stop.  I was playing the Saxons and figured my best bet was to get on the bridge and force some melees where my various melee-bonuses would come into play.  Other units could be close by and hurl javelins. 

(Above: my strategy not going well)

However, the Briton archers had brilliant luck.  Even at extreme range (hitting on 6s!), they were able to lay down 3 casualties on one my Saxon units.  Melees were a bit of a wash - I would get below-average results on to-hit rolls and the various rerolls only served to make them average rather than devastating.  The Britons (played by Sebastian) were also very aggressive with their cavalry early on which I did not expect.  The result, as illustrated above, was that many of my units had 2-3 casualties laid out on them very fast and many were disordered.

(Above: fighting on the bridge)

Things went possibly worse on the other flank.  One Irish unit threw a snake eyes on its first morale test and fled the field. The remaining Saxons on the bridge were effectively bottlenecked and really couldn't support each other, so the Britons essentially took turns with various fresh units hitting the same Saxon unit.

I lost my fourth unit (over half) on the Britons's turn, and the Britons then proceeded to complete their turn and put disorders on all three of my remaining units.  On my turn (the last turn), one of those units failed its rally and fell back to almost its starting position!

(Above: deep hurting)

(Above: final positions - one unit of Irish still on Briton side of river, but bridge and ford both held by the Britons, scoring the a "major victory".)

(Above: victorious Briton milites at the ford)

I think the Saxons played poorly because of dice (as always) but also the scenario involved two bottlenecks and the various Saxon abilities might work better in concert in an open field, where a proper "battle line" can be formed. Their "Gregarious" rule never game into play, either - they all fell back too fast to wear any enemies down!  The next scenario is the River Dubglas and has significantly more open terrain - we shall see!

The "Impetuous" rule still needs work.  I'm thinking of having units test for it at the END of their turn and not the beginning, and only testing if they have not otherwise had a successful activation.  The idea is they try to run off and attack when you are trying to make them STAY PUT.  If you successfully move them then they are content because they are distracted. If they do not move the become impatient and take matters into their own hands.  I have to ponder this a bit and decide if units that did not activate because your turn ended need to check for impetuous or not...

Agnadello II (1509)

Playtesting my Lion Rampant Agnadello game to be played at Ambuscade! in a few days (I previously played this battle last year if you would like to know the background).  Made some significant tweaks to the unit profiles for arquebusiers and the various artillery.  Also reworked the Gendarmes/Elmeti profiles, and also experimented with variations on the "Wild Charge" rule.  Royally screwed up with how to treat the dry riverbed.  Stated that it halved movement (no problems there), but stupidly also said it counted as rough terrain, the invariable result of which was that some French gendarmes got mauled by lesser quality troops in the riverbed.  That result then led to both sides advancing up to the edge of the riverbed and just standing there waiting for the other side to step in it.  Obviously, the rough terrain designation will not be included in the Ambuscade! version!

(Above: the French advance)

(Above: Venetian stradiots ride out)

(Above: the Venetian center and left)

(Above: French gendarmes)

(Above: Venetian elmeti)

(Above: the situation before the French gendarmes got mauled)

(Above: the situation AFTER the French gendarmes got mauled)

(Above: action in the Venetian center)

(Above: Grisson mercenaries in French service)

(Above: Venetian center consisting of arquebusiers and generic polearm infantry)

For the final Ambuscade! version, I'm thinking of removing any variations of Wild Charge entirely, and also of getting rid of Close Order for pikes and just baking that ability into their basic stat block instead.  More generally I'm feeling like my Italian Wars games are starting to have too many units for the Lion Rampant mechanics to handle.  Abilities like Skirmish, Evade, and Wild Charge seem to wildly unbalance and even ruin a game.  Of course, I still enjoy them and they are very useful and fun as a convention ruleset (especially if you test the game several times ahead of time!).  I'm currently taking a very hard look at Kings of War Historical, which retains some of the elements I like from Lion Rampant but might handle the larger armies more appropriately.