Last week at Canberra Games Society Chris and I decided to have a go at Lasalle, the new ruleset that is making something of a name for itself with the wargames press and internet pundits. Alan also watched and, as it was a Peninsula battle, helped out with rules and quotations from Sharpe.
The game was played out in its entirety in slightly less than three hours from dicing for ground condition and precipitation (dry and sunny) to shaking hands and packing away. After rolling for the board set up and then customising the set terrain and then determining attacker and defender the British secretly chose to defend while the French secretly chose to attack and as there was no conflict our secret wishes were both granted. How often can you say that in a wargame?
This British commander, Lord Lysander Droppings, noted that his force had a marked qualitative advantage with four ‘standard battalions’ and one large elite battalion (designated as the 42nd of foot) and a Royal Artillery battery. The French, commandeered the Duc de Frottage, seemed pleased with the idea that quantity has a quality all of its own with three battalions of veterans, four of conscripts, an artillery battery and a regiment of dragoons. As things would turn out neither pre-battle assessment would be correct.
As the attacker, Frottage had two sub commanders while the British defender had but one. After the game we realised that we had both forgotten to roll for characteristics (vigour and tactics) of our subcommanders. Nevermind.
After the defender chose their preferred table edge and the objective marker was set up by the attacker and then moved by the defender, the British deployed. Droppings chose to deploy three battalions along his baseline facing the river with the highlanders in the farm housing the objective marker, the battery to their left covering the bridge and another battalion (the Blankshires) on the extreme left of the line.
Frottage, misremembering his classical education, divided all his Gauls his into three parts. Two lots of conscripts and the guns to his left, two more conscripts in the centre and, with his typical generosity, he took command of the three veteran battalions and the dragoons.
Once we had set up, the battle started with each player thumbing through the terrain rules to see what effect the river that diagonally bisected the battlefield would have. Quite a lot as it turned out in that it was impassable and the only way across was the single bridge on the French right. Luckily for the Duc that was where his veterans were and he pushed them across as quickly as he could with one bold battalion crossing and deploying in line while their comrades tried to sort out the traffic jam on the Gallic side of the bridge.
In turn, the British pushed their available forces (the highlanders, guns and battalion of Blankshires forward to try to crush the bridgehead) while hurrying their other units across to the side of the board with the bridge.
Unluckily for the British right flank, the French guns advanced and unlimbered within canister range and this took a savage toll of one battalion, while another was drawn into a fire-fight across the river with a conscript battalion.
As the game progressed the French bridgehead was successfully established due to a combination of valour and poor dice rolling by the English. Really poor dice rolling. Consistently really poor dice rolling. By the time the lead veteran battalion was broken it had weathered several turns of canister fire from the RA battery (employing, it would seem, a form of ammunition devised by Mr Shrapnel’s hitherto unknown assistant, Mr Nerf), and musketry from the Black Watch and the Blankshires. In so doing it nearly as good as it got and both British battalions had taken a disruption marker.
Behind this firefight, the French forces were all across the river (except for the guns and conscripts engaging the two reinforcing British battalions) and had sorted themselves out. One veteran battalion had formed line and was taking on the Blankshires while the dragoons had pushed out to the left in waves (a double line with some squadrons in reserve) and faced a reinforcing British battalion that elected to form square and they basically glared at each other for the entirety of the battle. The other conscripts were also sorting themselves out and hoping the veterans would take care of things.
When one group of veterans had had enough of trading volleys with the highlanders they decided to let their bayonets speak for them and charged, while their veteran comrades started to chip away at the Blankshires. In that Brown Bess vs Charleville duel the French weapon was beginning to gain the upper hand. This prompted a British charge which was successful (a very rare instance of his Lordship rolling well) and the veterans retired behind some conscripts in march column.
This could have left the French in a difficult position as the other veterans’ charge was initially successful, but a counter by the game 42nd (who had by now dispensed with the rubber novelty bayonets that Staff Sgt MacPorridge ordered for the regiment as a practical joke last Hogmanay) broke the veterans who had given them a hard time. As they were within four base widths of their opponents they were classified as being ‘close to the enemy’ and, being classified as ‘amateur’ the conscripts needed to pass a discipline test to change formation. They did this with aplomb.
The excellent performance of the conscripts was no surprise as their classmates were steadily whittling down the British across the river from them with very little cost to themselves and the line of conscripts opposite the Black Watch had just made a recover roll (the only successful recovery of the game) needing three sixes on three dice. That encapsulated how fickle fortuna had abandoned Lord Droppings for the evening.
At this stage, after each player had completed seven turns, there was really only one more turn in the battle. The accrued damage to four British units saw each of them break, the artillery shattered their target, the Charvilles of two lots of conscripts blew away their opponents (one of which was the valiant Blankshires) and the other conscripts showed that a hat full of feathers and a sporran is no match for a surly teenager in ill-fitting clogs and they overwhelmed the exhausted Black Watch taking their colours, cohesion and pride.
This left the British infantry battalion in square, Lord Droppings and the guns which surrendered or retired as they saw fit. The French conscripts had exceeded all expectations and a grateful emperor may reward them with a nice trip to see the Czar if they keep this up.
Decisive French victory.
We both enjoyed the game and are keen to play again. This of course means we both need more miniatures.
Things we liked about the rules.
• The ‘near the enemy’ concept makes it a difficult proposition to have to manoeuvre right in front of your opponent and changes of formation are best carried out prior to closing with the enemy. Who knew?
• Large units are really quite tough propositions. If the Black Watch had rolled at least reasonably they could have made a real difference. As it was, they played the key role in the destruction of the only two units the French lost (both veterans, hopefully they’ll take a few pointers from the conscripts for the next battle).
• The scale allows artillery batteries to really depict the guns and their size and composition does matter. The four gun French battery was consistently more effective than the three gun Royal Artillery. They look pretty good on the table too. One wonders how the five gun batteries available to the Russians will fare.
• The rules for skirmishers are easy and elegant and are a pretty good simulation of what effective skirmishing could do without complicating the game.
• The quick reference sheets had the page number reference for each rule they describe or table they depict and the index is good.
• No points system. Forces are chosen from set compositions depending on period and theatre. Reinforcements are then chosen based on size of the game. Our game was played with just the basic forces.
• The rules work well, give a good game in a reasonable time period and are rather fun.
As the sun set and shadows lengthened, Lysander abandoned all pretence at dignity, flogging his mare across the parched Iberian plain, putting the clumps of fleeing infantrymen behind him. He turned briefly, images of Gascon teenagers defiling captured colours uppermost in his mind, and wondered if his uncle (who happened to be Secretary of War) could keep him in his command. He knew if he could, he would be back, and next time he’d make Frottage rue the day he stomped on Droppings.