Hello All,
A friend and I played a Maurice game today with 3 guns, 7 infantry, and 6 cavalry per side. A most enjoyable affair as we worked our way through the rules, however we have some questions that require (or request) clarification. We are not sure if these situations have been missed, but we did enjoy a couple of Reds during the game, hence our judgement may have been blurred ;-)
Artillery
We had two situations where a unit of three guns was frontally charged, one by cavalry, and later in the game this time by the opposite side, by infantry. In the first case (cav v art), two of the guns had fired in the volley phase, but one gun was out of range and did not bombard in the actions phase. The guns were frontally charged by cavalry and destroyed. In the second case all of the guns were 'loaded' and were frontally charged by infantry, the three guns were also destroyed. We looked through the Lite rules for a closing fire option for the guns, but could not find anything. Are we then to assume that the guns loaded or otherwise just sit there and take it? In the second case no volley was initiated by the active player, hence the enemy artillery did not get a chance to shoot in the volley phase. Artillery have very little chance of defending themselves with a factor of 1 compared to 6 for infantry and cav. Even if cav or inf have two or three DISRs they are still ahead of the game.
Related to the above situations each of lost 3 guns that counted towards the number of destroyed units. I was fortunate to be left with 1 army morale, whilst my opponent's army was broken with the loss of the 3 guns. Does this seem fair that one gun equals one cavalry or infantry unit for morale loss?
The artillery as a homogenous command also is restrictive. We believe that artillery should be allowed to be a part of (at least) and infantry command. The French at Blenheim (and most of the WSS) tended to 'distribute' their guns across the battlefield, the 2BW force rule does not really allow this to happen. My reading also indicates that Marlborough was probably the only commander who took the placement of guns seriously, and would justify a homogenous artillery force. Thought?
Cheers
Ray