Getting there with GNW Another AAR With Black Powder

Tonight we tried out the amended rules again with a slightly different scenario to see how they coped.

As we are now pretty happy with our heavy amends to Black Powder I thought we might share the detail with you and also the stats of the various troops as we are using them as I have been asked for these.

Todays game had a brigade of Swedish foot cut off and forced to retreat, these would be slightly less useful than usual due to this, but still pretty good.

They were pursued by a brigade of Russian foot, two brigades of Saxon foot with a gun, a brigade of allied horse and a small briagde of Polish horse.

Sent to break the brigade out were a Brigade of Swedish Guard infantry with a gun and a brigade of cavalry. The Swedes should still have the edge, just, and the Allies should get a decent game and stand a chance of defeating the Swedes if they got lucky. Very lucky!

The Allies

The Russian foot consisted of one regular and two cossack battalions, For the purposes of the game they were classed as poor and had a poor general, clearly for other games we can have average and good Russians to reflect the veteran units and the guard units. I gave the Russians 2 firing dice to reflect their smaller battalions that also had one fifth pike, but to reflect their musketry generally being superior to the Swedes I gave them a re-roll of one failed shot. Thanks Phil for this idea. So Russia Stats were:
   

	Hand to hand	Shooting	Morale save	Stamina	Special rule
RUSSIAN FOOT POOR	6	2	5+	3	Re-roll one failed shot

For the Saxon foot we had 4 average battalion and 2 good battalions with one good in each brigade of 3. Generals were average and the good units had first fire giving them an extra firing dice for their first volley of the game. Their stats were:

 

	Hand to hand	Shooting	Morale save	Stamina	Special rule
Allied Foot Average	6	3	4+	3
Allied foot Good	7	3	4+	3	First Fire

Allied horse were pretty much average but I gave them a good general so Chris could do more with them, 4 units and their stats were:
       

	Hand to hand	Shooting	Morale save	Stamina	Special rule
Allied Horse	7	0	4+	3

Lastly for the Allies was the Polish horse, these generally (but not always) performed pretty dismally so the stats reflect this, a poor general, lower stats and the Wavering special rule requiring a break test every time they take a casualty. For light horse I am also tempted to include the Cossack rule we made up that does not allow charges to any formed infantry frontally unless shaken or disordered, I didnt on this occasion use that though. The stats were:
     

	Hand to hand	Shooting	Morale save	Stamina	Special rule
Polish Horse Poor	6	0	5+	3	Wavering

I didnt do a stats sheet for the obligatory unit of biscuits (thanks Steve) however we did rate them as excellent!

The Swedes

The first Swedish command had been badly mauled and retreated before the start of our scenario so the below stats which apply to most Swedes have Ferocious charge and Elite 5+ removed for this particular game. Their commander was also rated poor which hanidcapped them. So this brigade is still potent but not nearly as nasty as most Swedes.

	Hand to hand	Shooting	Morale save	Stamina	Special rule
Swedish foot	7	2	4+	4	Elite 5+ ferocious charge

The Guards Brigade however are very good indeed, for their stats we beef them up just a little and they are very, very difficult to stop. Sorry Chris.

	Hand to hand	Shooting	Morale save	Stamina	Special rule
Swedish Guard	7	2	3+	4	Elite 4+ Ferocious charge, FIRST FIRE

I made the Swedish cavalry standard Swedish Cavalry which are still very good, stats were:

	Hand to hand	Shooting	Morale save	Stamina	Special rule
Swedish Horse	9	0	4+	3	Ferocious charge

Our Rules Amends

Our rule amends are fairly heavy now covering many areas, the main one is a complete re-write of the command and control so it is less extreme but also firing before moving, reduction of movement and firing distances etc. Rick Priestly wrote these as a framework to build your game around and these changes have been playtested a fair bit now so we are happy with them.

The sequence of play is:

1. Charge orders
2. Rally Casualties
3. Command and control / orders
4. Moving
5. Firing
6. Melee

Our new command and control looks like this (Apologies not sure how to get the excel cells to copy over properly, but you get the idea)

Command Roll Chart D10
Ability	0 move	I move	2 moves	3 moves
Poor	1,2,3	4,5,6	7,8,9	10
Average	1,2	3,4,5	6,7,8	9,10
Good	1	2,3	4,5,67,	8,9,10
Excellent	0	1,2	3,4,5,6	7,8,9,10

Other rule amendments include:

Allied Foot may not charge unless enemy shaken or dis-ordered
Allied foot may not charge cavalry
Fire before moving
Rally casualties on any and all units 6 for Poor or Average commader, 5-6 for Good and Excellent
Brigade break tests rather than automatic break
Cossacks may only charge flanks or rear of formed foot unless shaken or dis-ordered
Movement is at 2/3 of rules 8 inches foot, 12 inches horse
Firing is at 2/3 of rules 12 inches musket
Field guns limbered may move 6 inches

Anyone who is not familiar with the Great Northern War might be wondering why anyone would play against the Swedes, they look unstoppable. Its a fair point. We are trying to get a balance between historical accuracy and playability. You could argue that the Swedes were often even better than we have portrayed them. Giving them different commander abilities will make a big difference. We generally give them good commanders so they can get a real shift on which reflects their tactics, if they have a poor commander they are likely to take a lot more casualties as they advance on the enemy as they will be moving slower. You can also balance Swedish forces by giving them poor quality Polish allies.

Balancing a game will however mainly come down to the scenario, the Swedes very often attacked when outnumbered two to one or more and very often won against those odds, reflecting this in your scenario and sometimes giving the allies defences to fight from will even things out.

So back to the game. I took the battered Swedish Brigade so Steve could get a move on with the main force coming to rescue them and Chris Flowers took the allies.

We played on a 9 by 6 feet table, the battered Swedish brigade at one end blocked in to the rear by a wood, the rescue force at the other end of the nine feet and the Allies along the long edge essentially with the Swedish main force in front of their left flank.

As my brigade began dis-ordered I had nothing to do. The Swedes rolled and went first. Both brigades got two moves, the Cavalry pushing forward and closing on the Allied flank whilst the foot marched straight up the middle of the table. The gun already starting to fall behind the fast marching foot which is historically accurate.

The Allied foot then rolled with the poor Russians getting one move and the Saxons getting two. The Saxon horse was now lined up opposite the Swedes and a clash was inevitable, Chris had deployed his Poles on the right flank of his Saxons to take advantage of any weakness in the Swedes.

Next move and predictably Steves Swedish Cavlry charged Chris's Saxons, the ferocious charge re-rolling all misses meant Steve was pretty much guaranteed to win these first melees. But Chris was inflicting casualties and also rolling good morale dice so retiring from the melee, Steve then took a sweeping advance into the next rank of Allied cavalry. This time things were not quite so bad for this allies. Chris had 7 dice hitting on 4's because he had been unable to counter charge. Steve had 9 dice hitting on 3's as he was winning but crucially did not get the re-rolls for ferocious charge as the Sweeping advance is not a charge. Both allied horse are forced back but now both Swedish units are shaken from casualties so unbale to charge or counter charge and although three of Chris's are also shaken one isnt.

My poor commander fails to get his brigade to do anything, Steves Guards Brigade moves another two moves leaving the gun even further behind and the Allied foot also trundle forward another two moves

Next move and I am able to shift my brigade for the first time, edging close to Steve and starting to re-align to be able to react to the Allied foot. Steves foot move closer again and the cavalry start trying to re-orgnaise. Chris meanwhile throws his last unshaken allied horse at a unit of Shaken Swedes and his first unit of Poor Poles at an untouched Swedish unit. The Saxons and Poles are thrown back but more casualties inflicted on the Swedes, a sweeping advance by the untouched Swedes into the second unit of Poles see that unit broken but the third Swedish unit are now shaken and Chris has managed to rally casualties off two Saxon units so is actually in better shape than the Swedes at present.

Last couple of moves for the night. The remaining Swedish untouched unit charges the Saxons and breaks another unit. its Sweeping advance forces a further unit to retreat. The Guards move up to charge range but cant fire and are volleyed by the Saxons.

My brigade charges the main Allied foot, the inital rounds of combat see three draws from three melees, The final turn however sees the Russian unit and one Saxon unit forced to retreat and one Swedish unit forced to do the same, I am now 2 damaged Swedish units against 4 fresh allied units and a field gun.

To my right the almost untouched Guards briagde is ready to pounce on the Saxon foot facing it. With the ferocious charge re-roll and saving throw on a 3 they will certainly remove this brigade from play in short order, however if they recieve too many casualties they mau not have enough punch left to save my brigade.

Although the Swedish Cavalry have now broken half the Allied cavalry they are in no shape to take advantage of this and withdraw slightly to reform. It will be at least two more moves before the Swedes are in a position to deal with the remaining Allied horse and probably two more befire they can join the fray against the foot.

So with the night drawing to a close the game is still fairly evenly balanced.Chris still has the chance to destroy my brigade and Steve will be hard pushed to get to me before its too late.

Despite some truly awful dice from Chris on occasion he was still in a position to win the game if only his luck would turn.

At that point we called a halt so we could have a proper chat about how it had played. It felt pretty historical and played really well. The addition of the rallying of casualties meant that cavalry had more of a chance of recovering after a series of melees given a little time so could still influence a game. Removing the ferocious charge from the Swedes makes them much less powerful and this is good to use in specific scenarios, despite being Poor the Russian foot and Polish horse were all still useful in game terms.

Overall a great sucess and I think we have pretty much found the formula we want to progress with. Thanks very mcuh Chris and Steve.

I look forward to playing this again in th every near future.