Show and Tell, 29 August: French 2nd Carabiniers

This August I finished another couple of Shako units.  To add to the French heavy cavalry is another regiment of Carabiniers - the 2nd - painted in 1812 livery.  The figures are Essex and Andy had bequeathed me them ages ago.

Peloponnes - 28 August 2013

Sandwiched between some golf and a fantastic lasagne, and an extended post-summer catch-up anecdote round, we played Peloponnes.  A close battle at the top with the final scores (Population/Prestige) giving David the win with 36/31, followed by James on 30/32, Orhan on 30/29, Adrian 24/28, Kieron 24/21 and Andy 15/33.

Medal of Honor: Warfighter - 14 August 2013

No-one else was around so I played on the Playstation :-(

Shako, Battle of Castiglione - 7 August 2013

Games night during the summer hols meant sufficient time for Adrian to prepare an impromptu Shako scenario from the Fields of Glory book (which had the effect of inadvertently confusing James, Deej and Orhan who turned up clutching copies of FoG).  These scenarios are generally pretty good and can be completed in around 3.5 hours.  We went for the Battle of Castiglione, 1796.  We'd never played this one before because I'd never previously had enough Austrian line infantry units painted up.  As it is, the uniforms of all my figures are for the later period but there you go...

The Scenario map - The French are on the left, attacking the Austrian centre.  Fiorella's flank-marching Division can arrive from Turn 3 if the French gets the die roll; in our game it arrived on Turn 5

The figures at initial set up, the French flank march (Fiorella's Division) and reinforcements not yet on table.

Castiglione saw a grand outflanking manoeuvre by Napoleon to try to turn the Austrians' strong defensive position.  Historically this arrived too early and prematurely sprung the trap, but in our game it worked out about right.  Orhan played Napoleon with me rolling dice for Massena and Leclerc and James the Austrian General Wurmser, supported by Deej.  The scenario is a very tricky one for the Austrians since they are largely fixed in position and can but react to the arrival of the large flank march.  The French needed to break three of the four main Austrian infantry columns to claim victory, with a glorious victory achieved if they also occupied the village of Solferino.  A draw would result if the French failed to do this, and the Austrians would win if they saw off the assaults and break three French divisions.

Napoleon receives word from General Fiorella...

General Wurmser in position behind General Wetzel's Column on the heights of Solferino and General Pittoni's Column in the centre.  The Reserve Column of Grenadiers commanded by General Lipthay waits behind the line.

Napoleon opted to assault the Austrian Redoubt on the hill of Monte Medolano (in reality the 'hill' was only 5m in elevation but the Redoubt made it a formidable enough obstacle for the French to want to amass a grand battery against it) and the village of Solferino, with his combined Grenadier brigade screening the Austrian centre and his cavalry advancing against the Austrian cavalry on the French extreme right.

General Nicoletti's Heavy Battery in the Redoubt of Monte Medolano

Austrian Hussars prepare to go into action...

The assault on Solferino by Massena's and Leclerc's divisions went according to plan with the French grand battery pummelling the Austrian infantry to the right of the advance.  With minimal losses Massena managed to win and hold the village on the last turn of the game.

Massena's Division attack uphill in column, supported by Leclerc's Division.  French light infantry face off the Austrians in the woods.

On the right flank, Augereau's large French infantry Division managed to take and hold the Redoubt, with Kilmaine's cavalry driving off Schubriz's Austrian cavalry - who had to face an attack in the rear by the Dragoons of Fiorella's flank marching mixed French Division.

Croatian Light Infantry battalions assault the Redoubt as Austrian fusiliers of Peist's Centre Column advance against the flank of the main attacking body of French, General Augereau at their head.

The Austrian reserve column redeployed to face Fiorella and the Austrian centre column went into the attack.  It was clear that the last couple of turns would be crucial - would the French, clearly forcing the battle on both flanks, be able to do enough to claim victory?

Augereau takes the Redoubt as General Verdier's combined Grenadiers attack Pittoni's column in the centre (two battalions having just been routed by the leading Grenadier battalion).  At the top left of the picture the Austrian reserve marches in column to intercept Fiorella's flank march.

At the end of the final turn, despite having lost no divisions and seized the redoubt and the village, Napoleon had only broken 2 of the 4 Austrian infantry formations, not enough for victory.  The Austrians had not inflicted enough casualties to claim a win themselves (pretty dire dice-rolling throughout) so the final result was a well-fought draw.

Small World Expanded - 24 July 2013

Seven players at Adrian's and no Seven Wonders to hand, so we set up Small World with the Underworld set plus the Tunnels expansion to connect the boards.  The lure of the Underworld's high scoring special locations and artefacts generated early punch ups between Orhan and Kieron, meanwhile, topside there was slightly more space to expand but of course not enough room for everyone just to live in peace...  As ever the usual mix of luck and judgement resulted in a pretty tight set of scores: Kieron 73, Deej 79, Andy 89, Orhan 96, James and Stu 97, and Adrian 101.

Alea Iacta Est & Ra - 17 July 2013

A couple of games played over a warm evening sat in Andy's summer house.  The first was the dice placement game Alea Iacta Est where Andy and James' initially promising strategy of pursuing Fortuna tiles didn't pay off against the main aim of securing province and patrician tiles, and Kieron's bonus cards took him well ahead of the pack at the end.  Final scores: Kieron 49, Orhan 39, David 38, Andy 32, James 30.

Then a quick game of old favourite Ra in which the first two Epochs had large number of Ra cards drawn very early (four in a row at one point) which put the pressure on trying to use all the bidding chits.  A couple of close results with David just pipping Andy, and James similarly Orhan.  Final scores: David 43, Andy 42, James 32, Orhan 31 and Kieron 24.

Village - 10 July 2013

First play of the expansion ("Village Inn") for the new-ish but increasingly firm favourite Village.  The expansion allows an extra player, bringing the maximum up to five, and introduces an extra couple of buildings (brewery and inn) and a range of in-game and end-game bonuses from the Villager cards (recruited in the inn for a pint or two).  The new additions fit beautifully into and around the existing game board.

This really is a quality game - lots of lovely mechanisms, fantastic art and production quality, plenty of player interaction without any game-ruining impacts, and no clear idea of who's winning until right at the end.  And it was close, with Orhan overtaking James in the penultimate step of the scoring, only to be re-taken by James' extra few coins in the last step.  Final scores: James 70, Orhan 67, David 58, Kieron 50.  Great fun.