"Pordenone 1809 Scenario & March Attack AAR" Topic

Hi,

Mark at Crusader Games was kind enough to put my AAR experiment up on his web page for the "March Attack" rules. The AAR is of a hypothetical battle at Pordenone in 1809, assuming that there was a meeting engagement that developed before the historical battle of Sacile. There are actually three files: one has the scenario, OB, and AAR with notes on how the rules play; the second is the collection of maps showing the progress of the battle; and the third is a smaller file with just the scenario and OB info and a blank map for the terrain. The OB lists enough information that the scenario could be converted to any set of rules – but I hope the AAR gives you some sense of the experience we had with March Attack.

It's at the bottom here:
link

Cheers,

Christopher

Good AAR. I play these rules and love them.

Tom

Seems Pordenone-Sacile 1809 is becoming a popular battle group to game in recent years.

Plan to check out these new rules for our group's larger games…maybe some good insight.

Meanwhile….

Our group is running the Sacile battle at the next HMGS-PSW Winter Con on Jan 28th.

link

Previous Sacile game by Peter at Historicon. Link to pictures.

link

M aka WR

Looks good -with 28mm have you doubled everything up?

Thank You Cat
My group will certainly give your scenario a try.

Christopher, wonderful review, many thanks.

I like the sound of the combat mechanisms and movement. Could you add any detail on the Command & Control mechanisms?

Nick

@mashrewba – the official scales are: units mounted on 40mm frontage bases, two bases per infantry battalion or cavalry regiment/wing, one base per battery, and about 1" = 60 yards. Given those scales you could go a number of ways with 25mm figures I suppose, depending on how many figures you wanted in a unit and how much ground you needed to represent in the battle.

@Nick – Orders are issued as the first action of the turn, during the shared "strategic" part of the turn before initiative is determined and the players take their separate turns. Issuing a new order requires rolling a 7+ on 2d6. Modifiers include: Commanders are rated Poor to Excellent (-1 to +3), Staff are rated from Poor to Good (-1 to +1), distance (+2 if close, but -2 per 12"), and importantly whether or not the formation is "uncommitted" to battle (+2). It's also more difficult to order a formation to retire, especially if it's committed. The process is pretty fluid, so for instance if an army commander issues a new order to a corps commander, the corps commander can immediately turn around and issue new orders to his divisions, etc. There are eight different order types, ranging from Attack to Form Grand Battery to Retreat, each with short but playable definitions. It's assumed that there will be some writing down of details, but the amount is left up to the players.

Overall, the main thrust of the order system is closely tied to that of the combat system – which is, once you get stuck in (engaged, 9" or 5-600 yards) it's much more difficult to do anything fancy and you had best get your fighting done quickly. On the other hand, unengaged formations are much more flexible and can really zip round the board using strategic movement rates.

Cheers,

Christopher

Thanks Christopher

Fantastic write up, March Attack is definitely a set of rules I want to try and I am trying to get some people at my club on board. Do you by any chance have photos of the battle?

I did … (notice the past tense)

We actually played the game in the Spring, and I took very detailed notes and photos, and used those to experiment with the Battle Chronicler program. Then … I went on summer vacation, the photos got overwritten, and I only now remembered to go back and finish up the text! :(

In my defense, I'm in the middle of a big ACW project, which (as I've told Mark) makes my discovery of these rules a bit of a distraction. What was that saying about the raining and the pouring? I hope to get back to Napoleonics in the Autumn, and am working on 1796/97 scenarios to see how well MA will handle them.

Also, I actually played with figures mounted a little differently, as that is what I had on hand. They were 15's, based 3 infantry or 2 cavalry or 1 gun per 1" (25mm) frontage, and I just used two of them to represent one "official" March Attack base.

Here's an example of the notes I took (which might look like gibberish):

Turn 2. Skirmish Combat +1 French, 8 = 1 hit on B/2/1, VeD 6+2=8, 5 pass. Initiative, French 8+1=9, Austrians 10+2=12, Austrians move first. 2/5 Hu charges 1/8 Ch, countercharge. 1/5 Hu charges 1/6 Hu, countercharge. 2 Ch charges 2/8 Ch, countercharge. French Btry A fires at 3/52, 6", 4-1=3= 1 hit, no bouncethrough hit on B/2/1. 3/35 fires on B/2/1, 8= 1 hit. Austrian Btry A fires at 1/8 Ch, 9", 5-2=3= 1 hit. VeD 7-1=6 pass. 3/52 fires at 3/35, 6/3/1= no hit. B/2/1 fires at 3/35, 5/2/1= no hit. A/2/1 fires at 3/35, 5/2/1/0. 2/5 Hu 6+2=8 versus 1/8 Ch 3+4=7, 2CV Ret 12" D2, impacts Btry A, also D2. 1/5 Hu 6+1=7 versus 1/6 Hu 6+5=11, 3CV Ret 12" D2. 2 Ch 4+4=8 versus 2/8 Ch 5+6=11, 2CV Ret 12" D2. French move. French Btry A fires at 3/52, 5", 4-1=3= no hit, no bouncethrough. 3/35 fires at B/2/1, 8= 2 hits. Austrian Btry A fires at 1/6 Hu, 5-4=1= no hit. 3/52 fires at 3/35, 5/2/1= no hit. B/2/1 fires at 3/35, 3/1/0. A/2/1 fires at 3/35, 5/2/1= no hit.