"Talavera 208 - Game One" Topic

This weekend myself and six friends took the time to recognise National Armed Forces Day and support Combat Stress by playing the first of a series of refights of the Battle of Talavera fought two hundred and eight years ago on the 27th/28th July 1809

In this first game, our French team of players attempted to fight the plan envisaged by their historical counterparts with a few tweaks at improvement.

Of course they couldn't know what our Anglo-Spanish team would do in response!

We had quite a few twists and turns with an uncanny similarity to the actual battle.

If you would like to see how things turned out and perhaps support the project with a contribution to the Just Giving page, then follow the link to JJ's

link

Lots of stuff in this post.

Jonathan (JJ)

Well that looked like a great two days of gaming. Glad it all worked out so well after all the hours you have put into it.

Tony.

JJ, Excellent AAR and photos!! Wonderful looking game. Loved reading and seeing it all.
C&G seems to have a number of similar rules to Shako 2, such as division orders. Also the British being allowed to charge after a successful volley. The addition of cards can make things fun.

A few questions please:

How does C&G handle pass through movement, such as infantry passing through artillery batteries?

How are officers wounded, killed etc, is this an effect of general fire, or is it a specific die roll? Can officers be targeted, as in brigade/division commanders?

What do the white and red markers indicate?

Is there a brigade/division level morale check or is it strictly by battalion?

Do defenders get a plus for defending a hill in melee?

Thanks in advance!
Thomas

Hi chaps,
Thanks for your comments.

Thomas
All friendly units may move through deployed artillery at all times with no restrictions to movement, except during a charge when they are considered a linear obstacle causing a deduction in movement to the troops charging through them.

Officers tend to get wounded and or killed outright when attached to units in hand to hand combat or that get badly shot up. That's the risk they take when bringing their leadership to bear on a specific unit.

We use the markers to indicate units under compulsory movement in the next phase, white, red and yellow which is a rising level of disorder and morale failure with white being the first level indicating 'no advance', red, second level indicating halt or retire and yellow, third level or rout.

Morale checks are done on the unit or battalion, but the system monitors a fatigue level for the brigade, division, corps and army which can cause a whole formation to retire when multiple units within it become badly affected by combat and fatigue.

Defenders may well get the benefit of a hill which the charge resolution system takes into account charging up or down hill and if crossing disruptive terrain to get at a target of a charge.

I hope that gives you an idea of how things work. You can get a copy of the rule manual from the C&G web page and read a fuller description of what I have laid out here.

Cheers
JJ

Thanks JJ, will do!

where is the Cerro de Medillin, those were big hills

The Cerro de Medellin and the Cerro de Cascajal face each other across the valley of the Portina stream at Talavera and dominate the battlefield with the former being the higher of the two.

Andrew Field gives a very good description of both with accompanying photos pointing out that the military ridge on the Medellin runs northeast to southwest so was not the perfect Wellingtonian ridge to hide units behind and leaving the KGL brigades in particular to artillery fire.

The Cascajal is shown as being much more level than the Medellin with a really good platform for laying out gun lines upon.

My contours are taken from the Fortescue map.

It is nice to see all your hard work coming together in such a spectacular fashion.

Personally, I think formations passing through artillery positions with all their impedimenta should have their movement restricted. I allow a half move deduction, unformed status and then one move to reform after passing through. Of course the artillery can not fire during this period and unless elevated can not resume until the unit is well clear of the position.

Just a thought.

Well done, Chris

Thanks Chris, much appreciated.

I wouldn't necessarily disagree with you. The period of play in C&G is estimated at around fifteen minutes and so it comes down to a subjective calculation on what seems reasonable based on what we can know for definite, which often comes to not much.

Perhaps one of the most famous passage of lines through a gun line was D'Erlon's Corps attack at Waterloo.

Mark Adkin on page 345 of his "The Waterloo Companion" describes the process of passing four infantry divisions, 33 battalions in file through 500 meters of jumbled horse teams, caissons, limbers and wagons as they conducted passage of lines through the grand battery.

He goes on:
"Each division had to clear the guns and form up in their assault formation. It took time – perhaps as much as ten to fifteen minutes".

Whatever the validity of Adkin's assessment, the play seems to allow the interaction between artillery and supporting units to work well.

I guess the huge compromise most Napoleonic games have to live with is that of the depth of our model units especially if you want to play in a 'grand manner' style.

Let's hope we haven't started something here now I've gone and quoted a reference!!

cheers
JJ

looks ace, great stuff

Congratulations, JJ. The game looks fantastic.