"Battle of Cropredy Bridge 1644 - A Polemos Refight" Topic

Please see here link for details of a refight of the Battle of Cropredy Bridge

Hi Whirlwind, and thanks for this series of Polemos accounts. Pete Berry put a lot of time, expertise and effort into those rules and they deserve more exposure. Cropredy Bridge is a really difficult battle to reproduce effectively on the table, not least because of the terrain. The Royalist rearguard at Williamscot are in fact at the top a very steep hill, heavily cut by ridge and furrow fields. It is a hard walk up, cavalry trying it against an enemy at the top would have had practically no chance. So, to all intents and purposes, Waller's force was incapable of seriously influencing the battle. That left Middleton trying to funnel troops across the river at Cropredy itself, and then trying to charge up an open gentle slope against the Royalists at the top. Somehow, Waller's famed eye for ground seems to have deserted him. All that said, it is a great battlefield to visit, as it is possible to walk all the way round it, a very rewarding exercise, I found!

How do you handle the tempo bidding mechanism in the rules if you want to play solitaire?

How do you handle the tempo bidding mechanism in the rules if you want to play solitaire?

I just roll a die for it. Polemos ECW and SPQR limit tempo bids to between 1 and 6 anyway. I change the initial D6 roll to generate tempo points to a constant to reflect the quality of generalship. More here: link

Many thanks for that Mollinary. The terrain in the scenarios I adapted definitely didn't mention that! I will have to look at writing a proper scenario for the action. As you say, the Polemos ECW rules are a very good effort and always seem to give very plausible results.

A pleasure. Waller's account is what you might call ‘economical with the truth'! "I had a steep hill to mount, not far from the top of whereof the enemy was drawn up in a strong body. Some of the Regiments came up slowly, whereupon I turned back leaving my regiment to march on, but coming to the foot of the hill I was advertised" At this point Waller stops describing what he was doing, and turns to a report of what Middleton was doing (the two were completely out of sight of each other because of the hill). Having finished his account of Middleton's misfortunes, he resumes "the whole army of the enemy being rallied, I thought it best to make an orderly retreat to our foot, which we did without any loss…..". Doesn't need much reading between the lines!

Thanks for the AAR, nice to read about ECW battles.