Au pas de Charge | 29 Apr 2019 8:11 p.m. PST |
Which is more interesting and fun to play? Do you keep the theatres separate or do you play pan early 1700s games in an East meets West France/Sweden (And a little Ottoman Turkey) take on the world? Or, are they basically the same? |
Coyotepunc and Hatshepsuut | 29 Apr 2019 8:26 p.m. PST |
I prefer the GNW, but I think the WSS is more accessible. |
FusilierDan | 29 Apr 2019 8:52 p.m. PST |
I opted for the GNW. A new theatre from other periods I play, I found some figures I liked, enough material available to keep it interesting. |
Bashytubits | 29 Apr 2019 9:00 p.m. PST |
I think both are quite interesting, but it's hard to not like the Swedish swagger. |
Green Tiger | 30 Apr 2019 2:03 a.m. PST |
WSS – They both have their merits but WSS has more big battles and is easier to game (sides are more evenly balanced). |
Gunfreak | 30 Apr 2019 2:58 a.m. PST |
WSS plays much like a Napoleonic game in many ways, you have to sides quite even, Marlborough didn't beat the French army, he beat the French generals. The GNW is more exotic, the unstoppable Swedish killing machine, it's a game less about complex tactical manoeuvres but more about the uneven match. You can make GNW play more like WSS by having Danes vs Swedes, the battle of Helsingborg is the most WSS style battle of the GNW, quite well-matched armies, but the Danish high command simply was not up to the task. But if you fight Saxons or Russians vs the Swedish, it's mostly trying to survive the first Swedish onslaught, then pile on all your infantry to try and smother the Swedish. But the GNW also lend itself very well to small scale battles, if you want to do a few companies vs companies or a skirmish game, you have fights in Poland, Russia and Norway that are perfect for small scale campaign. I read a book about the war in Norway, and it's full of inspiration for a campaign, many small fights very close to where I grew up. |
Extra Crispy | 30 Apr 2019 5:48 a.m. PST |
Noting wrong with lopsided campaigns. So long as you design the scenarios right, you can have fun with just about anything. Isandlwana? The Alamo? Little Big Horn? Some the best games I've played featured a side for whom victory was very different than from winning, say, Shiloh. |
Lluis of Minairons | 30 Apr 2019 5:57 a.m. PST |
In WSS sides are balanced provided that one uses to game the central European theater – quite of a different affair if you play the Peninsula one. There you will find too large battles like in Flanders, as Almansa, Almenar, Villaviciosa or Prats de Rei. But there's also plenty of medium/small engagements where a dramatical unbalance is the standard, and fierceness is your only goal – especially in its last stages, when the Two Crowns started their final ride toward Barcelona. Is it a sideshow to most WSS gamers? For sure it is, I admit so. But it is also the theater with a real Spanish Succession flavour to me – for it's there, and nowhere else, where you cand find both throne claimants facing to each other on tabletop, leading their respective armies (Almenar 1710). I can't discard emotive reasons for this choice, admittedly. For this is the period with the deepest epics and drama in my ancestors' history – even deeper to me than the Almughavars' mythic ride through the Ottoman empire. |
corona66 | 30 Apr 2019 6:44 a.m. PST |
I have Swedish, Russian and Saxon armies for the GNW, but I can also use my Poles, Cossacks, Tatars and Ottomans, as well as some of my Renaissance Muscovites, so GNW offers more scope. |
Frederick | 30 Apr 2019 8:46 a.m. PST |
Being a SYW gamer you would think I would favour WSS but actually I prefer GNW because of the many colourful options described above |
DFLange | 30 Apr 2019 10:50 a.m. PST |
Both have their qualities but I find the GNW to have a greater variety of army types. |
von Schwartz | 30 Apr 2019 5:44 p.m. PST |
I will have to explore the options here. It sounds very intriguing both WSS and GNW. I used to have some late 17th century Poles, Siege of Vienna, had a ball with them. |
Au pas de Charge | 02 May 2019 1:47 p.m. PST |
So, Great Northern War is more exciting? I picture the tabletop landscapes as more desolate without towns and cities. Am I wrong? |
Gunfreak | 02 May 2019 2:01 p.m. PST |
Well you had plenty of sieges, and there is usually a city or fort when you have a seige. Of the top of my head, Helsingborg had Helsingborg quite a large city for Scandinavia of early 18th century. Battle of fraustadt happened close to fraustadt, and the Russo-Saxon army was deployed between two villages. Lesenya happened by a village, poltava was besieged during the battle of polatave. Plus many others. Most of the fighting in Norway in 1716 was done in the south eastern part of Norway, the most "densely populated" area of Norway, then and now, and you couldn't go far with out ending up in some sort of hamlet, village, town or some other thing even back then.
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Au pas de Charge | 02 May 2019 2:25 p.m. PST |
If you know, what did houses in Scandinavia look like at this time? |
Gunfreak | 03 May 2019 1:33 a.m. PST |
Not a 100% sure about Sweden/Denmark. Brick would rarely be used outside the biggest cities, and even then not that often, later in the century more brick would show up. This is a street preserved at the museum from Oslo about 1700.
You can take a look at this page. It's in Norwegian, but the first number is from when it is dated. |
Gunfreak | 03 May 2019 9:34 a.m. PST |
Naturally I forgot the last link. link |
Au pas de Charge | 30 May 2019 11:20 a.m. PST |
I should mention, I am getting GNW forces painted up in 15mm. Very close to having everything finished and I am very excited for some GNW games. I ended up having hovels paint me this 15mm Eastern European village set, RV5:http://www.hovelsltd.co.uk/easterneuro15.htm Anyone ever read this set?: link |
dbf1676 | 31 May 2019 4:09 a.m. PST |
Minipigs. I have "The Great Northern War Compendium," and highly recommend it. There is nothing in English that comes close to having the amount of information that these two volumes have concerning this war. |
Gunfreak | 31 May 2019 4:35 a.m. PST |
Yeah if you get the GNW compendium and the Helion & co book on the Russian army you are very well covered. (If you don't plan on doing Russians, then naturally you don't need the book on the Russians) |
RogerC | 31 May 2019 3:35 p.m. PST |
As above I favour Great Northern War for the diversity of troops, lots of detail on both Truls blog (Gunfreak) and mine on how we have approached the different forces involved. I can well understand people going WSS but the GNW wins everytime for me. gapagnw.blogspot.com |
seneffe | 01 Jun 2019 2:11 a.m. PST |
From my amateur study of the periods and wargaming experience, it is much easier to get a satisfying and close to history result in GNW than WSS (at least as regards Marlborough's battles). GNW battles are essentially defined by the extremely aggressive usually frontal assault tactics of the Swedes. Their opponents either hold or they don't- so it's easier to recreate. Having done many refights of Marlborough's battles in different formats- it is very difficult to get those right. The tactical subtlety, battlefield deception, use of dead ground etc characteristic of Marlborough are tough to meaningfully re-create. |
Au pas de Charge | 04 Jun 2019 1:02 p.m. PST |
So, what is it about the Swedes in the GNW? Did they shoot better, charge harder, move faster, combine movement and shooting better than everyone else? |
Gunfreak | 04 Jun 2019 1:11 p.m. PST |
Extremely aggressive tactics, coupled with superbly drilled and religiously fanatical makes super soldiers. |
Au pas de Charge | 11 Jun 2019 9:09 a.m. PST |
Does the large proportion of cavalry, especially in the Swedish army, distort of game mechanics? How do you all game with all that cavalry? |
Gunfreak | 11 Jun 2019 9:46 a.m. PST |
Not really, the swedish cavalry is powerful, but can be partly neutralized. It's very hard for any army to stand up to the swedes in an open battle. Hence the liberal use of chevaux de frise, and earth works. And the swedish cavalry is vulnerable without infantry support. It got routed at Poltava when the infantry was routed. I try and have about 50/50 cavalry infantry. I count each battalion as having 600 men, this is ofcourse paper strength and not reality of combat but the same goes for cavalry. I count each 6 cavalry/benith the lily banners squadron as 250. So my first goal is 7 battalions 18 squadrons. That's 4200 infantry and 4500 cavalry. |
Au pas de Charge | 11 Jun 2019 1:00 p.m. PST |
Hmm i did 15 battalions of Swedes and only 7 cavalry units. I dont use Lily Banners rules and just did generic 24 figure battalions (48 figure guard battalions) and 18 figure cavalry regiments. So to make it balanced i need another 12 cavalry regiments!? |
Gunfreak | 12 Jun 2019 1:25 a.m. PST |
That depends on the rules. A regiment can be anything from 2 to 12 squadrons. So you can play with the stats. Sure a regiment isn't the same tactical unit as a squadron. but it will work. You might want to add 5-6 more cavalry units? Again it depends on the rules. At Helsingborg, the Swedes had about 5000 cavalry out of an army of 14-15 000. So there are instances of less cavalry. The Swedish guard battalions weren't any bigger than the others, 600+ man battalions, but there were 4 battalions. For a theoretical strength of 2600 men in the regiment. |
Au pas de Charge | 12 Jun 2019 4:11 p.m. PST |
I guess i overdid the infantry. |
coopman | 13 Jun 2019 9:25 a.m. PST |
Which version of BTLB is the best for the subject two wars? I have no interest in the war of the three kings that is the subject of the 3rd edition. |
coopman | 13 Jun 2019 9:29 a.m. PST |
I will also chime in about the GNW Compendium. It is awesome! |
Gunfreak | 13 Jun 2019 11:14 a.m. PST |
Which version of BTLB is the best for the subject two wars? I have no interest in the war of the three kings that is the subject of the 3rd edition. As mentioned many times, the war in Ireland is just a theme, it's just as good as BLB2 for war in Flanders in the 1690s or the Spanish succession. It just uses the Ireland war as a medium to explained the rules, there are rules for all the type of units of the Spanish succession. You can play GNW with it too(just as much as BLB2) the new GNW supplement will expand on the GNW much more than that one page in the back of BLB2. |
coopman | 13 Jun 2019 1:57 p.m. PST |
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Au pas de Charge | 13 Jun 2019 3:24 p.m. PST |
I just bought the Compendium on everyone's say so here. Thanks for sharing your opinions; I look forward to reading it. GNW is like a brave new world for me and now that my armies are nearly finished being painted up, I am excited to try it out. I suppose eventually, I will try the Helion Russian Book. I see Helion is about to launch a lot of Military books on the 1660-1725 period. Are their books all generally well organized and written?
I might even try this "Lily Banners" rules business. 3rd Edition? |
coopman | 13 Jun 2019 4:25 p.m. PST |
I really want a rules set where each base is a unit, like DBA. I may try the DBA Humberside Extension for these periods and see how they work. |
Gunfreak | 14 Jun 2019 1:06 a.m. PST |
Yes, 3rd edition is all you need, but if you want more GNW flare, there is a GNW supplement coming out soon. The combendium is great, it convinced me from doing just the standard Sweden VS Russia, to Sweden vs Saxony, Denmark and Russia. |
Au pas de Charge | 01 Aug 2019 8:32 p.m. PST |
@Gunfreak Did you get both Danish and Prussians? I'm thinking of adding them myself and also considering Turks. Do you keep the terrain open plains or do you use villages, forests in games too? |
Gunfreak | 05 Aug 2019 10:38 a.m. PST |
I only have Danes, as I'm not that interested in the part of the war when the prussians joined in. The prussians only took part in one major action and it was a siege. I don't have a table at the moment, so I haven't done any terrain. But it's no different from any other European war, there weren't any major street fighting. But several battles had some villages, some had rivers, some had lots of forests, some were mostly open. Some had fortifications. |
Keith F | 23 Aug 2019 10:20 a.m. PST |
The GNW supplement called "With Talon and Claw" is now available to buy. I picked up my copy at "The Other Partizan" show in Newark last weekend. Unfortunately the contents pages are incorrect. I have yet to read the book in detail, but it looks very nice. The publishers are apparently aware of the contents page problem. I have suggested they issue a PDF correction on their website. |