Mustafa's "Blucher" - The Rage Continues!

Well, they ain't Miniatures...but then again, I didn't have to paint'em!

Overall, a nice portable substitute for Miniatures, except perhaps 2mm.

Scenario #8 "Melee" from One-Hour Wargames, by Neil Thomas.

Russians will be defending, holding the hill while their reinforcements race to the scene. The French are making a push to secure the hill - it overlooks the road and is easily interdicted by Artillery. How can the French advance without a secure supply line?

Only changes to the scenario are to make it fit Blucher, which doesn't fight to the death, but usually until 1/3 of the Units are Broken.  Here I compromised and made it 50% of the Units per side - 10 for French, 11 for Russians [one is only a Cossack]. In Blucher terms, they were 2 armies around 130 pts.

I diced for the forces using first the 6-unit then the 4-unit table in One-Hour Wargames. I came up with the below:

6 line infantry, 1 Guard infantry, 1 Militia Infantry, 1 Cossack, 1 Cavalry, 1 Foot Artillery, and buckets of Steadiness!

I Corps. 

Allied Infantry: 1 French Model, 1 Polish, 1 Conscripts, 1 Horse Art, 1 Lt Cavalry

II Corps. 5 French Line Infantry.

Atop the hill, Russians have two Infantry, Foot Artillery and the Militia have moved into the woods, on Turn 1 [the woods are the key to the position, CLICK here for analysis]. The Artillery nearly reach the road at 24".

French Turn 1, the Allied force entered, with the Light Cav, Horse Artillery at the front.  Three Infantry following up.  Russian Artillery range indicated by ruler. Uncertain if I placed their guns properly, but prefer Infantry to be close to the opposition, rather than the guns.

Guns in Blucher are pretty resilient - charges against them, even on a flank, are unlikely to succeed unless the guns are low on ammo.

Turn 2. Russians re-position as the Allies are moving up the road and avoiding them. French respond by continuing up road, unlimbering the Horse Artillery, and inflicting a Fatigue on the near Russian Infantry.

Turn 3. Russian reinforcements arrive - three Infantry following the Cossacks. The French cleverly held their Cavalry just out of charge range, so the Cossacks must be content with screening the Infantry, who are following closely behind. 

As defender's win ties in Close Combat with Blucher, and the Infantry can more than handle a lone light Cavalry Unit, Ivan isn't worried. The Russian Infantry spectacularly miss hitting the French Horse Artillery with 3 x 1's!

Meanwhile, on the Hill, The Russians have finished repositioning themselves into a more offensive stance. The Militia defending the wood have no reason to exit the woods and have a losing firefight against the Allied Infantry. 

In Blucher, the best thing for weak Infantry is to occupy a defensive position, which makes them a lot more effective than in the open. They also will wear down an enemy Infantry, even if they lose and retreat. 

Interestingly, Blucher doesn't allow Infantry shooting in or out of woods. Artillery may shoot up to 3" in. This makes occupied woods mostly a close combat problem. Only rules I know that do this! Reminds me a lot of the Histories I've read...

French Turn 3. Cavalry charge the Cossacks and are repulsed! Infantry advance.

French Horse Artillery blast the Russian Infantry for 2 Fatigues! Cossacks charge the French cavalry but this time THEY suffer a reverse!

Russian Infantry Move up and create a firing line.

French Turn 4. Polish and German Allied Infantry prepare to face the Russian advance, supported by the Horse Artillery. Meanwhile, they position Infantry to gang up on the Militia holding the woods, key to the hill position.

II Corps arrives on the road. Plenty of Infantry to reinforce the frontal push.

An Impatient Conscript attempts to oust the Militia, unsuccessfully.

Turn 5. French step up the pressure, charging the Light Cavalry against the severely weakened Russian Infantry, forcing a Retreat, and leaving them Fatigued. The Conscripts again try their luck against the Militia in the woods, and are again thrown back; this has left the Militia weakened, however.

Firing breaks out all over the East end of the battlefield, the French getting the upper hand right away, inflicting a Hit on each and taking none.

Turn 6. Russians hold the line as their reinforcements arrive at the West edge of the battlefield; a cavalry, a Guard Infantry, and an Infantry. French make a high risk charge and the Light Cavalry break the Russian Infantry - mostly due to the general failing to Prepare them. Firing continues, with the French steadily out-rolling the Russian Infantry.  A Russian charge against the horse Artillery fails [barely].

Russians down 5 Fatigues v. 1 French! Shooting is attiritional, and directly related to the amount of elan, so once you have been out-diced in a firefight, you may not recover from that.  Must shooting is a 50-50 proposition [slightly favoring the defense, which will shoot first] unless the enemy is softened up by Artillery first, or your Infantry have the Firepower or Skirmish Trait and the opposition does not.

Russian Turn 7. Cossacks attempt to be a nuisance, French Artillery Retires after running out of ammunition. Firefight continues as Russian reinforcements race to assist their comrades [oops, that's a 100 years too early...].

French Turn 7. I am at something of a loss to decide what to do with Units that have nearly run out of Elan. There seems to be a chance to charge the flank of the Russian Foot Artillery with the French Cavalry. Most rule sets would reward this clever strategm, BUT! Not Blucher!

The French Light Cavalry must score at least one '6' on its attack, which now will only have 2 dice. The Guns will have more, but even with only 1, and neither side scoring a hit, the result will be a tie which the defender wins. This would finish off the French light cavalry.  So instead, they Engage the Militia, which will make it difficult for them to escape the advancing French. As I am playing to 6 Russian or 5 French units lost, it is more important to destroy units completely than take the hill, ultimately. I have found a use for at least THIS weakened unit!

The French infantry meanwhile, will not be stopped for long by the Cossacks!

French winning the Firefight, 8-2 Fatigues!

Turn 8. Russian Reinforcements continue to rush to the fight.

French Light Cavalry - like heroes - re-roll their '6' and roll another '6', breaking the Prepared Militia!  The French Line, unsurprisingly, shoot the Cossacks away.

Turn 9. Russian Dragoons move up to the "trap" created by the cunning French Revolutionaries.  Confronted by two weak French Units, and a full strength Line Infantry in the woods. Choices are not actually that great.

Meanwhile, the Poles and French charge and destroy a Russian Line Infantry. The other has only one Elan left. Weak French Cav Engage a weak Russian Line, making escape very difficult, probly impossible.

French Turn 9. They move the Fatigued Conscripts into the face of the Russian Dragoons. Even if they defeat each of these Infantry Units sequentially, they will take two Fatigues, leaving them vulnerable to attack by the lurking French line.

This is the one of the few things I've found Fatigued Units are useful for.

Russian Turn 10. No matter how the Dragoons cut it, they will still be vulnerable to shooting from the other Infantry unit after they defeat the Conscripts.

If they Turn to face the Conscripts directly, they'll end up sideways to Infantry Fire.

Best to just go straight in and be ready to charge the next weak unit.  At least the Dragoons will finish off two French units. Won't change the game, however.

Russian Reinforcements make themselves noticed, setting themselves up for Fire next turn.  Instead, on French Turn 10, they get a thrashing from French skirmishing! 2 Fatigues on the Russian Guards and one on the Line Brigades.

This will be known as "The Turn of French Firepower"!  A hit by the weakened French Infantry, which is now also Prepared for the cavalry charge...

Turn 10 continues... French blow away the Russian Line.

Russian Turn 11. Seeing defeat at 50% staring them in the face, the Russian Infantry charge the French Line. The Guard roll 11 dice, and get NO SIXES!  The French roll 4 dice and get one, but they needed NONE since they win ties.

The Russian Line fare better, and win by one 6.

Russian Dragoons try to break the French Line square...French beat them straight up, one 6 to none [without a re-roll]. 

French Turn 11. They blast the Russian Line's last Elan off.

According to OHW, the scenario is won by whichever side ends up in sole possession of the hill, a pretty steep hill to climb, and likely to draw.  For this game, I modified it to the Blucher forces lost victory, also.  The side that takes 50% losses for this *valuable* hill will withdraw.  Blucher isn't a fight to the death wargame, like the original OHW rules are.

The last couple of turns were disasters for the Russians.  A bunch of units melted, and were unable to extricate themselves from their situations, anyway. Russians lost 4 Line Infantry, the Militia and the Cossacks. French lost a Conscript.

Furthermore, comparing Fatigues, the Russians had a couple more units with just a few Elan left. The French had two that were hurting badly, but were able to shield them from marauding Russkies.

This battle is usually a draw - if either side wins, it is usually the defender.  Today, the Russians took a much worse beating than I thought they would. Partially this was caused by a great decision of the French to advance forward as quickly as possible, engage only part of the hill defenses and fall aggressively upon the first Russian Reinforcements.  They also rolled very well at a couple of times, setting themselves up to win the battle of attrition.

The Russians badly mishandled their guns, but were perplexed by the woods, which is an obstruction.  They also should have moved all their reinforcements together along the North edge of the hill, where the Dragoons may have been able to make a better impression upon the French.

Blucher gave a very good game here, and altho I only had Momentum problems once a side, it was still tense at times, wondering if I'd have the MO needed to move the second Brigade.  I didn't encounter anything in the rules that was a significant issue.  Couple of lessons:

- weak units need to be protected, but - especially if cavalry - can be effective at Engaging the enemy, trapping them or slowing them against advancing forces until they are crushed.

- Combat against any defender where you have to re-roll Successes is VERY unlikely to succeed, since the Defender wins ties.

- Same goes for two weak units facing off against each other - neither side should bother to charge as when neither rolls a '6', the Defender wins. The resulting Fatigue distro is predictable and will eliminate the Attacker with 2 Elan left, not just the Defender with 1 Elan left.

- That being said, Fatigued defenders are a predictable charge for fresh cavalry - they can take the two Fatigues for losing, but will eliminate the Fatigued defender.

While certain aspect of Blucher make some results VERY likely, it is possible to beat all the odds with dice, which is pretty fun when it happens. 

Overall, I really enjoy Blucher, and plan to play it a bunch more while improving my paper terrain for it.

Mustafa's "Blucher" - All the Rage!

And by all accounts, he was a pretty ANGRY guy!

Well, after some back'n forth, "Sound Officer's Call" Steve agreed to run me through a game of Blucher.  I'd read the rules and reviewed the QRS, and found it to be the same sort of tightly written no b------t set of rules as "Lasalle".  Unsurprising, since Lasalle is the Unit=Battalion version of the same rules.  Blucher is a Unit=Brigade.

Overall, the rules are relatively simple, especially in the Basic version.  You play a corps commander, and are mainly concerned with positioning your Units [Infantry Brigades, Cavalry Regiments / Brigades, Artillery Battalions / Grand Batteries] and their Fatigue level.  Units have combat points which directly correlate to shooting and close combat dice. Typically, it is 4-5 Elan [Militia, Conscripts] to 7-8 Elan [Guard], with most units being around 6-7. When a Unit "hits" you in shooting or close combat, you lose a point of Elan. When your Elan is gone, the Unit is removed.  

Artillery works a bit different, it has several shooting dice, usually starting at 5, and decreasing by 1 or 2 until it gets to '2', after which it "Retires" from the field due to low ammo.  

Without going into details of the IP, every time you Fire with a full strength Unit you've a pretty good chance of putting one Fatigue on it, until you get low in Elan.  Close combat is more certain - the winner gets 1 Fatigue and the Loser gets 2!  This metric means that even winning Units are only good for a couple of Close Combats, after which they are weak enough to be easy prey for fresh reinforcements [hmm, sounding a lot like history here...].

While it read pretty cleanly, the best way to get aquainted is to play!

Steve threw down Quatre Bras, more or less, which was very suitable since we were just two days after the anniversary.  Map from [HERE].

A Horde of Rampaging French Grognards is attacking a mixed British - Dutch - German force near a strategic crossroads.  Can the British hold the French off long enough for a strategic win elsewhere??  Let's see!

Below, view from the British lines. 

Hordes of the French Things in 10mm advance upon the hapless Dutch-Belgian militia brigade, thinly scattered like a speedbump across their front.

Above, a few Nassauers and such will attempt to hold Bossu Wood from the Godless Revolutionary Savages who have spilled blood from Portugal to Moscow! [can you tell which side I'm playing?].

First Momentum roll of the game, I almost max out the possibilities.  I enjoy playing a psychological game against the French Commander, grimacing and trying to be nonchalant.  Will the Allied Psyops plan work?  We'll see!

"Seems they have quite the numbers today, eh" says Wellington calmly. "But mark my words, they will come on the same old way."

Below top, two Dutch militia brigades hold Gemioncourt [in game terms a wood and a town]. Below bottom, the British Guards and friends advance to their aid.

French to the front of them, French to the left of them, yet the Militia boldly stand.

French cavalry brigade outflanks the woods as infantry pins the front.

The Dutch militia go Prepared.  Turns out this is not a help at all unless there are cavalry about... I guess I'd prefer if it was just called "Square".

Below, Wellington gets his spyglass on the Horde bent on destroying King, Country and all that is Decent and Good in European Civilization. Or something to that effect.

Meanwhile, behind him in Bossu Wood, the only consolation these two Units have is that they are not sitting on the victory condition.

Turn 2 Momentum Roll for the French - I try not to jump up and down with glee...

Have to say that I find it odd to roll for my opponent's Momentum.  I would rather prefer to let him do it, without looking, and then just cover it up.  The Momentum points are spent to activate Commands and Units.  I found that one rarely ran low on them, but it occasionally did happen.

The French quickly force the militia out of the woods, and the town is next. This heavily outnumbered command is going to retreat, the only question is "when?".

French cavalry flanking Gemioncourt. The militia have 3/5 and 4/5 Fatigue. French infantry and cavalry finish off the Dutch.  "The Horror!  The Horror!"

Detmers brigade now stands along in the farm itself.

Then they two are swamped by the rising tide of Blue!

and the town stands empty and forlorn...

Meanwhile, the French have flowed past Gemioncourt entirely. The French Dragoons try to overrun the Guns, but tie and are repulsed!

"Well done," says Wellington.  "Of course, we expect that from British guns."

The foot artillery continue to support the Bossu Wood. But the Allied Cavalry has now made it up to support their left, which they succeed in doing.

Above, Allied light cavalry drive the French horse from the field. No Risk pieces were harmed in the making of this charge...

With some optimism, the French Quiot brigade charges the British guns.

And they succeed in taking the guns.

Meanwhile, near Quatre Bras itself, a wild cavalry melee is brewing.

With nothing more than their Powder Blue coats to protect them, the Lowlanders brace for another onslaught, and the entire French cavalry brigade charges.

They destroy one light cavalry regiment, but the Powder Blues stick around despite being out-weighed if not out-apparelled in cavalry.

Some issues with Unit placement are occurring as the center gets crowded and our lack of familiarity with actually moving the Units becomes a problem.

But, Blucher is a pretty forgiving system.  It is not driven by mechanics, but rather more by the decisions of the players.  If both players agree and get the effect they want, then many of the mechanics are easy to work out.

Over on the left, the British elite infantry are holding a hedge line and the road against the somewhat Fatigued French cavalry.

Farther left, Guards and Guns are damaging some French Units.

Above, the British Guards roll LOTS of 6's and easily hold off the French line.

Below, the British guns, are munched by a weak French cavalry regiment.

"I say, there seems to be a problem with our guns today," observes Wellington.

French are now attacking Quatre Bras as the second wave of Allied reinforcements arrives. They are fresh but militia, yet they hold the initial advance quite solidly, shooting the French to pieces from their barricades!

The French brigade evaporates - but there are more coming!

At this point, it seemed like the French wouldn't be able to take Quatre Bras. Overall, it seemed like a repeat of the historical outcome - the British hold the field but are unable to reinforce Blucher.

However, turns out we both forgot about the French guard, which was inadvertently left behind first due to a lack of Momentum Points, then because in discussing the rules and various other things, and of course figuring out various points in the rules, we just forgot about them.

My thought is that the French, with the Guard, would have taken and held the town, but there would have been some problems with their flanks due to their by-passing of the Bossu Wood.

Overall, this was a great run-thru of the rules. 

Forgetting the actual results, and some of the more unusual dice rolls, the game played quite smoothly.  Both of us were more concerned with where to put our Units and their Elan / Fatigue, than with lots of small persnickety rules.  You really do feel like a corps commander, and that you are making decisions at that higher level instead of worrying about if the Royal West Caldonians have got their tot of rum for breakfast and stocked up on dry musket rounds.

Most of the mechanics will be immediately familiar to any experienced wargamer.  Momentum is closely related to the command pips in the DBx family of rules.  Both the firing and close combat rules are entirely familiar.  However, it is the BALANCE of rules, and what is NOT put into Blucher that really makes it shine.  It is encumbered with neither novelty nor a multitude of rule exceptions, and this makes it an exceptional rule set.

I will definitely look forward to trying these rules some more, and borrowed Steve's unit cards to do just that!