Thursday Night's SYW Gaming Mayhem.

Last evenings gaming session was another foray into the "BP" SYW.
My Prussian force led by Fredrick himself against a larger French force, jointly commanded by Andy & Karl.
The Prussians were to play a holding action to deny the French access to the road leading to wherever in Prussia.
I was thinking of doing a battle report but to be honest, I got a bit to caught up in the game.
I did take some piccies though.
Anyways, to cut a long story short, the French got hammered.
The Prussians held and drove the French from the field.
A few eye candy pics of a very beautiful looking game.

All the French appeared on the right side of the table, oops!

The Prussians with only one entry point were slow to arrive.

The French traffic jam

It was going to take the French time to get into position

The Prussian battle line started to take shape

Prussian battleline nearly ready as the French start to deploy.

Beautiful looking French forming the line

French infantry with cavalry forming the French left flank

The Prussian right flank was slow in moving into position

The Prussian right was also struggling to get into position as the French extended their line.
Although vulnerable at this time, the French were unable to exploit this.
I was lucky to have a Prussian Infantry brigade in reserve if needed and luckily I didn't need them to swing over to the right.

Prussians are ready

Oops!. 

One thing we learned, don't charge guns frontally with cavalry.
The cavalry were shaken with closing fire and the resulting break test was a beautiful double one from Andy.
With the loss of the cavalry to the guns and the other French cavalry getting crumped by the countercharging Prussian Cuirassiers, who made a sweeping advance to crump another.
The French cavalry on the Right flank was effectively knackered.
Karl having not learned from the earlier episode of charging guns frontally, repeated the process on the right.

Oops! again

Once again the French cavalry charged and once again were destroyed by closing fire  from the target battery.

Beautiful French Dragoons from Karls collection. Painted by me over ten years ago 

More of Karls lovely French (Le Guard)

Le Grenadiers and a French Battery

Andy pointing out where the game ended with the breaking of the Irish

The French centre had collapsed, the French CinC was mortally wounded and carried from the field.
All was lost, three of the five French Brigades were broken.
This resulted in a broken army, game over.
The Prussians lost one unit.
I think the problem for the French was that they never got into position and I think Andy will agree on this.
The Prussians were ready first and the French attacked in a piecemeal fashion.
The waste of the French cavalry on a couple of artillery targets and a tussle with the Cuirassiers could have been avoided.
The fact is the the Prussians formed their linear line first and beat off sporadic French attacks.
Had the French time and if they had formed their own solid line and advanced together, things could have been very different.
 

The Big HOLE in the French centre as the French start to retire.

I love gaming and I love "Black Powder"
When played in the spirit and flavour of the period, it really works and gives a very enjoyable game.
Now I know some people say BP is a bit too abstract when covering such a large period in history.
I myself think this is it's strong point.
The tweaks the supplements give add to the period spirit, but at the end of the day, you must play in the spirit of the period.
As a commander in BP, you face all the same challenges that a real commander would face and things don't always go to plan.
A bit like warfare really.