Battle of Friedlingen 14 October 1702,

 During the War of the Spanish Succession, at dawn, on the morning of the 14th October, 1702,  Lt.General Villars was informed that the Imperialist army was abandoning its entrenchments opposite the French position near the town of Friedlingen. Immediately, Villars sent Generals Desbordes and de Chamarande with 3 Foot brigades and 1,200 Horse across the Rhine via the island of Schusterinsel near Weil am Rhein, to occupy the entrenchments abandoned by the enemy. 

Meanwhile, the Imperialist army had begun to retreat, after abandoning their entrenchments. By 8:00 a.m. Imperial Count Fürstenberg observed the French army was debouching on the right bank of the Rhine. When the Imperial Commander,  Margrave of Baden,  heard the report, he immediately sent the cavalry of his left wing to Fürstenberg's help. The Margrave then rapidly retraced his steps with his infantry to attack Villars' forces.

The French infantry marched rapidly to reach the crest of the Tüllingen Heights, before the Imperial Foot could reclaim their abandoned entrenchments....so I had a great scenario for a game that I could play!!

The Table: The French on the left having just crossed the Rhine.

The Tullingen Heights were created by big bits of foam under the battle mat. They were wooded, which slowed movement (if a unit moved at full pace in line it became disordered and if it moved at 2/3 speed it stayed steady.

The wooded slopes gave the benefit of soft cover when being shot at or defending and they would be the scene of some very bitter fighting.

WIP- Vienna 1683.

I have been considering this for a while.
I have the Poles and I have the Ottomans.
And I've added Imperial and Bavarian Foote to play out the relief of Vienna in 1683. Many of my WSS Imperial Cuirassiers will be fine...and I have lots of them!
I need some Saxon Foote and Horse ( I might cheat and use some of my GNW Saxons...but don't tell anyone).

I guess it's one of those battles that all gamers have heard of and many have played, and I think as I have had the Ottomans for so long it's time to give it a crack.

It will mean a table with the Kahlenburg heights...and maybe a section of the walls of Vienna....and a Turkish camp.

Hmm.....time to get started.

The first of my Imperial regiments. ( I have to confess I didn't paint this unit!)

Oudenarde July 11th 1708 -- or an attempt at it anyway

 Well it was going to be a big one as the Brothers gathered.  For a variety of reasons there were less of us than originally planned. Ralph was the French CinC , Vendome, and Tom and Phil were his subordinates.

Ross played Marlborough ( I think Ross liked being referred to as 'Milord' or 'His Grace') and Spyros and Chris were his subordinates. 

The game was interesting as both sides were marching onto the field and had to jockey for position as each brigade had to shake out into line. Troops arrived on a predetermined plan - each commander had a good idea of the arrival of various brigades with some possible alteration. The battlefield had long lines of approaching troops!

View from the French side. Moving along the road-A Dragoon Brigade. Behind Infantry brigade with Irish, Royal Italians and Bavarians. In the middle of the picture- the opening engagement- A brigade of Prussians and Hanoverians attack a brigade of Swiss and Germans holding the small village of Eyne.

On the painting bench....WSS.

 I recently went back to adding to my favourite collection- my Age of Louis XIV or Marlburian. I hadn't painted any figures for quite a while- so many others to do!!  A few years in fact so in November I ordered some figures from Front Rank. I decided on Imperial Troops ( Hapsburg Austrians) as I only have two battalions and decided to add two more.

I painted the Daun Regiment and then the Osnabruck Regiment.

I find myself just adding units- even if they didn't serve in any of the theatres that I am gaming.

The Army of Louis XIV vs the Grand Alliance

A game from a long while ago ( a year or two??) that was played one evening.  I took the photos, wrote up the report and then forgot to post!

     

    The Army of Louis XIV was ordered to hold a small hill line anchored on each flank and in the center on three villages: Oberglau, Mittelglau and Unterglau.  The French were told that the villages were the key to victory.  The Allies ( MiLord Duke of Marlborough) were ordered to defeat the French and Bavarian forces by ignoring the villages and capturing the hills between each village.

Reminiscent of the Battle of Blenheim,  without the Nebel stream, this was quite a big fight with over 40 battalions on the table and nearly 50 squadrons. 

On the left, the Bavarians with French Dragoons, held their own very effectively against the Prussians and Dutch. 

The French center came under enormous pressure but held without buckling. On the allied left, the pressure was mounting, but time, rather than troops ran out after a long game. A French victory! Louis XIV would be proud!

Army of Louis XIV vs the Allies!

I hadn't had my early 18th Century stuff on the table for a while, so I opened up the cupboards and pulled figures off the shelves so that i had a solid French force with Dutch, Prussian and Imperial opponents.

Nick and Ross were the French and Phil, Richard and I were the Allies. The scenario was a little convoluted. Prince Eugene had given one of his subordinates the task of proceeding down a valley and take a small village at the far end. The subordinate mistakenly  stopped and the first village where a brigade of Irish troops was installed and began to deploy his troops to besiege the village- the wrong village. Eugene arrives and orders the village to bypassed and get through the valley. The local French commander had managed to put a force of dragoons and second rate infantry together to block the advance- this was the starting point of the game.

Army of Louis XIV vs The Grand Alliance

Four brothers assembled to fight an early 18th Century clash that had nearly all of my Louis XIV and Marlborough's army on the table. Nearly 30 Battalions per side and over 30 squadrons on each side battled it out over the course of a long hot bloody day.

The Battlefield: in the foreground to the left, the Redcoats commanded by Chris, The Prussians arriving to support. And to the right the French regiments commanded by yours truly.

The game was loosely modelled on Ramilles, one of Marlborough's great victories. On the allied side the majority of the infantry were on the right and the cavalry were in the left, representing the deployment of the armies of the day. The terrain on the allied right was very hilly with a number of woods. On the extreme left a small town with the area in between a large open area of rolling fields.

The Army of Louis XIV vs The Grand Alliance: January 2013

Each year I try and get a very large game in with my Marlburians. At this point there are 52 Battalions of Infantry and 50 squadrons of cavalry....and still growing. I try to get as many on the table as I can depending on the number of players and the scenario. This time, in January  of this year, I decided to base the scenario on the Battle of Dettingen in 1743. Now that was a later war- not my usual fare of Spanish Succession but it is a fascinating tactical situation.  In my game the armies were switched and the names of the historical places changed and it was Marlborough' s army of the Grand Alliance that  was attempting to trap the Army of Louis XIV.

Christmas 2012 Marlburian Grand Battle

The plan was to design a scenario with defence in depth rather than standard six foot wide table- so I based this on a scenario I had read about from the League of Augsburg boys in the UK that had been played a few years ago. Using my Marlburians there was to be 21 French and Bavarian Battalions and 20 squadrons of Horse defending a series of villages. They were commanded by Paul as the duc de Villeroi and he had Ralph as his senior commander on the right flank commanding the Bavarians and some French troops. In the centre were Phil and Brian and Paul held the left flank. The Allied objective was to cross the river to their front and storm the villages held by the enemy. The French were to attempt to stop them.
On the opposite side was the army of Milord the Duke of Marlborough (played by Nick) with a total of 26 battalions of foot and 28 Squadrons of Horse and Dragoons (English, Scots, Danes, Prussians, Hanoverians, Dutch and Austrians). Nick took the English contingent on the Allied left with Chris as his subordinate commanding some of the redcoats. In the centre Ross and Roger commanded the large Dutch contingent and on the right of the Allied line Lochlainn commanded the combined Danish, Hanoverian and Imperial troops. The Prussians were commanded by Liam and these had been sent on a wide flank march on the Franco-Bavarian right. They would appear at a crucial phase in the battle.

French Center