Another unrecorded event…

The Bridge at Trabazos 

Long story short; I have been tasked to provide the battle narrative for an ongoing Napoleonic campaign - in other words, play out the battles with miniatures.

The Anglo-Portuguese commander wants the bridge destroyed, the French commander expects to deploy north of the town getting there via the bridge over the Druro River as part of a larger Peninsular War fictional battle.

Not really having the ‘proper’ troops for this engagement, I went small scale by using my ~40mm Flintloque figures to play out this portion of the battle as a very minor skirmish.

I gave the French two fine “companies” of infantry to approach the bridge while the British Engineers prepare to blow it up.  Each turn the Engineers roll a d6 until 16 is reached and it will be wired for detonation (and upon a die roll, of course!)

Defending the Engineers are a ‘company’ of the 9th Foot of the 5th Division. While a veteran regiment, the Captain is a martinet hated by the ranks. (a bad roll for his ‘personality’)  Alone in an isolated village away from the army commanded by an officer who had no idea what he was doing, with the temptation for loot and discovery of drink it was too much for the soldiers who, despite the efforts of their sergeant, left their post by degrees.  However the captain, excited by his first meeting of the Napoleon’s army (he had purchased his position and had absolutely no military experience), did not realize about the desertions.

The 'martinet' of the 9th. Note the sergeant with the halberd to the left of the officer already turned around to chase after the would be looters. 

However some defence of the town came from a small band of Guerrillas defending their homes who were of sterner stuff and fired upon the first company of French halting them and mortally wounding their officer.  This confident action (rolling 12(!) for activation) and subsequent roll of 6, activated a small contingent of Portuguese.

The  "Portuguese" 

Early in the action showing the French. The 9th Foot is across the river, the British Engineers on the bridge.

Meanwhile, as the French advanced, the 9th’s Captain marvelled at the French Colonel’s uniform and his flowing hair astride his charger galloping on the bridge in the glory of war. “Fire!” he yelled.  The loud percussion he expected was met with silence. 

“Now, sir?” was the only sound. The single trooper left with him looked up from his knelling position in a questioning frown.

The Guerrillas switched focus to the stagnant first company to the company lead by the mounted officer, but these French did not react to the resulting casualties. Ensconced behind a shielding wall, the raw soldiers of Portuguese remained in place and unwilling to engage in gunfire. But the large Engineer sergeant, a huge Irishman, declared to the oncoming French officer, “You be not stopping us you Froggie bastard!” and using a rusted shovel as a club, engaged with the Frenchman.  Seeing the following French soldiers, he looked over his shoulder and exclaimed, “Work faster!” to his fellow engineers.(my dice rolls were good but still 1 short!)

The Engineer sergeant on the bridge

Alas, his heroism was in vain, the horse evaded the shovel and a well-placed sabre met his brains. A following French soldier toppled an engineer into the water below and another used his hanger blade to cut the cords to the barrels of artillery powder suspended under the bridge. The Guerrillas and Portuguese then melted away.

Of course this story will never make it into the history books.  All that may indeed be mentioned is…the French IV Corps, 1st Division crossed over the Druro and deployed north of Trabazos…. 

Actually my "Calabrese Legion" troops.  Converted from Flintloque figures into something resembling the proper Napoleonic War troops..sort of... Full of 'character' they are.  ~40mm scale (ish). So outrageously cartoonish as to be cute.

Napoleonic skirmish (Flintloque-ish)

Hosted a “Napoleonic Skirmish” game using my old collection of 40mm-ish Flintloque figures; fantasy figures of the Napoleonic era and loosely based upon -originally- the ‘Sharpe’ series of historical fiction novels by Bernard Cornwell.  But now it has expanded to included toads, dogs, undead and other such creatures.
Years ago a local fellow was a major distributor who wanted some painted which I did in exchange for some of the figures.  I went about divesting the Orcs (their British types) of the tusks, the Elves (their French “Franche”) of pointy ears, and gathered together different historical units of Bog Orcs (their Irish) for a collection geared for the Peninsular War in Spain.
I tried to keep it roughly historical; the uniforms are as close as the sculpting allows.

Units are all the same size, no national characteristics, all fight the same.  And no 'morale'; all continue to move along happily until 'dead'.  Simplicity reduces the necessity of the number of rules to remember quite a bit I found.  Thus rules are homemade and simple…real simple…for a convention setting you understand.
The kinda rules that have 6’s and 1’s hit regardless.  Why the “and 1s” you ask?  I seem only to roll 1’s and I want to have hits too!  Actions by the highest card played by each of the players.  Combat conducted with the highest dice rolled.  That sort of rules in play.  A five year old should certainly understand it, so it hopefully should work well enough at the local wargames club for a pick-up game……

the version of "Sweet William" and the 60th

the French Grenadiers

The French howitzer.   A 40mm Perry gun; which gives you some perspective on the scale of the figures.

My whole collection, with each unit of 10 figures. British and Allies to the left, French and Allies in the middle, and Spanish to the right.  

photos from the game:

the version of the French Imperial Guard Fusiliers-Chasseurs (front) and Fusiliers-Grenadiers (rear)
Were these in Spain?  Don't know or care, but the uniforms matched the figures!

Spanish Walloon Regiment (the uniforms seem near enough)

British Light Infantry.  Sculpts with short legs, big hands, big heads!  Lots of character nonetheless....

The game itself?  Well ....I was massacred. Enough said.  :)

My "Flintloque" Napoleonic skirmish collection

With this last unit, my 40mm-ish Napoleonic skirmish collection is finished....probably.....

A recent game I hosted went well I thought as the very simple home-brew rules survived intact from the constant wining and complaints from the boys of the "Francis' Regulars".  The only legitimate complaint - the '"I can't win!" types don't count - was the varying unit sizes as the larger contingents did have a certain advantage in that all other modifiers were to be equal.  So I decided to rearrange some of the units to have all equal at 10 figures each. Somewhat difficult as each of the Alternative Armies contingents have no consistency of scale and I have a bit of CDO  {just like OCD but the letters are in the correct order!}

My goal for the year - and the next - is to complete some of the collections I already have and to have rules and organization ready prepared for future games.  This 'Spanish line' unit is the last of the painting for these.

The "uniform" and colours are somewhat stylized as these are fantasy types and so the sculptor has made some interesting choices in equipment and clothing cut; but in general, the effect is Napoleonic in nature.  My collection is solely focused upon the Spanish campaign and so if the elves are not French they form the Spanish contingent.

Having a new light for the table I simply took a photo before they go, if I am honest, into a box to languish for a long time before I put on another game......sigh.....

Well...at least for a year anyway... (a rather lame New Years Eve joke)

"Flintloque" type-ish Napoleonic skirmish game

A long time ago a local distributor brought in Alternative Armies 'Flintloque' fantasy Napoleonic-based figures which are very loosely scaled at about 35mm or so.
They are full of outrageous character and so I took the less fantasy (no Toads or Dogs for me) and trimmed the orc tusks and elf ears so they are now roughly human in design and organized them into recognizable historical unit - or as close as possible.

British Light Infantry 

Neapolitan 8th Line Regiment.  The standard finial is a 6mm horse!  The huge out of scale proportions are part of the charm of these big boys.....  The mules are from another undetermined source.  I considered them too large for 28mm but appropriately sized for this.  I added a plastic barrel to one and a lot of 'green stuff' to the other using soft wire to bind the bags in a very haphazard way.  

They have been stored away for some time (read: years!) but a couple of months ago I brought out the remaining few units and completed the collections, now numbering 200 or so.  Yesterday was the test of the new and very simple rules developed over some time (read: minutes!) I used as much random selection of table position, unit selection, scenario task and to keep it as even as possible because the usual Monday Night guys like to whine about everything!

Spanish infantry in late war dress being moved.

Other than a couple of minor changes, the rules I made up which are all of 2 pages long (!) were generally accepted and thought to do the trick for a fun convention game.

Later in the game, the Spanish are running...OK, then,....advancing, to gain their side of the table to complete their scenario task.

The miscellaneous figures I collected have become the guerrillas, enemy to French and British alike!

As an example of the play, playing cards selected poker style by each player dictates who has first action during a phase.  Doug's Handy Card System has the player select one of the cards dealt to him with Diamonds bettering Hearts bettering Clubs bettering Spades with ace high.  With the better card each player in turn can perform an action - shoot, reload, move etc.  The shooting is a hit with a good die and flip a card.  Face card = killed.  No wounds. Hand to hand combat is similar.  Points are given for the random scenario objective a player was given and for any kills he achieved.  That's about it actually.

The Chasseurs-Tirailleurs of the Young Guard continue to dig in the graveyard for the gold....

I am hoping for more players next time which should make the action even more wooly.....