Looking Good Even in Defeat

Scott has loaned me With Eagles to Glory by John H. Gill, which is proving to be a very good read. Gill's book sets out to correct the poor rating that the German troops always get in other histories and by extension wargames rules. He digs into regimental diaries and examines obscure actions which get overlooked as people rush off to Aspern and Wagram, to show that given their chance, the German troops fought as well and as hard as the French. The chapter on the Bavarians, covering in exquisite detail the Bavarian army's activities during 1809 has provided a lot of  scenario ideas and further encouragement to me to build some 1809 appropriate Austrians to fight them. 

I was thinking it would be interesting to try an unbalanced scenario, with my Bavarian division covering the withdrawal of their baggage against larger numbers of Austrians. Hillier's counterattack at Neumarkt or something like that. Probably would make a better Sharp Practice game, but Scott doesn't have any separate Big Men, so we went with General d'Armee.

Bavarian deployment. 1st brigade will fall back covered by 2nd brigade and then take up secondary position in village on the right.

Hordes of Hapsburgs

Hans and Franz anchor 1st brigades left flank in a village

2nd brigade artillery and cavalry cover the gap

2nd brigade

I'm winning the skirmish firefight

1st brigade artillery. First shots put a bunch of hits on an Austrian fusilier battalion, they fail their Discipline Test and take more hits and retreat.

Austrian cavalry arrive!

Things were going fine. I was going to limber my guns, give the white coats a volley from my fusiliers and then start retiring to the secondary fall back position. Scott's 12 pounder battery is given "Artillery Assault" orders, adding 2 Casualty Dice (on a 4, 5 or 6 they add an extra casualty to whatever the result is on the firing chart) to their roll. Scott rolls:

Ouch baby... very ouch.

So I've taken 5 hits on the battery in one turn! The double 6s causes a Destiny Test. Scott rolls. An explosion has killed my Brigadier causing the Brigade to Falter. So I have to send one of my 2 available ADCs to the brigade to rally them at the start of the next turn. I roll a 1. "Sauve Qui Peut!" goes up across the ridge. My skirmish line disperses. Every unit takes 2 hits and retires. So my battery is now over the limit and disperses as well. Plus I permanently lose 1 of my 3possible ADCs.

Well bugger.

"Beer?"

My baggage got away, but recovering the wreck of 1st brigade and extricating everyone over the bridge before the Austrian cavalry arrives would be bloody.

A very short game. But it looked good.