Italian wars 49, Battle of Fornova,Pike and shot

 So we were meant to have one last battle of the season, before holidays and me starting a  new contract  means putting the boards back up on the ceiling, New Model Army versus newly based Covenanters, with all four of us available, then on the day, Des went down with covid,double jabbed so he's okay but flu like and not really able to come,without his New Model Army, I cast about for something to do and decided to use my Italian wars figures, so using Ospreys Fornova campaign book( with a helpful wargaming section) and Peter Sides Renaissance Battles volume 1 , I set up Fornova 1495

I set up the French under Charles VIII on one side of the river and the Italian league under Francesco Gonzaga IV,Duke of Mantua on the other, hoping with overwhelming cavalry numbers to overwhelm the French, merely having to cross the Taro to do so.

We used the convention from the Osprey book that the first unit at one of the three fords had to get a 5 or 6 or the ford was closed, after Ben failed with both his first two attempts, we said the third ford was open,otherwise there wasn't going to be much of a game! There were some Italian light cavalry on the French side of the river, a unit of mounted crossbow men and two units of stradiots,  there was a bit of toing and froing between them and a unit of gendarmes and some Swiss pike,we found out how good the Swiss were!

The French Gendarmes took a couple of hits from the mounted crossbow men and then eliminated them,the Italians used their artillery to good effect while the French endeavoured to move and unlimber their guns. The Swiss swung around to face the ford, leaving one unit to take care of the stradiots who had been stranded after failing their activation, they were unable to evade as this would have taken them off of the table and they would be lost,at least they inflicted some damage to the Swiss before they went!

Ben was having trouble moving his troops as we had rolled for command levels, most of his commanders were a 7 and his overall commander an 8, in contrast the French overall commander was a 9 and most of his commanders were an 8 which made life difficult for the Italians who were starting to take casualties from crossbows, by this time we had rolled for the scenario special rules and the rain had put an end to all gunpowdrr weapons. 

The Italians managed to get a unit of mounted crossbow men onto the ford but not across it. 

We called it now as clearly the French would get off the board .

We had a fun time, Dan took over the French after a short while and I umpired,even though we didn't get to much combat, it was nice to get the Italian wars figures out for a runabout, quite a few for their first time! I realise I could do with some more crossbow men, not need exactly more that they would be useful! I also had a look at another large Swiss  pike block I've been slowly working on since I finished the larst batch,I figure I could do with them if I want to do Maregano.

The eagle eyed amongst you will have noticed a unit of landsknechts and some Papal gendarmes which I'm not convinced were there but they were in Sides order of battle so I figured I'd include them!

It was quite nice to pack away the Italian wars figures somewhere I could still see them!

Not sure what's up next,who knows, perhaps I'll paint some figures soon? Although really I should do something about my roads, they match my basing so well they're virtually invisible, hence the grey tarmac temporary road!

All the best Iain 

War of three Kingdoms 10 battle of Wistanstow

 Now dear reader, we are whisked away to Shropshire in 1645, to a battle just before Naseby with the Parliamentarians sending out a reconnaissance in force under Sir Reinking and the Royalist commander scraping together a scratch force drawn from local garrisons to try and retake Wistanstow, even though my flags were for parliament I was cast in the role of the fopish cavalier, Sir Michael  Woodhouse as Des a scion of the Geneva of the north(Bolton) would not countenance being anything but the rebels, so he was Colonel  William  Reinking.

We've just taken the scenario from warlords for To kill a king supplement for their Pike and Shot rules, which is part of the same stable of rules as Hail Caesar and Blackpowder,  it's not really a tournament type of game but gives a good game in a reasonable time with a fair amount of frustration as activations are a big part of the system, personally I quite like that. We were looking for something a little smaller as we didn't complete St Albans as it was so large a game the previous week and neither of us wanted to be up quite so late!

The parliamentary reconnaissance in force meant, under the scenario, that their artillery and troops were already set up and their command rating was higher General 9,battalia commanders 8, which in order to activate you need to roll equal or less. In contrast my troops were in a less advantageous position and my general was an 8 and my battalia commanders 7.

Entertainingly blogger has reversed the order of all the photos! Ah how we laughed! Essentially I  tried to move the battalia on my right flank around and over some hedges which worked for the first go,but stalled for some time after( my unit of cuirassiers were there pretending to be normal cavalry for the day!)

Des's army was a recently purchaded minifigs army,aromaticaly based with oregano, in opposition were my Essex/warlord plastic troops.I managed to rally off the damage my yellow regiment took with my commanding officer attached to it, which worked in spite of the  dreaded double six or blunder, which in this case merely bundled them into a hedge! Focusing all his ire on that regiment proved to be beneficial to the rest of my army as I was able to eventually outflank him on my right and get in amongst his artillery which was when we called the game. Great fun,although we didn't have enough hedges or road! Next up? Another AAR, theres precious little painting happening at the moment,hopefully blogger will put the pictures in the right order next time!

To kill a king does have rules for sieges, so I'm quite tempted by that!

All the best Iain