Yesterday battle videos

This was a very enjoyable game. It was one of those strange battles where, half-way through you think you've won when in fact you're losing badly. Poor Josh on the French left/north got steamrollered by 2/3rds or even 3/4 of the Austrian army that had swung wide to the east in a long right hook. From where I was in the French centre, Kevin (French south/right) and I were driving the enemy back off the objetive and the ridge north of it easily... Then we ran into the main Austrian force that had already disposed of Josh.

My mistake was to bring all my artillery up onto the ridge that Kevin and I were clearing just in time for the Austrian hammerblow to fall and capture most of them. Enough were retaken to just hold the crest of the ridge and although the Austrian right flank attack badly penetrated my left at one point, we just held and stabilised the line, allowing Kevin to crush the Austrian left and roll them up. I saw his dragoons doing some good work in amongst the enemy infantry at the end.

When we'd won I still had no idea how close a thing it had been.

This game was very typical of our HITS battles. I had no idea what was going on beyond what I and Martin could see. Although I sent a number of couriers to Josh to find out what was happening on his side of the field, they must have all been intercepted as the Austrians were between us. His division ended up being a spoiling force which stopped a very nicely conceived Austrian plan of attack.

This was the first MP test of the artillery mod. Both armies, totaling 52,000 men each brought 48 guns onto the field. Overall, the arty inflicted ~30% of the total casualties, with the French arty doing a bit better than the Austrian. Historically, the artillery was responsible for ~50% of battlefield casualties. In this battle, there really wasn't any bombardment phase as both armies waded into each other at first sighting. So 30% casualties is probably reasonable in this situation.

I forgot to mention that early on when my division bumped into the first Austrians we met, my artillery batteries unlimbered a way back and began bombarding and I was in my front line and saw quite a few devastating French roundshot hits landing home among the Austrian infantry.

I also saw an Austrian battalion attempt a frontal charge on one of my batteries and get stopped by the defensive fire.

I'd like to play more games using the new artillery rules, they seem to be a step in the right direction.

EDIT: One thing I noticed after watching Mitra's video is how many more destroyed guns this game seemed to have. I presume this is because of the tougher artillery fire?

Digby wrote:EDIT: One thing I noticed after watching Mitra's video is how many more destroyed guns this game seemed to have. I presume this is because of the tougher artillery fire?

Yes. In fact late in the game when the French hauled their guns to the top of that hill they were close enough to trade canister shots.   

Oh yes those cannister hurt badly. In fact there were cannisters all around me and I couldn't see s***, where it was coming from.

Berto acted as a bait at the objective while our other divisions camped in the east. I arrived near the crest about the same time as Josh - it was a close battle, but we mauled him in the north. His artillery was well positioned in the far distance and out of reach for me.
One of my brigade had about 9 regiments, only milita, but still. I could only deploy them in line (with skirmish), all other formations were ignored. It had a front of about 600 yards and was really difficult to move around!

Later Mitra and I turned south for the hill where Berto was driven off. I had no idea on the general situation and couldn't see much as I was still on the reverse slope of the hill. Suddenly the whole hill was cramped with French guns and we coudln't caputre enough of them to secure the position.
Our whole Corps was literally mixed all over and every regiment just fought where it was and for his life!
Then I saw Kevin advancing in force east of the hill, including Dragoons. Our nice-looking Hussars were no match for them and quickly routed.

The artillery was devastating. The increased cannister range freaked me a bit. And yes, a lot of guns were destroyed on the field. The un-positioning was interesting, you really need to think where to put your guns. This could cause problems for an AI-controlled force maybe as they won't reposition their guns.