I picked up the Honors of war rules several months ago and I have been itching to give them a try. I had three other players who were interested so I bascly decided double the two sides for the St. Ulrich scenario.
The red force (called the Empire) had two brigades with two infantry battalions and an Artillery piece. I made the Empire's artillery superior for shooting mostly to see how that worked and made their second gun a light artillery piece. I used a mix of Austrian and Reich Army units. I gave them a +1 shooting imitative but other wise they had fairly standard national stats. Dave and Mike J had the Empires forces.
The Blue force using forces from my Imagination The Grand Duchy of D'Argent had two brigades of three infantry and one of these had an artillery piece. The Duchy also had an extra Cavalry unit (3 in total all independent battalions). I gave the Duchy a +1 movement initiative but otherwise kept them standard. Mike F and I had command of the Duchy.
We began our advance Infantry on the right...
and two of three Cavalry units on the left (the third was guarding the right flank, though it lagged behind due to some bad command rolls).
Mike F had his infantry brigade start moving to form a second line behind mine.
Mike J thought initially it would be good to get his cavalry over to the other side but he quickly realized that maneuver wouldn't work.
Mike F got an "admirable" command roll allowing him to shuffle his men in behind mine.
Here is the situation before the first serious exchange. The empire has hit the Duchy's artillery hard but the presence of the army leader allows it to shed damage almost as fast as they inflict it. Mike F had some bad command rolls so the left is a bit of a stand off as Dave has gotten his cavalry around to a spot where he can probably launch a flank charge if Mike F advances ahead.
Mike J gets his cavalry out of is own troops path but not out of range completely...
Ad the first serious exchange of fire occurs.. Its deviating... One unit has to reatreet and the others are fragile. We screwed it up... I for got to apply the long range penalty to the roll since I did it for everyone its not too bad. Thanks to Mike F's plannin I'm able to move my men back and his pass through them (one of the great things you can do with this rule set).
I also launch a charge with the Duchess Dragoons who have finally caught up. Mike J's Dragoons are already suffering from musket shots and I roll pretty well he gets two hits on me but I get 3 hits on him raising his total hits to 5 and his cavalry Break and run.
Mike F got off shots on the Mike J's infantry and also put one of them to route. Things are looking grim for the Empire.
Our infantry advances forward, we takes some more hits form Artillery and the Prince William Dragoon (center left) are driven back by musket and artillery fire.
Cavalry clashes on the left as Imperial dragoons cross swords with their counterparts form the Duchy. Here the Empire prevails.
Regiment Marini launches its assault on the troops defending the bridge with Regiment de Burre in support. Mike J's troops are no match or the steady troops under Mike F's command and they break and run.
At this stage we call it (Dave had to bow out already). Technically the Empire had at least one more turn as we needed to kill at least one more unit to break the army but with a clear path to the bridge (other than the light gun that's in the way) the result seemed like a clear victory for the Duchy. I like the rules a lot and I think we'll play them again. They seemed to have covered most important points and we only found one rule were we had some questions about the authors intent. My only real complaint is the measurements are all in metric system, which is isn't bad except that I think in the English system.. 12 inches and 30 cm may be the same thing on a rule but they aren't in my head if you follow me, it just means I have to measure a little more for distances I can eyeball in other systems.
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