Huzzah Carnage and Glory Lobositz

 Saturday night I participated in a battle from the Seven Years war using the system Carnage and Glory.  As a quick look at the pictures will tell you this was great table with some awesome figures on it. The rule set used is a computer aided set.  This game was very different from the others I played in for that reason and its my first experience with this system so I will share some thoughts on it.

I commanded the left of the Austrian line playing the roll of General Lacey (an Irish exile in Austrian service.) under my command were two units of Grenzer light Infantry, 1 unit of horse Grenadiers, 1 unit of regular infantry and 1 unit of Grenadiers.  Initially I got a lot of advice from my fellow players until they realized I new what I was doing.

Both side move aggressively on the left and center. The Center degenerated in to series of bloody cavalry charge that hut both sided significantly.  The Prussians probably had it slightly better in the center. on the left my Light troops hit the Prussians hard with well aimed fire (once the miss and fog clear up that is)

Our cavalry initially got in our own way on the left and we had some trouble maneuvering the regular infantry in to place.  My Grezers however used cover efficiently and got a lot of really good shots at the Prussians on the road from the vineyards and wooded hills over looking the road. They managed to route two Prussian infantry units over course of the game and hurt a number of others. Austrian infantry came up though the town and with the support of some cavalry they began to push at the Prussians on the road thought the Prussians got in a number of good hits themselves.

The Cavalry Battle in the center eventually petered out  with a slight edge to the Prussians but the Austrians had the advantage on the left and the Prussians were starting to move infantry from the center to the left opening options for the Austrians in the area as well.  After a long day of gaming it was agreed we should call the game around 11:30 PM.

The Computer ruled the battle was a minor Austrian Victory.

Thought on Carnage and Glory the game is played by players moving the figures and letting the computer handle the details. No dice are rolled and the computer can take in to account factors that would slow the game down in handled by humans.  I like the fact the the computer takes environment factors (like mist causing muskets to misfire) , fatigue, and so forth into account. This adds a level of realism but would slow game play in most systems. At the same time not rolling dice left me feeling a bit disconnected from the action and some times the results the computer provided didn't make sense, because I didn't know what factors would influence the results when making my decision.

I would like play this game system again as I think it has merit. It leans more toward being a simulation than a game which can be a good thing if you are trying to recreate a particular battle but I don't know if its what I want every game night. 

On a personal note we passed 100 posting here on Fencing Frog a small number of post compared to some but a milestone worthy of mention.