Saturday 8 February 2014

"The Disaster at Fort Joseph", a Napoleonic game 4th March 1812 ..........

.......also known as The Battle of Fort Joseph 4th March 1812.........or how not to attack a Vauban fort!

A midweek game for myself and Ray with Postie as ringmaster..........

A small fort is barring Wellington's advance on Badajoz in Spain, so he has set up siege lines ready to pound the walls of Fort Joseph to create a breech into which his "scum of the earth" will try to assault and capture.
The French garrison hope to hold out long enough and inflict serious casualties on Wellington's army, thus forcing him to retire.

The Game or Disaster
Forces are already deployed ready for the bombardment and assault, obviously the British must capture the Fort and the French must beat of the assault.

I had to assault the fort from a prepared deployment, my 3 pieces of siege artillery could hit the fort but only causing damage on a D6 (the wall had 20 points of damage to be destroyed and cause a breach which only could be assaulted by units in column), the required damage took 14 turns to achieve!!!

Now I should have just rolled for 14 turns until I got the required damage but it was a game and dice had to be thrown..........


Fort Joseph awaits........

So does it's heavy guns.........

My siege guns...........

The British camp all peaceful..........

Wellington or Arthur Wellesley at the time.......

My Portuguese allies await.......

All ready, the British columns await the order..........

Supplies keep rolling in to camp over the vital bridge......

Crossing over the defenses caused immediate disorder.........

We used little stones to signify the pounding of the walls.......

I sent my light troops forward in skirmish order to try and lessen casualties and as a screen for the columns....

The regular infantry moved forward at speed but this would be their downfall........

Ladders at the ready for scaling the walls if a opening allowed it........

He had so little to do other than throw dice.........

The damage increases..........

More French infantry appear to line the walls........

The light infantry reach the defenses, Ray concentrated hid fire up to this point mostly on the columns......

A wider view of the assault.......... 

The light troops reach the bottom of the fort but there fire is quite ineffective (a single chance of a 6 on a D6 is all these figures get to fire)......

Same here but at least they no longer receive artillery fire.......

The damage still builds........

The remnants of a British column..........

I should mention my poor Portuguese allies who had suffered badly under the French fire.......

I speedily throw my two remaining columns in to the now opened breach.......

One round of canister later..........

By now Ray has brought more units out in the courtyard to face the columns (he still had some more units not yet deployed) and the game was called very next turn due to the columns being massacred...... 

An interesting game (another word for disaster) especially for an attacker, would things have been better with reducing the walls before the assault, maybe, Ray was lucky on the dice but he was rolling 4,5 and 6 at
 effective range (sometimes up to 5 dice) and close range he was rolling 3,4,5,6 (sometimes up to 8 dice) and my best was a 6 for virtually every shot and as I said on;y one dice most of the time but that's wargaming......


........but we finished this game quite quick and sorted out another game and this was a different story or as the legend will state "Is that cauldron attached?"

More to come......

80 comments:

  1. Great report of an interesting disaster!

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  2. 'tis a battle for bards to sing about!

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  3. So did it end with you yelling 'Run away, run away!'?

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  4. A righteous looking game there, Fran. Quite an undertaking, but you guys pulled it off. Best, Dean

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  5. Smashing game, but a cracker of a star fort!!!! Who makes it?

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  6. The fort looked like it could hold its own too

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  7. Impressive fort. I think I'd be needing 12s on 2d6 to do anything to that!

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  8. I did wonder when or if this game was going to be posted???? Well I enjoyed the game any way!

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    1. Things have been getting on top of me between work and stuff mate!

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  9. 15mm way too small for me. Thanks for google+ing me. Love your zombie game posts

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  10. Love t he set up Fran. Looks incredible.

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  11. Without an initial breach the assault was almost guaranteed to be a disaster - I blame Postie and his mind tricks.
    Good report Fran and hard to claim aught but a moral victory.

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  12. Nice batrep Fran! I'm with everyone one else on that Fort, looks great.

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  13. What rules were you using to play out the game? Also going to echo the same question.....who makes the vauban fort?

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    1. They are a hodge podge of several but I've emailed Ray to ask Postie what company makes the fort.

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  14. Lovely fort! And a tough nut to crack, apparently.

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  15. No Picture of Postie? I thought that was contractual. No embarrassing picture of Ray either. Not even a picture of Lee is a silly hat with a funny caption. So disappointing. That said I shall have to keep my head down at the shed of war or you'll find the worst possible snap of me picking my nose or something. I know how your mind works.

    Nice Report though. But had form on letting Monsiur "Le floppy hat and frilly shirt" win!

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    1. Postie was having a bad hair day, thanks Clint!

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  16. Owch! Nonetheless I look forward to Part II....

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  17. Great looking game Fran! Very tough work for the attacker though!

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  18. Well, I must say, as everyone, that this fort is really awesome, we love it! Excellent batrep too, great pics (love the heavy guns and the carts on the bridge)...

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  19. Damned Frenchies! Good to see the terrible twosome back in action.

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  20. Great AAR Fran and very nice model of a fortress
    Storming fortifications is not for the heart-fainted!
    Good luck next time!

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  21. "The required damage took 14 turns to achieve." Yikes. That sounds like a tough battle.
    I really like the idea of using those small stones to mark the damage on the wall. Nice way to keep track and show the effect.

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    1. They were put to good use but needed to be hit with a hammer they were so big!

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  22. Very nice AAR !!!

    Best regards Michael

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  23. That was a rather bruising, brutal encounter! Great report, although "The remnants of a British column.........." brought a tear to the eye.

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  24. Great looking game! It sounds like it was a rough day for the Englis forces though ...

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  25. excellent play by play even if it did end in disaster :)

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  26. Yes, a true disaster. Against a fort, a formal siege.

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  27. The General lives to fight again another day. Hail Fran the magnificent!!

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  28. Nice game report. Always very tough for an attacker in this kind of situation. Table and figs looks great.

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  29. Great looking game Fran and way to hang in there in spite of the pummelling.

    Christopher

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  30. That's an amazing looking fort - great looking table there Fran, top notch scenery and cannon fodder er... Redcoats & Portos! Hitting only on a 6 is a bit rough - you'd think at close range with a rifle your Greenjacket's would get an extra pip to hit! Miserable bastards the French, sitting nice and safe in their fortress blowing raspberries at you and suggesting you smell of Elderberries and your mother was a hamster!

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  31. It sounds only slightly more fun than sticking your willie in a meatgrinder. In agree with Doc, damned unsporting of Johnny Frog to built that lovely fort and then hide in it. Feh.
    Great looking game nonetheless.
    MP

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  32. Whoever did the work on the fort did a great job. Lots of detail work. Glad you guys had a fun time.

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  33. Very cool scenario for a battle. I'm going to be like everyone else and say that fort looks awesome, and that it looks like it was a great game regardless of the outcome.

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  34. Looks you had a great game once more. Fort is awesome

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  35. Those two brace British Ladders.

    NEVER FORGET.

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  36. Most impressed I must say. I liked the fort and the wee ladders (that's a really nice touch) but the supplies and bridge were outstanding. It gave the impression of a long siege. Well done to all.

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  37. Great pictures and battle report! I really like that fort!

    Greetings
    Peter

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  38. Hate to say it, but those assaulting columns looked a bit thin. I wouldn't have fancied my chances even with double Allied numbers - and I do like to be the attacker! I like the stones to represent progress on breaching the walls. You could distribute stones on both sides of the curtain wall being breached, with the defenders having the option - at some risk to their corpi delicti - of clearing the stones away from the interior.

    I suggest this as that indeed was what garrisons tended to do, with the result that attackers storming the breach found themselves on the lip with a 10, 15 or 18 foot drop into the street below. Unpleasant.

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