I have been Musing on Polish Winged Hussars in Tilly’s Very Bad Day and I needed a scenario to play test on. So here is the Battle of Kircholm (27 Sep 1605), in the Polish–Swedish War (1600–1611), using Tilly’s Very Bad Day. The Swedes had over 10,000 men and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth about 4,000, but it was a massive Polish-Lithuanian victory with the Swedes losing up to 9,000 killed to only 100 Polish-Lithuanians. This is one of many victories by the Polish Winged Hussars – and I introduce terribly draft rules to cover them. These defeats were pivotal in persuading
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[All words from Adam Landa.]
Adam and Steven played the first game of Adam’s home brewed rules for Indian colonial warfare. Rules that are currently unnamed, suggestions welcome!
The rules cover the rough period of 1740-1820, with this particular game being set around 1760, around the time of the Battle of Wandiwash. Think Clive, Tipu Sultan, Wellington before he was the Duke etc. They represent the bigger battles in India during this period, although these were quite small by European standards.
The battle saw a British force trying to drive off some entrenched French astride a road. A
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I’ve got both a Welsh and a Gurkha battalion planned for the Burma Campaign. So I thought I should get a clear idea of their order of battle for Crossfire. Information is scarce, particularly for the Gurkhas. George Forty, in his “The British Army Handbook, 1939-1945”, lumps all British and Commonwealth battalions, in all theatres, together under a single order of battle. This corresponds well with the Crossfire rules themselves, which have a single organisation for a “Great Britain: Leg Infantry Battalion (1939-’45)”. However, I have found the British and Commonwealth formations in Burma were similar to, but not identical
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After a bit of Spitballing on Eastern Armies in Tilly’s Very Bad Day I decided that the rules as they stand do not simulate Polish Winged Hussars adequately. So here is my current thinking.
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This scenario represents the Battle of Boldon Hill (24 Mar 1644) in the English Civil War. Historically Boldon Hill was a rather inclusive skirmish, fought in the enclosed fields between the Royalists and Scots Covenanter Armies. It was such a minor affair that some accounts of the Scottish campaign in northern England don’t even mention the battle. However, Vincent Tsao recently played a game of TVBD using the In Deo Veritas scenario for the battle, so I thought I’d see what a scenario specifically designed for Tilly’s Very Bad Day would look like. Given the number of troops involved in
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In our first game since Covid-19 lockdown, Jamie and I played my Small Herbsthausen – A Tilly’s Very Bad Day Scenario. In Tilly’s Very Bad Day terms this is a small game on a small table with small armies (in numbers of units). The Bavarians (Jamie) heavily outnumber the French (Steven) so I was going to find this a struggle.
Summary: A quick game resulting in an rather spectacular draw. That is pretty much the best result the French could expect from the scenario.
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In my mountain of unpainted lead are some goumier. Irregular Moroccan auxiliaries fighting for France in Italy during World War 2. Cool. I wondered what they would look like under Crossfire.
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When I first visited London, in 1989, I attended a wargaming club in North London. I forget where. The club night featured a renaissance game with Polish Hussars dominating the table. I was captivated. Now, years later, I’m revisiting the army of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (Rzeczpospolita). Poland was the biggest country in 17th Century Europe, nearly twice as big as the next biggest, France. Its army was powerful and combined elements of the east and west. The most distinctive component were the famous winged Hussars, but they also had good light cavalry, and western style pike and shot. And it
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When I was a kid, New Zealand troops were still fighting in Vietnam. I knew we had engineers, artillery and SAS over there. What I only realised recently is we also had infantry fighting alongside the Aussies. In fact New Zealand contributed one or two companies to an ANZAC battalion from May 1967 to Nov 1971. That is enough national connection for me, and I instantly started collecting figures for a new wargaming project. For Crossfire of course.
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I just bumped into Jasinski’s Examples of the composition of the Polish Army in the 17th Century. Perfect for getting a rough idea of what a Polish-Lithuanian army list might be for Tilly’s Very Bad Day. I converted each of Jasinski’s orders of battle to Tilly’s Very Bad Day using different nominal unit sizes. Then I combined those for a small game so there was a range for each troop type. That gave me a single army list with a range of options.
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This scenario represents the Battle of Herbsthausen (5 May 1645; also called Battle of Mergentheim) using Tilly’s Very Bad Day. For the third time in a row Mercy’s Bavarian army smashed the French (this time under Turenne). Given the number of troops involved in the real battle, this is a small game on a small table with small armies (in numbers of units).
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I’m already doing the Portuguese Colonial War. Adam got me interested in Burma. Chris and Jamie are talking about Vietnam. So, inspired by Brett Simpson, I thought I’d make some Bamboo groves to extend my on-table jungle.
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My Kiwis in Italy Project isn’t going well. I still haven’t started painting my the New Zealand infantry of 2 (NZ) Division in Italy. Sigh. But I do continue to make plans. I know I’ve got to do at least one carrier platoon when I finally get around to this. So I want to get my thinking straight about carriers in British / Commonwealth Leg Infantry Battalions and Motor Infantry Battalions. And Crossfire has that silly single APC carries a platoon thing, which is doubly silly for a 4-man universal carrier.
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I tend to focus on the Thirty Years War in western and central Europe. Tilly’s Very Bad Day is written with this same focus. But there was a lot going on in the East. Russia, Poland and the Ottoman Empire were all big players. Even closer to home there was also the Hungarians and Transylvanians – sandwiched between the Holy Roman Empire and the Ottomans – and they could field large armies in their own right. So how can we / should we represent these armies in Tilly’s Very Bad Day? I don’t know the answer so figured we should
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I recently blogged about Assaulting Bunkers in Crossfire – Possible House Rules. But I don’t think I was sufficiently clear on my final recommendation. So I’m having another go at explaining it. Short story is I want to make bunkers (and hard points) much tougher to assault. I’m intending to add this to my Balagan House Rules for Crossfire.
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