Yes, the date I´ve been looking for so long had finally come.
Saturday, 18th of August - high noon - high temperature and ... - high motivation.
This event had been an excellent ending of my holidays and I enjoyed the company of my friends very much.
Christopher (aka Axebreaker), Franz, Gerhard and I started our first test game on "Maurice".
Preparing the gaming table.
Parade on the armies - here the Austrians.
The one unit in the right middle had not been ready.
So a prussian command had to complete it.
The French.
A close up to the units of Christopher - Regiments de Berry, de RoyalRoussillon and an artillery stand on the left.
A superb looking unit - just have a look on the beautiful blog of Christopher:
christopher-bunkerhill.blogspot.com
A view over my Frenchies - the Commander belonging to the collection of Christopher.
The Austrians - part one - Hussar Regiment Nadásdy and Regiment Loudon.
The Austrians - part two - Regiment Wied (with the added Prussians), the CinC and the artillery.
The battlefield after setting the opponents.
It had been a lot of work to paint up the missing units for a first game.
As we wanted to play a bigger battle we also added some figures of the AWI.
I hope you don´t mind recognizing some units of the AWI.
After winning the initiative Gerhard and I decided to play the glorious Austrians which had to be the attackers.
The picture above shows Franz on the left and Christopher on the right playing the defending French forces.
The objective of victory was the watering place you can see in the centre of the picture.
Maurice is a game played with ActionCards. The attacker gets 8 cards to start (as he is the beginner) and the defender 5 cards.
The single turns in Maurice are beginning with a volley phase providing the units are in the responsible reach.
After the volley phase the active player (the player who has the actual turn) choses a force consisting of units of the same type, formation and within 2 BW of each other and can decide whether to march, to charge (if his units are in reach) or to rally with this chosen force. He can also start a bombardment with his artillery if he has chosen the artillery as force. He is also allowed to play an event card or to pass. Depending on his choice he then draws a certain number of new cards from the card desk.
For the chosen action the active player has to pay with a card from his hand. He can also spend more cards if he likes to modify the chosen action (+2 for firing units e.g.). But he must be aware that his counterpart can also play modifying cards as a reaction. This sometimes becomes a big surprise for the active player who surely will be confident of victory.
After the action of this turn has been played the former passive player becomes the active one and the next round starts with a volley phase (if the enemy is in reach). And so on...
During the first turns Gerhard and I decided to march with our infantry towards the French forces, stopping just a little outside the musket range of the French.
Franz and Christopher had not been afraid of that and started to march to the frontline too.
Now it was time to start an artillery bombardment.
The smoke of firing was in the air and as it weighted the Austrian Generals had to notice that the bombardment had no effect.
After another unsuccessful bombardment Gerhard and I let our infantry start a movement against Franz´s and Christopher´s army.
Austria was not lucky on saturday. Maybe the heat (about 33°C) made them lazy or they had just to much drinks the day before - the hit rate was miserable.
Also the French generals had almost every time cards on their hands that cancelled our modifying cards or interrupted our actions.
A circumstance Gerhard and I could hardly believe.
The use of the heroic Hussars was not able to turn fortunes of war.
The French flank didn´t break and we ran out of cards while Christopher and Franz(mann) had a lot of choice modifying their actions.
The victory had gone to the French for the Austrians decided to withdraw from battlefield.
Though not successful we will surely continue with Maurice.
In my opinion it was a great gaming day.
And it didn´t end with the BBQ after our test game. Christopher gave us an intro into the rules of BlackPowder and so we played a second game in the evening. Again SYW but with the rules of BP.
Christopher stayed over night and we both had been able to start another BP on sunday.
This time in my cellar - the temperatures had been over those of saturday.
It is always a great pleasure gaming with like-minded friends in good atmosphere, having some drinks (also non-alcoholic ones) and talking about history.
Thanks to all of them. I hope we will repeat this event very soon.
Life could be so easy. :)
Cheers
Mike
