First play test of Waltzing on the Danube

On November 19th I hosted 7 gamers for a run through of my Waltzing on the Danube 1809 game.  Rich (right), Adam (left) and Pierce (center and a newbie) commanded the Austrians against Steve (left), Leo (right) and Rob(center).  The following photos are from the game:

Rich and Adam looking over their commands

 

Austrian dragoons were charged by Berg lancers and sent reeling.

Austrian lancers caught a limbered artillery unit and wiped it out, while French chasseurs in line prevented the other lancer unit from reaching the second French artillery unit who deployed by the windmill.

Austrians moved first in an effort to gain some depth and not be pinned against there entry point.

The Bavarians came up just short in their charge on the guns after being ravaged by canister from the far battery.

 

 

 

 

The following pictures give a sense of the too and fro of the action.  The Bavarian line performed a save yourself maneuver and fled the scene.  They would rally later and return to the action. The Austrian horse withdrew with one unit dispersing after their encounter with the Berg lancers.  On the French right flank the horse forced the Austrians to deploy into battalion mass in order to continue to seek elbow room. They made juicy artillery targets.  In the center the Austrian line retained its line behind the cornfields and bided its time.

 

 

 

On the Austrian right, in the woods, their grenzers and landwher formed open order and slowly pushed back the Bavarian lights.  The prevalence of artillery smoke gave stark evidence of the slugfest underway.  All of the artillery was being well used.  Counter-battery fire was common as the guns often set up within canister range of each other.  (Note the cotton balls indicating artillery being fired.)

 

 

 

The Austrian center advanced through the cornfield and began a shoot out with the French Center.  After a while the combination of French artillery and infantry fire caused the center Austrian brigade to fall back.  On the Austrian right, Adam had stabilized the situation was bringing his horse back into the fray after forcing Leo to pull back a number of his cavalry.  Leo described the action between Adam and himself as Rock'em Sock'em Robots, a real slug fest.  Rich, on the Austrian left was bringing his troops forward to hit the Bavarians when we called the game because of time.  the computer called it an inconclusive action.  There were a ton of troops to push and not all of them got into play.

 

 

 

Lessons learned:  I need to scale this down a bit if I want to reach a conclusion within the standard 4 hour game format used at most conventions.  I've since pruned the Austrian and French OOBs and believe I have a more manageable game which will be a challenge for the Franco-Bavarians.  The Austrians will need to be aggressive in order to win.