More than a year a go I bought the In Deo Veritas rules by Philip Garton, which cover 17th Century conflicts. My plan was to use this for my 6mm Great Northern War (GNW) Russians and Swedes. The GNW was actually in the 18th century but the tactics were similar. In fact Philip Garton later brought out a supplement, Captain General, to cover the early 18th Century. I published my first thoughts here. I have now had the opportunity to run a small solo game.
The rule supplement did not add very much in terms of new rules, and its main value is the four extra scenarios. Alas there were no battles between Russians and Swedes – it is in fact quite hard to find suitable historical battles for the Poltava campaign that my figures are based on. It suggested giving all-musket infantry units an extra fire dice, and treating large dragoon units (such as the Russians used) as poor quality cavalry.
In my game I set a small Swedish force of three infantry and two cavalry units against a larger Russian force of six infantry, two dragoon and one cossack unit, plus two artillery. The Swedes were all Veteran except one Trained infantry unit; the Russians were all Raw except one infantry unit and the cossacks, which were Trained. Both armies were divided into two wings (the infantry and cavalry for the Swedes, four infantry and the cossacks, and two infantry and the dragoons for the Russians), with an overall commander for both armies. This captures the basic asymmetry between the two armies which is one of the things that drew me into gaming these armies. The Swedes are heavily outnumbered but should still have the edge – provided that they are aggressive. The battle was played out on a featureless flat table.
The first issue I had was how to adapt to my miniatures. The rules are designed for most of the units to be based on 3 inch (75mm) bases. My units use 20mm square bases, with three for an infantry unit and four for cavalry. These are actually meant to be infantry battalions and cavalry regiments, rather than the brigades of the rules (roughly twice the number of men) – but I glossed over that. I decided to deploy my infantry bases in line, and cavalry units in two by two blocks, and hope that the variation in frontage wouldn’t matter. It didn’t, and the visual effect was good. A trickier problem how to translate the distances – I used them as published. That was a bit of an issue because I was using tiny playing area of about 24 inches by 36 inches. This meant that some of the move distances (especially cavalry) were a bit long – but there was no easy-to-apply conversion factor. As I write I remember that I had made up some rulers marked out in two-thirds inches (“Canadian inches”) to use with Grande Armée – which would have been perfect. But I don’t think these have survived the house move. One of the advantages of having 6mm figures though is that you can use a smaller playing area, so I want to find a way around this in future. My basing system (developed for Gå På!) may be unusual but it is common to put 6mm units on a single base with 60mm frontage – so solving this problem would help more than me!
How did the game play out? The Russians started the game on Hold orders, and the Swedes on Attack. The Swedes tried to focus on the Russian left flank and refuse the right. This might have worked under Gå På! rules, but not with these. In the second turn the Russian right switched to Attack and caught the two of Swedish infantry units as they tried to make their way across, and outflanked them. Meanwhile the Swedish cavalry attacked the Russian dragoons, but one unit stalled and the other only made slow headway. This was when I took the picture above. It was not going well for the Swedes. But slowly they prevailed. One of the left wing Swedish infantry units escaped the outflanking move and charged forward to attack the infantry to its front. Forcing back first one unit and then the next; when the second unit was forced back it had to pass through the disrupted first unit, causing it to rout. Meanwhile the outflanking Russians routed the remaining Swedish infantry unit (the poorer quality one), but effectively lost one of their units as it ran off in pursuit; the other unit had been disordered in the process. The Russian right, facing one Swedish infantry and two cavalry, bogged down their opponents and started to force them back. But then the Swedes renewed their attack and managed to rout one infantry and one dragoon unit. That proved enough to collapse the Russians.
This was an absorbing game and a close fight. The Swedes probably had the edge, but I now see that their army (ex leadership) was worth 1,500 points to the Russians 1,375. Unlike Gå På! leadership did not have much influence on game play, hence the quick switch to attack by the Russians on their right. Whether this is realistic in a bit dubious – there is no activation step for new orders – but it probably helps to create a more enjoyable game. I used the random generator for leadership quality, with the Russians classed as “new” and the Swedes as “professional”. The dice tilted the Russian way and there wasn’t much difference in leadership quality between the two sides. This had very little impact on the game, though, which was surprising. I still don’t understand the difference between an “experienced” and “normal” general in game play. Unless I have missed something 9always possible), leadership quality does not have as much influence on the game as many modern rules.
Overall I found things a bit slower than I expected. I kept having to look things up. It did not help that the game took three separate sessions, the second a few days after the first, the third a full two weeks later, including a holiday. I don’t think the quick reference sheet is all that well designed – and it would help to slim it down for just the troop types within my armies. A second problem was that the rules are quite thin, though the big type and pictures still mean that they are spread over many pages. A lot of issues just aren’t covered, but it can take a bit of a search to realise that. I had to put in place my own interpretations several times, on matters that rule books should be cover, though often don’t. Less is often more, but not always! With a confident games master, though, most of these issues would disappear. This small battle, featuring lots of raw troops, still took quite a few moves more than I expected (I wasn’t counting though – in the region of ten I think, and about five hours). Melée combat quite often got stuck in a draw; even raw units had to be ground down before being destroyed. Some features of the rules jarred at first outing. I found the three stylised orders that each wing is bound to (Hold, Attack, Withdraw) a bit restrictive at first; the Russians on Hold couldn’t send out their cossacks to do a bit of probing. But this made more sense as the game progressed.
The only historical issue I came up with the that it did not reflect Swedish Gå På! tactics well. In attack the Swedish infantry (still pike-armed) only fired a single shot before going in close; the cavalry did not do any prep fire at all, contrary to general practice at the time. In these rules all units fire at each other as they close. I think this calls for some kind of special rule. Swedish cavalry and pike-armed infantry should be allowed to charge attack; when they do so they do not fire before they go in (but must take fire from their opponents) but get a melee advantage, such as an extra die. A further historical issue is that it is hard to reflect Swedish elite (i.e. Guard) units, if their better line ones are classed as Veteran. You can overdo this sort of thing though, and any extra advantage should be quite subtle.
Before I try these rules out again though, I need to prepare my own QR sheet, focused on my GNW troops, and with reduced distances (roughly two-thirds, perhaps using centimetres rather than inches) – and trying to make the layout clearer.
My first article asked whether these rules were an answer to a prayer (to find rules for my GNW figures). The answer is “yes”. All I need now are opportunities to game!