I am a fan of the rules written by Sam Mustafa and have
enjoyed playing Longstreet, Maurice, Lasalle and Grande Armée. His latest
offering is Blücher (Honour, 2014), is a set of rules covering the grand
tactical aspect of Napoleonic warfare. The basic unit size is roughly the
brigade, rather than the battalion, so the line/column/square formations
normally associated with the period are not represented. Therefore these rules
can be considered as a ‘replacement’ for his previous Grande Armée rules, which
I reviewed in a previous blog post. In contrast, Lasalle is his tactical
Napoleonic offering which does employ the standard formation types.
The rules themselves are an A5 hardcover book and are
beautifully presented. In my opinion Sam Mustafa is the top author of rules in
terms of publication style. The structure of the rules is logical and easy to
navigate. The writing is clear, concise and unambiguous. Diagrams are used
extensively and provide clarification when required. The author’s comments are
placed in clearly defined boxed areas, and provide information concerning
decisions made in the rules mechanisms (there is also a FAQ section at the end
of the book which adds further detail). There are army lists for the major powers
covered (including the Ottoman Turks), and a basic campaign system
(Scharnhorst) which facilitates the generation of a battlefield set up.
All units/formations have a footprint equivalent to a
standard poker playing card. Therefore games can be played using printed
playing cards (which I will discuss later) or miniatures grouped on a base of
roughly the same size. Measurements are defined in terms of base widths
enabling players using differently based armies to easily adapt to the Blucher
rules. All units have a strength or elan rating, plus a few special
characteristics (e.g. skirmish, volley, shock etc.). The rules use an IGOUGO
mechanism and a standard ‘battle day’ lasts 30 alternate turns.
The key, defining mechanism in the rules is ‘momentum’ (MO).
The opposing player rolls 3 D6 in a cup and keeps the score secret from the
active player. The active player activates his forces in any order he desires,
firstly by corps formation, then individually and finally using his C-in-C
‘follow me’ order. Each activation undertaken costs points which he tallies up
and when this tally equals or exceeds the secret dice roll, his activation
ends. Therefore the active player does not know how much of his force he will
be able to activate before his movement phase ends. This forces the players to
prioritise their actions. This is a very neat mechanism; it introduces an
element of uncertainty and reflects the command and control limitations within
an army of the period. In Sam’s previous grand tactical Napoleonic rules, Grande
Armée, command control is reflected by chits which are expended at a rate
significantly dependent on the distance of the formation from the C-in-C’s
position. In Blücher the system is much simpler, but I do find it strange that
a widely dispersed army can operate as efficiently as a more concentrated army.
The lack of specific formations make movement easy; there
are simple moves, difficult moves, reserve moves and charges. All these moves
are clearly explained and easy to understand. The use of diagrams in this
section of the rules is particularly helpful. Fire combat, generally only
carried out by units that did not move, is again very simple. Essentially a
unit rolls the number of dice equal to their current elan, with a few
modifiers, requiring 6’s for a hit. Artillery has an ammunition allowance,
which diminishes as the unit fires. Melee is equally simple; rolling dice equal
to current elan (plus modifiers), scoring on rolls of 4,5,6 and then comparing
attacker/defender scores to determine the outcome. Finally, victory goes to the player who
eliminates enemy units to a number greater than the enemy army break point
(basically 1/3rd the total infantry and cavalry units in the army).
Essentially, those are the rules of the game. There are some
more advanced rules which add special characteristics to units and armies, and
these allow differentiation to be ascribed to combatants e.g. French have the
‘skirmish’ ability, Russians are ‘steadfast’, the British ‘volley’ etc. Named
sub-commanders can be added to provide further characterisation.
Sam suggests that players try the basic rules using the
“Along the Danube” scenario published on the Honour website (http://www.sammustafa.com/honour/downloads/),
using the cards provided there. So this is what I did, and played the game solo
to get a feel for the rules. The hidden momentum (MO) dice scores do present a
problem for solo play but I took a suggestion made on the Honour forum (http://www.sammustafa.com/honour-forums/)
which suggested rolling the dice following each activation; if your current
tally exceeds the rolled score then activation ends. Discussions on the forum
did indicate that this does change the probability of activation ending and
suggested various alternatives, but it did seem to me to be simplest mechanism
available, so this is what I used. I also did not use the reserve movement
rules because these can only apply to concealed units, which are not easy to
transfer to the solo format.
The deployment of the armies, in card form, is shown below
with the French at the bottom of the photo, and the Austrians at the top:
The objectives are shown as red counters. I choose to deploy
both armies widely, rather than in depth, to facilitate as much combat as
possible. The reserve cavalry of both armies were deployed on the left of the
photo. I originally planned to play the game using only the cards (in card
protector sleeves), but I reasoned that as I had the necessary figures
available, that I would deploy them on top of the cards:
The battlefield suddenly seemed very crowded! Due to the
shiney nature of the card protector sleeves I did encounter problems when units
moved onto the hills, they kept sliding off, so in future games I will use
contour style hills. I also found that figures had to be moved off the cards
prior to movement and then replaced once completed, which was a bit of a pain!
The game flowed smoothly. I did not have to refer to the
rules often and the QRS sufficed. In fact after half a dozen turns I did not
even have to refer the QRS that often! The French and Austrian cavalry slugged
it out on the left flank for many turns with the French eventually prevailing,
but at a cost which prevented them exploiting the now open Austrian flank. The
French attack on the right across the shallow river stalled due to lack of
activations and a slow grind of a firefight ensued. The Austrians did
eventually launch a counter-attack here using their superior numbers, but this
was too little, too late. The main action was in the centre. The French counter-battery
fire quickly forced the Austrian artillery to quit the table, and the French
infantry surged forward. The issue was in the balance for a number of turns
before the Austrians finally cracked. Austrian units were lost in rapid
succession, and their reserve Grenadier units failed to stem the tide. The
French achieved an 8:5 victory after 15 turns.
Points I took from the game: At no point did I use the
C-in-C ability to activate using a ‘follow me’ order. I found that artillery
ran out of ammo fairly quickly. Their firepower became reduced after only 3
turns and was exhausted after 5 turns of fire, which represents only 1/3rd
of the potential game length. Maybe this is good representation of massed
artillery batteries, but it did leave me feeling rather deflated to see them
retire from the field of battle so early. In this game I made little use of
prepared status (representing squares etc to defend against cavalry) because
the French cavalry were so mauled (remaining elan of 1 or 2) that they could
not hope to take on almost fresh Austrian foot. I did use the voluntary retire
move to extricate battered units to prevent them being destroyed. The French
success seemed to be due to utilising their front line units to soften up the
enemy (by using skirmish fire) prior to moving the 2nd line through
to carry out assaults.
Final Thoughts: Even though I used appropriate figures, the
game still felt more like a ‘block based’ game rather than a miniatures game.
The hidden dice motivation system worked smoothly, forced prioritisation and
was simple, but I’m not fully convinced it simulates command and control that
well. The chit mechanism used in Grande Armée rules does a better job but it is
more cumbersome. The actual game rules were nice and simple, easy to pick up
and required little referral to the rulebook (or even the QRS). The game did
not feel especially ‘Napoleonic’, it could have been any horse and musket
period game. Maybe this simply reflects my personal take on Napoleonic
wargaming; I think I’m more interested in gaming lower level tactical actions
utilising columns, lines, squares etc. Playing further games might modify my
initial impressions when using non-corps based armies, and using armies with
differing special characteristics. I am also keen to try out the Scharnhorst
campaign system which will generate delayed re-enforcements, and encourage use
of reserve formations. So, would I recommend Blücher to others interested in
Napoleonic warfare? Most definitely! I cannot see myself using Blücher for
miniature based games but I will certainly use the card based supplements when
they are released.
In addition to the main rules, I bought the first card
supplement, “The Hundred Days”, which covers the famous 1815 campaign. All
participating formations are included and the cards are beautifully produced,
with their backs showing the respective national flags to allow for concealed
movement. The campaign specific rules and maps are published on the Honour
website. I greatly look forward to playing the campaign and I anticipate using
the cards in many games. However much I play Blücher, I envision buying each
supplement as it is released, even if only for aesthetic reasons.
