Jeffrey Arnold - Mar 9, 2006 12:12 am (#5442 Total: 5479) Just finished a brutal game of Rocroi. Brutal for the French anyway... The battle started with Gassion advancing to hit the Spanish left. Alburquerque watched nervously, then breathed a sigh of relief as Gassion missed a continuation. On the Spanish right, Isenburg advanced to the edge of the Ruisseau Ste Anne, then stopped (blew another continuation roll). Not a terrible result though, because it had the effect of paralyzing la Ferte (I didn't think it would be a very good idea to try to attack across the stream). After these initial moves, things went downhill for the French very quickly. With both flanks essentially static, the Spanish center began a general advance. A few battalions were moved to cover the flanks and the guns were limbered while the bulk of the infantry pushed forward. Don de Melo accompanied his tercios. After the Spanish center finished, Espenan had one activation to adjust his deployment slightly to receive the Spanish attack. Then Alburquerque pulled off what was probably the crucial move of the battle. Switching from receive charge to makeready, the Spanish left positioned itself to attack Gassion. On continuation, they changed to charge, and then launched themselves forward. Although the French had a significant edge in quality, Alburquerque and his troops were able to push their attack to another continuation, and the resulting carnage left both sides exhausted. The price was high, but the Spanish had essentially wrecked Gassion's wing. It would take time for the French to recover, and time was something they didn't have. On the next turn, Isenburg's troops stepped over the stream and began a limited attack that basically took la Ferte out of the battle. The French were having terrible luck with continuation die rolls, and this severely limited Enghien's ability to gallop about and rally or reform the (by now) very weary French horse. The Spanish had managed to negate the French cavalry, and this gave Don de Melo the chance he needed to push his attack against the French center. And push it he did. For the next two turns, the veteran tercios of the Army of Flanders could do no wrong. With the benefit of multiple continuation rolls, Fontaine's infantry used a mixture of momentum attacks and advancing fire to first pin, & then demolish the French center. Almost every die roll seemed to go their way...fire, close combat, morale checks...they could do no wrong (even their failures worked out okay; if a Spanish unit had to retreat, it just cleared the way for a fresh tercio to step up and hit a weakened French battalion). The end result of all this carnage was horrific. Ten French battalions were gone. Espenan, Gassion, and the Duc d'Enghien himself were all dead, cut down trying to salvage something from the disaster. I looked over the game map, did a quick count of the victory points and realized there was no chance for the French to recover. Time to pull the plug and try again. Just when I think I have the MPBS figured out, a game like this comes along that leaves me scratching my head. I know this was an extreme outcome, but I'm still glad that this was a solo game...no opponent to laugh it up while the French line dissolved. Oh, well...back to the drawing board. Geez....I really love these games...