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| The opposing armies meet across the battlefield |
My friend Mike came over last week where we played our second game
of Maurice. I couldn't stand much as my back is really troubling me of
late, so I did most things from a sitting position in true armchair
general fashion. We played Maurice last summer and the experience was a
mixed bag, where I liked the cards, but found the force structure a
little hard to get my head around. However, I always felt I didn't give
it a proper chance and so wanted to try again. Normally I know if I like
a game first time around and seldom change my opinion after more games,
but Maurice was genuinely a game where I wasn't sure how I felt and I'm
very pleased I did try again as I had a fantastic time!
Why
you may ask? The answer is I better understood the concept of the force
structure combined with using the cards or at least a more clear insight into some of it which
enabled me to enjoy the game a whole lot more. I won't go into all the
pro's and con's of the game or how it's played as that information is
available on the
Honour site, but I will mention a few things as I go along.
We
decided to play " Imagi-nations" which is playing fictional armies in a
real historical time frame. In this case we went with the 18th century which is the focus of Maurice. We
grouped all of our SYW, FIW and AWI together as we don't have enough
completed figures of any of those periods to play by themselves yet to do a proper historical battle and so all you absolute purists please
look away now to avoid a unsightly mix of periods which could
potentially upset you.:-) While we may prefer real historical armies "Imagi-nations" is fun too as it allows one to use what one has or simply cheery pick units you like from different armies and put them into one army of your own creation not to mention it works really well with Maurice.
We pooled our armies together and divided them equally
with Mike receiving one extra unit for being the attacker(12 to 11 army
points). Mike took the Austrians, Russians and half the Americans which
we will call the Kingdom of Nuremberg for reference and I took the
other half of the Americans, the French and British making up The Grand
Duchy of Hollfeld. For right now and the near foreseeable future we will play equal
armies until we have enough figures painted for each to build the
standard 100pts force from their own personal collection. We also ignored
the infantry and cavalry ratio of 3 to 1 and will continue to do so until we have
enough cavalry completed to meet this requirement. Also, we played without the
terrain/scout special set up card or Nobles and National Advantages plus
all units we counted as trained as we wanted to nail the mechanics
down. We plan to add all these the next time around and in addition give
two elite choices per army for extra flavour. One day we of course
aspire to actual historical armies, but until then "Imagi-nations" will
be the format for gaming Maurice.
I'll
give a somewhat highlighted account of the battle so I'll leave out less
dramatic activations. You can read Mikes excellent version of the battle
here .
Mike
began the game as the attacker and promptly opened up a cannonade to
soften up my forces before launching a fast and furious assault with his
small ruthless cavalry running down my equally small cavalry caught out
in column with brutal efficiency thanks to a few choice cards he drew.
However, my nearby infantry were able to exact a measure of vengeance
and gunned down his hot blooded cavalry in a hail of lead.
At
this point Mike realized he needed to advance his large compact infantry
block if he was going to achieve any kind victory since I decided my
army held the objective of the tower and didn't feel the need to move
other then a few wheels to get a better position. So advance he did with
drums and flutes signalling the advance in an attempt to overwhelm my
thinner deployed formation and probably would have......except that I
used a highly useful swamp event card and placed it right dab square in front
of his advancing block which would disrupt any unit moving through it.
Mike had no choice, but to bite the bullet and move through the swamp
emerging on the other side of it in a bit chaos which I of course promptly
took advantage of and unleashed a torrent of musket balls and cannister
and nodding self satisfactory to myself in the belief I had him in bad way. However, to my
surprise this did not destroy his force who through a feat of stubborn
tenacity where able to actually stand and return a deadly fire of their own! The battle
escalated into an almighty fire fight for the next few rounds with both
our armies inflicting heavy losses.
Our troops were
holding in there with both Mike and I staying about equal till we
reached about 4 points left each at which point Mike cleverly used a nice little
card to force one of my depleted units to charge his fresher one which
sadly led to their demise and basically my whole left flank along with it! To add insult to injury my last artillery piece also went up in smoke. However, my troops where not
quite ready to throw the towel in and with just 1 army point left managed to
rally and counter attack and with lady luck smiling succeeded in
destroying another of Mikes regiments bringing him to 1 army point left
as well! The drama has now gone Hollywood at this point!
At this point our exhausted armies played a
game of cat and mouse with both rallying then shooting or charging until
we ran out of cards to draw from the deck. I somehow managed to hold
on to a few more cards at the very end giving me more time to rally and
fire resulting in my lads breaking one of Mikes regiments and in the
process his army at the very last moment!
Mike was an
absolute gentlemen as always and the game could not have been better. It
was a real nail biter down to the very last army point for both sides
with all cards played and Mike holding the objective which he won
through a real show of determination leaving me the only chance for
victory was breaking his army before the very last card was used which
is exactly what happened to my very good fortune! Major kudos to Mike for
getting so very close as he had the more difficult task as the attacker
and fought a outstanding battle. An amazing game and the kind of close
one most of us gamers strive for.
There is no question Mike and I are very keen for another game of Maurice!
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| The Kingdom of Nuremberg |
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| Some of the Nuremberg troops |
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| The Grand Duchy of Hollfeld(minus one regiment not seen) |
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| Some of the Hollfeld regiments |
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| Mike prepares to unleash a cannonade |
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| Mikes Hussars after running over my cavalry |
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| Only to have themselves scattered by a hail of smoke and lead |
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| The Nuremberg infantry advances without difficulty until an unexpected mire reveals itself |
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| The armies clash in a maelstrom of smoke and repeated fusillades |
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| Casualties begin to mount at an alarming rate! |
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| An undisciplined charge leads to near disaster for Hollfeld! |
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| Hollfeld rallies after their flank collapses and mount a successful counter attack |
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| Barely giving Hollfeld a victory just moments before night falls leaving bodies to tell the story |
