The Battle of Campo Santo

We continued out Italian series of games with a refight of the battle of Campo Santo on A couple of weeks back.

This was a large battle, but not a huge one so easily accommodated at the club and everyone got a decent sized command.

Both armies faced each other in two long lines and in many ways this resembled at battle from the war of Spanish succession rather than the seven years war. This wasn't a battle were refined tactical finesse was employed to win. The Austrians were forced to advance through some some farmland, which in February would only have caused disruption to their formations and not provided any cover. Facing them the Spanish decided to sit and wait for their attack - our players decided to move forward and take on the Austrians.

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The end result of the battle was the after a couple of good rounds of dice the Austrians just managed to creep ahead and started to cause the Spanish centre to collapse. Although break points were not in danger of being met it was getting late and it was clear that the end of the battle had been reached. The bourbons just didn't have the men to fight any longer and a withdrawal would have been required. Unlike the historic result the Austrians wouldn't have need to withdraw to regroup and so would have achieved victory.

Nice to do a bigger battle with HOW. The rules coped well and now most of us are familiar with them enough to get through games without too much page flipping and head scratching.

Figs were a mix of Crann Tara, Elite, Trent and some other manufacturers. Pulling together two armies of white coated troops wasn't easy, so the eagle eyed will notice a few revolutionary French and a Russian unit in there and Syw French standing in for Spanish. However the overall look was great and the sun even came out for a bit! 

I really would like to get a few more white coated units for my Neapolitans. The WAS in Italy is a very interesting theatre, a sideshow perhaps but one which has much to enjoy.