The Battle of Lucca

As noted (or threatened) last time, the next Machiavelli campaign battle was in Lucca. Here, a French army had been transported from Avignon to the province of Lucca, supported by the lurking French army in Modena. The transport by the fleet in the Eastern Gulf of Lyons meant that the French in Lucca had one-and-a-half armies. As before, a dice roll decided that the Luccan army would come out and fight.

You can see a few other things going on in the turn in the picture, with the Papal army in Piombino, but French expansion is the main name of the game. Off shot there is not much else going on, neither the Austians nor Neapolitan Spanish are up to a great deal. French diplomacy has, in fact, ensured that they are friends or better with most of Italy, and what they are doing is picking off the autonomous garrisons. So far as I recall, this is more or less what would happen in a face-to-face multi-player game. The only difference is that by this time, those players who could count would realise that France is one city away from winning the game, and would probably agree to gang up on them and relieve them of a few cities.

Anyway, the Luccans decided to fight, and deployed their infantry on two hills with their cavalry, split also on the hills, behind. The French split into four columns, two of cavalry and two of pikes. The plan was for the infantry to storm the leftmost Luccan hill while the cavalry broke through the Luccan light horse in the centre. While the Luccan plan was reasonably sound, as French commander I thought the hills were a bit too far apart for mutual support.

Above you can see the game after the first few moves. The Luccan light horse have driven off a base of French mounted crossbowmen, but they are starting to return to the fray. The infantry columns, of Swiss fronted by skirmishing crossbows, are aiming towards the hill nearest the camera, which is crowned by arquebusiers and some sword and buckler men. In fact, behind them, there are two bases of gendarmes as well. On the far hill the gendarmes are starting to reposition themselves to challenge in the centre.

The above photograph shows the developing carnage in the centre. The Luccan gendarmes made it to block the French take over after the Luccan mounted crossbowmen had fled. The resulting clash was not pretty for either side. It led, in fact, to more than half the French gendarmes fleeing, some other changing Luccan gendarmes and some really bitter fighting between the remaining Luccans and a couple of French gendarme bases. Meanwhile, as you can see, the French infantry columns steadily approached the Luccan left (which is standing on a hill even if you can barely see it in the photograph) and the Luccan right is starting to chance its arm towards the centre.

It only got more complex and confusing in the centre, with charges and counter-charges against smaller and smaller groups of elements as the fight fragmented. In spite of their losses the French slowly gained the upper hand, but had lost a sufficient number of bases to cause an army morale check, which resulted in the army wavering and hence delayed the assault on the Luccan left. Not that the Luccans were unscathed, having lost their light horse (the remnants of which are fleeing off the top of the picture) but also some gendarmes, which put their morale in a fairly parlous state as well.

Eventually, the French got moving again and, just about, won the cavalry contest in the centre. While the remaining Luccan gendarmes rallied from their successful charges, the French general and another base charged again and this time won their combats, while the Swiss pike finally hit home on the elevated Luccan left. The Luccan sword and buckler men tried to intervene but were pushed back behind the arquebusiers who, even uphill, had no reply to the long pointy sticks (and, in fact, imposing deep formation) of the Swiss pike. The fleeing arquebusiers swept away their own sword and buckler men and the Luccan morale dropped to withdraw, and, in fact, only just above rout. Their general, who had been heavily involved in the cavalry combat in the centre and then in the infantry contest on his left, just about survived. If he had not it would have turned into a rout.

Still, it was a good game. The Luccan positions on the hills were reasonably strong although, as I have said before, Italian armies have no realistic answer to the Swiss in hand-to-hand combat. I did wonder if one of the recovering Luccan gendarmes could charge a Swiss column in the flank and what would happen if it did, but the angles, as it turned out, were wrong. The French had a tough fight of it indeed, although their tactics seemed to be correct.

Perhaps the Luccans should have had the courage of their defensive convictions and kept their gendarmes on the hills, inviting French charges, but uphill, and with the support of the Luccan firepower. Maybe, but the French are a two hit army, the gendarmes and the Swiss. Not contesting the centre would certainly have let the French focus on one or other of the hills with, probably, devastating results.

I cannot really blame the dice for this result. Both sides had good rolls and bad rolls. The French gendarmes fared poorly to start off with, better as the fight continued. Three deep Swiss pike, even uphill, are a handful, to say the least. No wonder that the Spanish answer, eventually, was to defend a ditch and wall against them using arquebusiers.

There are two turns left this year to see whether the other powers notice that France is on the verge of gaining twelve cities (they have, with Lucca which is now theirs, but the formal count is not until the winter turn). Once there the question is whether I finish the campaign then or carry on to see if the more advanced victory condition (18 cities, I think the next one is) is possible. On the other hand, this has beena rather successful game and I think it is transferable to other campaigns. We shall see.