After the excitement of Spring and Summer 1604, Autumn was rather quiet. Bavaria managed to fumble its initiative roll and suffered a diplomatic embarrassment, while the Poles raised another army. The French indulged in a little diplomacy, while the Muscovites were having a few problems. Their defeated army from the previous move had been forced back into Latvia, which is not Muscovite territory, and they did not have the finances to replace the lost bases, so it was an army that was at half strength anyway. Fortunately, before this got even more complicated, they got a move card and decided to merge the defeated army from Estonia into the one that was the support army for the original fight. So the Latvian force moved to Novgorod and became a train unit.
Winter 1604 saw the massive expansion of the map, as seen above. Europe is the left-hand side, above, with all the pins stuck in it. Eurasia east of the Urals is to the right, with few pins, at least until we get to south-east Asia, which is a bit of an armed camp. Persia, India, and China are quite demilitarised at this point. We will see how long that lasts.
Still, the changes to the campaign rules were minimal, largely consisting of lists of countries and their provinces, their strategic aims, and the initial locations of military forces. The East has, of course, its own diplomatic table, and the scruffy bit of paper pinned in the middle of the board is the overlap table, consisting of the Persians and Ottomans (who happen to be at war). The rules do incorporate possible raids by early colonial forces – Portuguese, Dutch, and possibly English, but I have not quite worked out how to incorporate these fully. Hopefully, I will have an idea soon.
There are rules for various raiders and unruliness in some parts of the continent. The Circassians, Tartars, Cossacks, Mongols, Tibetans, and Jurchen are all capable of having civil wars or invading somewhere contiguous if they have a mind. They are not ‘active powers’, but I am hoping they will have a disruptive effect. Mongols are also available for hire by China and the Moguls.
Still, with now 22 active powers, the rolling and card turning took a little longer. The Spanish raised a garrison in the Netherlands, while the Cambodians raised a second army. Laos raised a garrison, and Korea raised an army. The Vietnamese got a move card, which was deferred to spring. In random events, the Ottoman Emperor died, while Farsistan was hit by plague. The unruliness roll revealed that there was some disturbance among the Mongols in the summer of 1605.
Moving on to Spring 1605, a lot of diplomacy erupted. Poland, Persia, and Siam all raised extra armies. The Muscovites moved back into Estonia while the Laotians invaded Luang Prabang. They failed their GOOS score and so have to face a scratch local force. There was no random event in the West, but in the East the Jurchen invaded. This was resolved as the Jiang invading Haixi. Three wargames, therefore, and I had managed to forget the Vietnamese.
Both Jurchen armies (I decided to start at the east end and work my way west) were card drawn. The Jiang got 5 cavalry and 7 light horse, while the Haixi got 4 cavalry and 8 light horse. The table was very simple, the steppe only broken by a road and a hill.
I confess that this wargame stretched my resources of Mongols. The Jiang are to the right, drawn from my Mongol hordes, while the Haixi have had to accumulate a scratch light cavalry force from various sources – Cossacks, Tartars, and even a few Serbo-Croat hussars (I suppose I could have used Ottomans instead). The Haixi cavalry formation nearest the camera is on top of the hill.
The Haixi had the better of the opening skirmishes. As you can see above, the light horse have inflicted some damage on their opposite numbers, so much so that the Jiang heavy cavalry has had to move forward to provide a shield for the shaken lights.
Unfortunately for the Haixi, their tempo dice deserted them, leaving the general unable to control the light cavalry anymore. The first problem is shown above; the central Haixi lights simply did not move out of the way of the Jiang heavies and were ridden down. You can see the remnants fleeing past the Haixi heavy cavalry to the left.
Things did not get much better for the Haixi. The command disruption from a poor morale roll meant that their left flank light cavalry were the next caught by Jiang cavalry, and you can see their destruction starting on the far side, although one base has fought off the Jiang. In the centre, the Jiang heavy cavalry has withdrawn slightly to get out of the Haixi horse-shoe death trap of light cavalry.
The Jiang managed to get much of their light cavalry into action again, while their right wing saw off the Haixi left. In the centre, an exasperated Haixi general has brought up the heavy cavalry, but the losses have, again, caused command disruption and everything is starting to look a little parlous.
Again, the dice gods were not kind to the Haixi. The Jiang light cavalry saw off another Haixi light base (fleeing left front), while the Jiang cavalry got the drop on the Haixi and have started to demolish the centre. At this point, perhaps mercifully, the morale roll gave the Haixi a rout result.
That was very interesting. I am really not used to these all-cavalry armies, and to have two, not quite mirror images, was fascinating. In the end, it all came down to the Haixi not managing to get enough tempo to continue the light cavalry battle. One thing I have discovered is that you need quite a lot of tempo to keep the light cavalry going, pulling shaken bases out of line, re-ordering recoiled bases, and so on. On the other hand, I have also discovered that getting the general involved in the skirmish is risky, and neither general did that this action.
I am not sure what the result of this battle will be. The Jiang have now conquered another province, but they are not quite players yet. I will bear it in mind, and of course, Nurhaci lives to fight another day.
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