The final action of the Summer 1605 move is, as you might recall (if anyone has been paying attention) in the west, where the Bavarians, subverted diplomatically by the French, have invaded Austria. Unfortunately for the boys in blue, two Austrian armies are waiting for them. In my head, the French have agreed to pay for the Bavarian action, while the Bavarians rather expected the Austrians to have moved at least one army to support their incursion into Ottoman territory further south. The Austrians (I mean the Austrian Habsburg or Holy Roman Emperor) have just found that indolence, or a lack of move cards, sometimes helps.
Anyway, I am now left with another lop-sided battle, a single Bavarian force against one and a half Austrian armies. The Bavarians muster 5 bases of cavalry, 2 pikes, 4 musketeers, and a light horse. The Austrians deploy 4 bases of cavalry, 2 light horse, 4 pike bases and 8 musketeer bases. It has to be admitted that the terrain gods were not kind to the Bavarians. Whereas the terrain for the Muscovites in the last battle enabled them to defeat the foe in detail, the terrain here was broken up and left little scope for manoeuvre.
The Bavarians are to the left, with a rather thin-looking line. Beyond their left-hand regiment of infantry, by the way, is a ridge, which is steep in places and hence impassable. I pondered the Austrian deployment at some length. Initially, I thought of deploying them forward of the village and wood, the idea being to launch an all-out attack and attempt to rout the Bavarians once and for all (as the loyal reader of the blog will possibly recall, the Bavarians and Austrians have some history, here). Common sense prevailed, as the gap through which reinforcements would be fed is rather thin and, after all, the Austrians were on the defensive.
The Bavarian plan was to mask the foe with their right flank while attacking with infantry and cavalry on the left. I thought it looked reasonable on paper, as the Austrian left would not really be in a position to interfere. Well, maybe.
A few moves in, and you can see the progress of the Bavarian left. Fronted by the blue-coast under command of the general, they are making good progress, having seen off one base of Austrian light horse (fleeing just behind the redcoats), although their foot has suffered a bit of disruption, and a lack of tempo means that the cavalry supporting them is a bit close behind. The Austrians have moved the sub-general from their quiet left, and he is bringing a second foot regiment up to support the right. From the Bavarian point of view, that was not in the plan.
Crunches came in various shapes and sizes. The Bavarians got their right moving towards the gap between the village and the wood, hoping that the now denuded Austrian centre might be vulnerable. In the right-hand foreground, you can see the unengaged Austrian left on their hill. On the far side, the Bavarians are now starting to struggle, having lost a musketeer base to the Austrian foot, and also the general. Ouch.
Things did not improve much for the Bavarians, now unable to control their left. The infantry stumbled on, the remaining musketeers to be routed by the Austrian sub-general’s redcoats, while the remaining pike, now unsupported, attempted to contact the Austrian cavalry and was repulsed. The losses led to a morale check, and the Bavarians were wavering, which meant that the attempted assault on the gap between the village and wood faltered (or, in fact, stopped).
The end was not far away, of course. Under the command of the Austrian sub-general, the redcoats have now driven into the Bavarian cavalry on their left. Actually, the musketeers managed to rout one of the cavalry bases through sheer firepower, which is unusual. It has to be said that the Austrians got two lucky combat rolls to achieve it, and the Bavarians had no tempo to try to intervene. The remaining Bavarian pike on that flank has also routed. They were too far away from any support and, while bravely having a go, were not going to make much progress.
In the foreground, you can see the rest of the Bavarian army stuck in front of the gap between the village and the wood. The Austrians have sealed the gap with infantry anyway, but at this point, Bavarian morale collapsed, and the army was routed.
This was always going to be a tough battle for the Bavarians, attacking while outnumbered. There was little option for defeating the Austrians in detail, at least once I had decided that deploying in front of the wood was a bad idea.
The Bavarians had a bad day, dice-wise. The terrain was against them, and some of their tempo and combat rolls were awful. They were actually defeated by 10 bases of Austrians, and a third of the Austrian army never moved throughout the entire game. Yet the Bavarians had to attack, as the Swedes did at Nordlingen. And the outcome is possibly as bad.
Strategically, the Bavarians had better hope that the French step up to the mark with money for a new army, if nothing else. Bavaria is open to Austrian invasion. The line of Spanish armies on the western border of France would preclude any direct intervention by them in Germany. On the other hand, this is the second time in five years that the Bavarians have upset the Austrians. It did not go well for them the first time; it could go a lot worse this time.
And so, finally, we reach the end of the Summer 1605 move. As you would expect, little was really resolved internationally, as the invasions were mostly defeated, apart from the Koreans in Japan. I am being forced to consider moving my diplomatic tables onto my laptop, as with 22 nations, it is a bit tricky keeping all the numbers legible, and I would like the option of adding a few more nations as well, in South India, and possibly some emerging Jurchen tribes.
We shall see, or maybe it is just that my megalomania is still not satiated….
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