I finally managed to get some figures on a table and try out the freebie edition of Under the Lily Banners at the weekend. We pitched an allied army against a similarly sized French army (the allies had an extra infantry regiment to make up fr the superior French cavalry.) Most of te infantry had pike elements so we treated it as an encounter in the 1690's.
The play sequence seemed to flow quite smoothly - we were initially forgetting what proportion of each brigade could move but soon got into the swing of it. The French had some good shhting from their heavy gun batteries from the start and forced part of the Allied line to retire out of their range. This prompted a French attack on the disjointed centre by the French Guards with the support of the rest of the French foot.
On the right flank I abandoned my plan of carefully supporting my weaker cavalry with close support of a grenadier battalion and raced ahead to capture a low hill. Only to find too late that there is no dicernable advantage for attacking downhill! The dice made up for my lack of tactical skill though as the Dutch cuirrassiers crashed through their French counterparts and routed them before the carefullly planned flank attackcould punsh my rash advance.
On the other flank a French indfantry unit was isolated enough to tempt me to hurl a cavalry squadron at it. The infantry chose to stand and fire but failed the morale test and were ridden down. We then tried this encounter with the other possibilities available. We did get a bit confused about the cavalry /infantry melee procedure but my reading of it is that a charged regiment that stands to receive gets their normal musketry fire which can both cause a morale check to the charging cavalry and is then also counted as their effectiveness in the first round of the melee. (I hope I have got this right...)
The French cavalry on this wing managed to quite easily cut up a low grade dragoon regiment, that was parked in their way to stop them intervening in the attack on the infantry.
In the centre the French attack stalled when it became clear how slow infantry are whilst giving fire and that their effectivenes was reduced too. Also the Allied regiments that had been discomfited by the artillery were able to reform a formidable battle line that swung the odds back towards the Allies. There the battle ended with the French having to retire whilst they still had some solid brigades to cover the retreat.
Questions and Comments:
The -2 modifier for firing on the move seems harsh. There is already a half move and fire so it feels like being penalised twice.
From my reading of Nosworthy the French of this period favoured (in theory and often in practise) their "a prest" attack without firing. This appears to be impossible in the rules. A prolonged firefight is the only way to shake the enemy to then allow a charge attempt. Or have I missed something?
