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The Battle of Marengo



14th of june 1800
near the city of Alessandria
in Piedmont Northern Italy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Marengo
http://www.wtj.com/articles/marengo/art ... battle.htm

Opposing forces

Army's of the French Republic



Commanders

Napoleon Bonaparte, Louis Charles Antoine Desaix


Army's of Hapsburg Austria



Commanders

Michael Von Melas, Peter Karl Ott Von Bátorkéz


Introduction

Napoleon Bonaparte has seized Milan, Pavia and Piacenza and cut the main supply route of the Austrian army's under Michael Von Melas.
As a result he believes the Austrians will withdraw and that there is little danger of an attack, so he spreads his forces wide to block the expected Austrian retreat.
However Melas has other ideas, he crosses two bridges over the Bormida river and advances toward the weakened French army's around Marengo.
Battle is about to commence.

The Battle of Marengo

The Game

This will be a 2v2 CB game.

Again we will have two battles, giving both teams the opportunity to play both the attacking
Austrians and defending French forces.

Marengo may give us an opportunity for a more specific and therefore more interesting deployment of forces.

Battle of Marengo

DEPLOYMENT.

Map Attrition
(please feel free to look at this map from the defending French point of view and let me know what you think) the fighting at Marengo was both vicious and very difficult because of the conditions on the ground, lots of buildings and small wooded areas, this map certainly represents a challenge to the attacking Austrians.

I'm hoping that we can recreate the unique way this battle unfolded by a specific but also uncomplicated deployment of forces.

The French army's around Merango (French left under napoleon in our game) were faced with a much larger Austrian force,(Austrian right under Melas supported by some units from left, in our game) which they had to hold off and then retreat in good order to meet the reinforcements under desiaux (French right in game) coming from the south.The Austrians having too cross two bridges and deploy in a small area had some trouble bringing all there forces to bear.

I propose the following deployment conditions for the four army's.

Please click images to enlarge

The French left will deploy at the very front of there area and must defend this position all cav on the left , until the right reinforcing army is fully deployed in the centre of the field, they then must withdraw in good order to join the deployed reinforcements.


The French right army must deploy in the very rear right corner of there area in column and march not run to the centre of the field only when the first musket exchanges happen on the French left. All guard units should move over to the left and cover the left armys withdraw.


The Austrian right are to deploy in the centre of there area and instantly move to engagement at the start of battle.


The Austrian left is to deploy 4 units of infantry in line with there right side army and these are to engage along with the Austrian right, the rest of there army is to deploy in column at the very rear right of there area, Grendiers in reserve. (this is to represent the difficulty's the Austrians experienced in bringing the full force of there army to battle) and march not run to the battle at the commencement of the musket duel.


Recap on the games objectives.
French
The badly outnumbered French force around Marengo have to hold up the attacking Austrians, and then withdraw in good order.
French reinforcements to move to the aid of the French left and save the day.

Austrian
Austrian right supported by 4 units from left army to try and force the issue with there superior numbers.
Austrian left to move to engage the French around Marengo before French reinforcements can get involved.

This may sound over complicated and to much to think about, but in reality each player only needs to follow the instructions of his own army.

Marengo

Order of battle

This battle saw a French force of approximately 29500, with cavalry accounting for approx 3,700 with 25 too 30 artillery pieces.
They faced an Austrian army numbering approximately 31000 with a cavalry force of about 7,400 they had 90-100 cannon.

With HB battle no.1 Talavera the OOB fell quite nicely into place and I was pretty pleased with the representation achieved.
Marengo has proved much more difficult, the very large number of Austrian cavalry present being the main reason, as there cost in CB is very high.

I have approached the OOB's with two main aims,
Off course they are not called Historical battles for nothing, so as close as possible a reflection of the reality in differences in force numbers between the two sides aswell as force types present is high on the agenda.
But I have then tried very hard to blend this in with the need for a balanced game giving both sides a fighting chance, this is done by keeping the costs of the two army's as equal as possible.
(please see topic discussion on this point)

French left,
1 gen, 1x4 gun 12 pdr, 2 volts, 8 line, 3 yg, 1 chas-chev, 1 drag, 1 carabinier.


French right,
1 gen, 1x4 gun 12 pdr, 3 volts, 8 line, 2 og, 1 huss, 1 guard-chev, 1 gren-chev.


Austrian left,
1 gen, 1x4 gun 8 pdr, 1x6 gun 12 pdr, 1 jaeg, 3 landw, 5 aus line, 3 aus grens, 1 chev leg, 1 drag, 1 large drag, 2 huss.


Austrian right,
1 gen, 1x4 gun 8 pdr, 1x6 gun 12 pdr, 3 landw, 1 jaeg, 3 grenz, 5 aus line, 2 huss, 2 drag, 1 large drag.




In our game we have an Austrian army numbering 7,194 (24325fl) and a french one of 6,991.(23000fl)
Not quite as much of an advantage in numbers for Austria as in reality, but changing this would have upset the better balance we have regarding infantry and cavalry.
French cav in our game 492 against 984 Austrian double the number as was the case at Marengo.
French infantry 6,313 against 5830 Austrian, a good representation of the French advantage in this area.
In our game we have 8 French guns facing 20 Austrian, this gives the Austrians 2 1\2 times the number of French cannons, in reality they probably had at least 3 times or more the number of the French.
The problems here were the high cost of artillery in CB which would mean the Austrian army costing a lot more, and also I felt that an advantage of 24 cannon to 8 was to much to bear for the French army, regarding a balanced game.



Special notes on balancing game.

The percentage of cavalry in our game army's is about half the size of what appeared in reality, a result of a limit of 20 unit slots.

The Austrian militia appear in our OOB to keep the Austrian army costs down to a reasonable level, I view them as inexperienced low quality line units.

The 3 units of young guard appear to help raise the cost of the French army, (not to be used in open order)
I view these as experienced high quality line units.

The two units of Old guard represent the consular guard, and although there numbers are over represented again they help raise the cost of the French army.

Marengo

Game 1

Friday 29th may 2130 gmt

Game 2

Friday 12th June 2130 gmt

MAP- Attrition (just over half way down the list, between wooded valley and millfarm)
Team florins-25000

1. Could you all please have your relevant OOB's ready saved in your game, its just then a click of the mouse button to load and you are ready to go.

2. please have a final check of your deployment instructions, we all want the game to be something different and interesting so its important you guys are clear on this.

3. You will need to join the game in the correct order so you are all in the correct positions in the field.

Players.


Army's of the French republic

French left------------Game 1--------Game 2
N. Bonaparte----------Parder----------FVZ
French right
L.Desaix---------------Frog ----------Anklrd


Army's of Hapsburg Austria

Austrian left
P. Ott-----------------Anklrd--------Parder
Austrian right
M.V. Melas-------------FVZ---------Frog

Game 1

Anklrd can I ask you to please host the game, the joining order will then be as follows.

(Host)Anklrd, Austrian left, (attacker)
Parder, French left, (defender)
FVZ, Austrian right (attacker)
Frog, French right (defender)

Game 2

(host)FVZ, Fren, left (defender) Map Attrition, team florins 25K

Players then join as follows

1. Parder, Aust, left (attacker)
2. Anklrd, Fren, right (defender)
3. Frog, Aust, right (attacker)

Game 3.

Proposed date

Any Sunday at 930 GMT.

Players

We have 3 players so far.
Moopere, Austrian right
Gunner24, French right
and DougieJ.

One more player needed to choose either French or Austrian left,
DougieJ will play the spare army.

All replies to be posted on the main thread (not here) thanks DJ