Night in the City

Last time as part of a grand assault, Blunt, and the British allies had made it into the fortress, thanks to shifting allegiances and personal bravery. For the follow up, it was time to exploit the advantage. After a day of skirmishing and rest, in which the French contained the British at the breach (which as can be seen collapsed during the day, as a result of the over enthusiastic blowing of the gate. What would Michael Caine have said?), General Cameron planned to take the defense by stealth.

Having tired the enemy and kept them busy during the day, he held back some of his own troops and sent them in by night again.

The aim of the scenario was simple, any of mine or my allied commanders troops had to make it to the inner curtain wall, at the ends of the table - where gates to the inner keep were assumed to be. For the French, he had to use his limited resources to hold us back, and try to rouse more men. With a little luck and time on his side he would soon overpower us, so the allies had to move fast.


However, the British suffered from their usual problem when presented with civilian buildings, looting. We used an expanded version of my looting rule from a couple of games ago, and as a result my Light companies seemed only interested in looking for booze, gold and women.

Such behaviour would cost them dear.

The French Curassiers charged down my looters, who made themselves an obvious target by setting fire to the first house the found. within minutes of starting the attack they had advertised our presence and been routed from the field. The Curassiers tried to follow up this success with a swift charge of my own Dragoons, Provosts, wisely sent by Cameron to forestall the looting.

The attack on the Dragoons failed spectacularly, and saw three Curassiers killed. This was enough to put some spirit back in the British, and the attack resumes. Blunt attacked traitorous Irish Legion soldiers single-handedly, pleasingly back on form, whilst the other Rifles moved up the flanks.

Meanwhile the French commander went from house to house looking for slumbering or hiding troops. It seemed his luck was out as after four houses, with a one in three chance of finding more men, he'd found precisely, none.

Long range firing in the dark was proving fruitless to both sides and so it was coming down to the close assaults in narrow streets. The French tried their best, but only the Irish had any real fighting spirit. After more looting, the eventual intervention of a handful of British light troops saved Blunt from being hacked to bits in the central plaza.

Finally, the French commander found some troops, and sent them out to attack the British, only to see a half hearted attack falter in the dark. His men withdrew, left and right, in the face of a twin pronged move on the inner gates. By midnight the British had achieved their objectives, and a badly wounded Blunt was able to take the inner wall as his own.

Another fun game; made by being able to scrape together enough buildings for some real street fighting, and some nice special rules to make the units distinct.

My thanks to Neil and Lee for making this an enjoyable three hander.