charles vasey - 01:14pm Dec 9, 1999 PST (#44 of 76) 
J'aime les femmes, c'est ma folie

Cutting and pasting like billy o 

"AUSTERLITZ 1805 by Marc Brandsma and Nicolas Pilaritz for Vae Victis 2 

Vae Victis as an example of Gallic bravura is quite splendid. Skilfully
prepared in the manner of a great patissier (you put weight on looking
through the glass) the whole magazine is a joy to the eye. But we are of
stern Calvinist blood that hath haunted the Frenchies in their familiar
paths - is all this show covering real substance or is this just a
pretty bagatelle? 

The game is Napoleonic tactical action set at a level between the
battalion level complexity of Les Batailles and the brigade
computer-looping of Battles of Waterloo. Its rules feel like a figure
game and there is little that is new here (by which I mean all will be
familiar to you), but like French cuisine the ingredients are fresh, are
assembled with love and come to more than the sum of the parts. 

However, one warning is in order. The rules are in French and some of
you may find this off-putting. I can offer you a translation
(incorporating the latest amendments) I have made without any claim to
proficiency. Yours for a £1 coin (UK) or two dollars yankee (surface
America or wherever). The translation is not officially approved and is
probably wobbly but it may assist pro-tem. 

The topic is Austerlitz but because Austerlitz would be too big a battle
to consume at the chosen scale Marc Brandsma wisely chooses to limit the
area covered. Such discipline is sadly lacking amongst our more
enthusiastic American chums (or cherms as Antoine de Caunes would say),
but I hope Austerlitz 1805 may persuade them that discipline in such
matters has its positive side. The game thus concerns itself with the
north-eastern quadrant of the battlefield where Murat and Lannes faced
Liechtenstein and Ba gration. The plain of Siwitz is a large open area
surrounded by a circle of small villages and rougher terrain (going
north into the Moravian Switzerland and south towards the Stare
Vinohrady). The two armies have a simple mission - to take the villages
that the other player started with. There are two “specials”; the French
garrison of the Santon hill and the Russian Guards and jaegers around
Blaziowitz (who withdraw in due time to fight Soult’s Corps).

The map is very attractive indeed. It has all the detail and precision
of The Gamers or GMT yet is a pleasure to my eye where their maps look
like a Las Vegas night skyline with garish primaries. It looks like a
map from a book turned into a game board. On it march the counters,
wonderfully wrought representations of the troops in the relevant units.
Each counter has a colour coding to give its division, and each
divisional leader has a geometric symbol for his Corps/Column yet these
are not obtrusive (comp are the eye-ache of GMT or GamesUSA). French
light units have the full range of voltigeurs, carabiniers (with
bearskins) and tirailleurs. The French infantry wears the side-ways
bicorne with a range of differently coloured trousers to give a feel of
non-homogeneity. Unfortunately seen in profile the bicorne resembles
nothing so much as a Prussian fusiliers cap of the Seven Years War. The
hussars and chasseurs each wear individually coloured uniforms (so we
have French hussar! s in brown, white and red). French dragoons in
classical helmets (and horse colours changing once again to break up the
image). Cuirassiers at full stretch and carabiniers in bearskins
complete the picture. The leaders include portrait counters for Lannes
and Murat and d’Hautpol and Nansouty in their cuirasses. The artillery
when limbered is shown as long columns of horses and pieces, when
unlimbered as a line of cannon.

charles vasey - 01:14pm Dec 9, 1999 PST (#45 of 76) 
J'aime les femmes, c'est ma folie

The Russian foot shamble around in great coats and shakos. The
Semenovskii wear metal-fronted grenadier caps. The jaegers are in green
without bayonets on their muskets. The Russian uhlans wear full “Polish”
uniforms. Russian dragoons appear in helmets and bicornes. Hussars in
individual colours as are the multi-coloured Cossacks (complete with
differing headgear). All in glorious comparison to the sternly simple
white kollets of the Austrian and Russian cuirassiers (the different
helmets of the two armies faithfully recorded). Austerlitz 1805 is a
mixture of the best of boardgaming and figure-gaming aesthetically. It
is faithful in spirit and symbol to both armies.

As well as these magnificent counters (which you must cut and paste like
any game kit) there are numerous player aids all well-executed and
carefully considered. Brandsma and Pilaritz have worked very hard to
provide the gamer with a fully assembled product. Units in towns or
woods have cleanly delineated markers with a Russian or French flag.
These mean that you can quickly see who is occupying the town. Indeed,
most of the markers are executed in such a fashion as to be an integral
part of the overall system. They do not scream “ROUT” or “1” at you as
so many systems do (I see Les Batailles have improved here).

Accompanying the counters are two little cue cards (later issues of VV
have amended these). One has the Combat Results and Terrain chart. The
other has the fire chart and Leader tables on one side and the unit
strengths per formation on the other. These are admirably clear and
quickly display the logic of the system. Each formation and type of unit
is rated on the unit only for morale (and this can reduce per the unit
roster). However the Table Des Potentiels Des Unités shows the Fire
value, Combat Value and Protection Value (used to defend against Fire).
Infantry can be in six formations: Column, Line, Ordre Mixte (French
only), Square, Skirmish Order and Rout. Each has a different value mix.
Columns are 3 in combat, 1 for Fire and 2 for Protection. Lines are the
reverse 3 for fire, 1 for combat and 2 for protection. Squares are 0 for
protection but 6 for combat against cavalry. All much as you would
expect but it is also very clean and tidy. Artillery Fire factors are
determined by range and their Protection by whether they are limbered or
in battery. Cavalry are rated by weight (although cuirassiers get a
modifier from infantry fire - spuriously in my view).

charles vasey - 01:14pm Dec 9, 1999 PST (#46 of 76) 
J'aime les femmes, c'est ma folie

The thrust of this simple system is that one can fight a Bruce Quarrie
style Battle of The Dogmas. Let us take a battalion in line facing a
battalion in skirmish order both of which are firing (since the latter
can evade combat if trained light or jaeger). The skirmishers fire with
a 2 against a protection of 2 giving a net 0 (60% of some disorder, even
if only testing for disorder). The line fire with 3 against a Protection
of 3 giving the same result. I might have expected the skirmishers to be
more favou red than that as the classic analysis is that the skirmishers
can damage the line without a response.

A battalion in column engaging in a fire fight with one in line will
yield a -1 for the column and a +1 for the line. About double the damage
value for the line. A thoroughly pro-British game this. Although as a
good Quarrista one should cannonade the opposition into disorder first.
However, if the column survives and strikes home it will have a plus 2
and inflict one loss for sure. Losses are recorded on a roster and your
average French regiment has three or four steps (which reduce morale
only). So an undamaged column is not going to be destroyed by even the
best musketry (no step loss in the above case) although it may be
disordered particularly with poor morale. Disorder will take one point
off the column so we may expect it to attack at +1/+2. The +1 will give
1 loss and a rout 50% of the time and two tests for disorder (and two
disorders are a rout) for the column. The line will get a loss and a
disorder most of the tim e, but because it was unlikely to have been
disordered by inward fire the net result will probably be that the line
is left in disorder but the column routs. This is historically about
right, the real balance going to the best morale infantry. Clearly the
line has a severe problem if the column does not disorder on its inward
charge but the line is itself disordered. Here artillery is very
important in inflicting long range disorder before the assault. Losses
of themselves are important in reducing the morale values that determine
morale tests. The s ize and nationality of a unit have no effect on fire
or combat strengths, only on roster boxes and morale. There is a lot of
disordering, rallying, and disordering again.

Stacking is only allowed for one extra artillery battery. Leaders
project command out in the usual hierarchical structure, and out of
command units will tend to retire. However divisional commanders do have
an initiative value. the Sequence is Command-Rally-Charge-Move-Two
Fires-Combat. 

charles vasey - 01:15pm Dec 9, 1999 PST (#47 of 76) 
J'aime les femmes, c'est ma folie

Cavalry charges can trigger both counter-charges and infantry going into
square depending on base morale and formation when charged (do not be in
skirmish order when the charge comes in). Square formation will leave
cuirassiers with a -1 in combat (before firing results) which is
unlikely to break the square. However, the same charge on a unit in line
will give a +4 to our mounted chums, with a 50% chance of a rout. The
above analysis is based on the new Table Des Potentiels Des Unités from
the Moscou 1941 issue which looks like this (infantry only).

[sorry folks the tables wonky] 

So Austerlitz 1805 is essentially a well-organised very attractive
regimental level tactical formation driven game. As such its scale is
not quite the super detail of Les Batailles (many factors in that game
have been bashed into a single one in Austerlitz 1805) but it has vastly
more detail on tactics than the Battles of Waterloo approach which is
much more one of deploying units rather than fighting all the detail. 

The game situation involves the French infantry divisions (Caffarelli
and Suchet) in echelon moving up on to the Siwitz Plain. They are
covered to the south by a powerful and numerous cavalry led, in the most
part, by Joachim Murat. Facing them are the Columns of Prince Bagration
and Prince Liechtenstein. Bagration’s column (the Advance Guard)
consists of both cavalry and infantry together with jaeger support.
Liechtenstein commands three cavalry brigades; two Russians and one
Austrian (the latter being cuirassiers). In general the Coalition forces
have the artillery advantage. The combat usually develops firstly into a
hard cavalry battle with the winner clearing the way for his guns and
infantry to chase off the enemy. Although there are ten turns the game
can end earlier and one cannot afford to dawdle.

My only criticisms are those of clutteredness and the telescoping
effect. The use of areas, so disliked by the Bergistas of BROG has one
certain advantage which is that sloppy fingers do not necessarily wipe
out five combats with quite such ease (I find knocking the table still
works though). Since Disorder and Rout counters come on and go off a lot
this can be messy, but still nothing major. I have more concern about
the time element in that by the time one side has begun to destroy the
other’s cavalry (by losses or routs) the game is fast ending and we have
not had the clash of infantry. Twenty minute turns do require a certain
lightness of hand (hence many combats will see disorders being swapped,
then recovered in the rally phase and so on until losses tell - and in a
game where even Cossacks have four steps this will take time). The game
can take between two and four hours (approximately) and the cavalry
action could easily take up the seven turn game. This is not
historically necessarily wrong but it does raise questions as to the
length of the scenario. However, to have increased the length would have
made the game seem very long (even with its smooth systems). (Of course,
we may not be doing things correctly). Extending from this is the
suspicion that the counters are taking up too much room for the real way
they were handled. I have to say it is a suspicion that I reject except
to note that artillery at this level should really be taken off the map,
and to question the Cossacks as blockers of holes. Look at the map in
Duffy for the situation and I think the game appears much too linear.

Order of battle has a number of differences from Duffy. Beaumont’s
Dragoons look very like Boyé’s 3rd Dragoon division which supported
Soult’s men around the Goldbach stream (to the south-west of the game
map). Also missing are some French light cavalry. Treillard and Milhaud
(the latter missing in the game) had between them two Hussar regiments
and four Chasseurs à Cheval whereas Treillard has only two of each in
the game. 

My analysis of the two cavalry forces is that the French were less
well-mounted but better handled (as they usually were). The game
portrays them as much more equal, with only French weight telling in the
end. It did not read like the battle accounts. 

Of course this is all very subjective stuff and I must highlight that we
are into that happy area where one can criticise a game which one
enjoyed, rather than hurled from oneself with an oath. I still remain
certain that my method for handling such combat will allow almost the
same detail but in much less time, and this has doubtless coloured my
judgement. Although the game has some highly repetitive features, it has
managed them to the degree that I consider it superior in terms of
delivering simulation per hour than even the mighty Les Batailles and
far ahead of Battles of Waterloo (although the latter is aimed, it seems
to me, at a different group). Given its price and style I can only
recommend it. I believe it is sufficiently transparent a design to
permit those of you who disagree with it to amend with ease (and I am
sure with the blessings of the designers). Gentlemen, at all times
permit me to assure you of my m ost distinguished sentiments.