This is a solo replay (with mini-review added at the end) of the Vae
Victis Magenta game, which appeared in the same issue as the
Reichshoffen game that I played with John Nebauer last year.

The starting situation sees the Austrians spread out, massively
outnumbered by the French marching onto the map from the west and
north.  Their goal will be to hold on to the river crossings as long
as possible while not being outflanked and cut off from the city by
MacMahon's corps coming in from the north.  Austrian reinforcements
will be coming in through the day but right now the situation looks
dire.

Turn 1: Brigade Baltin is attacked in Boffalora and retreats
across the bridge with a step loss, the next French goal will be to
quickly nab the bridges across the Naviglio Grande.

Turn 2: The French pursue across the bridge and Baltin's brigade is
destroyed.  However, a second attack on the new Magenta bridge is
repulsed by Szabo's brigade, Clair's brigade retreats from the canal
and Szabo's men follow up, deciding that the village in front of the
bridge is better defensible. Of course they may soon need to withdraw
if their right flank is threatened by the taking of the northern
bridge.  Clam-Gallas and Liechtenstein position some units north of
Magenta to counter the apparent threat from MacMahon's corps.  This is
helped by the fact that MacMahon is out of command this turn and only
moving slowly.

Turn 3 (12:00): Zobel's corps becomes visible to the south,
approaching Magenta. His troops march leisurely, no faster than those
of MacMahon who approaches the Austrian lines from the north but is
out of command and cannot make up his mind what to do. D'Angely's
corps continues its attack on the Austrian front lines.  D'Angely
brings up his artillery but then decides to attack even without a
bombardment, with his guard troops attached he is dismissive of the
Austrian troops of Burdina's brigade.  This turns out to be a mistake
as both sides end up disorganised.  The Austrian's do fall back to
reorganise (which they do), but d'Angely cannot, or he will lose his
artillery! He tries to rally his troops and they do, but at the cost
of a step loss.

Turn 4 (13:00): D'Angely has decided to stop taking such risks; he
approaches the Austrian lines but does not immediately attack again,
preferring to wait for someone else to take up the slack. MacMahon
finally reaches command range to Napoleon III.

Turn 5 (14:00): Gyulai finally turns up in Magenta to assume command
of the headquarters.  This may be too late though, as MacMahon has
decided, with considerations that some Austrian reinforcements are on
the way, that a fast assault on the Austrian defenses is the way to
go.  (After considering this a bit, this may have been a bad choice -
after multiple turns of crawling around, outflanking the Austrians in
the East would certainly have been possible, and it would have been
advisable to let the artillery catch up.) The troops in the center do
not quite make it to contect, and the troops coming down the eastern
road attack in uncoordinated fashion. After the first attack, both
French and Austrians retreat to reorganise, which breaks contact and
prevents the second attack. D'Angely places his troops adjacent to
Gablenz' again but does not yet attack, deciding to let the artillery 
barrage first.

Turn 6 (15:00): Surprisingly, Gyulai gets the initiative.  He uses
this to bring up one of Liechtenstein's brigades on the right wing,
finally blocking easy access to Magenta for MacMahon's Corps.

At this point I decided that I'd bring up the French artillery before
mounting too many further attacks.  D'Angely moves his troops south to
the New Bridge, to enable his remaining brigade to cross.  However the
only actual attack is by MacMahon on Gablenz' front brigade,
coordinated by MacMahon himself, causing serious losses to the
Austrians who fall back disorganised...

Schwarzenberg's corps comes in from the south edge.

Turn 7 (16:00): Gyulai gains initiative again and uses it to slip
Zobel's Corps in on the right flank, protecting Magenta from a quick
envelopment.  Canrobert's corps has now crossed the canal and is
taking up position between MacMahon and d'Angely. Liechtenstein pulls
his men back from the New Bridge to forestall the assault by
d'Angely's corps. This seems to come too late though as to his right,
however, Gablenz' men are again assaulted by MacMahon and Burdina's
brigade is routed, with Gablenz being killed. Suddenly, there is a
mile-wide hole in the Austrian lines with little but some canister
fire between MacMahon's right wing and Gyulai's HQ in the outskirts of
Magenta.  On the left wing, MacMahon goes for a limited attack that is
repulsed, but still sends Krug's brigade of Liechtenstein's corps
reeling back with losses.

Turn 8 (17:00): Gyulai again manages to grab the initiative and
wrenches Liechtenstein's front line backwards at the last
minute. Brigade Szabo on the right is pulled south to cover the
northwest of Magenta, and Koudelka on the left falls hurriedly back
from the New Bridge, narrowly managing to take up a position that does
not leave it outflanked by d'Angely's men crossing the bridge.  If
Liechtenstein can hold for this turn, there might be enough time for
Schwarzenberg to establish a blocking position.  That proves to be in
doubt though as d'Angely's troops immediately pursue and two brigade's
slam into Koudelka's brigade, which is supported by artillery. The
defending fire is concentrated on the leading brigade which is sent
reeling with a step loss, but the other brigade takes the hex after
Koudelka retreats (which has eliminated the artillery). In the center,
Canrobert's attack, while repulsed with a retreat, also disorganises
Szabo's brigade and forces it to retreat. The Austrians are now thrown
back on the city limits, and Liechtenstein's corps is
demoralised. Finally, MacMahon attacks. Lefebvre's brigade takes a
city hex. Szabo's brigade is pushed back into the city, Gablenz's last
unit retreats north of the city rather than being destroyed, and in
the north, MacMahon's men also make inroads (and are now on the flank
of Zobel's corps, having managed a breakthrough towards the city).
With two corps demoralised and 1 hex of the city taken by the French,
the game is essentially over - victory points are 3:3 two turns before
the end and there is not the dream of a chance of Schwarzenberg
turning back MacMahon *and* the French Guard. (For the record, step
losses at this point were Austrian 10, French 2.)

Turn 9 (18:00): The French win initiative and MacMahon just barges
onwards.  However, things are not so simple. His troops are now
embroiled in a swirling fight on the outskirts of town, in some places
seemingly outflanked by Austrian defenders, and so many of his
brigades do not attack; also, with the fighting moving into the city,
the Austrians are now finally gaining some terrain advantage.  An
attack on Zobel's corps on the far left sends an Austrian brigade
packing with losses, but next to it, one of Liechtenstein's last units
manages to hold out, with the French gaining no ground. The unit that
has gained a foothold in the city does not attack so as to not
jeopardise the gains, and the Decaen's brigade attacking south of it,
while managing to eliminate Szabo's brigade, itself fails a morale
check and retreats, leaving Szabo's city hex empty. It is occupied by
Schwarzenberg's men (Brigade Wetzlar) before the French can
react. Schwarzenberg dismisses any thought of an attack as foolhardy,
but has now formed a frontline south of the city, as d'Angely notices
when he renews the attack. Clar's unit in the south faces so much
Austrian firepower (10pts) that it prefers not to attack, and the
attack in the center sees merely two morale checks, which the
Austrians pass, and the French, surprisingly, fail. Canrobert has not
managed to rally his brigade, and Niel's IV Corps is only just
arriving on the scene. So the situation remains in doubt.

Turn 10 (19:00): The French retain the initiative, and MacMahon renews
the attack. On his corps' extreme left flank, de Poihes men eliminate
Kinzl's brigade, but Koudelka's brigade, led by Liechtenstein and
Gyulai, withstands Castagny's assault to hold on to the northeastern
end of the city. Meanwhile, Reznicek's beaten up brigade, the last
unit of Gablenz' corps, almost surrounded by enemies, is routed
northwest of the city by Maneque's brigade, but this will not affect
the outcome of the battle. Decaen's brigade renews the assault against
Wetzlar's brigade, but is stalled. At this point, MacMahon personally
leads the attack by Lefebvre's units deeper into the city, hoping to
evict Ramming's brigade of Schwarzenberg's Corps that has taken up
position there, and split Gyulai and Liechtenstein from
Schwarzenberg. However, this does not work, Lefebvre is repulsed with
losses (got a D result but could not retreat due to congestion, so had
to check morale and succeeded).  Canrobert cannot even get close to
the city since MacMahon's corps is in the way. Meanwhile, Zobel
refuses the Austrian right flank, fearing an attack by the Italians,
especially with his flank unit still disorganised. Indeed, Fanti comes
up with the Aosta cavalry unit but its attack is repulsed.

The last French chance for a victory is to use Niel's IV Corps to
clear the way for d'Angely to make an attack on a city hex proper, but
to do that, Niel would have to push almost all of Schwarzenberg's
corps out of the way. Schwarzenberg has brought up his artillery,
deciding that the bonus is worth their probable loss in case of an
attack. Niel personally leads the attack by Charriere and Martimprey's
brigades against Durfeld on Schwarzenberg's flank. Durfeld is sent
reeling back, and this opens a gap through which d'Angely leads
Gault's brigade. He is still facing two defending units though, and
the fire repulses the Attack. Gault's brigade retreats, disrupted, and
d'Angely is killed. The game ends as a draw, with the Austrians still
partly in possession of Magenta (and presumably withdrawing from it
over night since they'd inevitably be crushed if the battle continued
the next day :-).

OVERALL COMMENTS

As with Reichshoffen, I must say I like the system - it is clever,
fast, not too quibbly, and refreshingly modern, none of this AE/AR/EX
stuff, the chitpulls are used at the right level and create the right
sort of traffic jams, but things are not totally random. Units take
(permanent) losses and rout, there is facing but it is simple, and
there is one table for all sorts of combat. One could quibble a bit
with the unit ratings, especially since the inferior side seems to be
downgraded in leaders, strength, morale, *and* number of steps. A
normal French brigade at Magenta led by almost any corps leader has a
5/6 chance of causing a D+1 (the worst possible) result to an Austrian
unit.  Were both battles really that one-sided? But, I'm willing to
spend the time to find out. Overall this system was one of the better
discoveries of 2007.

Now for some minor detractions.

One thing I am not quite happy with is the treatment of artillery. It
has a movement value of 3 versus the infantry's 4.  That means it half
as fast in cultivated terrain (which I might accept) but it is also
25% slower on roads and half as fast if the corps is out of command
(which halves the movement rates).  As a result it tends to lag
fearfully behind, an attacker needs to assume a 2-3 hour wait to bring
it into action, especially since it needs to be placed on hills for
ranged fire (and there are preciously few hills in Magenta).  If you
do that, you find that it has little effect in firing although it has
a positive modifier for the assault if you stack it with your
attackers so that it's adjacent to the defenders.  So far that is not
totally insensible, after all artillery should work more like the ACW
than like 1870. However, artillery is also of very limited use to the
defender.  It can add its strength on the defense, but the typical
artillery unit has only a fraction of the firepower of a brigade.  It
works mostly by the abovementioned modifier and by pushing the
firepower of the infantry unit it "augments", even if it is one of the
weaker Austrian brigades, into the higher reaches of the CRT where a
disorganisation result is almost sure so that the attacker has to
retreat or test morale and suffer a step loss. So far so good, so you
repulse the attacker - what happens?  Well, the problem is that even
if the attacker has himself retreated, a disorganisation result will
still force a defender retreat and that eliminates the artillery.
This seems a bit harsh. Let's look at it in detail. Most likely your
Austrian infantry has at least been disorganised (even the standard
French infantry will be on the rightmost two columns of the table;
having the corps leader stacked with it will produce a +3 modifier in
most cases). That means it either retreats (which kills the artillery
regardless of whether the attacker is in a position to advance) or
tries to stand, which, if it passes the morale check, will inflict a
step loss.  Now, Austrian infantry has at most 2 steps so this is
serious damage - if it has suffered a loss before, or if it has
received a D+1 result ("disorganisation plus step loss"), it will
immediately die just by trying to hang on. Even if it does that, this
leaves the artillery, with its weaker firepower and a rule that
automatically eliminates it if facing combat alone unless if manages
to beat off the French with a morale check (unlikely) to almost
certain death on the next turn.

So, in summary, artillery is pretty much a one-shot weapon on the
defense, even if the attacker pulls back it will be lost (or the
infantry will die faster by trying to keep from running so that the
artillery won't run with it and be destroyed). In theory, artillery
can provide fire support at a distance but again for that to happen
you have to have it on a hill. In the final combat I committed
Austrian artillery to the defense on the assumption that it would
probably be lost rather than turn the tide, but might prevent
immediate loss of ground. That's not how I read the period, even in
1859 (and certainly not for the Austrian artillery which was the pride
of the army), and some tweaking will probably be desirable here, for
example by letting the artillery remain in the hex even if the
infantry retreats and be only eliminated if the enemy advances.  In
case of one of those "both sides retreat and regroup" outcomes that
will at least give you a chance to reoccupy the hex if the chits fall
right.

The terrain on the map is sometimes a big ambiguous.  The draw above
probably comes back (at least in part) to the fact that the
southwestern hex of Magenta was hard to take. However, reading the
victory conditions now indicates that this hex (which has some city
terrain and what appears to be the city cemetery in it) does not count
as a city hex, so the attackers would not have gotten their strength
halved and might well have taken this hex and swept on to take the
southeastern Magenta hex.  There are also some rather strange road
ambiguities. For example, does the eastern road coming into Magenta
from the north enter in hex 2011 or 1911?  And does the western road
pass through hex 18.. or not? Such weaving of roads through mini
hex-fragments should have left the hobby with the map artist of
Command's Samurai Sunset... but I played and liked Samurai Sunset,
too, so no big deal.

Finally, a comment on the counters.  I don't like the VV counter style
particularly anyhow at this game scale, since I find the big icons
make it very hard to think in terms of larger units maneuvering and
obscure orientation. However, I also found them excruciating in play
and writing up.  They are the classic example of how counter design,
taken to the extreme, results in something that is painful to use.
80% of the counter is taken up with a pretty image that is irrelevant
for play while the ratings are kept at the bottom of the counter and
the formation information (which is crucial) is squeezed onto the side
or top of the counter in microscopic form. Despite the fact that the
counters are larger than normal, the corps numbers, which are critical
for various purposes (such as demoralisation), and the unit names,
which are needed for setup and reinforcements, can only be read under
sunlight or with a magnifying glass. Three boos for the VV graphics
department; they sure are pretty but I want to be able to play with
them, too, without extra strain on my eyes.

So, even though I spent a lot of space above on some small issues,
overall this is among the better tactical systems I've seen yet for
this era: better developed than Joe Miranda's Empires at War Quad
(which I like but which really went downhill with the S&T
Chancellorsville/ Plevna), and it avoids the old-style locking ZOCs of
Paul Dangel's Koeniggraetz for Command (which was otherwise fast and
clean and had very clever command control rules).  Even if I compare
it to ACW games at a similar scale (map and time), it comes off well.
It does have more historical flavour than Across 5 Aprils, and much
less fiddling and better feel for combat than Glory and its
successors. Nice.

Markus

Last 3 games played: The Barons' War, Arkham Horror, Operation Apocalypse
--------------- http://www.dbai.tuwien.ac.at/user/mst/games/ ---------------
"Bakayaro! Bakayaro!"  ("Stupid Bastards!  Stupid Bastards!") -- Admiral 
Aritomo Goto's last words to his staff, October 11, 1942

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