GNW: Double trouble in Humblebek

Battle of Humblebek was fought as the kickstart for our Great Northern War Campaign. 

See the introduction to this battle (scenario, OOB, etc.) from the scenario  play testing blogpost here

Since all 7 commanders had joined our kick of evening we had set up  two simultaneous games with two players in each, teaming up as Sweden and managing their dedicated regiments. Idea in the campaign is to track the story of this dedicated regiment as survival and heroic deeds bring them upgrades and destruction of the unit will lose these upgrades and yield negative effects.

I took the role of the Danish defenders on one of the tables, while Jaakko defended the other. Marko, whom had already played the scenario as a defender acted as an umpire on the other table, Joonas (Dal-regiment) and Ludde (Nylands regiment) were attacking the village defended by me and Mika (XX Regiment) and Aito (Björneborg Regiment) were assaulting the other.

How did it go battle 1. (Me, Ludde & Joonas)

In this battle we played so, that both sides were dealed three cards and an initiative was rolled off. Then sides proceeded one card from their hand at a time. Once 6 first cards were played, 6 more were dealt.

Swedes landing forces ready to go.

Danish defenders well dug in.

Most of  the Swedes were rather good at rowing, even under rather intense fire from the Danish defenders: the furthest boat with grenadiers and an officer took heavy casualties: only two grenadiers and the office reached shore. Jaakko found from the summary sheet, that boats are +1 to hit... maybe that was too much in this scenario...

 First unit to land was Ludde's Nyland. 

Lucky shot from the ships cannons killed one gunner and a dragoon, 

dragoons fled away from the danger zone

Joonas' Dal-Regiment also landed soon after, but their charge couldn't reach the Danish defenses, and they were soon driven back due to the fire from the defenders.

At the same time Nylanders charged the cannon crew and a Danish officer next to them.

And to no-ones surprise easily won the fight easily. With the dragoons out of the fight for a while Swedes now had a good position to roll the defenses from this flank. This could save their brothers in arms in front of the firing lines...

The on the extreme left landed and two grenadiers and the officer from it.

Then a straight of cards for the defenders were played and soon these brave lads and their officer 

were shot to pieces, and the Dal-regiment driven back.

Another card for the Danish regulars and the beach was cleared from Swedes. 

Only the Nylanders were engaged, while Charles XII and his livsgard still 

tried to reach the shore!

I had moved one of my militia units holding a perimeter in the village to encounter the raging Nylanders. They managed to get a round of shots at the oncoming Swedes, but that was far from enough to stop them! 

In the distance Danish defenders could hear the trumpets of the approaching reinforcements in the form of the dragoons... this lifted their hearts!

But it was too late! The rampaging Nylanders slaughtered my militia and moved into the cover of the building, planning to outflank to the village - out of the sight of the defenders. My only chance would have been to get few irregular cards to the play, to get the cavalry moving in, but gods of war were having fun on my expense: 

Gå På -card game up and the Nylanders entered the village ending the game... 

As a Swedish victory!

Charles XII returned to his flagship and waved his hat in celebration.

Game 2.

Danish commander Jaakko searching for loopholes...

Notice the aggressive deployment of the two danish militia units, 

just by the waterline. 

First Swedes making landfall.

Danish cavalry charge in, but are skewered into the Swedish pikes!

Aito's Björneborgare and grenadiers reach the defenses and vicious melee erupts,

even the king Charles XII was seriously wounded and carried away by his Livsgard!

Fighting at it's hottest

Both sides pay a heavy price - massive casualties.

Gå På!

The last Björneborgare takes on the Danish cavalry

But finally the brave Swedes succumb to the loss of manpower...

Victory to Danish defenders!

Plenty of more pictures on the second game here:
http://maalaus.blogspot.fi/2016/04/gnw-gaming-day.html  

Conclusions

Two bloodied battles were fought and this time it was much harder for the Swedes to survive. Still the Nylanders breached the defenses in the eastern landing zone and as the heroic Björneborgare caused such terrible losses to the defenders, that second wave of the invasion had it easy to secure Humblebek to Swedish hands. Road to Copenhagen was open...

In campaign terms this means:

* Sweden succeeded in taking Denmark out of the war - hurrah!

* King Charles XII so badly wounded, that he starts the next battle with one less wound in his profile