Troop Time!: Swiss

Tuesday, 4 July 2023

ADLG-R Swiss v French Italian Wars

With another ADLG-R competition coming up at the club soon I gave Swiss a try-out against Mike's French Italian Wars army. I thought I'd try Swiss as they are rather one-dimensional which perhaps suits my level of ADLG-R experience! The army consisted of elite Pikemen, more elite Pikemen and some elite Pikemen to make up the numbers with a few skirmishers and a couple of allied Gendarmes.

The Swiss attacked in the woods, as usual the table ended up fairly open with a few hills and woods on the flanks:

Simple army, simple plan. Everyone advances with the Gendarmes in reserve:

Swiss skirmishing crossbowmen lose out to Stradiots on the left:

Mike's army consisted of Gendarmes, Landschneckts and (even more) Swiss Pikemen all of whom awaited the Swiss avalanche:

There are three individual battles really, Swiss Pike v Gendarmes on the left, Swiss v Swiss in the centre and Swiss v Landschnects on the right:

French artillery fire is having an effect on the Swiss:

The Gendarmes await the Swiss attack:

Troops close up in the centre and on the right:

Being 'Headstrong' the Swiss are forced to charge into the Gendarmes. This seems like a bad idea:

It turns out to be a very bad idea as one Kiel is obliterated and the other takes numerous hits. I seem to remember all four threw 1's in combat to Mikes Gendarmes 5's or 6's:

In the centre Swiss clash with Swiss, again going badly for the erm Swiss:

On the right Swiss and Landschneckts battle it out:

On the left the Swiss recover a little and dispose of a French Gendarme:

No result as yet in this combat:

Or this one:

A Landschneckt Kiel breaks:

Unfortunately so does the Swiss one in the centre breaking the Swiss army:

The Swiss were indeed rather one dimensional but were still fun to play with, having to charge the Gendarmes was unfortunate but with better luck might not have been so disastrous! One other thing I didn't pick was the 'swordsmen' option for the Kiel's which allows them to win ties in melee against other pike or spear armed troops, I didn't think it was worth the cost but Mike had paid for it for his Kiel's and I think it made a fair bit of difference.

Still contemplating what to use in the competition, the lists are all quite similar with no 'unusual' choices like the Chinese army I used last time!

Monday, 7 March 2022

ADLG Swiss v Hundred Year's War English

Another game at the club, this time with my Swiss taking on Ted's HYW English to give him a practice game for a club competition later in the year.

I went for a simple composition of one large elite pike block with LI to screen it, a small second command of medium foot with polearms and a third command of three knights and a couple of crossbow light horse.

Winning the initiative the Swiss decided to attack in the plains and deployed the polearm command on the left, the pikes in the centre and the knights on the right:

Ted's much wider (but smaller!) army consisted of massed longbow, foot knights and billmen with the addition of a heavy cannon:

Both sides advance quickly, the Swiss are heavily outnumbered on their right but have the crossbow light horse to slow the enemy down:

The Swiss pike charge home! Unsurprisingly the English longbow on the left of the line are wiped out but other than that the English stand firm:

On the left things have gone less well. One Swiss polearm base has been shot to death while two more have been damaged after charging into combat:

The Swiss knights have redeployed to the left of the pike block but have been slow doing so. The pike block itself fights on inflicting more hits on the English and destroying some billmen. It is in danger of being outflanked on it's left though:

The Swiss pike are getting the upper hand in the centre and the knights will soon be able to run over the so far very ineffective English artillery:

On the left in the field the Swiss have lost three elements to the English one. The right flank of the Swiss pike is struggling but holding on:

The English C-in-C has joined in the fight with his foot knights but is about to be overwhelmed:

The English artillery is ridden down while the sole surviving Swiss polearm element battles on:

Having a small break point (19) the English army collapses when it's C-in-C is cut down though a couple of pike elements have fallen for the Swiss as well:

The English army flees, the crossbow light horse having done a valiant job of holding almost 1/3 of the enemy army away from the action:

I'm not sure there was that much skill involved in this game, both sides basically lined up and went for it! There was a bit of variety in the luck, the Swiss polearm command being easily slaughtered while the English facing the Swiss pike men had dismal dice rolls in general. With a slightly bigger army the Swiss could afford more losses though which made a difference in the end.

One thing I'd not tried before was the 'polearm' category newly introduced in V4 of ADLG (previously the Swiss were armed with 2HCW). It is better against mounted but no use at all against infantry and, since you really don't want medium swordsmen to be facing mounted anyway I'd much prefer to have at least the option of sticking with the old 2HCW category!