So, Eric, Phil, and I had put in to run another game of Age of Eagles (a Napoleonic miniatures game) at Historicon. Someone from a local group had gotten very excited about the idea of arranging a room for all the folks from the Maryland clubs to share and run games in, but apparently that came to nothing, as we arrived at the con to find we had been assigned a table in the big common room where most of the games are played (Distelfink).
The game we were running was based on the battle of Sacile, an engagement in the 1809 campaign in which a joint French and Italian army under the command of Eugene de Beauharnais (stepson of Napoleon and viceroy of Italy) sought to defeat an Austrian army under Erherzog Johann (brother of the Kaiser Franz II of Austria). In the historical battle, the French almsot broke, were reinforced, then withstood a renewed Austrian onslaught until they were outflanked and threatened with envelopment, at which they broke off and fell back.
We started setting up around noon. Phil arrived in the nick of time, bringing his share of the troops and buildings. I realised that I had not brought a printout of the scenario map and OBs, arrival times, etc. I was very excited to find that I could use my iPod touch to acccess the Internet through the hotel's wireless, and I was just pulling up the copy of the file that I had stashed in Google Docs when Eric and Phil both pulled out printed copies. :-) Ah well, at least we had it! People started gathering as we set things up, many of them the players who had signed up for our game, plus some walk-ons. We divided them up into teams (Franco-Italian and Austrian) and introduced them to their troops, then Phil walked them through a brief introduction to the rules (a couple of them had played already).
Bryan showed up at this point, and I felt bad that we hadn't explicitly saved him a slot (we could certainly have found him a command), but he didn't seem to be too bothered about not playing, so he and I chatted for a while. The game started around one-thirty, and I ended up working mostly to facilitate play at the west end of the board, where the French left wing, fairly substantial, faced a small Austrian screening force.
The Austrians threw a column of infantry this direction, while massing their elite troops, grenadiers and cuirassiers, in the centre of their army to deal a heavy blow to the French middle. Meanwhile, their right wing battled in an area of hills and vineyards against a strong French right wing.
The French massed artillery in their centre, swung their left hard at the screening force, and pushed through the hilly area in what became, effectively, a double envelopment. The Austrian hammerblow never really connected, as they left their best troops in range of French artillery for far too long, losing a lot of them before they moved, and then rushed forward to the attack while their flanking force was still on the march. The French left drove in the Austrian screen and made ready to engage their flank-marching troops; the French centre crushed the Austrian attacks, and the French right rolled up the Austrian light troops trying to screen them.
I forget how many turns we ended up playing, but we got a decision within our four-hour time frame. The players seemed to have a good time, and I think a few more copies of AOE may be purchased as a result. Picking up went surprisingly fast. Eric and Phil headed off for one more run through the vendors' area, then they, Bryan, and I headed off for dinner. Bryan and Phil headed home, and Eric and I, after considering our options for more games that night and in the morning, decided to do so as well.
I think it went pretty well, all in all. I didn't get all the figures fully done I had meant to, but the ones that still needed some work didn't end up getting used, so all was well. The Italian buildings Phil and I had painted up just for the scenario looked really nice, as did the vineyards he and I bought for the eastern portion of the board. Phil and Eric's troops looked marvelous, as they always do--those guys are excellent painters!
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