A HUSSAR'S DUTY
PART FOUR
Turn 13
First up is Lt Day. Nothing can go wrong now. All he has to do is charge 10" into the rear of the poor infantry who are in the midst of changing formation. Going in at the gallop he even gets +9 to his roll of 3D6. It all seems to certain. Lt Day activates his Dragoons and he orders a charge, throwing in a fervour for good measure.
But the French play a Random Event Movement card on the Dragoons! **This is a house rule that replaces the rules for when to roll for random events on units. As written, it is when moving or shooting and getting more 1s than 6s but we invariably forget to watch for this. Now the random events come out of the Bonus deck and can be played on the opponent who then rolls a D10 on the random events table**
The result is an 8 which is 'Hello Ladies!' and it turns out that of the dragoon command of 12, 3 have left the ranks and gone off to chat with the local village maidens. They will remain there until retrieved by the officer.
That does not though prevent the charge from going in. Rolling a 16 and adding 9 gets them a possible 25" of charge. The only question now for the young Cavalry Officer is whether he takes full opportunity and charges the infantry or if he charges the cavalry support instead.
This should not be pretty. 9 Dragoons plus a Big Man plus his Trumpeter +2 for his initiative +1 for his added fervour = 14 base. Now, as much as the French are not in square, they did maintain their formations throughout the evolution and in many ways, that slowed them down. The Dragoons will count as hitting a formed column in the rear. +25% for attacking at the gallop for a final total of 18 dice.
The infantry fight as one whole mass and spread the casualties amongst them.
| This was a mistake. Although both groups of the infantry formation will share the casualties, only the group immediately adjacent to the cavalry will get to fight back. The second group won't even add dice to the fight as rank bonuses because they are not facing the right way. I'll go back and try this from here with the correction: Part Four B |
The French have 26 soldiers and +1 for 3 levels of Big Men. Then we subtract 5 for 11 shock (22) and then half the result for being hit in the rear. That's 11 dice.
The Dragoons, on 18 dice, manage only 3 '5's and a single '6'. Suspiciously, the infantry get the exact same result from their 11 dice. The Big Man fate die rolls are very important here but Day is not dropped and neither are any French officers. The results are applied and they fight another round.
Dragoons will get 2 dice less to their subtotal so their total will be 15. The French also get 2 dice less but that leaves them with 10 dice still. Their odds might have improved.
Each 6 rolled will be a kill and each 5 will be a shock. The Dragoons roll and achieve 1 kill and 4 shock. The French score big and get 4 kills and 2 shock on their mere 10 dice. No Big Men are felled.
A Catastrophe for the British. Losing fisticuffs by 3 means that they will be thrown back 24" and gain another 2 shock. Only 4 Dragoons remain in the ranks with 7 shock on them and they will be falling back off the table edge edge.
What effect would 4 more dice from those 3 missing dragoons have been, one must wonder. Though the French infantry groups have 10 and 8 shock on them, none have more shock than soldiers remaining in the ranks so they retain their cool.
That seems a perfectly reasonable place to end the battle. The last ride of the British Light Dragoons was foiled by bizarre twists of fortune. Such is war.
