Alliance Ascendent

The first game using my Triple Alliance collection took place here at OHQ yesterday.

A straightforward encounter game to start with to get a feel of both forces and influence the next additions.

The Alliance forces left flank brigade, two Argentinian battalions and the small Uruguayan Libertad battalion.

The Paraguayans had two brigades of three battalions, the right supported with a 12pdr smoothbore battery and the left three battalions supported by a cavalry squadron.

The Brazilian contingent consisted of, in the centre a brigade of three battalions and on the right a brigade consisting of an infantry battalion, a cavalry squadron and a 4pdr mountain gun battery.

The Alliance forces won the initiative and advanced along the entire front to form a line between the two areas of boggy ground.

The Paraguayans advanced along their front also but sent their cavalry around the boggy ground the threaten the Alliance right flank.

Has can be seen above the Paraguayan advance became a little strung out. The little smoke puffs denote that the unit as yet to first fire, which gives them an added fire dice when first doing so.

The Brazilian cavalry in the bottom corner have been sent to counter the Paraguayans cavalry attempt to turn the flank.

The Paraguayan cavalry duly charged, they had been given the terrifying charge rule, this means the charged unit must take a break test, I realised on reading it's description for the blog that I had tested the Brazilian cavalry before contact when it should have been done on contact which may have had a different outcome on the game. The Brazilian cavalry retired and the Paraguayans decided not to follow up and risk the passing fire from the Brazilian gun battery. Then again it sounds odd has the Brazilians being cavalry could have counter charged before taking test🤔

Meanwhile in the centre the lead Paraguayan battalion was taking heavy fire and failed their resulting break test, the Paraguayans had the stubborn rule which with the addition of one to their usual stamina of three makes them very resilient, which they were, they did not give way easily. However on this occasion the re-roll was exactly the same score as the first!

The left Paraguayan brigade also came under heavy fire first one and then another becoming shaken. This resulted in both brigades being broken and retiring from the field.

A most enjoyable first outing lasting five turns and just under two hours of play.

The following were given to the Paraguayans to reflect their historical nuance's as used by Alan Perry for their games.

Stamina of four.

Terrifying charge.

Stubborn

Tough Fighters 

Terrain wise crossing the marshy areas we deducted a D6 from any movement as we had already halved the movement rates due to 5x4 table being used. We also adopted the one move and fire rule from the Glory Hallelujah ACW supplement.

There are now army sheets for the War for Valour and Fortitude so we may give them a run out next month. Until next time..........

TTFN & KBO