Regular visitors will be aware that last Friday saw the release of my second scenario pack for the For King & Parliament English Civil War ruleset: The Siege of Norchester.

The pack contains twelve free-standing, fictional scenarios in a loose chronological order. It tells the story of the investment of the fictional, Royalist-held city of Norchester. It begins with the Parliamentarians gradually pushing the Royalist foraging parties back into the city itself, then looks at the Royalist attempts to delay the construction of encircling works. There’s an assault on the outskirts of Norchester and then a Royalist attempt to get a messenger through to the King to ask for aid. Finally, there’s the arrival of a Royalist relief force, the fall of Norchester and the attempted escape of the main Cavalier protagonists. The same officers and units are used throughout the campaign, and it is hoped that the players will come to adopt and recognise them as their own or the enemy.

The pack is designed to give players who don't have enough time to write their own scenarios a number of games that they can play with little or no preparation. All you have to do is print out the game and player briefings, set up the table according to the map, break out the figures and cards, and start the first turn. You don't even need to print the pack out in full: just the pages you need for the scenario you're going to play. The games can be played either as a series of linked games or as a collection of one-off battles. To emphasise: each scenario is free standing and they do not have to be played in any particular order…but it is anticipated that players will play them in order as a campaign, keeping a running total of each sides’ score as they go along. The pack provides a Campaign Record Sheet as an easy way of doing so.

Finally, although specifically designed for FK&P, with a little work the scenarios can be adapted for any set of English Civil War/Renaissance rules: the basic elements of why, where and with what each side is fighting being largely common to all systems.

Napshill Downs

An important part of the preparation for launch is to playtest all the scenarios in the pack, and below you will find a gallery of images from the playtest of scenario #11: Napshill Downs.

As one of the later scenarios, the background is that Norchester has already fallen so some of the Royalist erstwhile defenders are trying to make their escape from the region in order to continue the fight against the Parliamentarian traitors elsewhere. The Roundhead force (which I was commanding) is tasked with bottling them up and destroying them.

This was one of those games that went wrong for me just about right from the beginning when I completely cocked up my opening moves! Read on to share my pain!

The Battlefield from the Royalist Side of the Table

Note Napshill itself nestling in the bottom right corner, and see the vast mass of Parliamentarian horse starting the game right in the middle of their line (in the middle of the far side of the table).

The Parliamentarians

Figures are 15mm: a mix of Peter Pig, Hallmark (from Magister Militum) with the odd smattering of Essex and Minifigs thrown in for colour.

The Royalists

My basing system is to use Warbases’ large vehicle bases to mount an infantry battalia or cavalry squadron. Works beautifully with FK&P.

The Parliamentarian Horse Moves Right

This was my fist mistake: I should have given half the horse to the CinC, kept half with the cavalry general, and therefore covered both wings.

Instead I had some cockamamy plan to mass my horse on one flank, smash any enemy horse there from the field, and then roll up his line.

It didn’t work!

Just to Rub It In!

General Royalist Advance

The Royalists have to escape, so seeing that my horse were now so far out of position, I decided to wait behind the hedgerow in front of my line and shoot the enemy down as they came into range.

Mistake two: cede the initiative to the enemy!

Royalist Horse Advance on My Left

Well, er, obviously that was going to happen!

Nothing to Stop Them

All I had on my left flank were two units of Rabble (without guns) and one unit of pike.

Unable to charge horse with foot, all my poor Rabble could do is wait for the mounted hammer to fall!

Another View of the Disaster that was my Left Flank

Meanwhile on the Right...

…my overwhelming numbers of cavalry were being bottled up by more Royalist horse.

You can see that being in column I cannot get my superior numbers to bear!

Quick Overview

All That Is Left On The Right

All my lovely Dutch Horse has left the field: not helped by the fact that I didn’t have much luck in the enormous combat that took place on the far right.

The Royalist line Arrives at the Hedgerow

The Final Fight

My relative success in the centre didn’t make much difference: you can see my left flank is collapsing.

With all my (expensive) horse destroyed on the right, and my left hand units giving way, I ran out of victory medals and so lost the game.

Victory to the Royalists who did indeed escape to fight another day!

The Attack on Marlowe

Meanwhile, blogger Zanoni has started playing through my previous ECW scenario pack: Marlowe to Maidenhythe, which is now available in both digital and physical form.

His first AAR, covering scenario #1 The Attack on Marlowe has lots of pictures of his beautifully painted collection of ECW figures. Recommended as a feast of eye candy!

Click here to see the report on his excellent Troop Time! blog.