Chuck came over for our regular 2-player session, and on the table this time was OSG's Four Lost Battles. This is a Quad games of four battles from the Dresden Campaign, 1813.

Mostly following a traditional IGO/UGO type of game, it adds a card driven element where the cards allow special capabilities or limit the opposing forces in some way. What is unique is that each card played affects the VPs. The better the card played, the more VPs you lose. Interesting. Each player is limited in the use of his forces in that the leader of each force (corp, group, or other related number of units) must pass their initiative roll (normally 3 or 4) in order for the force to be moved freely. If it's failed, then each unit can roll their own initiative (mostly 2s, which some 1s and a few 3s). If a unit passes, then it may be moved freely. Unis arriving as reinforcements may have a specific location assigned to them, and they'll continue to move towards that location, even when out of command, unless they come under a leader's command. Kinda like the Gamers Brigade series orders. Combat is fairly bloodless, pretty much requiring units to be surrounded and cutting off their retreat path.

We played the Grossbeeren scenario, which sees the strong French forces arrive from the south to meet the main Prussian force in two separate actions, one around the town of Grossbeeren, the other to the east, around Blankenfelde. The eastern Prussian force starts in and around Blankenfelde, and spends the whole game out of supply. One point is awarded per turn for the occupation of each town. The main Prussian force arrives in dribs and drabs throughout the day.

In our game, the special first turn card draws had the French eastern force go inactive, which meant Chuck had to roll each turn to wake them up. Nothing too exciting otherwise, so that left him with rolling for initiative for each unit, and a straggled force. The big card play was my card that aborted the arrival of the French corps from the south west, which took away a third of his force. From that point on it was a race against time for the French, trying to force Grossbeeren before the Prussians could gain a superiority in forces.

In the east the French eventually got into shape and forced the Prussians out of Blankenfelde. In retrospect I should have pushed forward some more and slowed him down in front of the town. I also should have been more aware of the combat results and defended in line to avoid getting surrounded, rather than in two power stacks in the town. This meant I got kicked out in short order, around turn 6, or so.

At the end of turn 3 (I think) from the south and north




The battle around Grossbeeren went well for the Prussians. A quick foray from the town with the cavalry managed to sneak around and cut off some units that had pushed forward a little too far, but at the cost of cavalry. This wasn't a huge loss as reinforcements were arriving and the French high water mark had been reached. From that point on they were on the defensive as I pushed them back, looking to force the flanks and cut off units. It didn't hurt that the French commander appeared to be asleep at the wheel (so to speak), and failed most of his initiative die rolls.

By the end of the day I had a resounding victory, scoring around 9 points to Chuck's -1.

Prior to my penultimate turn. The Prussian eastern corps has been eliminated and the French forces are moving west to pressure Grossbeeren. I moved the Russian cavalry (the brown units) east to block them off and kept pressuring the French around Grossbeeren, pushing them back more.




Overall, I wasn't too impressed with this title. I found the whole initiative thing to be a bit tedious, with lots of die rolling, for odd effects. We had a force marching up the road in a line, then the leader fails initiative and we find units in the middle of the line just sitting while units either end keep going. Just doesn't seem right that part of a marching line stops the minute the leader stops to take a leak. (Or whatever reason you come up with for the leader failing initiative!)

The bloodless combat system meant that nothing much happened unless one player was able to outflank the other. We just pushed each other back a bit. Not too exciting.

The map was also too large for the game. It took 4 or 5 turns before we rolled the first combat die roll, and there weren't any real maneuver possibilities to make the large map worthwhile. I'd say we barely used a quarter of the available map. However, due to some crappy die rolls for initiative, perhaps our game started slower than it could have.

However, my least favorite part of the game was the cards. Whilst the card play had a nice twist with each one costing you VPs, I thought the cards were too variable. I played one card at the start of the game that took out the strongest third of the French force, and which made the French task nigh on impossible. A bit random, in my view, and too powerful in a game with such a low counter density. Otherwise the cards fiddled with when reinforcements arrived, or where, gave a bonus here or there. No great effect, but better than being too strong.

Some interesting ideas, but overall not a success. That said, I could be convinced to try another scenario. I think the loss of that French corps made our game a bogey straight off, and I might be tempted to remove those cards or make them a delay rather than outright removal.

Many thanks to Chuck for coming over, I enjoyed the game, even if I didn't enjoy the game. If you know what I mean!