1848 Mincio Campaign Cartography

Wargamers unfamiliar with Italy may find it harder to pinpoint locations touched by the 1848-1849 campaigns and therefore maybe fail to appreciate the related aspects. In addition, wargamers may want to use real maps as basis for wargame maps and scenarios.

The Habsburg Military Survey is a good source for this. The 2^nd Survey in particular is what we’re looking for (you can find the Survey maps here). Northern Italy was mapped in 1818-1829, a bit earlier than what I’m looking for, but the Italian countryside and urban areas didn’t change much before the start of the XX Century, so it should still be a fairly good representation of reality in 1848. In addition, it’s georeferenced, meaning that it’s perfectly superimposed on a modern map – you can toggle between the two and, for example, have a better understanding of hills and heights. You can calculate distances too.

Here's a map of the Mincio Valley and area between it and Verona, Radetzky's main fortress during the 1848 campaign.

The Mincio Valley and nearby areas

If you zoom the map you could read the locations' names, but in order to help people unfamiliar with Northern Italy, I've added names using bigger "labels" in the image below. I've also noted the direction of other notable areas that fall outside the map.

Main 1848 locations

The Mincio river runs from Peschiera (on Lake Garda) in the north and flows roughly southwards touching Monzambano, Valeggio, Goito (all sites with major bridges) to Mantua just south of the map, and then ends up into the Po river. 

Custoza is located in the hill area east of Monzambano.

The Quadrilateral is made up of the fortresses of Peschiera, Verona, Mantua and Legnago. Legnago is roughly southeast off-map.

I'll use the Survey maps to see if I can create more realistic battlefields for the scenarios - but I'll keep playability over precise representation. I'll start with the Valeggio area.

Bridgehead at Valeggio - 1848 Mincio Campaign

The sun rose and the soldiers started preparing breakfast and packing their equipment for resuming the advance. General Bes was happy: he had taken the bridge at Valeggio - with some luck and speed, he would soon reach Radetzky's rearguard. The men of his brigade were of high morale and eager for a fight despite the recent forced march. They had been greeted as heroes and liberators at Milan, and it has been encouraging, a good start of this campaign.

"They are coming!" An aide came to him with news from the forward sentries.

"Who?" Bes replied. Was the King already here? As far as he knew, even if the rest of the army was only slightly behind him, he didn't expect the main body to reach Valeggio at least until the afternoon - or maybe tomorrow.

"The Austrians" said the aide "they are closing on our positions". It took a moment for Bes to understand. If we lose the bridge, our army will face a bloodbath in retaking it.

He smiled slightly as he prepared to give the orders for the protection of the bridgehead. His soldiers would face the enemy even sooner than expected.

"Send a messenger to General Federici at division HQ, and to the King. "Tell them we need all the reinforcements we can get to hold the bridge."

I started the Mincio Campaign I talked about here. With the Sardinians/Piedmontese trying to cross the Mincio at two different locations, I decided to start with the bridgehead at Valeggio. (Note to readers: miniatures you see in the pictures are plastic 1/72 Napoleonics, acting as proxies)

I used scenario 5 (Bridgehead) of Neil Thomas' One-Hour Wargames (OHW). This is the layout:

I tried to see how it would be with some buildings near the bridge, roughly representing the town of Valeggio.

It looks much better, but I wonder how it would affect play balance (I'll talk about it later). I therefore chose to keep the original scenario layout for now.

I'm still in playtest mode, so I played the scenario two times, one with OHW and one with Simplicity in Practice (SiP) to see the difference. Normally I use Wargaming 19th Century Europe, but I wanted to try these two, the first for quickness and the second for its mechanics. For OHW I had already played several times with the raw rules (I tend to use the Rifle and Sabre ruleset, even if for 1848 the Horse and Musket ones could be technically better) so I wanted to modify them a bit to address some issues I had:

1) infantry fire range is too great. Units seem to fire at each other from unbelievable ranges, at least when they are all armed with muskets. I understand it's made to avoid having defensive fire during the charge sequence (so you can fire at cavalry in your turn before they can charge in theirs), but I chose to decrease fire range to 10cm (as in SiP) and allow for defensive fire when charged, with hits applied immediately.

2) adding a morale check when you're fired upon and suffer hits (it always happens with the Sabre and Rifle rules), as suggested in another wargame blog. So after suffering hits you roll 3D6: if result is equal or higher than your current hits, you retreat 6 cm and lose 2 more hits. i felt it would represent both the progressive deterioration of units (as losses mount, passing the roll would become harder and units would be more brittle) and allow for units pushing back their opponents with successful attacks.

Turn 1 - Piemonte Brigade (General Bes) protecting the bridge
while Austrian Cavalry and Infantry advance

Bersaglieri rush to help, while Austrian reinforcements arrive behind the woods

 The Austrians got one of the worst reinforcement schedule they could get. While the two initial units arrived near the hill - the rest of the reinforcements came on the other side, behind the woods - and given that infantry and artillery can't enter woods (they didn't have skirmisher units) they are forced to make a long detour to reach the defenders. This would have a major impact.

As more defending brigades enter, the austrian Cavalry had been repulsed
and the infantry was isolated against Bes' soldiers and the Bersaglieri skirmishers.

With the first Austrian infantry unit routed, it really took a lot of time for the Austrians
to get their other units in attack positions;
meanwhile the Piedmontese bridgehead became stronger and stronger

The Austrian cavalry has managed to charge Bes brigade in thee flank,
routing it, but was soon routed itself by other supporting units..

As I said earlier. all Austrian reinforcements arrived behind the woods. It could make historical sense: the "north" is on the left of the picture, and the bridge at Monzambano is there. Most likely the Austrians were sending troops mainly from there... but it made for a harder battle here. (Actually, I realized later that I had misread the rules and the last reinforcements should have come from the hill side, but I let it go and continued).

Austrians finally prepare to attack, but Piedmontese artillery is in position too

The two attacking Austrian units rout the Bersaglieri,
but are too battered and will be unable to make much headway

The remaining Austrians units arrive, and start to deploy

From bad to worse for the Austrians. By attacking piecemeal, they are subject to strong concentrated fire from the Piedmontese. And they are unable to bring their artillery on the front.

Despite suffering losses, this last confrontation will see
their units routed while the Piedmontese lose only one.

By turn 12, all Austrian units had been routed, and the Piedmontese had retained control of the bridge.

Ruleset comments: the morale rule was mostly a disappointment - it wasn't really a factor except for units near the breakpoint, which meant it just quickened their rout but didn't really provoke the push-back / progressive deterioration effect that I hoped for. I might have to try it again. Plus, having defending fire meant I didn't know how to apply it to charging units - roll before the charge when they suffer hits from the defenders? or after? I decided to roll it after all charge losses were assessed. It mostly had no effect anyway and therefore was a non-factor. Reducing fire range was a better choice, but maybe 12 cm would be better than 10 cm. Still unsure about it.

Scenario comments: the Austrians got to the battlefield piecemeal, couldn't coordinate and were accordingly defeated. The arrival point of reinforcements had much to do with it - without skirmishers, arriving behind the woods delays a lot.

Overall, I had fun, but somehow I didn't see the "besieged" situation I thought when I think "bridgehead". This may have been an effect of the reinforcement schedule more than the ruleset.

I then replayed the scenario with SiP rules. I just tested one variation, regarding close combat: instead of rolling dice and see who made a higher result I would consider hits on 4+ - as other blogs suggested. Still, I will calculate results for both systems and see if any difference is made.

The first Austrian units arrived from behind the woods again, but things then proceeded differently from the first battle, with more Austrian troops coming from the road and from the hillside.

Initial moves

Slower movement rates in SiP means more turns before contact

In OHW, infantry moves 6" or 15cm. In SiP, infantry moves 10cm. Cavalry moves 30cm in OHW, 20cm in SiP. In both cases, it's 33% less. This has a relevant effect in determining when units get in contact, because in SiP it takes some more turns. Does this affect play balance? Possibly, because sides which have to cross larger parts of the battlefield will take longer to do so, which can make some scenarios artificially harder to win unless they are adapted. Here it impacted the Austrians on the side - being unable to use the road they couldn't reach the Piedmontese and this allowed them to be reinforced.

Both sides receive reinforcements

The Austrian hussars attacked the Piedmontese infantry directly. Not a smart move (a frontal assault by light cavalry against formed close order infantry is seldom successful) but i wanted to test close combat. As predicted, odds were brutally against the cavalry as the defending infantry could claim several advantages. In this case, no difference was noted among the different methods for resolving close combat: the Piedmontese rolled more hits at 4+ than the Austrians, and the total dice result too was higher. The battered cavalry (now at 3DP) was then kept in reserve for most of the battle.

After the Austrian Hussars failed to break the enemy, it's time for the infantry to try.

The Piedmontese were able to create a defensive position roughly as an half-circle in front of the bridge, with Bersaglieri skirmishers on the left, infantry in the centre and artillery on the left. Their strength lay in depth - reinforcing infantry was ready to cover any hole that could be created. The Austrians instead had chosen to maximize firepower and concentrate on individual enemy units, but this left no reserves to exploit successes.

The Austrians are slow in deploying,
allowing the Piedmontese to create a defensive position

The firefight was intense but at first produced little results. A potential breakthrough could happen on the Piedmontese right/Austrian left. Thanks to Austrian artillery on the hill, the Piedmontese brigade on the right was weakened enough to allow the Austrians to charge it with their own infantry... the entire flank could crumble, but the attack was repulsed! Thanks to support, both attacker and defender ultimately had the same number of advantages, and the defenders won. In this case too there was no difference in results using the two resolution mechanisms. The Austrians rolled only 1 hit at 4+, while the Piedmontese rolled 2. Likewise, the Austrian die total was 1 point less than the Piedmontese one. The attackers had to fall back and would be eliminated soon after.

The Austrian infantry on the right has just failed to break the Piedmontese line
and had to retreat! In the centre, the battle is fierce.

The Piedmontese have reserves, who help keep the line intact...

The Austrians managed to destroy one Piedmontese infantry brigade in the centre, but it was replaced by another. This too was routed, but another one arrived - and it finally proved too much for the weary Austrians who had endured the Bersaglieri fire for hours.

...but Austrian fire is efficient and creates new holes.

In the end, most Austrian units were routed and the remaining ones were too weakened to have any hope of breaking the Piedmontese line, leaving contro of the bridge to King Charles Albert's men.

In the end however, it's the Austrians that have to concede,
having lost most of their units and being unable
to break the last Piedmontese defenders.

It was a more tense battle than the previous one. Firefights in OHW are really fast to reach resolution (at least with the Sabre and Rifle rules, I should have used the Horse and Musket ones instead), here they were more attritional, and it felt more historically correct.

Ruleset comments: First time I used the SiP rules and I'm happy with the result. I liked how the battle unfolded and I felt the rules drove that nicely. I feared that the slow movement rates would make the 15-turn limit too short, but the game arrived to conclusion in 13 so it wasn't an issue. Not sure if the slower Austrian approach helped the Piedmontese however. Still the game was fun.

Scenario comments: this time the Austrians arrived from different locations and it made a marked difference. They were able to mount a more coordinated attack and had some success, but their lack of reserves proved fatal as they couldn't exploit their successes. The initial cavalry charge proved to be detrimental for the Austrians: the hussars were too weak to attack again, and instead they would have been better used by threatening/charging the Bersaglieri skirmishers on the Piedmontese left - then threaten the flank of the infantry. Overall, a good battle narrative was created.

After the battle, I thought about using terrain that models the historical battlefield. I'll talk about that in a later post.

1848 Mincio Campaign

The Barolo Campaign (see my flowchart here) is a good abstraction of the battles across the Mincio river at the start of the 1^st Italian Independence War and can be used as a basis for a campaign on that.

General Eusebio Bava
CO of Sardinian I Corps

If we consider side A (Empire in the campaign description) to be the Piedmontese/Sardinians and side B (Electorate) to be Radetzky’s Austrians, then Peschiera is the fortress to be besieged by side A if it wins. We can easily see the Southern thrust in the campaign as being Eusebio Bava’s I Corps attack at Goito: in the campaign we have the attackers trying to cross a bridge before it’s blown up by the defenders, which is exactly what happened in history, with Bava’s forces attacking the bridge at Goito while the Austrians were trying to destroy it.

The main army instead would represent represent II Corps (General Ettore De Sonnaz) and Reserve Division, all under King Charles Albert, which crossed different bridges farther north. The final battle that determines if/how the siege happens would be Pastrengo. Peschiera’s real position (north of all these bridges, instead of between the two forces as depicted in the campaign) doesn’t affect the campaign flow, so it’s not an issue.

History of course is not always good for wargaming, which usually calls for scenarios that are more challenging – and/or more playable – than reality. This is no exception. After Bava’s victory at the battle of the bridge of Goito, very little actual combat happened until the battle of Pastrengo, aside from some very small skirmishes. While Bava was crossing the Mincio at Goito, De Sonnaz was doing the same at Valeggio and Monzambano but he was mostly unopposed.

General Ettore De Sonnaz
CO of Sardinian II Corps

Radetzky had retired behind the walls of Verona fortress and even the battle at Goito was just a delaying action – he had moved quickly and didn’t need to risk a battle. Protecting Peschiera from a siege wasn’t his primary need and it actually pinned the Piedmontese. He risked battle (and a limited one) only when he sent troops to protect his lines of communications to the Tyrol at Pastrengo. Even battle at the bridge of Goito is difficult to represent with historical accuracy on the wargaming table: the Austrians had almost finished wiring the bridge when the Piedmontese attacked and the bridge blew up very soon – it didn’t blow up completely, but badly enough to make it impossible to cross under fire. The two sides then fired at each other across the river for some hours until the Austrians retreated due to Piedmontese artillery fire, the Bersaglieri crossed and a new pontoon bridge was set up. Unless you want to have a game that just sees units firing at each other across the impassable river without maneuver, it doesn’t really make for an interesting game, unless you allow the Piedmontese to have more time before the bridge is destroyed.

In order to get a more interesting wargaming campaign I think we need to alter history just a bit. Let’s imagine Charles Albert was not as hesitant in declaring war to Austria and actually had invaded Lombardy 1-2 days before what he really did, launching his forward brigades full speed ahead trying to catch Radetzky before he got behind the protection of the Quadrilatero (as an aside, this single idea could create more ideas for scenarios based on Piedmontese troops battling the retreating Austrians in Lombardy, before they cross the Mincio).

Due to this, the Austrians are able to maintain only a slight advantage over their Piedmontese chasers. Radetzky fears behind caught in the open plain just short of Verona if he lets the Piedmontese cross the Mincio unchecked, so he detaches part of his army to block the bridges, destroy them if possible, and anyway delay the enemy advance. Hopefully the delaying troops will be able to blow up the bridges and then reach their comrades behind the safety of the walls of Verona fortress.

General Michele Bes

Unfortunately for them, General Michele Bes, one of the best Piedmontese Brigade Commanders and the first to cross into Lombardy, has just taken the bridge at Valeggio before the Austrians could reinforce it. Austrian troops are closing in on Bes positions and hope they can repulse him back before the rest of the II Corps can reinforce the bridgehead (this would bring us to campaign scenario 2: bridgehead, which starts the main army attack across the river).

Meanwhile at Goito, south of Valeggio, Wohlgemuth brigade (Austrians) is trying to blow up the bridge but D'Arvillars’ 1^st Division of Bava’s I Corps (Piedmontese) has arrived earlier than expected and the wiring isn’t ready yet. It will be a race against time for each side (this would create the premise for campaign scenario 1: bridge destruction).

Now I just have to start playing it.

The Barolo Campaign

I recently found Bluebear Jeff’s page about ladder-style mini-campaigns submitted by various wargamers. It’s a collection of interesting ideas on linking different scenarios in order to generate a campaign narrative where each battle result determines the next scenario to be played (and sometimes affects its conditions). One of the most interesting ones is the Barolo Campaign by Peter Douglas.

I was attracted to it at first due to its name (“Barolo” is an Italian high-quality red wine) and because most of the locations in the campaign have Italian-styled names (the only exception is Montferrat, which in Italian should be Monferrato and is a region, not a city as in the campaign description). What’s it about? In short, two countries in mid-XVIII century are at war. Their border is marked by a river, the Barolo, and country B (Electorate) has a fortress city, Montferrat, that lies on one side of it. Country A (Empire) wants to besiege and take control of Montferrat, but has to cross the river first in order to lay effective siege lines. Country B of course tries to stop it from happening.

The campaign ladder is an example of the creativity you can use in designing such campaigns: A tries to cross the river at two different locations  (one with main army, one with a secondary force), and what happens at both locations contributes to the final outcome. Such ladder is a bit convoluted, and the campaign flow is not so easy to follow just by reading the instructions. Therefore I’ve drawn a flowchart that should make it easier to grasp it while reading and playing. It really shows the campaign creator’s sklls at designing it.

Barolo Campaign flowchart

There are a couple of instances where the text isn’t completely clear and I had to use my own judgement to interpret it: 

1. If A has lost scenario 1 and then has to fight scenario 4 and wins, what happens next? I assumed A would then go on as if he won scenario 1, meaning he presses on the attack. It makes sense, but a line at scenario 2 hints that it may not be necessarily so and that if A wins scenario 4 you get the same result as having won scenario 5 regarding what happens at La Morra.
2. If A loses scenario 2 but has won scenario 4 or 5 (this is the line that I refer to above), it says the main army regroups and continues the attack south, joining forces with the southern thrust at scenario 9. But what happens next? If A then wins, it says winning troops reinforce at either scenario 7 or 8 (the two possible versions of the final battle), but because of the above conditions, there’s no force at either 7 or 8 anymore! So which one is to be played? I’m still unsure about this and leave it to individual players to decide. Personally I’d play scenario 7 (and not scenario 8) because that’s a worse final scenario for A (after all, he got there in this way exactly because he previously lost!). Still, alternative interpretations would be good!

I’ll try to reach to the author about these 2 points in order to get what he meant.

Anyway, regardless of the above interpretations, the campaign sees a minimum of 4 and a maximum of 8 scenarios to be played – enough for an engaging and fun experience no matter the results. It can easily fit Napoleonics and/or XIX century narratives (possibly also XVII century). Being centered on operations across/near a river, I realized it could be a good basis for a 1848 1^st Italian War of Independence campaign across the river Mincio, or a 1849 campaign across the Ticino. I’ll talk about it in a future post.

Imperial Assault and app-driven wargames

A few days ago I played with my brother at Imperial Assault. It’s a fun and engaging game, where theme and mechanics combine really well. Like other recent board games (see Mansion of Madness) it uses an app to help players guide the game. In Imperial Assault, it determined which (and how many) enemies appear, where, when and how they behave. It also drives the scenarios and campaign forward. In other words, it fulfills the role of a Game Master, and allows solitaire play.

I liked it: we really felt the pressure of increasing numbers of enemies closing on our positions while we fought a desperate rearguard action. We didn’t have to check rulebooks or charts aside for the few ones regarding our own forces  - the app did most of it for us. It effectively blended the “old” (miniatures on a table) with the “new” (the app).

Ok, I agree it's more of a boardgame than a wargame. But it reminded me of the usefulness (maybe not always, but sometimes at least) of having an umpire/control during a miniature wargame too – something that nowadays is common only in professional wargaming for defence and the military. It was more common for commercial games in the past, just look at C.S.Grant’s table top teasers and scenario books, but the current difficulty of arranging face-to-face games with fellow players makes it even harder to find someone who doesn’t really play but just acts umpire – unless you attend a wargaming club.

And yet, maybe we’re missing something without it. The idea players may not know all that will happen during a battle (reinforcements, weather, sudden change of orders/objectives) or the fact they receive a briefing about what to expect – and then find differently and have to adapt on the spot.

We usually cover this with randomization (for example for variable-entry reinforcements) and it usually works fine. Most players (especially younger ones) consider “umpire” only as the people to ask for in-game rules clarifications or interpretations. Still, I can’t stop thinking that a similar app (better if non-rules specific) for scenarios and/or campaigns would be great.

Will app-driven games reach the miniature wargaming field? In a sense, with games like Imperial assault and other historical forthcoming titles, they already are, in a sense. It could even spark a new booming trend if they prove successful. But would a specific one aimed at traditional miniature wargaming be ever produced? I don’t know. You need a market for it, given the investment it would require to make it work AND be pleasant to use. I think it could be produced for a mainstream rules system with a large community of players worldwide. Or a generic one could be produced, one that can be adapted to any (a sort of modern version of “Programmed Scenarios for Wargames), but then you would lose the marketing angle linked to known rules.

We may be sad that maybe we’re losing the ability and willingness to do it on our own, or that it may drive people more towards a different concept of miniature gaming, but if technology can help revive and spark new interest in wargaming, then I believe it’s a good development anyway.