Return to the ECW campaign

It has been about six weeks since the last time I played an English Civil War game as part of my on-going campaign. The last battle saw Parliament attempt to increase their control of the South Coast region, only to see their army repulsed in July 1644.

Campaign map as at August 1644

Moving ahead to August (after a roll of 1 on a D3 dice) we have a Royalist army march from the North Midlands into the West Midlands. However in Royalist controlled regions trouble was brewing with clubmen gangs fed up with deprivations cause by the war causing problems for local garrisons. This has resulted the artillery train being delayed and a smaller force being available (although some say poor dice rolling was the cause of that).

On the other hand Parliaments army was buoyed by a wealthy commander who supplied an additional cavalry unit (from his own purse no less) along with the continuing benefit throughout 1644 of well funded armies curtesy of excise taxes.

Chance cards in play for this game.

Orders of battle...

Royalist Units:

• 3 x cavalry
• 3 x infantry
• 2 x dragoons
• 1 x elite pike

Parliament Units:

• 5 x cavalry
• 4 x infantry
• 2 x dragoons
• 1 x lobster cavalry
• 1 x Artillery

The battle is taking place near the town of Driotwich.

Terrain cards

The terrain cards were drawn and tabletop setup. The Royalists commander will choose the long table edge to defend. While there is a river this is fordable at any point to all units except artillery, and all unit crossing the river will suffer the loss of 1 hit.

Tabletop layout.