In Deo Veritas Inquiry

[MGH]

Well I bought the rulebook In Deo Veritas for battles in the Thirty Years War. I want to play my first battle for the local group Saturday and picked Fleurus as it is a small one. Rules seem understandable enough - will know better once I've done an actual game of course.

However - in the opening OOB info on Fleurus the book states the Protestants have 17 brigades not counting artillery and the Spanish have 14 brigades. Then the next page details the Spanish army - their starting set up etc. and -

there are only 11 brigades not 14.  That is quite a discrepancy so which is right?

Anybody play this one?  I'm worried missing 3 of 14 brigades might make a big difference in game balance.

[Codsticker]

I'm not familiar with the battle or In Deo Veritas but the Wikipedia page (link) may be helpful.

[Battle Brush Sigur]

Quite accurately observed. I never noticed that before!

I played that scenario ( https://www.tabletopstories.net/language/en/2020/07/in-deo-veritas-basing-woes-and-test-game/ ) and found it to work O.K. as is, especially as an intro game. Even with just 11 brigades vs. the Protestants' 17, the Spanish army's got a pretty good chance for several reasons:
.) due to the terrain layout the overhelming cavalry superiority on the Protestant left is harder to bring to bear.
.) Spanish tercios (all discussions about what formations actually were like aside ), especially being 50% veterans, in a static defensive position are tough.
.) In general the quality of the troops is in favour of the Spanish side.
.) It's not mentioned in the rules specifically, but there's that Wagenburg on the Spanish left. You can either just have it be impassable terrain  for cavalry (anchoring the flank). IIRC historically that Wagenburg kept the Protestant cavalry from breaking through at that flank. If you want to give the Spanish a further edge on that flank you could have the Wagenburg fire like an infantry detachment.


I think that the Spanish are in a pretty OK position in that scenario. The interesting question would be whether to play the Spanish infantry as "Early Tercios" or regular infantry brigades. That's up to you really. I guess the stats for "early tercios" are warranted (and add a little spice to the game), but historically the term irks me a little for 1622. But I'm no expert. I just developed that little "waitaminute..." reflex when it comes to the terms 'tercio' in terms of battlefield formations and 'cracole' in terms of tactics.

Either way, if you look at the points values in the back of the book and add them up (I haven't to be honest, but I think it should work out) I think that the numbers will be at least pretty even in the end.

Looking at OOBs (historical and from other games) for that battle, I think that the layout looks about right in IDV terms, so my guess would be that it's just a typo in the overview table on page 76. Good thing is that either with 11 or 14 brigades doesn't change the bracket in the big, colourful army exhaustion table.

I think that the game should work out fine. :-) Just now I looked at the date of the post, so I hope that the game worked fine for you!

[MGH]

Thanks for your reply, Sigur, and btw I love your armies, they look incredible.

We have actually played the game twice now - Fleurus both times and with two different groups of players. I just ran the first one for two teams of two players each and then second game I did need to play to balance the players.

Now I will admit, I did not use the Spanish as tercios, I've read various accounts which debate this and went with them as regular brigades (hey all the players were new and wanted to keep it as simple as possible). So keep this in mind when I continue however....

I also read that some of the Protestant cavalry left the battlefield early in the real battle due to being disgruntled with their lack of pay, etc. So I had them roll on this table:
          1-2  Unit leaves field immediately.
          3-5  Unit stays but is Raw.
             6   Unit stays but is Trained.

So more severe than the book. First game only 1 unit left - second game 2 did.

OK, given all that the Protestants won both battles.

In the first they actually were getting thumped on their left wing where they had 7 cav units to the Spanish 3  (plus musketeer detachment in the walled farm to help which they did). But the infantry fighting went against the Spanish and the Spanish right wing cav were wiped out. So Protestants ended up breaking Spanish will.

In the second there actually was no clash at all between the infantry, both Protestant cavalry wings smashed their opponents and when the two wings failed the Spanish also rolled badly and the Will roll sealed their fate. So very one sided win.

I honestly do not think the scenario is all that balanced. Top it off, I read somewhere else on line of another group somewhere who played it and the Protestants won there too.

Strange for a real battle where the Spanish won.

Just saying.

Did we have fun, yep!  There are parts of the rules we really like, parts we did not care for So the jury is out. Im going to try Twilight of Divine Right rules next.

[Battle Brush Sigur]

Maybe in my case the Spanish were saved by the fact that I, playing solo, forgot about the rules  for wing fatigue for a good while.

Yes, the thing with the "early tercios" is an interesting question. I guess simply in terms of rules using the rules for Early Tercios for the Spanish would be warranted, simply due to the difference in troop quality and training, but as a term it can be misleading. For intro games though I also always prefer going simpler and minimize the number of different troop types/formations.

Your house rules for the scenario make sense. IIRC in the Twilight of Divine Right version of Fleurus there is a chance of several Protestant cavalry units not showing up.

Overall how much of an impact did Raw troops have faving Trained or Veteran ones?


IIRC the victory was mostly on a strategic level as Mansfeld didn't want to put his (mostly newly raised) army in danger already, so he ended up having to take the detour around  the Spanish army. Anyway, glad you had fun. Which parts of the rules did you like / not care for much? And what did your players think of the movement distances?


Me, I love the Wing Fatigue/Will rules IDV has. They can be a bit harsh at times, but I think I prefer that over armies fighting to the last man. Overall I think that the rules are built on things looking way scary and steady, but as soon as disorder breaks out that whole card house may collapse pretty swiftly, be it at a unit level or on the army level. I also enjoy the secret orders stuff. Oh, and the post-battle pursuit stuff to determine the final outcome.

[MGH]

True Mansfeld went around the Spanish later but that's because he was beaten. In our games his side won both, the second win was utterly lopsided. Oh well, it was a learning experience.

What did we like?  The fast movement was great, some games take too long for the plodding approach marches if the setups are too far apart.
                            We liked that Combat whether shooting or melee used the same system.
                            Secret orders also was cool.
                            We got both games done in one session each night which is always a good thing! So
                             you get a definitive results.  Oops, we never even used the post battle
                             pursuit rules. Shrugs.

 What did we not like:   The rules being short and simple left us confused a lot as to specifics
                                and we had to stand there debating what to do. Slowed the first game
                                down especially. But then this is probably true for most gamers playing
                                new rules.
                                  The Disorder and Fatigue rules had a full page of modifiers to wade
                                  thru each and every time.

   Oh yes, about Raw Troops - well I don't think it's a huge disadvantage having them at least not in our two games so far.

                   I had mentioned that I was getting Twilight of Divine Right rules to try - well my copy arrived and at first examination - oh good lord - all the modifiers on the QRS! I know you don't use all of them of course but that is still going to be a lot of plowing thru for a single game. I'm already worried and my friends despise lots of modifiers so this might not go well at all.

          One way or the other though I am going to find a rules set to game the Thirty Years War though as I love the period.

              Thanks for your input!  Oh and might I say it was your spectacular armies and cool AARs which pushed me over the edge to get into gaming this war. So you are to blame! 

[DivisMal]

Sigur‘s AAR mase me really curious, too. Thank goodness a little panic about heating prices made me stop making an instabuy.
What I really found intriguing here again was the idea of going for the big picture and not bogging down in details ( there are other rules and scales for that)!

[Battle Brush Sigur]

@MGH: Yes, at first I was taken aback a little with the movement rates, but it's just as you said - it's just saving time really. Same in Twilight of Divine Right really, where technically a formation may move over and over and over - as long as they pass their test to do so.

The rulebook could be clearer in some parts, that's true. Or rather a few more sentences would have helped make things a ltittle clearer for the ever-industrious mind of the wargamer. But in the end it's a pretty clear and concise rulebook. With a very useful QRS in the back.

I really should give using Raw and Vetertan troops a go some time. There's these pretty impressive modificators for the save dice, but maybe that doesn't come into play that much in the actual game.

Twilight of Divine Right is a little bit crunchier than IDV, but as a pay-off you get more period-specific stuff and some very interesting and useful support rules between units. Don't worry about the big table of modifiers- - usually you got those down pretty swiftly over the course of a game. I mean it is several modifiers, but at least the amount of dice is always the same.

I got into the Thirty Years War because I was interested in that catastrophic conflict ever since high school. Then I saw a docu series from the late 90s a bunch of times, and last but not least it's something somewhat 'local'. Just interesting stuff all across middle Europe. And it's endlessly deep. Fascinating period. And I'm happy to announce that after pretty much exactly 10 years I now got a collection that's big enough to play most battles of the conflict. (unless there's something silly like 10 units of Transylvanian light cavalry for White Mountain or something like that. )


@DivisMal: Aye, I think that's something that currently stops some insta-buys for several people, I suppose. Bless those little panics. Anyway, yeah, big battles are interesting as long as you don't have to be Napoleon and a Sergeant at the same time (to cite an old figure of speech). I started with Pike&Shotte by Warlord Games, which is alright, but now I'm nicely settled between IDV, Twilight of Divine Right and occasionally Baroque. Another wargamer from 'round here told me he wrote his own set of rules for TYW battles, which is based on battlefield squares, denying battlefield space and whatnot. which sounds interesting and which I hope I get to play at some point.