Liberated Hordes

I'm currently rereading Robert Hardy's 'Liberators', and it inspired me to get out my South American armies again, and give my HOTT variant, Liberated Hordes a go. Looking at this blog, it was 2019 since any iteration of them last took to the field, so a return was long overdue.

In order to remind myself of how to play, I set up a simple head-to- head fight with no special scenario rules. The armies were randomised, but ended up similar - the Patriots got seven infantry, four cavalry and an artillery, whilst the Royalists had one more artillery and one fewer cavalry. I diced for the generals and they both ended up as average, but also both had a trait; the Royalist general was Panicky, which meant he might flee the field if he thought things were going badly, whilst the Patriots were commanded by a Coward, which is a Panicky general that also offers no extra combat benefits to his troops. 

Here's the Patriot army - they are mostly Argentinian troops, but there's a Chilean flag in there as well.

I kept the terrain unobtrusive and mostly for show.

The Royalists. They anchored their flanks on a farm and some scrub, and sent some of their cavalry wide in order to try and flank a Patriot advance.

Both sides actually moved forward. To be honest I really started them too far apart. You can see that both armies retained an infantry reserve, with the general attached.

The Royalists opened up with their artillery, to little effect. Artillery isn't that powerful in Liberated Hordes; even if armies had guns they were generally fairly light.

On the flank the cavalry of both sides met in their own action.

The armies were now in musketry range, and the first round of firing saw the lines break up a little. I forgot that with these 1" square bases I generally have infantry only recoil half a base-depth, as it looks better.

The cavalry action, initially a stalemate, quickly went the Patriots' way

The Patriots finally pressed home an attack, and the Royalists committed their reserve.

The Patriots fell back and the Royalists reformed. The latter had taken casualties, and was getting close to breaking.

As the Patriots regrouped, their cavalry moved in from the flank ...

... and charged the Royalists in the flank. It looked like it was all over.

But no! The Royalist infantry destroyed the cavalry charging it, and a volley of musketry saw off the second element. The Royalists were still in the fight, and the Patriots were now taking casualties.

Both armies reformed and there was more musketry and fighting. The Patriots still had one base of cavalry left in the fight, and they tried another flank attack, supported by infantry this time. It was enough to break the Royalist left flank, and their army quit the field.

The end of the battle.

The Royalists lost six elements, and the Patriots four.

I've got the rules back into my head now, so will set up a refight next, with mixed quality troops (in this game I ran everything as regular). I am taking the opportunity to update the rules as well; I noticed that a few things I play aren't in the published version on this blog yet (and that was published in 2015), so an update is long overdue. I also have a small tweak to how I run militia troops to try out.

Just as an aide, this battle was fought on the 209th anniversary of the Battle of San Lorenzo, the only action that San Martin fought within the boundaries of modern Argentina. I mean I say 'battle' - it consisted of 500 men in total, but it might make for an interesting game.

Note: I have classed this as a game in its own right for 52 Games. Whilst it's a variant of 'Hordes of the Things', it's sufficiently different in tone and many mechanisms to justify being a different game.

52 Games - Game 14