Bob Wiltrout hosted a 20mm SYW game, playing PIQUET rules. Jeff Wiltrout and I commanded the Prussian force… We each had a brigade of 6 infantry battalions, 2 cavalry battalions and 2 guns. Facing us was a similar size force of French. We were informed that the Prussians were of slightly better quality than the French, hence we were attacking. Infantry and cavalry battalions were composed of 4 stands, artillery batteries of 2 stands. Even though the batteries had 2 stands, the guns got only a single shot, i.e., tossed a single die. PIQUET uses all the dice in the book… 4-sided, 6-sided, 8-sided, 10-sided, 12-sided and 20-sided. The 20’s are used solely for seeing which side has the initiative. I didn’t understand the breakdown of missile fire ranges. Below are the ranges in inches. Type Point Blank Short Medium Long Musket 3 4 8 12 Lt Art 4 8 15 30 Med Art 6 9 18 36 Hvy Art 9 12 24 36 Point blank range for muskets extends to 3 inches, while the short range adds a single additional inch, up to 4. The change between point blank range to short is 4 inches for light artillery, and an additional 3 inches for both medium guns and heavy artillery. The entire table looks sort of bunged up to me… quite arbitrary, and not at all historically accurate. Of even more importance, due to the arbitrariness, it’s difficult to memorize, requiring frequent look-ups. Throughout the entire game, when we tossed for the initiative, I was extremely lucky for our Prussian side… rarely did the French win the toss. Winning the initiative in PIQUET is critical, for it permits a side to go on and on and on and on. In the mainstream of games, when you win the initiative, you get to move or fire first, and it’s then that the opposing side gets a chance to do something. In PIQUET, if you don’t win the initiative, you die… you do nothing, and it’s only the winner that can activate his troops. We Prussians had a deck of 30 action cards, as did the French. Each side rolled a 20-sider for initiative, and the high toss was given the difference, the delta, between the tosses as the number of cards he could draw from his deck. French toss a 9, Prussians toss a 16, and the Prussians can commence to draw 7 cards from their deck. The cards in the deck denote the actions that can be undertaken by the side. We Prussians looked for "Infantry move" and "Cavalry move" cards to advance up the field. I think that we had 3 "Infantry move" and 3 "Cavalry move" in our deck, so they didn’t appear that frequently. Even worse, I decided to send a 4-stand battalion of Grenadiers (I knew they were Grenadiers because Bob had indicated that they were the guys with the pointy hats) into a nearby woods to flush out a 4-stand unit of French skirmishers. To enter the woods, they had to draw an "Infantry move in rough terrain" card, and, once in, they had to draw other "Infantry move in rough terrain" cards to keep going… the normal ‘infantry-move’ cards don’t apply any more, and since there are less ‘move in rough terrain’ cards than the normal ‘infantry move’ cards, it was a mighty slow trek through the woods. At the start of the battle, I immediately sent my cavalry forward to charge the French guns. The horsemen moved at 9 inches per card (3 cards in the deck of 30), and they had to advance some 30 inches to contact. "Test the melee rules!", I cried. Alas! My cavalry never made it. PIQUET requires that each unit keep a record of whether or not its weapons are loaded. Once having fired, an artillery unit requires the draw of an "Artillery reload" card. There are, I think, 2 of these cards, and 3 other cards for reloading muskets. When the French battery first fired, it started out with a 10-sided die. There was a modifier for firing at medium range, and the modifier was to change the type of fire die from a 10-sided to an 8-sided. PIQUET is a "groping for dice" game, and all combat, firing and melee, is resolved using different types of dice. The French battery tossed its 8-sider, and I tossed a 6-sider… the difference is the number of casualties taken by the target unit. In the firing procedures, the firer’s die, as modified for range, cover, etc., is always matched against a 6-sider. It requires 2 hits to remove a cavalry stand, and 3 hits to remove an infantry stand. The battery’s toss was sufficient to remove 2 of my 4 cavalry battalion’s stands (4 hits). PIQUET does not require a targeted unit to take a morale test… regardless of its losses, the target sits and waits for its next card. As did my cavalry. The French artillery battery was now unloaded, but it managed to draw a ‘reload’ card before we Prussians drew another ‘cavalry move’ card. BOOM! My valiant cavalry was no more! Note that the range of casualties in this instance was from none (target’s 6-sided die more than the French 8-sided firer’s die) to 7 (French artillery die of 8 to a 1 on the Prussian 6-sided die). Since I only had 8 figures in the cavalry unit, a good, solid toss could have just about wiped it out. Losses Losses, therefore, can be quite catastrophic. The rationale, as I understand it, is that, during the bound, as cards are drawn, the little guys on the field are continuously firing at each other… the actual effect of all those musket and cannon balls whizzing around is resolved and becomes apparent only when the firing unit tosses its die against the defender’s 6-sider. The same philosophy applies to melee. Two units came together as a result of one moving on a ‘move’ card. And there they stand, seemingly immobile and frozen, until a "Resolve melee’ card is drawn. At this point, both sides toss their dice, and the difference is the loss taken by the lower side. Again, this can be quite significant, if one side tosses well below the other. Here, the thinking is that the two units, facing off, are continually striking at each other, smashing each other with muskets, sticking bayonets in each other, breaking skulls, kicking and screaming, and it’s only when the "Resolve melee" card appears, that the losses become apparent. Thanks to our unending series of winning the initiative, we Prussians came out on top. But again, as in all the PIQUET games I’ve played or witnessed, while the game can be termed "interesting", the sequence is lurchy and the game doesn’t seem to flow. There are several "Milling around" cards, and "Dress lines" cards in the 30 card deck, and these do nothing but irritate the participants, since they permit no action. So one-sided were the initiative rolls by the Prussians, that Bob brought up several suggested changes by PIQUET adherents to attempt to even out the sequence. Even so, I can only say that PIQUET is not my cup o’ tea. Back to PW Review January 2001 Table of Contents Back to PW Review List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 2001 Wally Simon This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com