FLOWER OF CHIVALRY (FLOC) is a set of rules published by the Canadian Wargamer's Group in 1993; it was authored by Bruce McFarlane. There are 76 pages of text, with some four of them actually devoted to the rules structure... the remainder consists of army lists and scenarios and lottsa historical background pertinent to the middle ages.
On page 56 is a solo scenario, an English attack on a French strongpoint which took place on July 17, 1453. The French were besieging the city of Castillon, and Sir John Talbott, Earl of Shrewsbury, took it upon himself to help out the besieged townsfolk. He attacked... without any preliminary scouting... the redoubt in which the French artillery were located, and got his head handed to him.
In the FLOC scenario, Sir John's forces consisted of three battles, three groups. The entire attacking force is composed of:
| Troops | Number of Units | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Nobles | Men at Arms | Longbow | |
| Sir John's battle | 2 | 2 | - |
| James Talbott's battle | - | 2 | - |
| Evringham's battle | - | 2 | 2 |
The Noble cavalry units consisted of 3 stands each; all other units, i.e., all infantry, were of 6 stands.
Against the attacking 10 English units, the map sets out 16 defending French units; when the English get to within 6 inches of a defending unit, dice are tossed, a table of units is referred to, and the French unit may be one of crossbowmen or Men at Arms or dismounted Nobles or artillery or handbombards.
The English come in from the northern baseline; they must pass by the Abbey (see the map), and this, too, has a unit of defenders. Here, the dice toss decided that this would be a 6-stand unit of Men at Arms. Sir John's battle was in the van, and he ordered his Men at Arms to attack.
Under the FLOC procedures, one doesn't simply order an attack and push the troops forward. Each battle must be given one of five orders: Charge, Maneuver, React, Stand, or Fall Back, and one dices to see if the order is actually carried out.
Sir John shouted "Charge!" and I tossed his dice and referred to the following chart applicable to the "Charge" order:
- The unit will
01 to 05 React
06 to 35 Maneuver
36 to 100 Charge
Each of the five orders has its own listing.
Needless to say, I tossed under 36... Sir John's men refused to go forward. And, in fact, they did the same on the next turn; it took a third dice toss on Turn #4 before they got their act together. The loss of three turns in trying to get Sir John's battle to close with the defenders of the Abbey was critical... the scenario indicated that, somewhere over the horizon, were four French cavalry units riding to the rescue. They would start dicing for their appearance on Turn #8.
But now that Sir John's men closed to contact, it was their turn to bash the enemy. In the FLOC sequence, only the active side strikes on its half of the bound. Cards are drawn denoting the number of actions given to every unit on the active side, and each action permits one strike against the opposition.
Sir John drew a "3" card, i.e. 3 actions. The first action was used up in moving forward and closing, and the remaining 2 gave his force 2 hacks for each unit in the combat. A Noble cavalry unit and a Men at Arms unit had closed; each got 2 strikes, and they scored a total of 2 hits against the single French defending unit.
10-sided dice are tossed for hits. Depending upon the type of units involved, the required die throws to hit the enemy unit range from a "1-to-5" (mounted knights striking) to a lowly "1", when an artillery unit strikes. •
Each hit kills one stand; the target unit takes a morale test and subtracts 10$ for each stand lost. Here, the French unit calculated its morale factor as a base of 80$, less 2-stands lost (20$), or 60$. The defenders passed their test; they held and thus would strike back on their half of the turn.
What's interesting is that a single die toss can result in more than one hit. If, for example, a toss of 3 or less is required, then a "1" is one hit, a "2" is two hits, while a "3" is three hits. FLOC indicates a unit of 6 stands represents anywhere from 500 to 800 men; in removing multiple stands, therefore, the casualty rate is a fairly high one.
It took until Turn #5 before the Frenchmen at the Abbey were cleared out. Precious time wasted. While Sir John's first battle was engaged, the other two tried to bypass his troops. Note that on the map, there's a narrow bridge over which the English must cross on their way to the French redoubt; there were no known fords and the bridge was obviously placed there to cause a traffic jam. It did.
On Turn #6, the English force resumed its march.
But on Turn #7, I halted it. I had "Battlelust" problems. FLOC requires that each battle keep track of a parameter called "Battlelust" (BL)... a combination of efficiency and tiredness and cohesion and morale and you-name-it.
If the BL is too high (+7 or over), the battle is exhausted and horrible things can happen. If the BL is too low (-7 or lower), the battle is demoralized, and even more horrible things happen. The object of the game, therefore, is to balance the BL factor somewhere in the middle.
All three English battles had been on the move for 6 turns; all were tired, with large "plus" BL numbers, and so I gave them "Stand" orders and looked at the following chart, pertinent to the "Stand" order:
- Effect on BL
01 to 65 Stand -3
66 to 95 React -1
96 to 100 Maneuver +1
Each of the five orders has its own effect on the battle's BL factor; some increase it and others decrease it. Statistically speaking, if one wants to reduce a battle's BL, give it "Stand" orders, but note from the above chart that there's still a 5% chance (a dice toss of 96 to 100) that the BL goes up by a point. Now here's an unsolved problem in the FLOC scheme of things: when the dice are tossed for orders, the change in BL applies regardless of what the units in the battle are doing. This results in an apparent inconsistency.
For example, on Turn #5, two of Sir John's units were in combat at the Abbey, and his other two units were simply standing by. For Turn #5, I gave Sir John's battle "Stand" orders, and the dice toss was sufficiently low (see the above chart) to cause the BL to go down by 3 points, even though, during this time, half his units were fighting for their lives in melee!
The problem stems from the fact that the BL factor applies across the board to every unit in the battle as a whole. In a multi-unit battle, units may be doing different things... archers may be arching, knights may be fighting, other units may be standing by... but the all-encompassing BL factor affects them all equally.
The rules are silent on this matter, and so I took my guidance from the WRG school of philosophy: as long as the rules don't say you can't do it, you can!
Under FLOC, a battle must be given "Charge" orders to make contact, which, most of the time, raises the BL by 3 points. As soon as my English units were locked in combat, then, on the next turn, I gave them "Stand" orders. As indicated on the "Stand" order chart, this immediately lowered the BL level.
I have to admit I felt I was skating on thin ice in using this ploy, but, believe me, Sir John needed all the help he could get. On Turn #10, the front line units of Sir John's battle came within 6 inches of the redoubt... I diced for the French units, and up popped one unit... 6 stands... of crossbowmen plus an artillery battery: French fire caused one of the English Noble cavalry stands to disappear, but the unit passed its morale test and held position.
Having come this far, I was ready to charge the redoubt with Sir John's Noble cavalry. There was no way, said Sir John, the defending crossbowmen could withstand the heavy horse attack.
I quickly reread the scenario rules... just to make sure I wasn't cheating... and omigawd!... Sir John was in trouble again!
Horses cannot leap over the earthworks, said the rules. And so, right under the nose of the French defenders, Sir John's Noble cavalry dismounted... valuable actions were used up... one to dismount, one to cross the ditch, one to climb over the earthworks.
And all this under French fire, which took out another stand of Nobles. This meant a second morale test for the Nobles, yet despite a very low morale level, they passed!
In went the English over the ramparts with a loud "Hurrah!". In truth, it really wasn't that loud... I sort of whispered "Hurrah!" under my breath.
By this time, I had discovered another problem with the scenario. Each leader is given a classification (buffoon, plodding, efficient or brilliant), which then determines the content and makeup of the card deck from which he draws his side's action card. Sir John was defined as an "efficient" leader, which gave him several "3" action cards plus a couple of "1's" and "2's".
But nowhere in the text was the French leader's category specifically defined. The text merely says the French force is "modern and efficient". I took that to mean the French leader was as efficient as Sir John and gave the French a deck of cards identical to that of the English.
The deck is important because its draws determine both movement distance and the number of strikes permitted the active side when in melee.
And so on Turn #12, the men in Sir John's battle charged to contact. Two units entered the redoubt, and inflicted 4 hits on the artillery, which faded away. The French crossbowmen, however, were made of sterner material. Despite losing a couple of stands, they passed their morale test and held position.
Another factor now entered... the remaining French units. As the English entered the redoubt, five other French units, now within 6 inches of Sir John's troops, revealed themselves: 2 Men at Arms, 1 unit of crossbows, 1 handbombardiers, and l artillery.
Thus far, only seven out of the total of 16 French units had been revealed; more were still lurking in the background. Sir John scratched his head... "Definitely a rather crowded redoubt!" said he.
French crossbow fire (a toss of 3 or less) finished off one of the English dismounted Noble units, the one that had the single stand remaining.
Another interesting note on FLOC is that individual stands do not fire, a unit fires as an entity. Thus a unit, as long as it's on the field, and has at least one stand hanging in there, will receive its 10-sided fire die.
The scenario text stated that the English army started with an Army Morale factor of 10. The loss of this first English unit, the dismounted Nobles, reduced the English Army Morale factor by 2 points to 8.
FLOC mandates that when the Army Morale level reaches zero, the battle is lost. Which meant that Sir John had two factors to worry about: the "Battlelust" level of his individual battle groups, and the Army Morale level of his entire force.
On Turn #13, the supporting French cavalry arrived on the field. Fortunately, their entry point was some 4 feet away. This would give Sir John's troops a chance to eliminate a unit or two in the redoubt before the cavalry arrived.
It's Turn #14, and Sir John's units are still in contact, slugging it out with the French. Despite the long-term melee, Sir John's battle group BL factor is still fairly low because of my use of the orders ploy, giving "Stand" orders, previously mentioned. All's fair in love and war.
Turn #16 and all the English units have had their BL factor sufficiently reduced to enable them to attack the French. I give all English battles "Charge!" orders. Lots of dice tossing on the "Charge!" order chart... but the dice are against Sir John... only his own battle group obeys... their fellow units hang back, probably because they see impending disaster.
Another English unit gets wiped out; the Army Morale goes down from 8 to 6. An English unit retreats... it failed to pass a morale test, and the Army Morale is down to 5.
On Turn #17, another English unit disappears; Army Morale is 3. Definitely time to assess the situation.
As of this point, the English had penetrated only some 8-inches into the 2-foot-long redoubt. There still remained a large number of unknown French units in the redoubt, while outside the enclosure, the oncoming French cavalry were about to make contact. I had stood by the side of Sir John as long as possible, but now, I was forced to admit there was no way the English could win.
Out of curiousity, I diced for the types of remaining French units (7 of them)... they turned out to be dismounted Nobles, handbombardiers, and a couple of artillery pieces.
Back to PW Review January 1995 Table of Contents
Back to PW Review List of Issues
Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List
© Copyright 1995 Wally Simon
This article appears in MagWeb.com (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web.
Other articles from military history and related magazines are available at http://www.magweb.com