Battle of Klissow (Klezow) in the Twilight

You remember last time... I had become busy applying basing and painting troops for the Great Northern War; outside my supposed 'focus' for the year. This extended to doing some preparation and conversions to have some pancerni cossack cavalry available too. As ever, ambition exceeds time available, but I had them 'good enough' for a game when Julian came around for a few hours last evening.

Schulenburg's Saxon army in their defensive position. These are the most nearly complete of the troops on the table.

Klessow, fought in the summer of 1702 on 8th July by Julian calendar, 9th July by Swedish calendar and 19th July by Gregorian calendar, was the third in a string of against the odds victories by the Swedes, lead by their young king Charles (Karl) XII, in the first two years of the Great Northern War. Karl an audacious commander with a fine coup d'oeil, was proving to be far more of a challenge for his enemies than they had expected when they sought to take Sweden down a peg or two upon the ascension of this little-known, until then flippant, even 'playboy' youngster to the crown. Moments maketh the man and he had more than risen to the challenge...

As with all great victories of history, the 'challenge', in a wargaming sense, is to emulate it.

The game, using "Twilight of the Sun King", provides plenty of bonuses for the Swedes (quality of troops and command), against the strengths of numbers and position of their Saxon and Polish-Lithuanian opponents. The latter are no easy beats, with mainly average troops, but also some top quality and poorer, but overall more 'flaky' morale.

For this game I used the version in the second book of scenarios for "Twilight of the Sun King". We used the 'early start' option from the scenario, so the Saxons and Swedes were in place while the Polish-Lithuanian army arrived on the Saxon/Polish-Lithuanian first turn.

View of same from Saxon lines.

Charles ordered the centre to advance, supported by Rehnskiöld's cavalry on the right, while the left-flank cavalry faced off the Saxons.

The Saxon artillery fired on the advancing Swedes, focussing on the Livgardet till Fot (heavily disguised as the Jönköping regiment), but failed to affect either morale or to stymie the advance.

The turn before the Swedish successfully negotiated the swampy banks of the stream, making a GåPå charge against the Saxon first line (guards and Kurprinz/Koningen regiments)—I thought that I had taken the photo, but obviously did not in my excitement.
Note in the top-right of photo, the distinct, 'Julian manoeuvre' of a cavalry turn to the left to head around the flank. Never one to 'sit on his @rse', he likes to seize opportunities and can be guaranteed to try something audacious.

Excitement over on the Saxon right. The 'finest cavalry in Europe' successfully charge the Södra Skånska/Småland cavalry regiments, assisted by a flank charge by the Saxon Garde du Corps regiment.

The Swedish cavalry were sent packing; dented morale, but not broken. Even though my cavalry were on the receiving end, I was elated to see the hussars make a successful charge. Mind you, I was fortunate to have rolled well and so avoided my cavalry breaking!
(The on-going mêlée between the infantry can be seen in the centre of the photo.)

That was the last turn of the evening.

We'd completed two turns each that were 'full' in terms of movement and action, with plenty of discussion and double-checking of rules (being only my second go with them and 18 months in-between the two). Things are looking up for Saxon and Polish-Lithuanian forces, but the battle is on a knife-edge.

Will the best cavalry in European history (and the best troops to be on any table top, even exceeding Napoleonic French cuirassiers—a big call for me!) continue to emulate the great Sobieski?

Can the Swedish infantry break the centre, or will the Saxon's send them packing?

Will Rehnskiöld prevail on the Saxon left, or will the Saxon out-flanking manoeuvre work? 

To be continued...

For me, another successful test of "Twilight of the Sun King". Highly stylised rules, but a set that has managed to incorporate key elements of quality, command, attrition, terrain, as well as historical tactics and feel. A rare, novel set of rules. Not the only game in town for me, but certainly a keeper for a larger-scale action, requiriing fewer figures, especially while I'm in the process of 'raising' armies! I'll use them for the Great Northern War, of course, but also for Ottoman wars of the 17th and early 18th centuries along with Polish-Lithuanian/Cossack/Tartar conflicts.

For Julian, an interesting and enjoyable outing that led him to conclude 'not for him'. Too stylised, too abstracted, so not a set of choice, but certainly not 'never again'. Hopefully he'll be able to find a few hours in the near future so that we can complete the three of four turns that I reckon we'll need to bring this to a conclusion.

There has been a bit of action in the shed the past couple of weeks, with getting figures 'good enough' for this game and some reorganisation of storage thanks to these two lovely sets of drawers given to me by friends; 'surplus' to them, greatfully received by me.

I was wondering what Xena was fascinated by the other day, but soon realised,...

it was one of the lovely Black-headed monitor's (Varanus tristis) that lives or at least spends a lot of time in our roof space, sometimes running along beams inside and out. They usually make tracks quickly (not nick-named 'racehorse monitors' for nothing), but this one 'posed' long enough for me get this photo. Great for rat and mouse control! Always lovely to see and I expect of interest to viewers/readers.

References

“The Battle of Klissow 1702” In Kling (Jr.), SL (Ed.) (2015) Great Northern War Compendium The Historical Game Company. pp. 159–164.

“6. Klissow” In Twilight of the Sun King – Scenario Book 2 – Great Northern & Ottoman Wars.

“The Battle of Klezow (or Klissow) 9th July 1702” Weapons & Warfare https://weaponsandwarfare.com/2015/08/27/the-battle-of-klezow-or-klissow-9th-july-1702/

“The Battle of Klezow (or Klissow) 9th July 1702” wgamers.org.uk. http://www.wfgamers.org.uk/resources/C18/klezow.htm

Rules

Twilight of the Sun King, 2nd Edition

Scales

Base width represents ~300 m, base width 50 mm, game area 1 m x 1 m

Infantry: units approx. 1 600, 2 000, 2 400 men for small, average, large.
Cavalry: units approx. 800, 1 000, 1 200 for small, average, large.
Artillery: approx. 12, 20, 24 guns for small, average, large batteries.

Of course, these numbers are interpreted really loosely as with most 'unit' based rules nowadays.

Figures (all 1/72)

Saxon

Infantry Mars Saxon infantry.
Cavalry Strelets Russian Dragoons of Peter I
Artillery Zvezda Swedish Artillery of Charles XII and Mars Polish field artillery (standing in as the Saxon 3 pdr guns).

Polish-Lithuanian

Hussars Zvezda Polish Winged Hussars.
Pancerni Orion Polish Winged Hussars.
Dragoons (heavily disguised as reitars) Strelets Reitars of Charles XII.
Wallachian light cavalry Mars Polish 'Lisovchiki' (1st half of the XVII century).
Lithuanian Tartars Mars Lithuanian Tartars (1st half of the XVII century).

Swedish

Infantry mix of Mars Swedish infantry, Strelets Swedish Infantry of Charles XII & From Narva to Poltava.
Cavalry Strelets Lieb-Drabants of Charles XII and Zvezda Swedish Dragoons of Charles XII.