War of the Spanish Succession Playest

I completed a playtest of my WSS amendments last night. A entertaining game with
some surprising results.

I went for a larger game format of 14 British units vs 15 French. The French had
more infantry but some of these were of lower quality and they had one less
artillery unit.

The French were to occupy two towns and hold these against the British attack. I
was fully expecting the British to advance with artillery support, perform a
successful assault through sustained musketry fire and sweep the French from the
field.

Nothing of the sort. The French took the initiative by forcing some early
cavalry duels. Again the superior British cavalry were expected to win this
contest. This didn't happen: the French firepower horse were effective in both
defensive and offensive fire and despite the elite status of the British a
couple of their units were impacted by poor morale throws. The French cavalry
captain was also able to use a local superiority of three units to two to
perform some flank attacks which neutralised the edge the British had in
hand-to-hand combat. Despite the success of the French I didn't get the feeling
I'd made the Firepower Horse overpowered. Like most aspects of the game there
seemed to be a consistent "bad luck" theme in the dice rolls from the British
side.

This also featured strongly in the infantry and artillery battle. The French
held their line and prevented the platoon fire of the deployed British units
disrupting their cohesion. They also had a reserve to plug gaps and their
artillery on the left flank performed an immense task in blunting the British
assault there. In contrast the British guns performed poorly.

Overall the French won in a comprehensive manner. They retained 6 Infantry, 2
artillery, their dragoons and most significantly three cavalry units. In
contrast the British conceded on three infantry and three artillery units(which
would shortly be neutralised by the unopposed French cavalry).

I was pleased with my amendments. I made some changes to my Dragoons when I had
them charged while still mounted. I ruled that they could not perform defensive
fire in these circumstances.

For aesthetics I dispensed with the 4 stand line and used 6 stands for infantry
arranged three to front with a depth of two (still counting as four for
casualties). The cavalry and artillery remained as per the rules.

This now leaves the Seven Years War to complete my initial first round of NW
period adaptation playtests. I'm finding that each H&M period I play not only
adds insight into that particular contest but also to the other peripheral
periods I've been looking at.