Monday 27 June 2011

Sunny Spain



After ten days of a typical British Summer its lovely to come back to blue skies and warm evenings. The days are getting very hot, but the water in the pool is also warmer. Spanish summers do take some adjusting to, but we seem to have adjusted much better than we expected.

The Spanish spend most of the day indoors, keeping out of the sun. We have followed their lead, and spend most afternoons wargaming. Our wargames table is the coolest part of the house, and we have a large fan over the table if the temperature rises too much.

Most of today has been spent catching up on the administration for the Hanover campaign. This has resulted in the fifth battle of the campaign, and one that looks like being very interesting.

The Prussians have taken a hammering in the latest battles, and have had to retreat towards Magdeburg. The French have taken a day to regroup and prepare for the final push towards the river Elbe. However crafty Blucher has concentrated two of his corps and has ordered a last ditch attack on Helmstedt. Davout has ordered a second corps to move to support the Poles holding the town, but whether they arrive in time depends on whether the corps commander has anticipated the order and started to move closer to Helmstedt before it arrives.

I have also been working on the rules. I managed to write a first draft of the amendments, which include reaction to cavalry charges. These are all things which Jan and I have been using in recent months, but had not amended the rules yet. They will need a little play testing before I amend them on the rules blog.

My desktop computer has started to crash for no apparent reason. My computer man thinks it may be the heat, and that may just need a good clean out - or perhaps a new fan. He comes to have a look tomorrow, and I am hoping that it will be quick and cheap. Meanwhile I still have the laptop. But the keyboard seems much too small for my fat fingers.

If he sorts it out tomorrow I will be able to send out the messages and umpire report ready for the next set of orders. Then I will see whether Marmont will arrive in time to save Poniatowski at Helmstedt. The PBEM certainly adds a degree of uncertainty to the campaign, which was missing when playing solo.

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