Again this is ‘live’ blog and I will be updating it from time to time as I discover things. The date of the latest version is 25 March 2025.
The death of Gustavus Adolphus at the battle of Lützen
The acid test of any set of rules is whether they deliver a typical historical result in the same circumstances as a known historical event. Are distances travelled in the same sort of period, does fighting last as long as the historical event, does the progress of the fighting follow the historical events with regards to casualties, routs, retreats, units pushed back or surging forward? The main problem is finding a historical event, at a scale suitable for the wargames tables and rules, and with sufficient detail to make an evaluation, that seems to possess the same features as most other attacks. So many, well recorded historical events are recorded simply because they appeared to be an outlier, an exceptional event with an unusual outcome which makes it worth recording. Likewise, casualty results are often contentious, many soldiers are not killed during the battle but rather during the retreat or units suffer desertion before the battle started. Finding a suitable example with sufficient historical detail and possibly backed up by archaeology, is challenging, especially from the earlier periods when printed records are less common.
Lützen (1632)
Cornelis Danckerts - Battle of Lützen as seen from the Imperial side however the depiction of the Imperial deployment is incorrect and outdated.
For the Thirty Years War period, one of the most studied battles is Lützen (1632), for the simple reason that the Swedish king, Gustavus Adolphus, was killed during the battle. This momentous event meant that eye witness accounts were recorded and disseminated and the events of the battle were recoded in great detail. There has been considerable later historical research with the Swedish General Staff conducting a detailed study of the battle and there has been an archaeological study of the battlefield in 2023. We have quite detailed knowledge about the events of the battle, particularly the death of Gustavus Adolphus.
The mist that hung over the battlefield that day, resulted in two events, firstly the Swedish cavalry on the right of the line conducted its own attack on the Isolano Croats, fake troops and Imperial baggage and got separated from the rest of the battle. Only the Småland Horse stayed in the locale of the infantry together with the King. Secondly, the four Swedish brigades that made up the first line, split apart and made two separate attacks on the Imperialist line. The Swedish and Yellow (Guards) Brigades on the right of the Swedish line deviated off to the right and attacked the Imperial brigades of Breuner and Comargo with the seven Imperial guns. It’s this discreet action that we are going to use as our example to test against variou sets of rules to see how they perform.
10:30 am the Swedish army had finished deploying north of the canal and the attack started with the right wing cavalry moving off first to drive away the Croats
11.00 am Gustavus reached the bend in the road. The Småland Horse was either delayed by the ditch alongside the road or by the fire of the seven gun battery
11.30am the Swedish Brigade (1,581) and Yellow Brigade (1,220) arrived at and crossed the road. They seize the Imperial guns driving off the commanded shot along the road
12.00pm Imperial units started to counter attack with the Comargo (900) and Breuner (800) Brigades, Gotz cuirassiers (400), Piccolominimi harquebusiers (500) supported by the Baden (500) brigade from second line.
A gap now emerged in the Swedish front line as the Blue Brigade was drawn into the fighting on the left flank around Windmill Hill. With no cavalry to the right and no infantry to the left, the two Swedish brigades ar
A protracted struggle ensued around the guns with the Swedish brigade being caught in the flank by the Imperial harquebusiers and cuirassiers while engaged to its front
1.15pm The Swedish and Yellow Brigades fell back having suffered at least half their strength as casualties.
Wilson, Peter H. Lützen. First edition. Great Battles (Oxford University Press). Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press, 2018.
So in summary, two Swedish brigades advance 1,200 meters from their starting point, against 7 guns with commanded shot and two Imperial brigades. Then you have the counter attack with an additional brigade coming up and the cuirassiers and harquebusiers able to attack the right flank of the Swedish brigade as the Swedish cavalry has disappeared into the mist and the Blue Brigade was drifted off to the left. The attack lasts from 11am until 1.30pm or 2 and a half hours. 2,800 Swedish Foot, fight 2,300 Imperial Foot and 900 horse and 7 guns of various sizes. In the area of the guns, the King runs into a body of Imperial cuirassiers and is initially wounded in the elbow by a pistol shot and then another shot to the back and he falls from his horse. Later Pappenheim’s cuirassiers sweep through this area and the wounded King is killed by a shot to the head and his body stripped.
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Ground scale 1 Bw = 60 mm = 150 m or 1: 2,500
Timescale not specified but assuming advance of 3 km an hour (2 mph) 250 m would equal 5 minutes
11am (Move 1 Bounds 1a and 1b) Swedish move forward to cover 1,200m (8 BW) to enemy guns
11.10am (Move 2) to 11.45am (Move 9) Under Bombardment by Imperialist guns fail 1 Action Test on 1 or 2 1D6 and do not move forward as trying to coordinate attack
11.50am (Move 10) Under Direct Fire as within 3 BW
11.55am (Move 11) Under Direct Fire as within 3 BW both Swedish Brigades fail morale test
12.00am (Move 12) Swedish capture guns Gunner pass morale test and shelter with nearest Imperial unit
12.05am (Move 13) Imperialists begin counter attack Comorgo and Breuner advance but Comargo fails Action Test
12.10am (Move 14) Imperialist both fail AT
12.15am (Move 15) Imperialist advance
12.20am (Move 16) Imperialists advance and contact Swedish brigades. Swedish +1 Elite, Imperialists -1 Small. All pass morale
12.25am (Move 17) Baden advances from second line to join fight. Swedish brigade fails Morale Test
12.30am (Move 18) Imperialists fail both morales tests Swedes fail one
12.35am (Move 19) Baden joins the fight as a support which adds +1 to Imperialists Swedes both fail morale, Imperialists fail one
12.40am (Move 20) Imperialists 1 morale test (Comargo is now within 1 of routing as are both Swedish brigades) Cuirassiers and Harquebusiers attack flank of Swedish Brigade and Swedes both fail their Morale Test
12.45am (Move 21) Swedish fail both morale tests and retire.
As regards time, events moved a bit quicker than in reality and given that most of the delay was imposed on the Swedish advance by artillery fire. The 8 BW advance took 12 moves or 50% longer simply from failures of Action Tests. The actual fight around the gun position lasted 6 moves with the Swedes starting with 4 morale. Up against Comargo and Breuner, the Swedes would have won in the end simply because they were Large Units and Elite while the Imperialists were Smal units. Baden's support helped even the score but almost all units were on their last legs by the end when the cavalry attacked the flank.
Did the rules make the player behave as they should do? The bonus given for flank support and rear support would tend players to bring the second line forward sooner and for the entire line to remain tight together which would not create the conditions for this attack in the first place. The early delays in the advance due to artillery fire are just tedious and add nothing to the battle.
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DBR rules as written tend more towards a 'game' rather than a historical recreation so I have made some minor adjustments to change the balance more towards the historical.
The first of these changes regards PIP points and groups. Current PIP rules tend to force players to bunch all their elements together into one big group. This allows multiple March moves to be made. However, my aim is to use a historical order of battle and more formal groups based on the Brigades used by both sides. The modification is to move in the FOG-R direction and specify formations and give a PIP allowance to commanders so that they can move all their Foot and Horse units on a throw of 4. Swedish Front line commander has 5 formations each made up of 12-15 elements to represent the brigades. The commander has a PIP score of 1 + 1D6 so will be moving 2 to 7 formations a move. As formations get damaged or broken up he will need these extra PIPs to move the larger number of formations.
The second change is to address Mike Guth's comments about Shot targeting enemy Pikes by multiple elements at long range. I discussed this in an earlier post and decided for this game that firing elements would have to ‘line up’ against their opponents and would only be allowed to gain the additional firer bonus if a second rank was deployed or if they overlapped their opponents.
Ground scale 1: 1,250 (50p = 30mm) and 10 minutes for a pair of bounds
11.00am Move 1 Swedish PIP 5 = 6 Move 100p towards enemy (distance 1,600p or 1,200m) currently safe from artillery
11.10am Move 2 PIP 6 Move 100p
11.20am Move 3 PIP 3 Move 100p
11.30am Move 4 PIP 4 Move 100p
11.40am Move 5 PIP 3 Move 100p come under Imperialist guns firing 1200p
11.50am Move 6 PIP4 Move 100p gunfire
12.00am Move 7 PIP 5 Move 100p (900p) Recoil 50p (850p)
12.10am Move 8 PIP 3 Move 100p (750p) 1 element destroyed Swedish brigade
12.20am Move 9 PIP 1 Move 100p (650p)
12.20am Move 10 PIP 5 Move 100p (550p)
12.30am Move 11 PIP 4 Move 100p (450p) reach the road about an hour late!
12.40am Move 12 PIP 3 Move 100p (350)
12.50am Move 13 Pip 4 Move 100p (250)
13.00am Move 14 Pip 3 Move 100p (150) Distant combat with commanded shot guarding guns which Recoils
13.10am Move 15 PIP 3 Move 100p Artillery destroyed and Commanded shot destroyed
13.20am Move 16 halt. Comargo starts to advance to retake guns
13.30am Move 17 Comargo advances
13.40am Move 18 Swedish Brigade and Comargo conduct Distant Combat Swedish firing: 1 Swedish Recoil and Imperialists 1 Destroyed plus 2 Recoils. Then Imperial firing 1 Swedish Recoil with 2 Imperialist Recoils
13.50am Move 19 Distant Combat Swedish firing: 1 Swedish Recoil and 3 Imperialsit Recoils. Imperial firing 1 Sedish Recoil and 2 Imperialist Recoils
14.00am Move 20 Distant Combat Swedish firing: Swedish 1 Destroyed 2 Recoils and Imperialist firing Swedish 1 Destroyed and 1 Recoil with Imperialist 2 Recoils
14.10am Move 21 Close Combat Swedish 3 recoiled Imperial 3 recoiled and Swedish 2 recoil and Imperialist 3 recoiled
14.20am Move 22 Close Combat swedish 2 recoils and Imperialist 2 recoils and for the Imperialist bound Swedish 1 recoil and Imperialist 2 recoils
14.30am Move 23 Close Combat Harquebusierss attack flank of Swedish Brigade and destroy 1 element of shot
14.40am Move 24 Close combat Swedish recoils but Harquesbusiers destroy another Shot and force another to recoil.
With half the group now destroyed, the Swedish Brigade must retire which allows the Imperial Cuirassiers to flank the Yellow Brigade and drive them back too.
Overall the advance was far too slow taking one and half hours to travel the 1200 m which was covered in half the time in reality. The combat took an hour which is about the right amount of time, So overall a good result if a bit slow to play and lots of die rolling for little effect.
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I wanted to try an ‘old skool’ set of rules so have tried my club set of rules for the English Civil War, written by our founder George Gush. In these rules a Foote move is 6cm and leasures 2 minutes.
The first 11 moves saw the Swedes advancing quietly and then 4 moves under long range artillery fire with no effect. Close range artillery fire for the next 4 moves was far more deadly taking a figure off each move and then the commanded shot around the guns took off another 2 figures. Feeling somewhat battered the Swedes paused after captrung the guns while the Imperialist counter attack rolled in. Comargo’s brigade field only 4 stands (each of four figures) while the Swedish Brigade fielded 5 stands, however the effects of the artillery and shooting and knocked one of these off, so it was an even fight.
5 moves of shooting reduced both sides to a couple of battered stands, so that the final close combat charge by Imperial pikes was just the coup de grace.
It was now just 12 o’clock and the Swedes had been completely destroyed and the Imperialist were left with just two stands with two figures on each.
In conclusion, these rules are far too bloody with combat lasting just 12 minutes, while the movement rates are far slow by comparison.
I was not surprised by these results as the combat mechanism seems to have come from the WRG 1685-1840 rule set without amendment. To be more representative it should be toned down by 3/4.
Conclusion
Gottfried Heinrich Graf zu Pappenheim
Bernhard of Saxony
I quite enjoyed running this test with the various sets of rules, it was quite revealing playing the same ‘game’ back to back using different rule concepts.
What struck me, was how much the rule sets stuck to ‘standard’ wargaming concepts or mechanics without attempting to match historical type events. I am reminded of the battle of Naseby when the Parliamentary first line of Foot was pushed back onto the second line. When have you seen a set of rules that allows for that? Likewise, at Lützen the two Swedish brigades retreated onto their second line after their failed attack rather than being routed or destroyed. As always morale played a much greater role in early modern battles than in eighteenth or nineteenth ones, with their professional troops and stricter discipline and control mechanisms.
