001. The Battle of Loano - WDS Campaign Marengo

23 November 1795 - Historical - Intended to be played Head to Head - In September 1795 General de Division Schérer replaced the aging General Kellerman as commander of the Army of Italy. On October 26, 1795, a young upstart named Napoleon Bonaparte was named command in chief of the Army of Italy. Field command of the army remained in Schérer's hands for now. The situation along the Italian Riviera was similar to World War One with both the French and Austrian/Sardinian forces dug in facing each other over a landscape of mountains and narrow ravines and along the coast in towns, farms and lush landscape. The French were looking to break the stalemate and a young General de Division André Masséna worked with his commanding officer, who wisley felt that Masséna knew the ground better than him, to produce a plan that would work. The Austrians were commanded by FZM de Vins but he was battling the gout and the real command fell to FM Wallis. Wallis would command the Left Wing of the army while FM Argenteau would command the Right Wing. As usual the Austrian command was split and communication was not very good due to the terrain and weather (thus there is no overall Austrian army commander). The Sardinian forces under the Austrian FM Colli were on the extreme right denying the French the ability to turn that flank. Initially, Masséna and Schérer sought to turn the Austrian/Sardinian right flank but a snow storm blocked the passes and they had to come up with another plan. Masséna boldly produced a plan that would break the Allied center and turn the left flank of their lines thus causing them to abandon their positions. Colli's men would be forced to retreat north and out of the operational theater of war. The plan was both brilliant in planning and daring to the extreme. The terrain the French would have to scale was daunting but the charisma of Masséna and the tenacity of the French soldiers produced a masterpiece of victory. The French were able to take the key defensive positions and execute their plan to almost perfection. Masséna's division drove along the spine of the mountains forcing the Allied right to fall back along the coast. With a numerically inferior force Schérer and Masséna had won the contest. Player Note: The actual battle was two days long but it was determined during playtesting that the players would not need two days of battle to determine a victor. The Austrians lack an army commander in this scenario as Wallis acted more as a wing commander than he did as an overall leader of the forces. The former army commander, FZM De Vins is provided in a variant version of the scenario. The Allies have a Wing - Division - Brigade command structure which should provide sufficient command bonuses for those commanders in command range. The French have the same level of command - Army - Division - Brigade command level so they do not have an advantage over the Allies in that regard. Adding in De Vins was felt to be too much of an advantage for the defender. The French will enjoy a better command range over the Allies. Finally, the French flotilla has a variable withdraw time reflecting the uncertainty when the British navy will show up.