Slow-Mo Piquet: turns 6-7

Turn 6

Sequence decks unchanged except impact of fully routed Prussian Dragoons (random card replaced by Dress Lines)

Phase 1

Roll 1: 7:19, 4:8 pips

Prussians turn Maneuver, then Infantry Move. Burgsdorf attack 4/Kurmainz, leaving Willemey out of command. Fusiliers advance, Salmuth to contact with 2/Kurmainz. Kurmainz fire an opportunity volley at short distance, D10 d1 for 1 stand loss, 1:4 for no effect. Then turn useless card until a Heroic Moment shows up last, let's see what it will turn out to be.

Empire turn DL, Elite Reload (used for the Kurpfalz Guard) and cav move for nect time.

Roll 2: 10:16, 2:4 pips.

Prussians turn DL (I'll carry the heroic moment through that) but then a difficult move, so the heroics are not needed. Then turn DL and Maneuver.

Empire move their Cuirassiers to their left flank, turn DL

Roll 3 for 2 pips: 13:12, Empire turns another DL

Roll 4 for 1 pip: 19:9, Empire turns another DL

Phase 2

Roll 1: 10:16, 3:6 pips

Prussians turn and use reload for 3 pips, turn Officer Check but have nothing useful to do with that, turn melee. The Grenadiers use the last pip for their melee against 4/Kurmainz, with D8 u1 charging vs D8, 7:2 for 5 hits and one stand lost, and defender tripled: Kurmainz rout and are inralliable. As a result, Prussians get two more pips, Empire lose 3 morale chips (melee lost, unit routed and stand loss).

Salmuth fusiliers use the opportunity to melee 2/Kurmainz, at D8 up 1 charging vs D8 down1 for 1 stand lost, losing 1:6 in a reverse of the first melee's result: 3 morale chips lost and the Fusiliers rout unralliably. Empire get two pips.

The last Prussian pip turns a Cav Move.

Empire now has 5 pips, turns a reload and reloads 2/Kurmainz, fires Kurpfalz at Willemey Grenadiers D10, 10:3 for another two stands loss. Empire spends one morale chip for a challenge on Willemey, which is D8 down lots for lost stands to D4 against casualty D8 for 7 hits, 3:4, disordering the Grenadiers and pushing them back 1", for another Prussian morale chip loss. Next pip reloads them, last one refills one opportunity pip.

(I only noticed later that the Grenadiers were actually off the table after losing the fourth stand, as Piquet assumes units to have four stands each while my basing gives them six).

Note 1: I took the bonus pips for won melees from the 20 pips per phase, but am not sure whether that is correct (I guess when no pips re left in the phase's pool I wouls generate extra ones?

Note 2: I marked unralliable routers by removing the stand with their flag, maybe this could even be seen as a flag captured by the enemy?

Roll 2: 12:12, turn ends

The tide has turned - after a brief melee on the Prussian left and intense firefights in the center, half of the Prussian division is broken and they need to try and extricate the remaining troops before they are crushed completely.

Turn 7 (towards noon, assuming the troops started marching around 8:30)

The Prussians have lost 3 out of six units, so they will have to try and withdraw without being completely wiped out.

Phase 1

Roll 1: 10:12, 2 pips Prussians: turn a useless Elites Reload because the only target for the remaining Grenadiers is the routing Kurmainz batallion, and another Cav move which comes a bit too early.

Roll 2: 10:12, 2 pips Prussian: two Dress Lines.

Roll 3: 3:11, 2:6 pips

Prussians turn Dl, Musket Reload, Brilliant commander for a first inf move (starting with the routing Fusiliers)

Empire turn Native Move and Cav Move.

Roll 4: 9:1, 6:2 pips

Empire move the Cuirassiers, but lose time getting on the hill on their left flank. Then turn useless cards, ensing with a Heroic Moment for their next card.

Prussians turn Officer Check and move their staff out of the way of the retreating infantry.

Phase 2

Roll 1: 4:10, 2:4 pips

Prussians turn Cav Melee and Cav move, and do bring  back the Hussars to the foot of the hill. Next card is Musket reload.

Empire turn Musket reload, allowing the Ferntheil infantry up to three shots at the withdrawing Grenadiers. The first one is at D10 d1 med range, u1 for fist fire, 1:3 for no effect.

Roll 2: 10:18, 2:6 pips

Prussian Grenadieres return the fire at D12 d1 med range, 3:3, reload and fire again 10:2, for a two stand loss on Ferntheil. Then turn deploy, Officer check and Inf Move.

Empire don't bother to reload and fire Ferntheil (at down 3, it would only give them a 1:24 chance to remove a stand), but instead turn Cav move and difficult move (allowing the Kurpfalz Guard to leave the village on their next move). 

Roll 3: 18:10, 6:0 pips, as only 6 pips were in the phase (and Prussia is down to their last card...).

The Kurpfalz Guard move out of the village to pursue, and take opportunity fire from Hoffmann Fusiliers at D10 d1 med range, 6:3 for one stand loss. They return fire at D10 d1 med range, d1 for stand loss, 3:1 for no effect.

Then turn Officer Check, and Command Indecision to end the phase.

Phase 3

Roll 1: 17:18, Prussians turn DL and end the turn.

Slow Mo Piquet: Initiative statistics Turn 1-5

One of the striking aspects of Piquet is the random initiative pip assignment. This seems to raise eyebrows for first-time players, and I didn't dare go for the rules as written, either, going for a house rule to split the initiative between winner and loser roughly 2:1.

I understand that much more statistics are needed to check how fair the written rules approach is vs the various house rules, but I can't resist writing up some quick stats based on the first five turns of my detailed play-by-play.

Overall, very hard ini swings are only weakly balanced by the house rule and late-in-the-phase rolls often use up all remaining pips for one side. 

Turn two phase 1-2 added up balance out perfectly, but phase and 4 which went completely to Empire by the die rolls and the house rule only compensated for that very little.

Turn 3 overall was won by the Empire in house rules, by as much as the Prussians would have won in standard rules.

Turn 4: overall, 1 pip difference between house rules and standard.

Turn 5: all phases but the second favor the Prussians, the house rules mean the swing in favor of the Empire in phase 2 is reduced, which nearly counteracts all of the other splits in favor of the Empire.

So, as expected, the house rules smooth out the swings a little bit, but actually increased the overall inequality from 2% as per standard to 10% as per house rules. So much for fiddling with rules you don't quite understand yet...

Turn	Roll E	Roll P	House Pips E	House Pips P	Rule Pips E	Rule Pips P
Turn 1	16	15	1	0	1	0
Phase 1	16	15	1	0	1	0
Roll 1	7	6	1	0	1	0
Roll 2	9	9	0	0	0	0
Turn 2	115	97	34	26	38	22
Phase 1	26	37	9	11	4	16
Roll 1	8	6	2	0	2	0
Roll 2	2	11	3	6	0	9
Roll 3	5	12	2	5	0	7
Roll 4	11	8	2	0	2	0
Phase 2	59	57	10	10	14	6
Roll 1	20	15	4	1	5	0
Roll 2	18	19	0	1	0	1
Roll 3	14	5	6	3	9	0
Roll 4	7	18	0	5	0	5
Phase 3	30	3	15	5	20	0
Roll 1	18	2	11	5	16	0
Roll 2	12	1	4	0	4	0
Phase 4	39	15	16	4	20	0
Roll 1	5	3	2	0	2	0
Roll 2	20	7	9	4	13	0
Roll 3	14	5	5	0	5	0
Turn 3	73	76	21	17	16	22
Phase 1	35	31	12	8	10	10
Roll 1	12	7	4	1	5	0
Roll 2	10	20	3	7	0	10
Roll 3	13	4	5	0	5	0
Phase 2	38	45	9	9	6	12
Roll 1	6	16	3	6	0	9
Roll 2	8	4	3	1	4	0
Roll 3	4	2	2	0	2	0
Roll 4	2	5	1	2	0	3
Roll 5	18	18	0	0	0	0
Turn 4	70	53	21	12	22	11
Phase 1	37	33	12	8	9	11
Roll 1	7	10	1	2	0	3
Roll 2	5	8	1	2	0	3
Roll 3	6	11	1	4	0	5
Roll 4	19	4	9	0	9	0
Phase 2	33	20	9	4	13	0
Roll 1	17	4	9	4	13	0
Roll 2	16	16	0	0	0	0
Turn 5	198	223	44	54	39	59
Phase 1	44	51	9	11	8	12
Roll 1	8	2	4	2	6	0
Roll 2	8	17	3	6	0	9
Roll 3	8	6	2	0	2	0
Roll 4	13	14	0	1	0	1
Roll 5	7	12	0	2	0	2
Phase 2	52	44	11	9	14	6
Roll 1	15	12	2	1	3	0
Roll 2	7	9	0	2	0	2
Roll 3	12	16	1	3	0	4
Roll 4	18	7	8	3	11	0
Phase 3	48	54	8	12	7	13
Roll 1	16	17	0	1	0	1
Roll 2	4	14	3	7	0	10
Roll 3	10	3	5	2	7	0
Roll 4	18	20	0	2	0	2
Phase 4	28	38	8	12	5	15
Roll 1	11	6	4	1	5	0
Roll 2	10	17	2	5	0	7
Roll 3	7	15	2	6	0	8
Phase 5	26	36	8	10	5	13
Roll 1	8	3	4	1	5	0
Roll 2	8	19	3	6	0	9
Roll 3	10	14	1	3	0	4

Totals

472

464

121

109

116

114

Slow Mo Piquet: Turn 5

As the frontlines get closer, action intensifies. This turn 5 went through the complete Prussian sequence deck in five phases.

Phase 1

Roll 1: 8:2, 4:2 pips

Empire turns 3 useless cards (incl. Officer Check) and, on their last pip, the Cavalry Melee. Let‘s see whether they get to use it before the Prussians can use theirs with the charge bonus.

Prussians turn Officer Check and Musket Reload for no effect.

Roll 2: 8:17, 3:6 pips

Prussians turn Officer Check and Cav Melee just before the Reichsarmee get to use theirs (though with the WRC in hand I see that the Prussians get the charge bonus because their card resolves the melee, not because they actually moved to contact...); they resolve it on pip 3 with a roll of Empire D10 unmodified vs Prussian D8 up 1 for charge down 1 vs cuirassiers (I‘m not sure I like this, cuirassiers are already stronger as heavy cav...) up 1 for the army cavalry combat effect card for a net D10, rolling 8:4 resulting in a 2 base loss and a 14“ rout move for the Prussians. 

Melee morale effects: both units, as cavalry, are automatically disordered after the melee. The Prussians lose a total of four morale chips for losing a melee and 2 stands and routing (I assume they do not lose another chip for becoming disordered as the disorder is from the cavalry melee rule, not from a successful morale challenge); the victorious Cuirassiers do not lose a chip although they do get disordered. The pursue test for the Cuirassiers is their unmodified morale D6 vs D8 for routing cavalry, a 3:5 so they stay put.

After a useless card on pip 4, the Prussians turn Infantry Move on pip 5. As the Prussian Burgsdorf Grenadiers have the routing Dragoons directly in their face I‘m not sure whether they have to wait until the cav routs through them, or they can move through the routers at their own initiative. I‘ll read the rules (for now) that line can also voluntarily move through routers at the cost of becoming unformed, but will make them pass a difficulty check, as for moving in IV terrain, i.e. their morale D8 down 2 for line formation to a D4 against the terrain IV DC D6. They fail 3:6, stay put and go out of command as the Willemey Grenadiers advance normally.

The Reichsarmee don't need the cav melee card anymore and turn another cav melee, an elite reload (useless because the Kurpfalz guard is still out of range) and dress lines.

Roll 3 for 5 remaining pips: 8:6, 2 pips Reichsarmee 

Turn infantry move and move the first line brigade up to the village.

Roll 4 for 3 remaining pips: 13:14, 1 pip Prussians: Fusiliers move up

Roll 5 for 2 remaining pips: 7:12, 2 pips Prussian: turn cavalry move, move the routing Dragoons.

Phase 2

Roll 1: 15:12, 2:1 pips

Empire bring infantry forward, and turn a reload.

The infantry lines are drawn, the Prussian Dragoons have routed away while the Suebian Cuirassiers still block their infantry, and the Kurpfalz Guards are about to enter the village in their front.

Prussians turn a useless Musket Reload

Roll 2, 7:9, 2 Prussian pips: Elites reload, DL

Roll 3: 12:16, 1:3 Pips

Prussians turn infantry move and use two pips for a full oblique move of the Willemey Grenadiers. The Kurpfalz Garde respond with an opportunity fire, D10 up1 (first fire) down 2 (long range 8") vs D6: 7:2, 5 hits, 1 stand lost, no morale challenge (not worth it gainst the Morale 8 Grenadiers).

First volley fired by the Palatians, but for no effect. An intensive exchange of first fire volleys ensues.

Empire use their pip to reload the guard.

Roll 4: 18:7, 8:3 pips (exactly using the remaining 11 pips)

Empire: replace the opp. pip

Turn Cavalry Move and use it to retreat the Cuirassiers behind the infantry line (the risk of charging the Grenadiers and take a full volley seems to big).

Turn DL and Melee, then Move III/IV and the Guards enter the village.

Turn another Move III/IV.

Prussians use 2 pips for a full oblique move of the out-of-command, and 1 pip for a half oblique move of the Fusiliers

Phase 3

1st roll 16:17, Prussians turn DL

2nd roll: 4:14, 3:7 pips

Prussians turn cav move, move routers, then turn Native Mobility, Melee, Move in III/IV, Heroic Movement for a maneuver which is not very useful, and DL.

Empire turn Officer Check, rally unformed Cuirassiers, and move the General's staff ahead a bit.

3rd roll: 10:3, 5:2 pips

Empire turn infantry move and use 2 pips for the Infantry brigades (the out-of-command Guard in the village stay put). Then turn maneuver, but keep that for later and let Kurmainz 1st bat. fire on the Hussars at medium range, D10 up1 (1st fire), down1 (med range) vs D6: 3:1, one stand loss.

Prussians turn Maneuver and DL.

4th roll for 2 pips: 18:19, Prussians turn Brilliant Commander and plan to use that to let the Hussars retreat with Cav move

The last pip goes to the Empire, who use the Maneuver to wheel the Cuirassiers for a march to the left.

Phase 4

Roll 1: 11:6, 4:1 pips; Empire turn DL and Command Indecision, for limited damage, but the Prussians retreat their Hussars put of firing range.

Roll 2: 10:17, 2:5 pips

Prussians turn cav move, their Dragoons rout off the table. Then turn inf move and advance the Grenadiers. Guards fire on Willemey, D10 up1 for point blank, 1:4 for no effect. 4/Kurmainz fire against Burgsdorf at medium range, D10 vs D6, 4:6 for no effect (forgot their 1st fire bonus, prbably reflecting their poor fire discipline). The Grenadiers return the fire, Willemey against the village with D10 up1 1st fire, down2 village, down 1 for 1 stand lost, D6vsD6, 3:5 for nothing. Burgsdorf return fire at 4/Kurmainz, D10 up1 1st fire, d1 medium range, d1 unformed, D8vsD6, 2:1 for a single hit not worth a follow up.

Empire turns Deployment and Musket Reload. (The Prussian Grenadiers should have started with a D12, I guess they are too confused from the approach march...)

Infantry blazing away

Roll 3: 7:15 just using up the remaining 8 pips 2:6.

Prussia advances the Fusiliers, and I/Salmuth fire at 2/Kurmainz at long range, D10 up1 1st fire, d2 long range, D8vsD6, 3:5 for no effect. Then turn Cav Melee, and Musket Reload, reloading the Grenadiers.

Empire reload their central units.

Phase 5 of a long turn

1st roll: 8:3, 4:1 pips

Empire reload 1/Kurmainz, fire the Guards D10 up1 for pointblank, 7:3 for 1 stand casualties against Willemey and 4/Kurmainz at Burgsdorf D10 d1 medium range, and refill one opportunity pip.

Prussians reload the Salmuth Fusiliers.

Roll 2 8:19, 3:6 pips

Prussians turn Officer Check, move their General up, rally the unformed Grenadiers and return them to in command. Willemey doesn't bother to fire on the village again (D12 d2 for losses and d2 for the village).

Turn Deploymemt, and Burgsdorf fire at 4/Kurmainz again D12 d1 for medium range, 3:6 for no effect

Empire turn 3 DL.

Roll 3 for 6 pips: 10:14, 1:3 pips

Prussians turn a DL and fire Salmuth at 2/Kurmainz D10 d1 medium range, 4:1 for 1 stand loss.