"Waterloo- Prussians" Topic

I'm hosting an umpireless WL re-fight in a few weeks, using DBN, 1 base per brigade, 1"= 100 yards, 10mm figures. Troop scale is a bit out as each brigade only has a frontage of approx 160 yards at that scale….. but it's always a compromise. Building size is OK(ish)- I'm using 3mm buildings- LHS is 30x40mm, Hougoumont, 60x80 & they're 15" apart (apologies for mixing units!) So far, so good.
What I'm less comfortable with is how to build in all of the uncertainty of the Prussians' arrival for both Wellington & Bonaparte.
We could go with the scenario writer's rule- they start to arrive after turn 12 on a 5 or 6….
But I think I'm looking for something more elegant…. maybe randomising the possible arrival time (earlier, later, never) & then a dice roll as prescribed on top of that….
Thoughts?

"Never" should not be an option. Wellington knew for certain that the Prussians were on the way – if not, he wouldn't have stood in the first place.

How about a snakes and ladders approach? Customise the events with period specific stuff like village on fire (snake), hussars find old roman Ford across River (ladder)? Bob Cordery has this kind of idea as a campaign framework.

We diced for arrival and location, and also diced for Grouchy, Prussians a D10, Grouchy a D20. Prussians rolled a 4 Grouchy a 15, but it made for a good game,

Tally Ho!

If you say Waterloo lasted 9 hours and the Prussians hove into view (i.e. a threat but not in combat) about one and half hours after the start then you can scale it accordingly depending on how many moves you want the battle to take.
The Prussians held off attacking until they had managed to concentrate sufficient force to take on Lobau's 6th Corps. So, you could make the timing of their actual attack dependent on how much the French commit to hold them off. Less than the entire 6th Corps plus Domon & Subervie and they should attack earlier, more and they will attack later.

Why introduce chance into this? They were moving as quickly as they could so a much earlier arrival is unlikely and as mentioned, Wellington wouldn't have made a stand if they weren't coming.

Only in that never arriving would ruin the game, seems to have happened to me in many convention games.

Eumelus…. Never is noted & won't be an option.

Wellington may have "known" they were coming. Why does that make it a certainty that they would? And if the Prussian plans were changed on the 18th, allowing for delays in communications, could Wellington have safely pulled back? And having committed to fighting at Waterloo, would he have done so if he could?

In my BBB scenario I had this "Where is Grouchy?" optional rule that gives some chance of (a) fewer Prussians arriving and (b) some French arriving. (It assumes Grouchy moves early enough and close enough to intervene at Waterloo.)

From Allied Turn 4 onwards, roll D6 at start of Allied movement phase.
1-4: Prussian reinforcements arrive as scheduled.
5: One random Prussian reinforcement unit scheduled for that turn fails to arrive and is removed from the game.
6: As above, plus a French 4 S unit of Vandamme's III Corps arrives. No more than three of these may arrive.

Scenario in the BBB group files (along with 100 or so others):
PDF link

Ziethen's change of direction then reversed by Muffling was fortunate. Had he headed on down to help Bulow's IV Corps he could have ended up like d'Erlon two days earlier, wandering around ineffectually. Even once the Prussians had arrived, things could have worked out very differently (without Grouchy suddenly appearing out of thin air)