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Black Powder: Battle of Assaye, 1803

This scenario provides everything you need to fight the Battle of Assaye with the BLACK POWDER ruleset, and has been designed to approximate the historical conditions, terrain, and deployments. The Maratha troops boast a significant numerical advantage as well as a murderous line of artillery batteries; nevertheless they are plagued by untested troops and unreliable leadership. Wellesley’s smaller force offers superior cavalry, two implacable Highlander battalions, and, of course, Wellesley himself. The setup has been crafted to offer a distinct, asymmetric challenge to both players.

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HISTORICAL NOTES:

On September 23rd, 1803, on a narrow shard of the Deccan Plateau divided between the rivers Juah and Kaitna, the coalition armies of the Maratha Confederation engaged a smaller pursuing British force with the intention of smashing it utterly, and thereby thwarting the British scheme to convert the Maratha states into subsidiaries of the East India Company. There was good reason to believe that they could succeed. In addition to their vast hordes of mercenary irregulars, the Marathas had fielded a large force of modern line infantry commanded by European officers, supported by a thunderous cavalcade of French-trained artillery batteries.

In contrast, the British army—like a perverse mirror of English colonial ambitions—was composed primarily of native sepoy troops backed by a few crack battalions of Scottish Highlanders; it had been separated from a nearby supporting army, and was outnumbered and outgunned by a factor of ten. Nevertheless, in what appeared to be an act of mad ambition, the 34-year-old Major-General Arthur Wellesley gave the order to fix bayonets and attack, driving his troops directly into the firing line of the Maratha guns.

Based on his suspicions about the quality of the coalition leaders, Wellesley had gambled that his disciplined, professional force would overcome the Maratha regular infantry and, in doing so, provoke a rout amongst the larger force of mercenary irregulars. The gamble paid out. Despite a horrifying toll (an estimated thirty-five percent casualty rate), by sunset the British army had broken the Maratha line and put the entire coalition to flight, securing a reputation and career for Wellesley that would later pit him against another great empire—the French Empire of Napoleon I.

A century later, as India struggled to forge a national identity from its motley of ethnic, religious, and tribal factions, the memory of Assaye—and of Indians killing Indians for European coin—began to seem increasingly distasteful, and the Battle of Assaye is now designated a “repugnant battle honour” by modern Indian Army units that still trace their ancestry to service with the East India Company. Indeed, their victory over the Marathas also put an end to serious resistance to the East India Company’s ambitions for over half a century, and ultimately paved the way for the establishment of the British Raj that would rule over India until 1947.

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SUGGESTED HOUSE RULES:

* In the turn order, swap the shooting phase with the command/movement phase. Each player's turn will now go as follows:

-Initiative moves
-Shooting
-Command/movement
-Hand-to-Hand Combat

(This more accurately reflects the historical advantage to entrenched defenders, as well as allowing disciplined units the ability to "give a volley, then charge.")

* A brigade is not broken unless at least half of its units have broken. (Being Shaken is not sufficient.)

* If a commander is lost in battle, immediately roll 2D6. If the result is less than the commander's Staff Rating, his brigade has been broken—or, if the commander is the general, the entire army has broken and the army is lost.

(This reflects the risk taken by an officer who chose to personally rally his troops or lead a charge. The presence or absence of a great commander often turned the outcome of battles. Wellington once said of Napoleon that "his presence on the field made the difference of forty thousand men.")

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Historical notes and scenario design by Nicholas Musurca

Special thanks to Kendo353 for providing custom miniatures for the Maratha army, also available here: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1553274691
Hovels: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1316077146
British miniatures (slightly rescaled): https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1536389472

Reference materials:
"Black Powder: The Last Argument of Kings,” Warlord Games
“Black Powder: Albion Triumphant,” Warlord Games
“Assaye 1803: Wellington’s first and ‘bloodiest’ victory,” by Simon Millar
"Queen Victoria's Enemies: India," by Ian Knight
"Sharpe's Triumph," by Bernard Cornwell
Wikipedia: Battle of Assaye[en.wikipedia.org]
The Times of India: British vs Marathas: Clash of military cultures[timesofindia.indiatimes.com]