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We used a house set of fast play Napoleonic hex rules which Dave Mac has been developing, to pit a sizeable French army against Russian opponents in an equal points contest. Although the rule system is still at the development stage, it did produce a very fast moving, enjoyable club game which was concluded in a little over two hours.
The French army (Tim and Tony) deployed first and Mick and I moved first - this was decided by di roll. The bulk of the French cavalry was positioned on their left so we matched this by placing all our cavalry on our right, but kept two squadrons of Hussars as reserve in case we needed to commit them elsewhere as events unfolded. Both armies positioned their infantry centrally, although three units of Russian Grenadiers were on our extreme right wing just beyond and in support of our massed cavalry.
We used our first move to advance all our units slowly forward positioning our artillery at either end of our line of Russian line infantry, the light battery on a small hill. We had a couple of units of Cossacks which we used to extend our line to our right and plug the gap near the table edge – they were of limited combat value in this scenario!
Let battle commence! Tony charged my right wing with his French dragoons and advanced his Legere infantry towards my infantry and artillery. Our guns proved ineffective and as soon one of our two units of Jager infantry and our light artillery were soon under the hammer from the charging dragoons. Meanwhile my Cossacks had been shot-up by French infantry and neutralized. One of my infantry battalions formed square to protect my infantry line from the marauding French dragoons, but things were already looking challenging.
On the right wing Mick had launched our massed cavalry against their French counterparts with some initial success. However, Tim had an up-hill advantage afforded by an 8 hex hill on which the French squadrons formed a line. The Russian grenadiers were too far behind to offer any support to the cavalry and slogging match developed which consigned many squadrons from both sides to the casualty tray.
On my side of the table I prepared for the French infantry attack. Thankfully the heavy gun battery recoiled one of the advancing battalions which left just two French against three of my Russians. I had a 3+ advantage before the double di roll and still managed to lose. Resigned to defeat on my section of the table I looked across Mick’s side to see that he wasn’t doing particularly well either. The mass cavalry battle was nearly finished. The French infantry were now advancing into the void and with the Russian grenadiers still too far to the right to offer salvation - it was already a lost cause!
We had a general discussion about the how well the rule system had worked, and although there is some tweaking and refinement required, all were pleased with the pace of the game, how easy the rules had played, and the ‘Napoleonic’ feel of the game.

A really interesting and lovely looking game. These are the two armies that I would most like to do for this period. I know you quite like showing infantry formations as two bases deep (the sense of mass it brings to the hex is superb), but I wondered, this being French / Russian, the depth of unit does not look out of place, but if you were putting a British army on the table, would this system require them to look more like line i.e. a single base depth rather than 2 bases deep?

This rule system that we used for this game was a very 'slimmed' down version of a pretty comprehensive hex based system that Dave and Tony have have been working on for some time. The idea was to simplify things to a point where a large Napoleonic battle could be fought to a conclusion in a couple of hours or so. The full version includes lines one base deep, attack columns two base depth and march columns 4 base depth, skirmishers, victory points, role of built-up areas, unit support etc. The British or indeed any firing line could be two basas in a hex with a battalion extending across two hexes. This was very much a fast play experimental game, which, with a little further development could produce a very viable alternative to the full system, hopefully better suited to evening games of limited duration.

Thanks Paul, coming back to this thread gave me an excuse to look at those pictures again