The first outing for my French

Today, we had another try out of Beneath the Lily Banners 2 - but now I got the chance to use my newly finished French army ( they will get Bavarian allies as soon as I can get them painted!).
I will start with a quick tour of the French!

Cavalry Regiments Cosse and the Gendarmerie de France with the Dragons Colonel-General behind. 

 2 Battalions of the Gardes Francaises on the left, then Swiss regiment Salis next to Province. left rear is Regiment Crussol and left rear German regiment Greder.

 To the right of the gun, Regiment La Reine with Lyonaise behind, to the left of the gun Regiment De Maine, with Royal De Vasseaux behind.

 At the left of the French infantry line, Regiment Irlandoise du Dillon, with Royal Italien behind. The Dragoons in the foreground are the Dragons du Dauphin, who were backed with Cavalry regiment D'Orleans.

 The 12 infantry battalions deployed in 2 solid lines.

My right wing horse were restricted by a large wood on their right. 

Lawrence, running the Danish allies of the Austrians had 4 squadrons of horse beyond my right wing. 

 A brigade of Danish infantry with a gun faced my cavalry.

 Ian's main Austrian infantry brigade were on the Danes right. 

Another brigade of Austrian foot with 2 brigades of Austrian Kuirrasiers behind them and on their flank. 

( An overview of the centre) 

The game began with the Danish gun pounding my cavalry as it advanced round the wood. 

 One of Regiment Cosse's squadrons retreated through the 2 following ones.

 They rapidly regained order. My Dragons Colonel General dismounted.

 Phil, in charge of the French left and centre advanced on the Austrians. My Infantry brigade held back and began to turn towards Lawrence's Danes.

 Phil sent his Dragons du Dauphin into the wood to protect the flank of the Irish.

 With awful command rolls, the main body of the Austrian infantry stood still as Phil advanced.

 Lawrence got all the movement as his Danish infantry rushed to stop my Cavalry.

 The Danish gun changed its target to my infantry.

Lawrence moved his Danish horse towards my Cavalry too. 

My French artillery was firing very well. 

 One of Ian's Austrian battalions was shaken by their fire.

I was unable to get my horse round the wood without being shot up by the Danish infantry, so they turned to move through the wood to engage the Danish horse, covered by a squadron of regiment Cosse. 

 My Dragons Colonel-General moved toward the wood too.

(The position in the centre at this point.) 

 Ian tried to advance an Austrian battalion. 

 Their target, regiment Province, was taking hits from the Danish gun, but remained steady.

 To cover my cavalry's move into the wood, the covering squadron charged the advancing Danish infantry, who failed to stop the charge with a ragged volley.

My horse smashed into the infantry and won the first round of melee, but the Danes held.

 Some Danish elite Kuirassiers charged in support of their infantry and wiped the French out.

Cosse's brave charge wrecked the infantry, and allowed the rest of the French horse time to enter the woods.

In the centre, the Infantry of both sides had ground to a halt. 

 The Danish horse was reforming a line before my cavalry engaged them. 

 Asingle Danish battalion detached to engage my gun.

 The Austrians still found themselves unable to move.

 Nor did Phil's French.

At this point, the Austrian gun misfired! followed by the French one opposite!, both proved unable to fire for the rest of the game.

The Danish one was still firing though... 

..despite another hit, Regiment Province was unperturbed! 

The Danish cavalry attempted to charge the Gendarmes Eccosaise in the wood in the flank, but they failed!

 The Gendarmes had time to deploy to attack the Danish horse, the crisis was over.

 My infantry was formed to resist the attempt on their flank.

 In the centre, a battalion of Gardes Francaises were trading shots with the Austrians, and winning.

 With no gun to worry them, Phil's infantry began to advance again.

 The broken Austrian gun withdrew, and the Austrian cavalry began a long move to support the Danes.

Directed by Mareschal Villars himself, my gun engaged the advancing Danish foot. 

The Danes began to suffer. 

At this point, we agreed on a minor French victory, as we had caused most casualties, and our army was in much better shape than some of the Austro-Danes units.

The real win was we learnt more of the rules! - we all had a good game!

We were a little late starting our game, as a very nice family from Vienna visited us, their son, Simon, is a wargamer and is interested in the British wargaming setup. I hope he finds some nice gamers in Austria to play against when they leave our Sceptred Isles!!