Egypt 1882

 After last weeks batle I noticed that the British had some Indian troops in the armies, so modified a lancer and an infantry stl by giving them tourbans & 3D printed a brigade each of Bengal Lancers & infantry. 

Tonight we tweaked the battlefield a bit with a lot of small ridges to potentially restrict lines of fire & set up a smaller battle than last week, but this the British force was half Indian.  Jim commanded the Anglo-Indians.  & Steve & Mark had the Egyptians.

The starting deployment viewed from behind the B/I's.  Indians on their left.

The B/I force spread out as it advanced fearing being outflanked by the more numerous Egyptian cavalry & confident of the their superior firepower.

The B/I's advanced into rifle range & a firefight erupted all along the line.

The first combat was a mutal cavalry charge on the Indian's flank.
The left of the Egyotian charge was hit by rifle fire  before the charge & then teh Bengali's threw hot dice & broke them staight up. 

The other Bengal lancer unit held on against amassed enemy long enough for their comrades to hit their enemy in flank completing the rout of the Egyptian cavalry on that flank.
The Indian infantry with the support of the British artillery broke half the Egyptian infatry on their flank. 
But on the other flank, the Egyptian had the artillery support & the dice gods favoured favoured their riflemen & it was the Brits thayt were getting the worst of the firefight. 

The Indians soon completely broke all the Egyptians on their flank.
But it was a very different story on the other flank.  A combination of artillery & rifle fire broke the left flank British unit which created an overlap that lead to British line falling like dominoes from the left.
Then the Egyptian cavalry attacking in mass broke the British cavalry's front line. 

Both sides had won a flank but had high casuaties in total.  However, the Egptians had more units left unshaken so it was the Brit/Indian force that broke.

Last week the Brits blew away the Egyptians behind earthworks, but this week the Egyptians in the open won the firefight.  Meanwhile the Indians rated similar to the Egyptians won against equal numbers. It seemed that both left flanks had the better of the dice, but it was also significant that teh flank with the artilery superiority won in both cases.

It was very apparent that the increased range & firepower of the breach loading rifle rifles made firefights brief affairs.  That combined with the small forces being deployed in single lines without support made for a quick & exciting fight.