A Clash of Steel
The toy warriors are gathering in the war room. Mat has told me he likes the idea of random generation of sides rather than calculated choice so each group of units or units will be given numbers and a card draw or dice roll will decide on each sides composition.
Warriors available will include chain mail clad, plate armour, mounted and on foot as well as Viking types and archers, catapults and mercenary Mongol archers as well as mercenaries armed with great swords. There will also be the ever suffering peasants. A number of heroes and champions will also be present. If one side is much weaker than the other it will be given some other advantages such as a tower and playing the role of defender. It will be interesting to see if the two sides even out.
Objectives will include farms and loot. The war begins tomorrow morning in the land of Beerstein and I'll update this post tomorrow night.
As I brought out the various units I had a real dose of inspiration. The Viking (or 'Hill people') would have the outflanking rule which some units in 40K have. What this means is that they are held in reserve and diced for to come into the battle but instead of necessarily arriving on the base line they are diced for to see which flank they may arrive on. I am considering also making them mercenaries.
The other thought I had, as, past midnight, I put away my ACW wagons and gun limbers to make room for the medievals, was to again borrow another idea from 40K and dice for battlefield deployment; that means that deployment could be ends of the board, sides or diagonal. Next we will dice off to see who sets up first and thus chooses to go first or not. The loser can then attempt to 'seize the initiative' on a thrown 6 of a D6 and go first after all.
THE FIRST FIVE MOVES
Each unit was given a playing card and we used a second deck to take turns in seeing what units we got. When we had finished I had a large horde of Vikings with four Viking heroes, one foot and one mounted units of plate armoured Teutonic knights, small unis of long bowmen, bowmen, handgunners, and crossbowmen, a cannon and a medium catapult, a couple of units of medium knights and two largish units of foot knights in plate. I also had two plate armoured heroes. Mat had a largish unit of peasants, two large units of long bowmen, a large unit of plate armoured foot knights with halberds and another with sword and shield, a unit of medium Mongol horse archers and another of heavy mounted Mongol archers. Mat had three plate armoured heroes. He also had three medium catapults and two largish units of plate armoured mounted knights with lances. My army was considerably larger. I felt things should be evened out and gave Mat a tower which he put on his flank and filled with a large unit of light longbow men. I also upgraded an objective, which was close to Mat's deployment, a church on a cliff, from 50 points to 120 points. On reflection I think I over compensated him as his mounted troops were very powerful. The advantage I had was that my Great Sword mercenaries and six units of Vikings had the outflank rule. This was weakened somewhat as they came on in dribs and drabs and one unit was driven off the board by a cavalry charge.
Below is a choice of card marked units.
Below: Mat fills his tower with longbowmen who were deadly against my outflankers.
My Teutonic knights race to the bridge.
My deployment zone in Beerstein as the army marches to attack Bogavnia.
Mat's and catapults cavalry
Mat places Lord Swartz with a band of peasants, at first a seemingly curious move, but soon to prove a big speed hump to my Vikings. Normally the peasants, with low battle skills, no armour, poor weapons and chicken hearts would perish very quickly.
My Great Swords and Mercenaries trap the medium Mongol cavalry and archers in the open. One unit of Vikings refrains from action as it demands more money from its employers. it would soon be pushed off the table edge by a mounted knight charge.
Mat's deadly archers
Mat brings up reinforcements. His commander, next to the tower, urges his men on and they pass many morale tests.
My archers lurk in the forest. eventually knocking off a couple of Mat's impetuous knights that are recklessly trying to get into my deployment zone but unsupported by other units. Nether-the-less they hold up nearly half my army trying to get through the bottleneck, before finally being destroyed..
My foot knights are slowly pushed back by a single unit of Mat's impetuous mounted knights. However, they have been ground down by my earlier missile fire and the melee as my heroes add their weight to the battle.
My Tuetonic knights cross the bridge and have covering fire from some Viking bowmen.
Mat's longbowmen defend the church, the main objective in the game.
My Viking outflanking spearmen engage the trapped Mongol horsemen and my Great Swords are about to wipe out a small unit of archers.
Mongol armoured horse almost wipe out the Great Swords but a new unit of Vikings wipes out the greatly diminished Mongols.
Viking spearmen wipe out the catapult crew only to be charged by the mounted knights.
Nearest is a converted Timpo metal figure, next is a rare 1950s plastic alien converted into a handgunner, followed by two made in China pirates with no real structural change and last a Hing Fat (or is that Phat - I forget) pirate changed into a Renaissance looking fellow. The two closest have the simplest and earliest types of handguns, tubes on sticks basically. The handgunners did not play a huge role in the game, especially as they can fire only every second turn.
Warriors available will include chain mail clad, plate armour, mounted and on foot as well as Viking types and archers, catapults and mercenary Mongol archers as well as mercenaries armed with great swords. There will also be the ever suffering peasants. A number of heroes and champions will also be present. If one side is much weaker than the other it will be given some other advantages such as a tower and playing the role of defender. It will be interesting to see if the two sides even out.
Objectives will include farms and loot. The war begins tomorrow morning in the land of Beerstein and I'll update this post tomorrow night.
As I brought out the various units I had a real dose of inspiration. The Viking (or 'Hill people') would have the outflanking rule which some units in 40K have. What this means is that they are held in reserve and diced for to come into the battle but instead of necessarily arriving on the base line they are diced for to see which flank they may arrive on. I am considering also making them mercenaries.
The other thought I had, as, past midnight, I put away my ACW wagons and gun limbers to make room for the medievals, was to again borrow another idea from 40K and dice for battlefield deployment; that means that deployment could be ends of the board, sides or diagonal. Next we will dice off to see who sets up first and thus chooses to go first or not. The loser can then attempt to 'seize the initiative' on a thrown 6 of a D6 and go first after all.
THE FIRST FIVE MOVES
Each unit was given a playing card and we used a second deck to take turns in seeing what units we got. When we had finished I had a large horde of Vikings with four Viking heroes, one foot and one mounted units of plate armoured Teutonic knights, small unis of long bowmen, bowmen, handgunners, and crossbowmen, a cannon and a medium catapult, a couple of units of medium knights and two largish units of foot knights in plate. I also had two plate armoured heroes. Mat had a largish unit of peasants, two large units of long bowmen, a large unit of plate armoured foot knights with halberds and another with sword and shield, a unit of medium Mongol horse archers and another of heavy mounted Mongol archers. Mat had three plate armoured heroes. He also had three medium catapults and two largish units of plate armoured mounted knights with lances. My army was considerably larger. I felt things should be evened out and gave Mat a tower which he put on his flank and filled with a large unit of light longbow men. I also upgraded an objective, which was close to Mat's deployment, a church on a cliff, from 50 points to 120 points. On reflection I think I over compensated him as his mounted troops were very powerful. The advantage I had was that my Great Sword mercenaries and six units of Vikings had the outflank rule. This was weakened somewhat as they came on in dribs and drabs and one unit was driven off the board by a cavalry charge.
Below is a choice of card marked units.
Below:This was my deployment but the terrain caused bottlenecks that prevented much of my army entering the fray until late in the game.
Mongol armoured horse almost wipe out the Great Swords but a new unit of Vikings wipes out the greatly diminished Mongols.
THE LAST SEVEN MOVES
Mat's cavalry almost wiped out my unit of Viking spearmen until another Viking unit appeared led by three heroes, two who attended to Mat's King Blue Iron of Bogavania. He managed to kill one of them and wound another before they dispatched him. We did not have a pre-agreed rule on the loss of the commander so continued the battle. Some highlights were that Mat's large unit of peasants held out against a small Viking beserker unit. The leadership of Lord Swartz was the key because unlike your every day run of the mill lord he did not disdain to fight alongside the lowly folk. after a long battle the last of the beserkers was dead and one peasant musician and Lord Swartz was left. Meanwhile Mat's halberd armed foot knights beat back the mounted Teutonic knights over the bridge where a unit of Vikings added their support to their Teutonic allies. The feisty foot knights pushed them off the board before a fresh column of my foot knights arrived and, by virtue of their rank bonus, drove the halberd men off the board thus saving the village for Beerstein.
In the end I had failed to capture the church, which was worth 120 points. However I had captured two farms and my deployment zone was clear of enemy troops; each of these was worth fifty points so my total score was 150 points to Mat's 120.
The mercenary rule had been interesting as my Viking bowmen got the 'march to join the enemy' instruction. It was unable to because a melee on the bridge stood in the way. So we diced again and they shot arrows at Red Sonya's large unit of Vikings. A fratricidal side battle occurred with the bigger unit wiping out the bowmen before being pushed off the board by the pushback 20cm rule when they fought with Mat's halberd armed knights. Another unit of Vikings demanded more money and then were also pushed off the board by Mat's mounted knights. To even the score, two of Mat's units of knights were also pushed off the 'edge of the world'.
Late next week we are going to switch roles as I defend the church as King Blue Iron and Mat is the Bogavanian King Longshank. Some small changes will be made to the rules and I will be dispensing with the tower. In a future post I shall explain the rules in detail.
Above: Beerstein's handgunners,
Nearest is a converted Timpo metal figure, next is a rare 1950s plastic alien converted into a handgunner, followed by two made in China pirates with no real structural change and last a Hing Fat (or is that Phat - I forget) pirate changed into a Renaissance looking fellow. The two closest have the simplest and earliest types of handguns, tubes on sticks basically. The handgunners did not play a huge role in the game, especially as they can fire only every second turn.
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