L'Art De La Guerre- couple of some High Medieval bashes

Couple of games of ADLG today at Stephens as he is entering a competition in a strange, far off, foreign and alien land ie the Republic of Ireland (Limerick I think ?) this coming June.

Theme is High Medieval period (lists 230-268) and so he was wanting to try out a couple of armies. I have nothing later than 1100AD so Stephen had to provide both protagonists (no real problem with his sizeable figure collection) from a selection of very quickly compiled army lists I had sent him (competition has armies of 2225pts)

First up he chose his Ottoman Turks and I selected Medieval Hungarian as it included 2 War Wagons which is a troop type we have not used in ALDG before and therefore good practice to see them in action. Fun and interesting game with the war wagons being fun to see in action.

Second game was Stephens Burgundian Ordnannce (I really love the figures and banners in this) and I picked Medieval Teutonic as their foes. Another fun game with lots of heavy Knights and foot on display on both sides.

L'Art De La Guerre - two games vs Sassanids

Two games of LADG today against Stephen who had a newly painted Sassanid army to try out.

So I selected my Maurikian Byzantines and Avars to give them an outing

First up was the Byzantines and this was a very close game which the 'Roman/Greeks' lost narrowly with just 4 difference in losses upon reaching their 19 loss level.

I did get decent terrain to help me in this one but the Elephant supported by Elite Dailami proved my undoing.

Second game was more the usual affair with my Avars suffering a horrendous turn of losses that they never recovered from and hitting their 21 loss level pretty quickly.

Terrain was far from kind in this one.

Two more enjoyable games with this excellent set of rules that easily allows two games in a days play a factor not to be sniffed at.

Byzantine clash

Avars take their turn

L'Art De La Guerre - another double dunter with Romans and Sassanids

Ever the glutton for punishment I had two games again of LADG at Stephens today (just as well this is such an enjoyable set of rules).

First game saw my Early Republican Romans face historical Carthaginian opponents under Hannibal.

This was a very close contest that went to Carthage in the end after my Iberian Ally was crushed on my left.

My Legionaries had pretty poor rolls throughout whilst two lowly units of medium Javelinmen rolled nothing but sixes and fives !! 

"Its a game of skill !!"

Second game my Sassanid Persians faced a contemporary Late Roman force as Stephen wanted to use his newly painted Forged In Battle figures and very nice they are too (think this is 3rd version of figure manufacturers he has painted up for this army !!).

This game was pretty much decided at start by the terrain set up which saw most terrain we have ever had on a Plain (A coast line, 2 fields 2 plantations, a hill and a marsh) and with several centrally placed pieces really cramming my mostly mounted force into middle (I of course failed to move or remove any with my 2 attempts)

This one took much longer than I expected to complete but Sassanids succumbed in the end as the Roman Heavy Infantry just take too long to defeat, I did manage to punch a hole with 2 Cataphracts but not quickly enough as flanks imploded.

L'Art De La Guerre - two more games played

 Another couple of games of LADG played today at Stephens.

First up it was my Avars vs Thematic Byzantines, however I had got my army list slightly schewed a tad by including Elite Medium Cavalry Bow (not allowed but could have been Heavy Cavalry Bow instead at same price) and then counting my Light Cavalry as Elite when only ordinary despite costing them correctly.

Not sure it made any difference as my shooting was pretty pants from get go but may have made a couple of elements hang around longer than they should due to Elite bonus ?

Quite evenly matched armies although the Avars find it difficult to deal with supported Byzantine heavy infantry of which there were thankfully only a few.

Avars lost eventually.

Avars advance trying to hold Byzantine foot on right 

Next game I fielded an all mounted Central Asian Turkish force for a good historical match up against T'Ang Chinese. 

My 22 elements were all elite but again they just have no real answer to the T'Ang mixed spear and bow heavy foot of which comprises a third of their force.

Thankfully the river Stephen placed turned out to be dried up so I did try a flank march with a light cavalry command which arrived right away (ie on turn 2) which was maybe just too early letting cat out of bag rather soon, but at least they arrived.

T'Ang where able to march right along my left flank and push the 'wall' of heavy foot directly forward due to good leaders and high PIP rolls, of course I managed to roll a one twice for my command PiPs limiting my ability to react.

The Chinese heavy foot then shot up my light cavalry and a gap soon appeared in my center as my left wing cavalry clashed with more numerous T'Ang mounted.

I did kill a couple of crossbow units with some lucky shooting and killed a cataphract but too little compared to losses I sustained as Turks fell apart.

One of these days..........................................

Turk right wing tries to envelope Chinese (flank march appeared on far right)

The 'jet propelled' T'Ang do an on table outflank

My left wing in difficulties with low PIPs hampering options.

L’art De La Guerre - Maurkian Byzantines up twice

Being a masochist of sorts I decided to try my Maurikian Byzantines with LADG today. 

Two games managed again first against Arab Conquest and the second against late Sassanid, so historical match-ups.

I find the Byzantines rather impotent and difficult to organise effectively but both good games.

The Arabs are a nightmare with the solid line of heavy infantry swordsmen to which I have no real answer. I used a Bedouin Ally which is cheap and did sterling service. I held my Skutatoi and bowmen back in center straddling a hill as no match for Arab foot and tried attacking with my mounted on my left. I had excellent shooting dice it must be said but this just does not do enough damage before my mounted have to fight.

As expected the elite Boukellari held their own but the ordinary Defensorses and Hun lights succumbed too quickly leaving my elites to be flanked and overwhelmed. A couple of poor evades rolls saw me lose some light infantry which are costly hits to army and a deluge of disordering hits saw my army morale plummet and break. 

Second game against Sassanids was a completely different affair with lots of ‘micro’ manoeuvring and swirling combats. I did not use the Arabs this time fielding a couple of Optimates (elite lancers) and Cursorses (LC bow) in their stead. I even managed to catch a group of evading Sassanid heavy cavalry in the rear with my own cavalry but failed to kill them off and again my lesser cavalry was mauled by a marauding elephant and my army morale collapsed.

L'Art De La Guerre- two games with Punic Romans

Two fun and interesting games of LADG today at Stephens with my Republican Romans taking the field.

First opponent was Gallic with lots of mounted troops.

The terrain worked out pretty well for the Romans with cover on both flanks despite my failing to place a river on a flank.

Whilst I choose to attack the numbers of Celt mounted meant that I knew that advancing too aggressively would see me outflanked on both ends of my line as Celt foot hung back from legionaries.

And so it turned out as I ended up vainly chasing the Chariots with Legionaries on my right whilst my left bore brunt of charges by the Gauls elite heavy cavalry as warbands held back until near the end to defeat the Romans. 

The Gaul Soldurii with an embedded General proved very effective.

Romans just cant field enough mounted of their own to support flanks effectively. 

Roman Legion faces the Gauls

Romans have good terrain on flanks at set up but Gaul mounted dominate the more open areas

Gaul elite cavalry bear down on my left

And Chariots invest my right with no real counter to their 'skirmishing' ability

Second game was a much different affair as Stephen fielded Later Macedonian.

This was much more of a slugfest and really came down to my Elite legion failing abjectly against the pike whilst their average compatriots dealt with Macedonian right.

A couple of key combats decided the matter for Macedonians but this was a bloody battle !

Getting two games in is certainly very feasible with LADG even with our discussions of all sorts unrelated stuff including 'could the Germans have actually won WW2 ??' and other waffle :-)

Romans deployed to met the Macedonians

Clashes all along the line with my Elite Legion beginning to suffer already in center

Right wing supports chasing off some cavalry

Macedonian General survives a flank attack on my extreme right.

L'Art De La Guerre - 2 games played

LADG played today at Stephens and we managed two games.

First up I used my Minoans against Hittites.

A fairly close game until my central Chariot command (the Dendra armour boys) came undone in center and then some heavy Spearmen and Bowmen were lost leaving gaps the Hittities could exploit.

The second game I used Stephens Ghaznavid figures against his Hindu Indian and this was an extremely close game indeed !

In fact it ended up with both armies breaking in same turn (Indians had lost a few more points worth) which I do not think we have ever had happen before ?

I won a Elephant clash and a Cavalry clash on my left and center but my right suffered from Indian Bowmen shooting and not helped by my having 6 Rally attempts (over 2 turns) for my elite Ghulams and failing every single roll (4+ needed). 

We both had a lot of 6:1 rolls in this game seeing units killed off pretty quickly. 

Found this which tickled my funny bone