Age of Arthur WAB One Dayer Report (Part Three)

And so to the final game.
This time the shaky Saxon alliance would be playing some of the Celtic fringes. Mike hadn't any club-mates on the opposite side, so Scrivs simply allocated us opponents. The free tables were Cat Coit Thingumyjig, which I'd already played on, or the river table. So to the banks of the bonny Glein I was sent.
Now, I don't mind this scenario, but I do seem to have played it rather a lot and generally it seems to revolve around who can fail the fewest Warband tests and thus hold the banks.

I was to be playing Pete who had a Scottish army, featuring many and varied conversions and stuff from his bits box. His Welsh allies had Numidian legs apparently. Anyway they looked rather splendid. Pete also had boats with him. Boats that he had made and was very proud of. So I took several pictures of them. I also had a bonus ten free slingers in my force for this game, so I would have the chance to see if Scrivs was right about needing more skirmishers. The bonus models I used were Scrivs' ones that I'd thrown downstairs the night before. I think he gave them me to make me feel bad.
It worked.

My plan was to push forward on the left using skirmishers to screen my advance and look to grab and hold the ford using my Gedrith. I intended just to contest the bridge, which would be enough (if the Gedrith did their job) to snag me a win.
Meanwhile the boats zoomed upstream and disgorged a pair of Scottish units on my side of the river. I wasn't expecting that!

 Slightly chipped skirmishers advance

Oooh heck! Nice boats mind.

Pete's welsh allies put their numidian legs to good use and sped to gain control of the bridge.

My battered and borrowed slingers saw off a unit of dogs and some slingers that Pete threw forward and the Gedrith made good progress toward the ford. Pete's cavalry advanced on the ford, but some hefty shooting from the two units of skirmishers took their toll.

 Lovely boats. He made them himself you know.

 Splish, splash!

Smack, stab!

Over on my right a unit of Duguth saw off one of the boat bound raiders, but couldn't catch them and they rallied. A second charge didn't go so well and my Duguth made for the hills. Fortunately I was able to get my cavalry over there and fire and flee (and more importantly rally) a couple of times to keep Pete's men tied up.

 Run away!

Meanwhile the Gedrith were holding the ford, and saw off an attack from Pete's men. The resulting panic saw the Scottish cavalry disappear too and I was able move my remaining Duguth onto the ford, meaning that side looked pretty secure.

Finally, as the game drew to a close Pete failed a Warband test (his first failure of the game) and the unit he had holding the bridge charged in pursuit of a small unit of my skirmishers. The result was they were left side on to my unharmed Geoguth, with inevitable consequences.

The young lads wipe out some Scotsmen

And with that it was all over. Pete managed to swing a unit toward the far end of the bridge, leaving it contested and denying me a mighty victory, but with the ford secure I'd sneaked a win.

Another good fun game with a terrific opponent that hung in the balance to the very last turn.

As it happened my skirmishers (together with the extra unit) did indeed prove their worth in this game. The fact that I'd played the scenario quite a lot before also meant I was able to execute a solid battle plan, and for once warband tests worked in my favour.

So that was the day's gaming over. Scrivs had done a great job of organising it and everyone seemed to have a great time. 

We'll be doing an El Cid version of this in early October (with me chief organiser this time) so if you fancy three games of WAB in a great venue with good company and cake (probably) then drop me a line. Full details to follow.