WAB: Irish against Saxons

Steve and I managed to squeeze in a weekend game for a change.
As the Peterborough event draws ever closer we agreed a game of WAB 1.5 was in order.
Steve's Irish are mostly complete - the Fianna need some fettling and his Welsh allies remain mournfully Mornfang Brown but other than that he's got 1500 points.
Predictably my Late Romans lag behind so instead I dug out the Saxons (with a unit of LR allies).

We debated playing one of 5the WAB scenarios, but as they required rivers and fiddling with army lists and time was pressing we just went with a pitched battle.

 The Gedrith arrive!

 The Irish battle line deploys

 Romans on a hill, Duguth on their flank

The battle began, as dark Age WAB games tend to do with a general rush forward

 Waaag...errr...sorry, wrong game

Apart from the Roman, who hid behind their big shields on a hill.

 Its-a nice-a ana safe up-a here

The Irish raiders too surged forward, with slingers to the fore

Due to woods and things my Gedrith were able to charge the Fianna. This did not go well for the Irish lads. The Gedrith hit very hard and I have several characters in the front rank. I also rolled well and Steve had a rare off day with the dice.
Newly Painted Army Syndrome I expect.

 Right then, lets be having you (and don't forget the buckler re-rolls!)

Elsewhere the Duguth crashed home as well

My Gedrith broke and ran down the Fianna and the Welsh spearmen were likewise driven off. The left flank was mine.
However things were a bit trickier in the centre and right...
A unit of Duguth had got themselves surrounded. And although the Irish Chieftain was unable to hit anything very much they were in trouble

On the hill the Romans saw a juicy flank charge and thundered home

Here-a we-a go-a!

The charge broke the Irish, but the pursuit fell short and the Irish rallied. 

Meanwhile the Duguth bounced off the Irish general but rallied themselves.

And were charged once more.

Hold lads, hoooold!

The Romans decided they'd had enough of charging and instead dropped anchor and formed shieldwall.

Come-a ana have-a a go-a!

Finally the Saxon general came to the rescue of the beleaguered Duguth.

In the flank!

Thye Irish general broke but an unwise pursuit by the Duguth crashed into a supporting unit of Ciethern

ooops!

Who duly went to work on the Duguth...

This could end badly...

The resultant break by the Duguth cause the general's unit to panic and flee. From a hugely dominant position my army was suddenly routing in all directions.

However, despite the general failing to rally the game ended with my Romans and one other unit unbroken which was just enough to pull back a victory!

A good fun see-saw game. Mostly I was in control but last turn panic nearly snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

WAB still feels a bit clunky and fussy after a few years away. And I think I actually prefer some of how WAB2 worked over 1.5.

That said, we're having fun and it feels good to be playing "armies" again rather than the skirmish fair we've played recently