El Cid cavalry

 The horses for these have been painted for years.But getting the collection out for the Crusades game recently inspired me to finish off the riders

Walter d'Isigny

 Freebie figure from Partizan. I started painting him because he looked like he'd ne easy and quick but with no real plan for how to use him. Until James pointed out he'd be ideal for El Cid games,so he got the yellow Ochre base treatment.

A Crusades game playtest

Chum Matt is working on a Crusades set of rules that Helion will hopefully be publishing later this year. I don't have any Crusader miniatures per se however the difference between the Christians of the first Crusade and the Christians of the age of El Cid is the odd headscarf and we also felt that my Almoravid force would do a good job as stand-ins for appropriate opponents. As it happens my El Cid Christian force was too small for a game, so we ended up with a mish-mash of Knights and spearmen - all probably at once representative of the melange of forces of the period and massively a-historical at the same time. But hey-ho, it's a playtest.

I was due to go on holiday early the following day, hadn't read the rules in advance and the game was played well over a week ago, so my recollections are hazy, so mainly here are some pictures.

The "Arab" forces deploy

Their "Christian" foes take the field.

Some of the Spanish are a bit shiny - I need to get the matt varnish out!

I sent forth a flanking cavalry force.

And "cleverly" pulled some of the opposing spearmen out of position.

My archers gave a good account of themselves, driving some of the Christian infidels back.

Unfortunately my camels took a beating on my right.

The white clad spearmen of my forces advanced to support the cavalry.

Whilst my centre held firm.

The Christian Knights finally did what Christian knights do best...

...CHAAAAARGE!!!!

Truth to tell I don't even remember the result. I think I may have won, or maybe Matt let me win. Or I may have lost.

The point was Matt got to make some notes and try things with a real live simpleton of an opponent.

It was a fun game. More abstract than I was expecting (not that I'm sure exactly what I was expecting!). It uses a grid which some will find anathema, but I didn't really notice once the game had begun. The focus is on decision making rather than dice rolling and it played reasonably quickly and I felt it worked. Look forward to testing it a few more times and then playing the finished game.

It was also good to get the El Cid collection out on the table. Some of the models need a little TLC (especially the bendy lead Gripping Beast spears) but it did make me thing I should get them some proper movement trays for this game and Midgard (El Cidgard). There's a few more models in the leadpile too so maybe time to add a few more units.

El Cid Warhammer Ancient Battles

At some point over lockdown Stephen painted up an El Cid Spanish army - using mostly Footsore models.

He's packing his house up in preparation for moving to the Isle of Man and wanted to give them a run out for the first time before packing them away. So we dusted off the excellent El Cid supplement and the 1.5 version of WAB. We were aiming for around 2,000 points but in the end I just threw down what was about the right amount.

I had a core of spearmen and pushed some cavalry up on my right

Inevitably Spanish light cavalry swarmed my flank.

At this point I changed the settings on the camera qhich makes things look bleaker then they were...

The Almoravid centre steamrollered on.

While the Christian cavalry waited

More light cavalry on my left too

Facing the mighty Kamel Korps of Khamu Khazi

The Berber horse forgot to run away and I remembered how rubbish they are.

Their death triggered a "panic bomb" and most of my right flank ran away.

Things were going better on the left, where an attempted charge was foiled and driven off with javelins

Meanwhile my centre bore down

My spears rallied and faced off the caballeros

Finally the Almoravids crashed home into the peons.

My archers were caught by jinettes

Still the face off in the centre

Christian cavalry joined the fight in the middle of the lines.

However the Black Guard proved triumphant and panic gripped the Christians who fled in numbers

The caballeros continued to shoot down the Berber spear

Before deciding enough was enough, charging home and routing the spears!

My other spear unit turned to face the caballeros breaking through in the middle

With the Spanish centre destroyed the Black Guard chased off the crossbows

And with that the game came to a close. A victory to the Almoravid invaders.

Fun to get the soldiers out and WAB gives a fun game. The rules did feel a bit dated and "fantasy" after a long time away from them.

It all looked splendid with two fully painted quite big armies going at it.