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.

Age of Arthur WAB One Dayer Report (Part Two)

For our second game we would be playing singles with just our basic 1500 point lists.
Scrivs decided that the Franks were proving a threat to Post Roman stability in the region and that Saxons were the men to restore some sort of order to the situation. Once again my allied Saxon commander had a club-mate in the opposing ranks, so rather than him play Grahame again that honour fell to me. I did try to point out that having played against Grahame at several Cold/Hot/Steel/Lead events I'd probably played him almost as many times as Mike had, but my protests fell on deaf ears.
Sadly, although I've played Grahame many times I've yet to beat him. Still there's a first time for everything, after all Andy Hawes had already won a game and the world still appeared to be rotating on it's axis...

The scenario was a Pitch Battle variant with extra points for killing the general. Or something.
While Grahame made a map I thought about deployment. A bit.
I decided to occupy the side with the village.

 You shall not take our pig-pen!

Grahame deployed his fiendish Franks opposite

I advanced as only a Saxon can. Quickly and with a minimum of manoeuvre. And soon the fighting began.

 This fight did not end well.

Grahame punched through my lines with one unit with rather alarming ease. For some reason he seemed reluctant to allow my Gedrith to charge him in the face and instead I was reduced to javelinating him from a distance. Grahame, as I have learned in the past is a master at WAB hit and run tactics. He has, in previous encounters, Parthian Shotted me to distraction, but on this occasion saw fit merely to surround me with skirmishers and let a hail of pointy things do their worst.

Owwww! That hurts!

When I did finally get to grips with one of his units I was unceremoniously charged from behind by some allied skirmishing Duguth, which rather took the shine off things.

 Yowwww!

Finally Grahame managed to fit one of my remaining units into a Cavalry sandwich, and with that all hope was lost.

 Squish!

 Some pigs take advantage of a newly deserted churchyard

Surrounded and javelinated

In the end, a  fairly comprehensive victory to the Franks. But much more importantly a fun game played in good spirits. 

Scrivs has been on at me for some time to include more skirmishers in my AoA forces, and this game was a good indication that he's right. I end up getting outmanoeuvred and whittled down by armies with more skirmishers and their attentions mean I lack the punch to really claw it back by the end. The problem is (or rather are) that firstly I always struggle to use skirmishers effectively and secondly that I much prefer the idea of big units clashing to weedy me throwing stuff at one another. Still, if I want to win (or at least compete in) more games I may need to rethink. (That sound you can hear is Lord S at Gripping Beast rubbing his hands together in anticipation of a re-think of my army)

Age of Arthur WAB One Dayer Report (Part One)

Yesterday I ventured the short distance up the road to sunny Mansfield to Maelstrom's Eye of the Storm Venue to play Age of Arthur games all day.
This was a one day event Scrivs had organised. Technically I was supposed to be helping him, but he'd got it all so well under control that all I really ended up doing was baking a ginger cake for all the players to share. To make matters worse, the night before I threw a box of Scrivs' beautifully painted Saxons downstairs as I was retreiving them from the loft to hand back to him. It's bad enough dropping your own soldiers, but when the chipped and mangled models belong to someone else you don't half feel bad I can tell you. Sorry mate.

Anyway, grovelling apologies out of the way it was on to battle.
Scrivs has already posted an overview over on his blog, so I'll stick to my version of events. Fortunately I remembered to take a lot of pictures, so I won't be writing too much (as I'm sure my regular reader will be delighted to learn). The picture quality is a little variable as the Eye of the Storm, though great for gaming isn't always helpful to hamfisted buffoons using the digital equivalent of a Box Brownie.

The first game was doubles. I was paired with fellow Saxon Mike of Trouble at t'Mill blog. Facing us were some Romano British in the ownership of Andy of Andy's Wargaming blog and Geraint who as far as I know doeasn't have a blog.
Mike and Andy are clubmates and had apparently been engaged in the unseemly practice of practicing for the event earlier in the week, so I faced off against Andy while Mike lined up opposite Geraint.
The Romano armies looked particularly splendid - Andy's I'd played against once before at Hot Lead or Cold Steel or Warm Copper or something, but Geraint's red and white colour scheme looked great too. Real inspiration to crack on with mine. I've mentioned before that a significant chunk of enjoyment for me is setting up the models and then just looking at them and that was certainly true on this occasion. Playing the game's a bit incidental after that.
So here's some eye candy:

 Saxons (mine)

 Andy's Romans

 Geraint's Red and White Boys

The lines begin to close

The scenario was Cat Coit Cumquat or something from the AoA book. Essentially the Romano British had to smuggle as many units as possible off our table edge and we had to stop them. Being Saxons we only know one way to defend, and that's CHAAAARGE!. So we pushed forward, each leaving a small rearguard.

 Into the fray!

I made first contact and one of my units puiched their way through Andy's lines. However his general's unit managed to get the drop on my Gedrith, which is never a good plan.

 Geraint's men take the scenic route

 Stab, smash, hack slay!

 Oooer, where'd they come from?

Mikes men meet stiff resistance

Andy's reinforcements, in the shape of treacherous fellow Saxon's arrived at around this point and showed the milksop Romanos how it should be done by chasing off my Geoguth. Meanwhile our generals were locked in mortal (if slow) combat.

 The Kings duke it out

 Traitors! No you are! Your mum!

The grind continues 

Mysteriously the photo of my king dying at about this point was all a bit blurry. However it spread a fair bit of panic. Andy's bodyguard unit proceeded to steamroller over my next unit of Duguth and swept forward carrying aloft all the banners they'd knicked

 

At this point it all started to quiet down on our end of the table. Andy had already sneaked his unit of cavalry off the board edge, and some re-forming meant his bodyguard unit were home free too. The rest of his army was almost certainly too far from the edge to make it.

Don't let 'em get away fellas

Meanwhile over on the right...

 

 Saxons, ahem, tactically withdrawing

Hold, men, hold....

 

 Hardcore Saxon on Saxon action

 

 That'll smart!

Geraint had got lucky with his re-inforcements roll, bringing them on in our half of the table and marching them straight off, which meant they had three units home. Mike however was making it hard work for the Romanos to get more away. My reinforcements finally came into play with only a couple of turns remaining and on the far end of the board, so they could do little. True to form, I did however mange to almost get them killed on the last turn.

In the final analysis, the Romono British alliance had done just enough to claim a minor victory. Andy had nabbed the Arthurian Artefact from my Gedrith and the Saxon empire was due to shrink by a few acres.

 

Finally some raven's eye views of the final stages of the game:

 

 

It was a splendid game, my first of WAB since Cold Steel back in January. Andy was a top opponent as always as was Geraint, though he was mainly fighting my estimable ally Mike. Like all good WAB Dark Age battles it seemed to see-saw quite a bit with the result  in doubt right to the very end.

Anyway I'm off on holiday for a couple of days now, so the other two reports will have to wait. Sorry 'bout that.