Britcon Game 5 vs Early Scots Isles & Highlands

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petedalby
Lieutenant-General - Do 217E
Lieutenant-General - Do 217E
Posts: 3100
Joined: Mon Sep 18, 2006 5:23 pm
Location: Fareham, UK

Britcon Game 5 vs Early Scots Isles & Highlands

Post by petedalby »

After far too little sleep Sunday morning’s game was upon us. My opponent was Brian Espie using Early Scots Isles & Highlanders. This was the army that had destroyed Steve’s Medieval Scots so I knew this was going to be tough. At this point I think I was sitting 5th or 6th.

Brian’s army was huge – 18 BGs – and no-one had broken it thus far. It comprised an IC, TC 1 x 4 LF Bow, 9 x 6 HF HW, 2 x 8 HF Off Sp, 3 x 6 MF IF B*, 1 x 6 MF HW. I was surprised to see only 2 generals. I’d tried the same thing myself a few years ago and it didn’t work for me. This game would be all about the match-ups. The LB had to avoid the Highlanders. The Knights had to avoid the Off Sp and the billmen had to avoid the HF HW.

Brian won initiative and chose Agricultural. We ended up with a reasonable amount of terrain on the table and I was again fortunate to have a defendable Enclosed Field in my central sector. I deployed the Knights at the back so give them room to avoid the Off Sp and the rest fairly wide as I needed to stretch Brian’s line. Despite having to deploy first I was pleasantly surprised to see enemy HF deployed opposite my EF whilst his MF largely occupied terrain. And both the Off Sp were together and therefore easier to avoid.

English Deployment

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ESI&H Deploment

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Brian moved first and made a general advance. Opposite my right flank some HF were deployed in a Gulley and without a General there it took them some time to emerge. This allowed my LH to close them down and restrict their advance. A lucky 2 hits also saw them disrupt to shooting but I struggled to get another 2 hits thereafter.

My Knights stayed mounted and were keen to repeat their earlier success by charging into HF HW. My billmen tried to get opposite the Highlanders whilst my LB shot from the EF in relative safety. Unfortunately 1 LB BG was unable to avoid the attentions of some Highlanders who ripped through them in short order.

The armoured billmen proved to be more resilient. Although down at impact they were up in the melee and were more than a match for the MF in the open.

In the centre the Knights went into the HF HW. One HF BG had the IC and rear support, the other just rear support. Both lost but only 1 went disrupted. I conformed to fight more bases against the disrupted BG and ensure I wouldn’t have to break off. In the melee the disrupted BG went fragmented whilst the steady BG went disrupted. Things were looking good.

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Unfortunately I was unable to reinforce the melee and Brian had overlaps on both flanks. The weight of dice told and I lost a base. The IC rallied the disrupted BG and I lost another base in the next round as well. At this point I was fighting 50% steady foot so had to break off. The fragged unit rallied up to disrupted. We then failed our test not to charge and had to go in again. It was a step too far and we lost another base to auto break. There then followed the comedy moment of the weekend. I had 2 BGs that had to test for the break. The first threw double 1 and fragmented. And then the second BG did exactly the same! And to cap it all the Knights burst through both and suddenly I’d lost 3 more BGS at a stroke. This was muppetry of the first order with echoes of my practice game against Martyn.

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Essentially my centre had ceased to exist but both wings were going well with several enemy BGs broken or fragmented through a combination of shooting and fighting.

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On 2 separate occasions armoured billmen ignored my orders and pursued into fresh enemy MF in terrain – losing the impact each time but then grinding the MF down with the benefit of the armour POA.

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With time running out Brian started to take risks and the 4 man LF BG was shot to destruction through base loss. This added to another couple of routed units opposite my right flank consigned his army to defeat.

This was probably my most enjoyable game of the weekend despite my stupidity in the centre. On paper this game should have gone the other way but the beneficial match-ups and Brian’s lack of generals gave me the edge.

This win moved me into 3rd place and I’d hoped to play Graham’s Mamluks in the final game but instead I had to face the Swiss – a daunting prospect.
Pete
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