Warrior Ancient and Medieval Rules

[Ewan McNay]

That most gracious of wargaming hosts, Bill Low, is once again organising a house event in Wilton, CT on Sunday May 28. I imagine that most folk within likely distance have been informed, but figured that it could not hurt to mention it here also - drop Bill a line if you're able to come. Both 15mm and 25mm will be on offer, I believe, and timing is flexible... but getting there for the breakfast pastries is recommended .

[Todd Kaeser]

Check out the Album section - new pics of battles from Bill Low's typically outstanding festival. AAR soon to come on a few battles I'm sure.

[Ewan McNay]

AAR: A great time was had by all.

12 - an impressive turnout for a house tournament! - Warrior players came out to Wilton yesterday for another of Bill's generously hosted events; not only does he provide space, food, and often some lead, but his own game time gets significantly eaten into. Thanks, Bill.

We had set a loose aim of getting Theme armies out in advance of H'Con, and so there was a lot of Medieval lead in play; amusing to see one side's utterly useless LI CB come up against... the opposing side's LI CB .

I was lucky enough to get two really nice games in before going home and trying to earn a few points for the next event . I had brought Italian Condotta, Neapolitan variant, with pikes/Almughavars/knights and a few oddments; in the first round I was a little worried to be facing a Swiss, and one with more scouting than I had (16 to 15!). Dennis had two single-unit commands, of Ally Generals in 12E swiss pike/halberd blocks, and then a large CinC's command with another 12E block, 3 smaller blocks (8E, 2x4E) and a bunch of other stuff (2x2E LMI HG, some LI CB, 2x2E LC CB). The three large blocks were all set up on my far left, across one of two large brush patches Dennis laid down, and the lack of many supporting troops allowed me to essentially skirmish them out of the game with some LI CB, thankfully . The action was all on the centre-right: I sent a knight unit (I was violently aggressive with my knights in both games, buoyed by their being all-SHK) into some evading LI which allowed a converted charge on one unit of the handgunners, removing the flank suport from the 8E pike/halberd block whish was on the end of Dennis' main line; that set it up for a joint charge by Almughavars frontally and SHK into the flank; all was well, right?

Well, a Swiss pike/2HCT block does a *lot* of damage when it rolls +3. Like, 85. On a 12-man Almughavar unit, that's 7CPF doubled to 14, plus one for an imetuous charge - instant exhaustion!

Both of my units went to the 'more' line. Hmm. 5 at more is 60, 9 at more is 108. For a total of 168. Which is, well, not *quite* twice as many as 85...

...Damn! The pikes died the following turn when another knight unit hit them and they failed to pull off a second dice miracle, but that bound's delay really messed with my expected timing, and the speedy Swiss pike blocks were coming in from my left as fast as they could, while my own lower-calibre pikemen cowered on the hills. On the far right, my LC were combining with a unit of pavisiers (outflanking with HI!) and the sword/buckler men to push the Swiss LC off-table, but the command was not quite on retreat - needed one more unit, and trying to get an army of Reg B to fail wavers is tough! - when the pike reinforcements arrived at the schwerpunkt. My second Almughavar unit had to go in alone; that's when I discovered that the Swiss list rules in the list book had been significantly expanded online! Now the Swiss could charge and not be preempted, and they rolled up again; I won the first round still, but was now tired and disordered. One of the 12E units had been charged in the flank by SHK to allow my Almughavar carge to go in against a small Swiss pike unit, at least, and so things were about to get very messy: the kights which had detroyed the 8E pike unit were turned round ready to help the Moogs, and the knights fighting the flank of now-disordered pikemen were about to do hideous damage but were also about to get hit in their own flank... and so we ended, 4-1 to the Italians. Another bound, the big Swiss command goes under but I lose a Moog unit and have a very troubled knight unit; probably a 5-2 or -3. The Swiss brought no knights at all, and Dennis pointed out that the 160p move is not *that* much further than that of a Swiss pike block; fair point.

Game 2, Todd Kaeser - whom it was very good to see make it down after a 3-hour drive; we had folks from PA, NJ, MA, CT and NY at the event! - and Knights of St. John. This is, I think, an excellent Theme army choice, with no need to worry about elephants for example. And they have some of the best LC available in Theme, too, in the regular turkopoles - my CB guys were definitely outclassed. However, Todd missed his first terrain pick and we were fighting on a pretty open centre with a steep/rocky hill on my centre-left and a patch of brush on my right. Initial fortune favoured me, as my LI CB caught Todd's identical unit when it evaded short, and that slight traffic jam caused a small manouvre problem in the centre. Then, as the lines met on bound 3, Todd's kights were held back slightly while mine went screaming off - and the real story of the game is Todd's morale dice, which were terrible. 3 charges on bound 3: two against 2x6E missile foot skirmishing in front of Italian pikemen (one on the left, one on the right), and one against a 4E 2HCT/CB unit in the centre. All three failed their wavers, and when the central unit routed on contact, the ongoing LI melee acted to protect one flank of the pursuing knights also; meanwhile a knight-knight combat beside the hill was a win for Todd (because these knights had just shaken the missile LMI there, hence were tired after a second charge) but a pike unit took his following-up knights in the flank. On my left, a LC CB unit had outflanked the hill and was able to dance around LMI CB opposing it to come in on the flank of the left-hand shaken LMI unit, routing that away (woohooo! Italian LC CB kill something!!) but the matching unit on the right failed a counter and was summarily dispatched by the turkopoles. In the middle, following up my pursuing knights was an 8E pikeblock which was spread out 4E wide and had been hit by a 4E and 2E unit of more 2HCT, CB guys; we threw off the smaller one but lost overall and were now sitting disordered; not good. In comes the KoSJ CinC to finish them off. However, I roll for combat direction - from my left. So: LMI bowmen rout when charged by LC; knights with subgeneral shake and rout to the pikemen in their flank. Halberdiers fighting my disordered pikemen both shake *and* rout for the subgeneral going, turning their rear to me. And to cap it all, the CinC shakes when the halberdiers rout. My pikemen went from almost an auto-rout to having one opponent rout and the other one shake, even before we got to combat. It was a quick game, and Todd took it all very calmly - "Some days, you're the bug."

Again, thanks to all. We had a bunch of family members come along and hang outotgether, going to a movie and playing/drinking wine, and it was just a fun day.

[scott holder]

Thanks for the report and for the pictures. This was a 25mm event? At Bill's house? We've finally turned him:).

The Theme this year should be fun. Yeah, probably lots of KOSJ, Swiss and Medieval Spanish but there are enough Irish and Scots players out there to make it look mixed up.

Heh heh, LI CB. What's LI? Spoken just like Charles the Bold certainly talked. Okay, if he spoke colloquial 'Merkin English.

scott

[Todd Kaeser]

What a gracious host in Bill Low - it is always a pleasure to do battle at Bill's house.

It was a day of ups and downs for me. Ewan crushed me in the 2nd battle - read above for the defeat. For the first I'll give it a go for an AAR.

It is pictured in the Album section (see top of page) in pic 1229. Matt Kollmer's Late Ottoman vs. Knights of St. John - Matt knew I'd be bringing it and wanted a historical matchup.

1480 A.D. - revised. Pierre D'Aubusson has received reinforcements on the island of Rhodes to fend off the Ottoman invasion. d'Aubusson has opted for battle rather than face a lengthy siege.

Terrain consisted of a marsh in the left rear of the Ottomans and a woods was in the center right of the Knights. The might of the Ottomans - the feared Janissaries in 2 large blocks - 3E 2HCT,HG,Sh 3E CB 3E B flanked by units of HC/MC L,B,Sh and LC B. LC Jls,Sh filled the space to the left of the woods and other lights flooded the left side of the Ottoman forces. The heathen Serb allies EHK roamed the rear looking for gaps to fill.

The Knights of St. John deployed with CB on the flanks, then Greek Bowmen, and finally Marianarii in the center - heavily armed and armored units. The Knights of Justice backed up the infantry, looking for targets.

As the battle unfolded the right of the knights was a slow process of shooting away the LC w/ the CB armed militia. Crossbowbow bolts and arrows blotted the sky and the two forces peppered each other with missile fire hoping to create a gap. The knights scored the first blow with two shots on the HC/MC units tiring one out and shaking the one of the janissaries left effectively taking it out of the battle as the Ottoman general tried to rally them. The two forces drew nearer and the janissaries started to effect their toll on the forces of St. John.

Finally a fortunate occurance happens for the forces of St. John. The militia CB unit is able to shoot away the opposing LC. Here one of the subs of St. John seizes the day and charges the skirmishing HC?MC unit and catches them on the evade. The battle will circle around this conflict as the knights push back the Ottoman cav. A Serb knight unit moves us to peel off the knights of justice. A St. John turkopole unit moves in to hit the flank of the HC/MC unit. Behind the fight the janissary unit is faced by two units of shooters of the knights. Even though they are tired the Rhodean militia Greek Bowmen roll up and the fearsome janissaries shake. A valiant charge by the militia CB unit breaks the janissaries who carry away the Serb knight unit and shake the other janissary unit causing the right flank of the Ottomans to fold. Aggressive shooting and charging against the left flank of the Ottomans chases off a unit putting the entire army into retirement.

Rhodes is saved as the Ottomans are forced back to their ships to lick their wounds.

A fun battle with Matt Kollmer indeed. Had a few more things gone his way the Ottomans would have overrun Rhodes and this historical document would be quite different.

Todd Kaeser