Historicon 2016 Medieval Tourney Round 3

A Headless Body Production

Venue:   Fredericksburg Expo & Conference Center
Event:    Historicon's L'Art de la Guerre's Medieval Tournament, Round 3,
Players: Phil Gardocki, running Anglo Irish
                  Dale Shanek, running Mongols.
                 
Game System: L'Art de la Guerre, 200 points per side.
Theme: Medieval.  No Heavy Knights, No Foot Knights, No Elephants. 


The Forces:

   Anglo Irish: Commanders  Larry, Darryl and Darryl, all barely competent.
      4 Galloglaich, Heavy Swordsmen, 2HW (elite)
      2 English Longbowmen (elite)
      2 Anglo Knights, Medium Knights, Impact (elite)
      4 Longbowmen
      2 Irish Nobles, Heavy Cavalry
      2 Light Cavalry, Javelin 
      2 Kerns, Light Infantry, Javelin 
      2 Irish Foot, Javelinmen, Javelin

Larry with 5 Galloglaich, 4 Longbow,
Each Darryl with a Light Horse, Light Foot, Longbow, Javelin-man,  Anglo Knight and the Irish Nobles.
Breakpoint...21

Mongols: The Great Khan, a Strategist of great renown, is too sly to allow this kind of information loose.  
Breakpoint...19

The Board:

The Mongols win the initiative and elect to attack in the plains.  After the terrain rolls, the Mongol side of the board is bare save a gully in the corner.  While the Anglo-Irish side has 2 fields, and a hill.

Deployment:

The Mongols deployed with a dominant right wing strategy, with 8 units of horse, and 4 of foot.  The center and right had just 4 just units of horse each.

The Anglo-Irish deployed with their primary strength, 4 Galloglaich and 4 Longbow in the center.   But 2 of each were hidden behind the hill.  On each flank were 6 units, 3 each horse and foot.  But on the left flank only the lights were visible, the rest also hidden in ambush.

Turn 1:

When I asked Dale what army he was running, he just sat there.

The Mongol left and center, looking thin.

The Mongol right and center.  Obviously he is going to try to try a right wing attack.

Darryl on the right is not looking worried.

My other General Darryl is not looking so confident.

Turn 1:

This is the last game of Historicon, and I am tired and foggy.  The Mongols are the army most unlike my own.  All maneuver.  While mine is as close to unmaneuverable as possible.  On the other hand, he only has 9 combat worthy units.  And vulnerable to longbow. 

The hordes left flank moves first.  To pin my forces down.

The center moves cautiously forward.

Their right, as expected moves forward aggressively. 

Darryl's lights are outnumbered 3-1.

The first ambush is revealed.  Longbow and Galloglaich come to the top of the hill.  Arrows rain down and damaging a Mongol Migghan.

The other ambush is also revealed.  Longbow behind fortifications, supported by heavy horse.  The lights don't even try to stop the force in front of them.  Let them come to us.

Darryl decides he can win this fight and starts to pull his command together.

Turn 2:

The Mongols recall their disordered Migghan and begin to vector their right and center onto the hill.  It looks like it is going to be a missile fight.

The Mongols on the left advance on the Irish in the field.  Of frame, Darryl's Longbow reaches out and touches another Mongol Migghan.

Uncharacteristically, the Mongols run out command points, giving the Irish Lights a chance to escape.

Sorry for the lousy picture.  Darryl launches into an attack.  Knights run off the lights, and the Nobles run off the the Mongol Heavies.

More shooting, more disorder upon the Mongol ranks.

Turn 3:

The lines are forming up.  More missile hits.

The Longbow have left the hill, but shoot solid here as well.

Darryl also was short on command points and just adjusts his line a bit.

Turn 4:

The Great Khan continues to shift his focus.  But even he cannot be everywhere at once.  A Zuun of lights receives a flight of arrows and are dispersed.    Other Migghans accrue disorder.

Hard choices.  Maneuver and keep disorder, stay put to rally and keep getting shot.

However, the Mongol arrows are finally finding their marks as well.

Turn 5:

Mongol bowmen, seeing a the ranks of the Irish waver, push on.

The Irish foot are definitely wavering here.

Turn 6:

Irish Light Horse charge and are destroyed on contact, but they present an opportunity as the Irish Nobles strike home.

The only viable combat units for the Irish are the Irish Nobles and the Anglo Knights.  But most of the Mongol army has cohesion hits.

The Irish left is not faring so well.  They were losing the missile exchange against the Mongol foot bow, who are pressing their advantage.  But on the far left, Anglo Knights are actually fighting a Mongol Heavy Cavalry unit.  But it is in the field with a -2 modifier that is a killer.

On the right, the Irish Nobles win their fight, routing a Migghan, causing further cohesion loss the one behind it.

Despite the collapsing left flank, there is an opportunity here.  The I have the Mongol army bowed.  They can move or they can rally.  Either way the Irish are going to collapse them like an egg.

Another poor picture.  The Irish foot, despite being damaged and outnumbered continues to hold.  Clan O'Lyre, (white flag) advances to take shots that would be striking the Longbow instead, giving them a chance to recover.

Turn 7:

Faced with nothing but bad options, a Migghan charges the Longbow.

The Mongol Foot bow finally destroy the Irish foot.  But they are scattered and there is little they can do to effect the battle. 

This fight has been going on since turn 5.  Time to finish it.  The especially since Darryl doesn't have to worry about his Javelin men or Longbow any more.  Irish Light Horse take a Migghan in the rear.

Clan O'Lyre runs a Migghan off, but now they will return with a flank charge.  Which frankly we accept. 

For the life of me I don't know what the dead marker is for.  All the Longbow and Galloglaich are accounted for, and there are no Mongol foot on that side of the board.

The Mongol line however continues to compress.

Another Mongol cavalry dies to the combined shooting and support.

Turn 8:
This was not a long game, but it certainly moved fast.

Two more combat rounds and still no resolution here. 

Turn 9:
The Mongols spend their points in the center and right retreating before the longbow.  The Irish left is going to be a total loss, which will be worth it if I can get the center.

The Anglo Knights have fallen.

I am sorry, I don't have any good closing shots.  The game was called on time.  The Irish had lost 10 points, while the Mongols lost 14.  It was a good fight.

What went right?  Instead of running my Galloglaich as a solid unit of 4, I broke them up, each paired with a Longbow unit.  The thought is whatever could take the Longbow, didn't want to fight the Galloglaich.  And whatever ran away from the Galloglaich, the Longbow could reach out and touch it.

I still am having trouble with the flank commands.  The Swiss Army Command seemed to work well, but, I am beginning to attribute that to luck.  It is a command that intrinsically has 3 parts, and a General that sometimes can only command only 1 or 2 a turn.  It's structure alone contains the seeds of its own defeat.