A Carol of Franks

A Headless Body Production

Venue: An Totally Different Undisclosed Basement
Event: Saturday afternoon
Players: Phil Gardocki playing Nikephorian Byzantine
              Carl playing Carolingian Franks
Game System: L'Art de la Guerre, 200 points per side, 25mm
Theme: Dark Age, no Knights

The Forces:

Nikephorian Byzantine(list 128)

Led by the Sneaker brothers, Nikephoros the younger and Brilliant, Adidasphoros, the Brilliant and Pumaphoros, the ordinary, and somewhat unreliable.

4 Tagmata, Kataphractoi, Heavy Cavalry Bow, Impact, Elite

4 Prokoursatores, Light Cavalry, Bow

5 Varangians or Menavlatoi, Heavy Swordsmen 2HW

5 Skutatoi, ½ Heavy Spearmen ½ Bowmen

4 Psiloi, Light Infantry, Bows and Javelins

Breakpoint of 22

 

Carolingian Franks (list 149 with Charlemagne updates)
3 Commanders, Charlemagne the Strategist. <<think of a name for this guy>> a Competent commander, and Fjiord Viking Ally, also Competent
8 Caballarii, 7 Heavy and 1 Medium, Cavalry, some Impact, some Impetuous, some Elite
2 Gascons, Light Cavalry, Javelin
4 Heavy Spearmen
2 Huscarls, Heavy Swordsmen, Armor, 2HW
3 Viking Warriors, Heavy Swordsmen
2 LI Bow
Breakpoint of 21

The Franks win the initiative and elect to attack in the Mountains.

The Board:

Nikephoros deploys his first command. 5 units of Varangians between the cool waters of lake <insert name here> and a deep gully.

Charlemagne takes the position of honor on the right with a strong foot force, supported by over eager lancers.

Of the remaining Byzantine forces, none are to be seen.

Fijord's Vikings deploy in the center.

<<Think of a name for this guy>> takes the position on the Frankish left, but is ready to redeploy if need be.

The view from the Byzantine left.

Turn 1:

Before the first Frankish command dice is rolled, an ambush is revealed. It's Adidasphoros, the Ordinary and somewhat Unreliable. He has climbed the steep and rocky hill with a few Psiloi.

Why reveal early you ask? An ambush behind a hill could be negated if enemy forces get behind the crest before revealing. I figure I'll get it over with now rather than risk losing it.

Charlemagne takes his horsemen to the center of the table, while his spearmen advance slowly

<<think of a name for this guy>> and Fijord pass each other.

Adidasphoros, on the hill goes unresponsive. So Nikephoros holds his troops steady as deployed.

Turn 2:

Charlemagne's foot troops halt. I think they do not want to advance too far as they may need to intercept a flank march on the right.

<<think of a name for this guy>> pulls some interesting dressage moves, while Charlemagne pulls in behind him.

Fjiord advances forward cautiously.

Adidasphoros continues to be unresponsive.

Nikephoros burns about 6 seconds off the clock and passes.

Turn 3:

A single Frankish spearman approaches the Byzantine held hill

Charlemagne sends forth his Impetuous horsemen to intercept a possible flank march. <<think of a name for this guy>> slowly approaches the hole between the Varangians and the hill.

Fjiord isn't waiting, and double times his foot.

Finishing his coffee, Adidasphoros looks around and decides to take a look around.  Cresting the hill he throws a few taunts at the Franks below.

Out of the gully climbs 4 units of Skutatoi, bows in hand.

Staring at his hour glass, Nikephoros mutters, "Where the hell is Pumaphoros?"

Turn 4:

Of the Byzantine flank march, there is no sign. The Frankish spearmen prepare to intercept if it is on their side.

<<think of a name for this guy>> looks at the Skutatoi and assesses his chances.

Elite, Armor, and outnumbering the Skuts 6-4, he decides to throw the dice.

Fjiord advances to just out of charge reach. If only the Byzantines would cooperate and meet him half way.

The view of the Gods

"They are not coming up here", mutters Adidasphoros

The Skutatoi line almost lines up with the Varangian line. Misses by just a scoche

Some "Light" adjustment. Get it? Light? ... Tough audience...

Horns!, Horns of the Tagmata! Pumaphoros has come at last!

Turn 5:

<<think of a name for this guy>> commits to charge reach

Charlemagne drives his flank interceptors covering all approaches.

Fjiord commits to combat. Next turn will decide the fate of the world

More light adjustment. Adidasphoros's forces are exactly where they need to be.

Arrows loosed. But only one hit.

Nikephoros has comforting words. Leather covers are removed from bright axes

History does not record Charlemagne's thoughts here, but shear mass of horse flesh arrayed against him must have been daunting.

 Turn 6:

The cream of Frankish cavalry doesn't even make a dent into the Byzantine line.

An odds interlude  I have a built a combat simulator using Excel and it's macro language, Visual Basic for Applications, that takes a combat situation, and runs a thousand iterations of the combat until one or the other unit is killed, from there I determine the odds of ultimately winning, and length of time it takes.

On impact, the numbers are Cavalry +zero with elite and armor. The Skutatoi are +2 with mediocre and missile support. So the cavalry are at a disadvantage on the face of it, but it is not as bad as it seems.

In a straight up fight, the Heavy Cavalry will win, destroying the Skutatoi 53% of the time taking an average of 6 turns to do so.

The Heavy Cavalry with support will win 92% of the time, defeating the Skuts on average in 4.75 turns.

However, the Heavy Cavalry with a missile hit only has a 16% chance of ultimate success. 

Then take into account the infantry fight next to this one, where the ends of the Viking line are 2HW, Armor verses the Varangians sans armor. The Huscarls will win 55/45 taking 3.7 turns

And that is why we throw dice. The Huscarls break even, but the 3 ordinary warriors all perform excellently.

It is do or die for the Franks, their Impetuous cavalry charge. The result is a minor loss for the Franks

The score is 5 to 3, in favor of the Byzantines.

The Skuts break through

Note the end of the Skut line. They won the impact round, but now have two hits. Armor and Elite is a big deal.

The Varangian line is already collapsing before Viking spears.

Tagmata charges, supported by their Prokoursatores

Another Caballarii is trampled into the mud

The score is now 11 to 6, in favor of the Byzantines

 Turn 7:

Despite the long term odds, it is not looking good for the Caballarii against the Skutatoi

But the same can be said for the Varangians.  The race is on, which command will collapse first?

The flank Caballarii are giving way

A minor miracle. Frankish Light Horse are actually winning against a Heavy Spear unit.

Another penetration of the Frankish lines

Pumaphoros's cavalry are ultimately victorious.  In two turns Charlemagne's camp will fall and the rear of his other commands be taken.

The Vikings show they can play this game as well.  Pumaphoros may arrive in time to see the Varangians totally hacked to pieces.

But the Fijords brave Norsemen are too late. The flower of Frankish Nobility has been defeated and Charlemagne calls for retreat.

The final score is 21 to 8 

So what went wrong?   There are a thousand lessons in defeat, but none in victory.  From the Byzantine side, A few things went wrong.  A command that went unresponsive, late arriving flank march, and the Heavy foot just went to pieces on impact.  

But the terrain fell perfect for the Byzantines.  With a trip wire force of a pair of Psiloi on a steep hill, the Franks were not going to be able to take advantage of the unresponsive command without activating it.  The side benefit of that was the Skutatoi ambush could not advance out of the gully, even if they wanted to, and so the Franks had no information to work with.  The Franks could not know how big the flank march was, nor which direction it was coming.  So he had to split the interception forces, and in so doing 4 heavy spear, 15% of his force by points, never got into battle.

The Varangians rolled poorly on impact, and that led to heavy losses, but the dice ran the other way with the Skutatoi vs Cavalry. So luck averaged out.  

The flank march arrived a bit late, but that also served to giving time for Charlemagne to assemble a mounted force to receive them.  That force was out matched, but not by much.  3 Impact and 3 lights vice 4 impact and 4 lights plus a heavy spear.