A Chiasm of Chinese

A Headless Body Production

Venue: Wyndom Lancaster Resort, nee' Lancaster Host
Event: HMGSs' Fall In(tm) Open 15mm tournament, Round 2
Players: Ben Taylor, running Three Kingdoms Chinese
                   Also referred to as "Three Kingdoms Standing Like the Legs of a Three-Legged Cooking Pot"
               Phil Gardocki, running Samurai, list 221
Game System: L'Art de la Guerre, 15mm, 200 points per side.

The Forces:
Samurai commanders include the Strategist Yoshitune, Darryl-san, the Competent, and Darryl-san, the Ordinary and Included
2 Heavy Cavalry, Bow, Elite
2 Light Cavalry, Bow, one Elite
5 Samurai, Heavy Sword, 2HW, Elite
6 Samurai, Medium Sword, bow, 2 Elite
3 Peasant Bowmen, Mediocre
2 Peasants armed with Naginata, Medium sword, Mediocre
3 Light Infantry, Bow
1 Stampeding Cattle, played as a Scythed Chariot
Breakpoint...23

The Chinese, are commanded by commanders of unknown, but probably excellent quality.
4 Heavy Cavalry, Impact
2 Heavy Cavalry, Bow
5 Heavy Infantry, Pole-Arm, Support
3 Crossbowmen or Bowmen
2 Medium Swordsmen, possibly Impetuous
4 Light Horse, Bow
3 Light Infantry, Crossbow
Breakpoint of 23

Display Conventions: When you see a jagged word bubble like "Ouch!", "ああ！" or "哎哟!",this implies a disorder from missiles. Letters in parenthesis represent some value change for the specific unit. For commanders it is s for strategist, b for Brilliant, c for Competent and o for Ordinary, u for unreliable. For troops it is e for Elite, and m for Mediocre. Other abbreviations, Hvy Heavy, XB Crossbow, LB, Longbow, Jav Javelin, 2HW 2 Handed Weapons, B Bow, Kn Knight, HKn Heavy Knight, HC Heavy Cavalry, Md Medium, Sgt Sergeants, LC Light Cavalry, Chr Chariot, Cat Cataphract, Pa Pavise, LI, Light Infantry, HG Hand Gun, FKn Foot Knight, Hvy Spear, Heavy Spearmen.

"XX" implies a unit killed in that location on that turn.

Inappropriate capitalization is for words that have a specific meaning in the game.

Any inaccuracies and vagueness as to specific units is to be regarded as fog of war and should be considered as part of the fun.

The Board:

The Chinese win the initiative and elect to attack in the plains.

The Samurai only got part of their desired terrain. Their right flank and center have plantations, but there is a wide clear area from center to left.

The Chinese right is a mix of horse skirmishers and impact

The center is a strong force of foot

Their right flank has a weaker force of horse.

Yoshitune's command tries to cover the terrainless left.

Darryl-san's micro command (HC, LC and cattle) take the center.

While Darryl-san's command takes full advantage of ambush possibilities.

Turn 1:

It will help to think horse race announcer here...

(but not much)

And they're off! It's LC on the outside corner, followed by HC on the inside edge, HC impact following on their heels.

Pulling up are heavy foot. Lagging behind are missilemen....

Impetuous and HC are stalled at the gate. But LC is is ahead by 5 lengths, it's LC and..

OK, we can drop that silliness. Yoshitune recalls his scouts to safety.

His foot does a left, move, move and right face closing the gap with the boards edge.

Darryl-san marches his heavies across the plantation

His peasant archers release volley after volley to no effect against the Chinese scouts.

Turn 2:

The Chinese push forward

Their left flank commander begins to redeploy his horse.

Yoshtune closes the left off. His archers loose a volley against the Chines horse archers to no avail.

Darryl-san holds his cattle

While the other Darryl-san reveals another ambush. Samurai archers, shooting to good effect.

On another table Rich Kroupa (right) and Scott Holder (around the corner, upstairs to the left) are lining up Hebrews against Samnites.

The Hebrew camp is a burning bush. This is also the second Arc of the Covenant I have seen this day.

Impetuous Gallic tribes advance.

On another table was a continuously running Circus Maximus.

Turn 3:

The Chinese recall their horse, and advance their foot.

Their bowmen advance to trade arrows against the Samurai

Yoshitune advances his heavies, while his mediums hold their ground and continue to loose arrows.

Darryl-San herds his cattle towards the Chinese archers

His Samurai archers are shooting very well.

Turn 4:

Chinese foot assault the Samurai foot to good effect.

Elsewhere arrows are striking home also to good effect.

Chinese horsemen step into an arrow-storm

On the far left, the Samurai go to a nose's whisker from the Chinese horse archers. In the center, katana wielding samurai flank charge one Chinese foot, routing them, and then into another, routing it as well.

Darryl-san stampedes his cattle. And charges with them routing a Chinese archer. The Cattle roll up causing two hits on the other Chinese archer.

The score is 6 of 23 for the Samurai

to 15 of 23 for the Chinese.

Turn 4:

The Chinese commit their impact cavalry. One Samurai is routed, another disordered.

The Chinese foot in the near the center (red shields) had destroyed their naganinta men earlier, and conformed to destroy the peasant archers.

Though disordered, Chinese horse rout one samurai, and disorder another.

Taking the Samurai to 14 of 23...

to 16 of 23 for the Chinese.

Yoshitue commits his heavies to charging the Chinese Heavy Cavalry. He brings his scouts to support his medium foot. But still loses two more units.

Darryl-sans peasant archers charge the Chinese horse. Routing one.

The score is now 19

To 20.

Turn 6

The score is very tight. Each side trying to push for a victory, and avoid a loss.

Katana armed samurai make no progress against the Chines horse archers.

The Japanese scouts evade when the Chinese heavy cavalry conformed on them. And rolled short to stay on the board.

The last Chinese heavy horse turns onto the naganinta men on it's flank. Despite two supports, the naganinta's are disordered.

Bringing the Samurai up to 22 of 23, while staying at 20 for the Chinese.

In the upper left. A Chinese cavalry is traded for a Samurai foot. Japanese scouts return an loose arrows for another point.

Another Chinese cavalry is flanked and disordered. The Chinese impetuous foot tries and fails to rout Japanese peasant bowmen.

With rallies, the Samurai keep their score at just 22.

The Chinese also had good rallies, and kept their score at 20.

I apologize here. Turn 7 did not get any photos taken. But the end results were in as 23 - 22. So the Chinese squeezed in one more point, while losing 2 at the top of the 7th.

What went wrong?

I had a significant advantage from the early bow fire, up 7 points with Ben's Chinese only 7 points from demoralization.  But Ben relied on better matchups at that point, mostly his heavies against my mediums, and took it in for the win.

My problem was that my heavies were not effectively employed.  The three on the far left were basically screening against heavy cavalry, and only got into contact because Ben wanted them too.  One of that three did manage an effective flank charge, killing one Chinese heavy, then another.

Darryl's two heavies, wasted much time trying to get into action.  Many command points spent, and finally one of them got engaged, causing a single hit for one point total.  

I put the three on the far left, because I expected them to engage a flanking cavalry maneuver.  But horse units are much faster, and the the Chinese just shifted their focus elsewhere.