DBMM Forum
General Category => Battle Reports => Topic started by: Barritus on January 15, 2012, 10:13:55 AM
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A couple of nights ago I sent my army to invade Persia. I was facing Jon who I last faced in an Alexandrian Imperial cage match.
I placed a sea on my left flank, while Jon placed a couple of rough patches, one near the sea on the centreline, and a gentle hill which sat on Jon's left jutting out of his deployment zone.
My army contained four commands: Command 1 had massed Cv, LH (S) and Ps (S); Command 2 had a smaller amount of Cv and LH and some Bd (I) and Ps (O); Command 3 had only Bd (I) and Ps (O); and Command 4 had some LH and some Gal (F). My deployment from left to right was Commands 4, 2, 3 and 1.
Jon's army contained massed double-based Bw (X) and Bw (O). The centre command had a mob of Irreg Bw (X/O), backed by some Ax (O). On his right, near the sea, he had some Bw (O), some Ps (S) and (O) in the scrub, plus some Cv (O) and LH (F). On his left, around the hill, he had some Regular Bw (X/O), and some Cv (O) and LH (F).
I looked at our relative deployments, and figured that I'd concentrate of breaking through the centre command with the Bd, and overrunning his Cv (O) with my Cv (S), and his LH (F) with my LH (S). I'd try to defend as much as possible on the left.
Then the weather result caught me out - strong wind. Worried about the galleys being wrecked on the shore, I gave Command 4 the highest PIP dice, Command 1 the second highest, then Command 2, and Command 3 the lowest. My plan to land the galleys and disembark the Ps went out the window because the crews would be greatly outnumbered by the Persian Ps. Instead I'd use the (hopefully) plentiful PIPs to keep close to shore and shoot down anyone who came close.
Tactical subtlety went out the window. Jon expanded his column of LH (F) and otherwise slowly advanced his infantry, cursing his luck that the wind reduced his range. I matched the expansion of his LH with mine, and sent the infantry forward to face his.
Jon's early shooting was pretty good, pushing some of my lads back and even knocking over one Bd element. But in my bound I took advantage of a couple of high dice rolls in shooting to press forward into contact. It wasn't until I calculated the factors for double-overlapped Bd against double-based Bw (X/O) to realise that pressing forward like this wasn't a bright idea: 2(I) to 5(I). I was lucky to come away with only one more dead Bd.
Jon was cautious on my right, and didn't charge into combat when he could. So when I moved into contact all my elements would break ties and get +2 on winning. I was confidently expecting to rip holes in Jon's mounted wing. But it wasn't so. My combat results were dismal and our losses were even in number, but bad for me because I lost a 2ME Cv (S).
The combats in the centre and on my right wing continued for several bounds, with Jon generally getting the better of it. By the time he'd lost three elements, my right wing command was disheartened, and I was forced into ever more risky moves to give the Cv (S) a chance at kills. Meanwhile the Persian sparabara were scything down the Bd with their archery. And even when I got an extended line of Bd into contact, only once did I win a combat and thus destroy the enemy.
In desperation I pushed the mounted of Commands 2 and 4 forward in the hope of forcing a result against the Bw of Jon's right wing, but I had no more success there.
Eventually both Commands 1 and 3 broke, and the two 2ME penalties for Command 2 were enough to break it too, and thus the army. I think one Persian soldier got a nasty cut in what was clearly a 25-0 result for Jon.
Thanks to Jon for an entertaining game which finally forced me to admit the command structure of my Cancon army was rubbish and needed serious redesign.
My main problems were that the infantry were split between two commands which had the lowest and second lowest PIP dice. This was in turn the result of strong wind convincing me to give the high PIP dice to Command 4. Had I accepted any loss of the galleys by giving Command 4 the lowest PIP dice, I would have had a lot more PIPs for the commands which were actually intended to Do Stuff to the enemy. I also now realise that if the Bd (I) are going to Do Stuff to enemy who have high factors, I can't afford to go in overlapped, let alone double overlapped.
So the result has been the complete redesign of the army for Cancon. Good idea? Possibly not. But I don't think the result could be much worse than what I've endured in the last month or so. At least I get one practice game before the big event to see whether I'm on the right track.