A few weeks ago I had a game intended as a practice match for Wintercon. In the end I was unable to play at Wintercon, but I thought people might like to read about this practice match.
I had a four command Mongol army with Brilliant General, including some Cv (S), Cv (O) and LH (S). David fielded Tibetans in three large commands, two with Kn (X) and a couple of LH (F), and one command with Cv (O) and more LH (F).
The Tibetans were the invaders, in spring (hoping for Hungry Horses).
The table had a couple of 1 FE sized difficult hills in my deployment zone, one left and one right. Near the centre of the table was a small gentle hill. There were also a couple of gentle hills in Dave's deployment zone.
The deployment dice determined that (a) it was sunrise, (b) Dave would deploy first, and (c) that the weather would include Mud. As the game was intended as a proof of concept of the Mongol army, I suggested we ignore the mud result as it
would skew the game too severely.
Dave deployed his Cv command on his right, with the cataphract commands centre and left. I deployed the C-in-C (with Cv (S)) on the left in front of the difficult hill facing the Tibetan Cv command, the second command (with Cv (S)) on the right, the larger (but still small) LH command in the centre, and the smaller LH command Concealed behind the right hill. (I realised after the game I should have spent a Brilliant Stroke for that decision. Oops, sorry Dave.)
Dave's first PIPs weren't great but they were sufficient to move the Cv command forward enough that my C-in-C's command couldn't march. As it was stuck in front of the difficult hill, the only move I could make was to column up to the left
and try to get directly in front of the enemy command.
On my right I moved the second command forward as quickly as I could, getting outside the flank the Tibetan left wing. I sent the small fourth command up to join them. In the centre I advanced the 2 Cv (O) in the third command to stop Dave's centre command from advancing too quickly.
The first combat was on my left where the Tibetan LH attacked Mongol LH and destroyed one element. With my command in a bit of a mess, even 6 PIPs didn't let me do everything I wanted, so I doubled his PIPs with a brilliant stroke and managed to make a heap of single element moves.
The early combat generally favoured the Mongols, with a heap of Tibetan LH (F) being exchanged for 1 LH and 1 Cv (S). The Tibetan right wing was disheartened, broken and shattered in short order.
But the pendulum soon swung back: in the centre the cataphracts pushed forward hard and managed to contact the LH (S), destroying three in one bound. Other cataphracts, having pushed past the Khan's command, turned around and hit some
of my Cv (S) in the rear. Suddenly my first command was broken, and the transferred ME penalty was sufficient to break the centre command. That was 36 out of the 38 ME needed to break my army.
Meanwhile, on my right I had two commands facing Dave's low PIP command. Dave sent out individual LH as speed humps while he gradually wheeled his cataphracts around. I knocked over a handful of the LH, but Dave was then able to hit some
LH and Cv (O) with cataphracts, and destroy them. And that was enough to break the army.
I came close to disheartening Dave's left wing, but even so probably achieved about 30% casualties, meaning it would've been about 19-6 to Dave.
Thanks to Dave for both an entertaining game and for lending me the figures.
