Just for something a little different, I decided to take on Nick's Mongol Conquest army with some cobbled together Batavian Early Germans (69AD).
I had two commands with a mix of Cv (O), Ps (S) and (O) and Wb (F) (24 and 20 ME respectively), one command of Cv (O) and Ps (S) (20 ME) and Suevi allies again with Cv (O) and Ps (S) (9 ME). (I saw the list notes say that ally contingents drawn from the list don't need to have Wb in them.) The first two commands each had only 6 Wb, so I only had 12 Wb altogether...except that the Cv can also dismount - as Wb (S). Having faced a few nomad armies in open competitions lately, I wanted to try out a different response to them rather than just taking another nomad army of my own.
Anyway, I was the defender in summer. There was no weather and the game started at 6am. I chose a bunch of difficult terrain pieces, which approximately covered both flanks. Nick placed a couple of gentle hills which ended up near his table edge. I deployed first.
I placed Command 1 on my left, Command 2 in the centre and Command 3 on the right. Command 4, the small Suevi ally command, was entirely in ambush in a wood on my right flank.
Nick placed a large command of Cv (S) and LH (S) on his right flank, sitting on a gentle hill. In the centre was a Black Army command entirely of Cv (S). On his left flank was a command of Irreg LH (S). The large command got the biggest PIP dice, the centre command got the middle PIP dice, and the Irreg LH command got the lowest PIP dice.
Moving first, I tried to get across the board quickly to pin the Mongols in place and prevent too much faffing around. However I discovered to my embarrassment that the Suevi command was too deep in the wood to move straight out, so I only had PIPs to move a couple of Cv and Ps out.
Nick's first PIPs weren't great, so he advanced a little towards me.
Within another couple of bounds combat was pretty general across the line. Nick attacked the Wb (F) with double-ranked LH (S) charging down hill. Despite all these advantages it took a while for the LH to grind their way through, and in the process they lost a couple of LH spent.
In the centre I kept getting the good rolls against double-overlapped Cv (S), and within another couple of bounds the Black Army command broke.
However on my right things went severely pear-shaped. Despite having the lowest PIPs, and having LH facing Cv supported by Ps (S), the Mongols were here clearly victorious. First the Suevi were broken, having never entirely got clear of the woods. Then Command 3 was overrun as time after time the LH laughed off their one or two factor disadvantage to destroy Cv and Ps. I think in one bound there were something like three combats where the (S) bonus made the difference.
Meanwhile, on my left, things moved a little more slowly. Nick charged in, lost a Cv (S), and then Feigned Flight out of combat. In my next bound I had enough PIPs that things didn't get too bad, although I had a column of Ps (O) move impetuously out of a wood on my far left. Nick's troops turned around to face me, while my troops charged in to renew acquaintances.
Around this time we had to call time. My Cv which had beaten the Black Army Cv (S) were slowly swinging onto the flank of the LH fighting my Wb, while the Cv/Ps of Command 1 were slowly grinding forwards with low PIPs. The unanswered question was whether I could wrap up that large command before Nick's victorious left flank LH command could hit my centre command in the flank.
Thanks to Nick for an entertaining game.
I won't be running this army in competition any time soon, but I feel that the cheap Cv (O)/Ps (S) combo is a potent counter to massed LH nomad armies, particularly when you get to move first.
