Well, last Thursday saw the much-anticipated showdown between my Nikephorian Byzantines and Karl's French Ordonnance army. Karl had finished second to me at Cancon, but we didn't play each other because Karl missed the first day of the competition. That's right - in a six round competition, Karl finished second having played only four games. So it seemed only right to see how our armies would match up.
I was the invader, originally intending to invade in autumn, but delayed to winter thanks to the dice roll, and the weather provided strong wind (diagonally into my face) and the threat of rain.
For terrain I chose a couple of gentle hills and a patch of rough flat. Karl selected a couple of rough hills, a wood and a road. The rough flat landed on my left flank, facing the wood which was on Karl's right flank. A rough hill was on Karl's left, and we each got a gentle hill in the centre of our table edges. Other terrain played no part in the game. This was just a little too much terrain for me to be comfortable with - the wood and the rough hill neatly covered Karl?s flanks, while the rough flat was just a little in my way.
After much dithering, I placed Command 4 in the rough on my left, with Command 1 next to it, then Command 2, and Command 3 on my right flank (see my thread about Cancon to read up on my army). Karl deployed three commands plus a regular baggage command (competition rules for Book 1 and 4 armies). On his right were Swiss Pk under a sub-general. In the centre were Reg Kn (S), Reg Cv (O) and Reg Bw (O) under a Reg Kn (S) sub-general. On his right were Irr Bd (O) backed by Irr Bw (O) in the front, protected on their flank by a couple of Irr WWg (O). To their rear were a couple more Reg Cv (O) and the Irr Bw (I). After Karl completed his deployment I realised I'd forgotten to use my scouting stratagem, and as a result was unsure whether there were ambushes either in the wood or behind the rough hill.
Karl started with excellent PIPs, and in fact he got good PIPs throughout the game. As a result he pushed forward with his Swiss, Cv and Kn facing Commands 1 and 4. He was a little more defensive with his left wing. I also tried to push forward hard on my right, while playing things more defensively on the left. However, despite having one PIP dice more than Karl, my own PIPs were generally less than his. Thanks to Karl's excellent PIPs, however, the rain soon came - something of a nuisance for a pair of armies with a few arrow shooters in them, especially when combined with the strong wind.
My plan was to crush Karl's left wing as quickly as possible, then swing onto his centre. The problem was that his vulnerable Bw (I) were a long way away from my Bw (X), and I wasn't confident of taking on his WWg. I was therefore pleasantly surprised to discover that WWg lose 1 in combat against mounted in the rain. So I lined up the Cv of Commands 1 and 2 and prepared to receive his Kn while charging his Bd/Bw and WWg line.
Karl got the first kill with his Swiss against Command 1's LH, followed by the Ps in Command 4. Stupidly I sent Command 4's general out to attack the Cv of Karl's centre command, whereupon he was swamped by Swiss Ps and killed. That shattered that command, costing me a valuable PIP dice. I could happily lose all the Ps in that command without it even becoming disheartened, but lose the general and the command is broken.
My initial attack achieved little, killing only one Bd, but I was confident of further success. The following turn Karl's Kn hit Command 1's Cv, and killed three, pushing the command to the edge of collapse. I counter-attacked with the C-in-C, using a combat Brilliant Stroke to just barely push his opponent back. Meanwhile, Command 2's attack began to pay dividends, as one of the War Wagons was destroyed, along with some more infantry.
Over the next couple of bounds I managed to push the French left wing to the edge of collapse (including getting the other War Wagon), while hanging on desperately with Command 1. The second combat Brilliant Stroke achieved no more than the first. I sent the LH of Command 3 from my right wing to support Command 1, and they were soon in the thick of the action.
Finally, it all ended in a rush. My Bw (X) shot down a Cv element from Karl?s left wing command, while the sub-general killed another element to break that command. But then Karl's Kn launched another attack which killed the C-in-C and a couple more Cv, breaking that command. Along with the loss of Command 4, and 1 Cv from Command 2, it was enough to break my army. 18-7 to Karl.
Thanks to Karl for a very enjoyable game.
So while Karl won the battle, I'd still scored enough points to stay ahead of him on Cancon aggregate - 120 to 116!
