So tried out Sertorius the other night and both of us being in experimental (well mental really as one would not take these armies to a serious comp.) Richard fielded his Toltecs.
After a little help from Mr Barrett on this forum I went for this silly list,
1 Reg Cv(O) CinC Sertorius,
10 Irr Ax(S) Spanish Minions
2 Irr Lh(O) Round Shields
3 Reg Ps(S) Romanified Javelin hombres
3 Irr Ps(O) Backcountry slingers
3 Irr Exp(O) Flaming Wagons
1 Reg Bd(O) Sub General Igotyourbackus
6 Reg Bd(O) Roman Exiles
1 Irr Ax(S) more Spanish Minions
8 Reg Ps(S) again Romanified etc.
1 Reg Cv(O) Sub General Gettingroundus
3 Reg Cv(O) Trained Long Shielders
1 Irr Cv(O) not Trained yet Long Shielders
11 Reg Ps(S) this is getting ridiculous
1 Irr Ps(O) (why can we not be trained) Slingers
1 Irr Cv(O) Ally El Nogood Diceo
2 Irr Cv(O) El Nogo?s Retainers
11 Reg Ps(S) Why are we with an Irr General
1 Irr Ps(O) Last of the barrel slingers
6 Irr Bg(I) Ox Wagons
At 395 points I also took defenders Concealed Command (definitely a bad choice).
Let me just say I do not have models for the expendables or ox wagons, just wanted to try out the army. I felt that the regular skirmishers would help, especially as they cost no extra ap and I have a compulsory wooded hill. I would like to state at this point that Peter did advise me not to take the expendables and how right he was but then again I did not expect to play against a baulk of irr Bw(I).
Richard invaded and put down a river, coming in from side 1 (my 5) just about 70cm from my corner to my base line to the near maximum 120 cm form the same corner. I placed 1 wooded hill on my side of the river closer to side 1, another wooded hill on the other side of the river nearly opposite the first, then lost a wood (could not place it) and put 2 half woods on Richards side of the river 1 touching the river the other near my base edge further over.
My battle plan (never really have a plan), flank march El Nogood Diceo, on the side with the Dgo, flank march the semi mounted cavalry command on the other, delay the blades, hold my hill with the Ps(O), deploy a line of Ax(S) away from the river (far enough not to be shot over), expendables in a column with Seri, and Baggage behind. Richard deployed some Ps(O) (6 of them) on his hill in the same command as his CinC with Irr Bw(I) and some warband fast, and 3 other commands of loads of Irr Bw(I) with a smattering of Reg Bd(I) and Reg Bw(O). I think he nearly has 4 24 Me commands and a baggage fast command (delayed).
My map is not great but just experimenting; Richard has 4 regular dice (which is nice) and the train dice. He gave the command to my right the highest dice and averaged the other three, Seri got my highest, exiles the next, the cavalry the last.
Friendly game and river was low, summer (important for visibility in the woods {2cm}). First roll delayed command arrived, sent all the Ps(S) into the wood on the other side of the river, bought on the rest in the triangle of river, Ax(S) and my table edge. On came Richards blocks of Toltecs, on the right hand side (as I look at his blocks) were the Reg Bw(O) and Bd(I), which on the Com 3 and 4 decided to break off, to go around the wood on either side. Pips were bad usually for me and spent most of the rest of the game fiddling with Ps, Richard marched the Bow blocks up to the river and very sportingly decided to cross. My Spanish ally decided to arrive and after having a Brain freeze moment marched on with a mostly single line of Ps(S) on his side of the river, a column of cavalry on mine, marched into his puny Ps(O) up hill and proceeded to die, (who say S against O is deadly), bought up the Ax(S) to defend the river bank (could not now be shot at as the bows were wading) while the blades trying to stop the flying column that had crossed the river near my table edge. Well to cut a long and boring story short the Ax(S) completely crumbled in combat to bow(I), I rolled lots of 1?s and 2?s, even mistakenly giving the Ax plus 1 defending a river bank (which we corrected during the game), Doubled the blades pip dice once and still could not kill much bow(O) or Bd(I). The Spanish ally did not get much pips to kill Ps(O), and lost 4 Ps(S).
The cavalry arrived on bound 5 or 6 and tried a vain run to Richards arriving baggage, we had loads of spontaneous moves in the river (moving in lots of wheeling into overlap columns (really don?t know whether they could do this due to flow of river but it was fun all the same). Lost 7 Ax(S) in CinC?s command, which managed to dishearten both Bd command and Spanish ally and I just waited for the fat lady to sing Barcelona.
Expendables never even saw action what a waste, must remember to pay more attention to Peter B?s advice. Fun game and good for a laugh not using competition armies or tactics (sending Bw(I) over a river to fight Ax(S), never), one of the few times I got a double down on Bd(I) I managed to kill a general, to little to late.
William
Ps Map seems to not have pasted over, still trying to get these things to work.
