Easter Holiday Haul

While I was away on the Easter round-robin road-trip to visit family and friends I picked up a random haul of goodies. These came from a collection of second hand books shops found in National Trust sites we visited and a "The Works" discount book shop in Straford. The latter had the unexpected bonus of a half-price 1/144 scale Tu-95 Bear found in the "book shop"! (see below):

Books:

• Bosworth Field (Wars of the Roses)
• D-Day (1944)
• St Nazaire Raid (1942)

A wide range and diverse of reading methinks ;)

Good as the above are, I do 'pine' for the "ones that got away":

• A 1911 British Officers officers guide book to "Military Map Reading"
• Models of Ann Hathaway's and William Shakespere's houses in something between 15mm and 25mm scale

The former caught me without any money while the latter was veto'ed on style grounds.The wife seeing clean through my feeble attempt at claiming it would be a cool mantelpiece ornament. In her words 'naff idea beyond words'.

Fair cop ;)

Impetus Renaissance (5 of 5): "The Field of Glory (aka Massive Points)" - Player Exhaustion

The final wargaming half hour (pushing the players to the point of exhaustion):  

The Swiss are assailed from all sides, but stubbornly refuse to die, see below:

In fact others (WotR armoured foot) die first, see below:

The Italians push "as much forward as possible" losing their brave Halberdiers in the process to the WotR "cavalry reserve" (there was a downside to the "cunning plan" of the Italian General commanding the left wing), see below:

Nevertheless the Italian Pike Block push back the WotR armoured foot in disorder, see below:

Though this local success  brings about the unappetising situation of, the very same armoured horse who killed the valiant Italian Halberdiers, now sit on the Italian Pike Block unguarded flank (see below). In the far distance (top right of the picture) two more blocks of the WotR armoured cavalry reserve can be seen bearing down on the Swiss Pike Blocks.    

Time had to be called at this point (boo hiss). It was too biog a battle to run on a "club night" but as a demonstration of how nice Renaissance Impetus can look, it was an outstanding success.

Review of the "close of game" situation: 

The Italian/Swiss army had one untouched fresh Pike Block still ready to be called upon. The WotR though at breaking point in the middle still had two powerful wings of infantry slowly coiling round the Italian/Swiss flanks, to which the Italians had one "wing of horse" to counter with.

As we left it a draw - but looking very dicey for the Italian/Swiss in the longer run, consensus (myself included) being that the Italian left flank commander (me) had bottled the attack on the left. Looking at the Order of Battle the Italian left wing did not have sufficient "skirmish" troops, all I was needing was just two units of skirmishers as "arrow attractors". Even without them the knights still stood a fair chance of winning and would have at the very least pinned the WotR "cavalry reserve" in position. Ho hum, next time, next time, I vowed, I have got the hang on the infantry side of Impetus but I need to work on the more mobile cavalry side of things.   

A good New Years resolution to have for 2013
;)   

Impetus Renaissance (4 of 5): "The Field of Glory (aka Massive Points)" - Blood Flows

Clip clop, the horses are coming, but if truth be told the armoured knights ain't all that fast "to exploit space" and there is a classic infantry traffic/log jam to contend with ahead, see below:

The Italian Skirmishers have finally "disappeared" but their sacrifice has allowed the Trained Harquebusiers to get into position to shoot down the WotR Artillery Park before it sets its sights on the Italian Pike Block that is approaching, see below:

Trundle, trundle, hooves approach as the armoured knights continue on their journey (taking long range missile fire from the WotR archers in the process), see below (disorder yellow, casualty red): 

The WotR park disposed of the Italian Pike Block pushed through the Trained Harquebusiers (a neat trick of Impetus is that "Heavy Infantry" displaces lighter types, so the Harquebusiers siphon back, so you don't muddle around with Pythagorian movement puzzles). All-in-all this is looking quite tasty for the Italians, see below: 

The second Swiss Pike Block is now contesting the WotR battle line and is enveloped in a desperate slugging match with "many" other opponents. The second Italian Pike Block had rotated and is now moving in its support. The first Swiss Pike Block has ploughed on and is attacking the reserve body of WotR infantry defending the WotR camp, see below:  

The Italian/Swiss success in the center is all "just as well", as the Swiss right flank has fought itself to destruction, freeing the WotR left to come to the assistance of their beleaguers comrades in the center, see below: 

The Swiss in the center are "feeling the pain of battle", but are not spent. The Swiss are clinging onto their last remaining bound Impetus. For the WotR forces it is a desperate time as they are defending on their baseline with their last infantry reserve, see below:   

For all their success the Italian/Swiss force has not broken the WotR army yet and may have dangerously overreached themselves ... or are on the verge of a stunning victory. Who can tell?

Next: The WotR commit their cavalry reserve

Impetus Renaissance (3 of 5): "The Field of Glory (aka Massive Points)" - The Middle Game

The Italian Contribution: 

Meanwhile to the left of the fearless Swiss.. the Italians join the fray. The Italian Halberdiers contest the wood against WotR "lights", while Italian Skirmish types buzz the WotR infantry line and artillery park, see below:

The Italian Halberdiers are victorious and the Italian Skirmishes are still alive, the plan seems to be working, see below: 

The Italians push a "mass" of Trained Harquebusiers and the smaller of their two Pike blocks forwards, see below (Also note below the "turning" of the WotR infantry to face the "Swiss threat"):

Sensing the "locus of the battle" to be in the center of the battlefield and not convinced that charging the massed WotR archer formation makes that much sense, the Italian left flank Condottieri General develops a "cunning plan" of his own and heads his cumbersome formation to the center, see below:

But dear readers, was it the right "cunning plan"?

Next: Blood, death and mayhem

Impetus Renaissance (2 of 5): "The Field of Glory (aka Massive Points)" - Opening Moves, The Swiss Get "Stuck In"

The Swiss on the right,although outnumbered "fly off the tether" and fearlessly get stuck in, see below (impressive by their courage and lack of fear of death):

The Swiss in the middle are equally as fearless and go "off to the races" putting the wind up the WotR players "big style", see below:

The Italians are more sedate, getting themselves in a traffic jam behind some "big bloody houses" somebody (at the last minute) decided to put in the middle of the battlefield (Note: as a better use at least one should have been stacked up behind the Swiss adding depth to the punch), see below:

Italian shame, the powerful Italian/Swiss left just stared at the mass of arrows and foot and did not know what to do (yes, I was the Italian General), see below:

The Swiss in a perfunctory manner dismiss the WotR skirmish screen and then get stuck into the WotR infantry mass, see below:

The Swiss attack grinds on, see below:

And on,spewing forth death and disorder but not losing its momentum, see below:

Finally busting the WotR armoured infantry as the "main course" and eying up the softer archers for deserts, see below:

"Yum, yum", says it all, see below:

Just when the WotR players breathed a 'sigh of relief', thinking they had "weathered the storm" and seen the worst of it, the second Swiss pike moved up into position to continue the Swiss momentum. Luckily for the WotR players it did not contact anything, see below: 

Next: The Italian contribution and WotR riposte

Impetus Renaissance (1of 5): "The Field of Glory (aka Massive Points)" - The Muster

The boys and girls (well boys) at my local wargames club (at bonny Hartlepool) have always wondered what Impetus would look like scaled up from 300 points a side to a "what we could field on the table" scale. With no better excuse or historical pretense, it was "bring what you can Renaissance-wise and we will put it on the table" (see below). The result was a mainly WotR (Wars of the Roses) army faced a Italian Renaissance and Swiss army complemented with many an armoured knight and Men-At-Arms. WotR on the left Italian/Swiss Landsknechts on the right (see below):   

The Italian/Swiss Army:

A hoard of armoured knights (4 units), an artillery park (1) and some light horse mounted crossbowmen (1) on the Italian/Swiss left, see below:

Left middle Italian/Swiss: Landsknecht Pike (2), one pike block attaching a unit of Skirmish DoppelSoldners (1), Skirmish Crossbow (1), Skirmish Harquebusier, Trained Harquebusier (1) and some blood thirsty Halberdiers (1), see below:

Middle right Italian/Swiss: Swiss Pikes (2), Trained Harquebusier (1), more blood thirsty Halberdiers (1), an Artillery Park (1) and some Skirmish Crossbowmen (4) [one of which is occupying the built in area in the advanced middle of the table]:

The Italian/Swiss left: A rather bedraggled affair of some light horse mounted crossbowmen (1) and some armoured knights (2), see below: 

The War of the Roses Army (WotR):

WotR Right: Armoured foot (3) with back rank(s) of supporting archers (3), armoured knights in reserve (3) and Skrmish Crossbowmen (4), see below: 

WotR Center: (Viewing left to right in the picture) An artillery park (1), massed ranks of archers (6), supported by armoured foot (5), another artillery park (1),plus in reserve defending their camp more amoured foot (2), see below:

The WotR left: Another artillery part (1 [the first being part of the WotR center command]), more archers (4), supported by armoured footmen(2) who in turn are backed by a reserve of armoured knights (1), see below:

After set-up the toy cupboards of the four players were deemed as empty (technically I did have a painted "Lady G figure" but she was deemed to be of no fighting value and I declined to demean her By fielding her as mere "camp booty")

Next: The moving and the firing begins