"Derby" AAR 4: Ooh, they've brought a large wooden horse for us....

Sorry for making you wait for this one. Today's post is the fourth and final AAR from "Derby".

My opponent was Bob Medcraft from the Oxford Team. I've met him before at Campaign and he's a great guy, so I knew it would make up for my horrible experience in the morning game.

Bob was fielding a Later Mycenaean or Trojan army, and had opted (unsurprisingly) for the "Achaians in the Trojan War" option. This was his army list:

Inspired Commander (Agamemnon)
3 x Troop Commander (Nestor, Achilles and one of the other boys from the gang)
1 x 6 Myrmidons (MF, Superior, Undrilled, Armoured, Impact Foot/Swordsmen)
2 x 8 Nestor's Spearmen (HF, Average, Drilled, Protected, Defensive Spear)
2 x 4 Light Chariot (Superior, Undrilled, Light Spear)
1 x 8 Spearmen (MF, Average, Undrilled, Protected, Offensive Spear)
2 x 6 Spearmen (MF, Average, Undrilled, Armoured, Offensive Spear)
2 x 6 Javelinmen (LF, Average, Undrilled, Unprotected, Javelin, Light Spear)
2 x 6 Bowmen (LF, Average, Undrilled, Unprotected, Bow)
1 x 6 Slingers (LF, Average, Undrilled, Unprotected, Sling)

Bob won initiative and opted for Hilly terrain. We ended up with 3 steep hills, a piece of impassable terrain (a lake), 2 pieces of broken ground and an area of brush. Much of it ended up in Bob's half of the table, including 2 steep hills in what should have been an ideal position for him to take advantage of.

Advancing on my right flank. I decided to commit both my skirmisher units to this attack, to try to deny Bob the hill on this wing whilst screening my 4 average units as they advanced.

My block of superior troops in the centre, advancing slowly towards the fight between the hills against Bob's best troops. Meanwhile, I've sent 2 of my average units forward on the left flank to try to take that hill.

 

Clash of the not-very-Titans. We've each managed to disrupt one unit at impact.

Moving into the gap. Bob had pointed out something I'd been doing wrong in my earlier games, that chariots can't be combined with medium or heavy foot to form a battle line for movement. That is why the right hand unit is slightly behind the rest.

"We'll hold here whilst those sluggards catch up"

On the left flank, one unit disrupted by enemy skirmishers. They'll be seen off soon enough and my gallant swordsmen will charge over the hill into his spearmen.

On the right flank, I'm winning the skirmisher melee with one of his units already broken. However, I do appear to have a swordsmen unit about to be menaced by some chariots in the open. Gulp!

My chariots and one unit of superior armoured swordsmen rashly charged in against Nestor's spearmen whilst the sluggards were once again, errr, sluggardly and didn't join in.

Back to the left flank - skirmishers chased off and enemy spearmen contacted. I seem to be winning here....

That's half of Nestor's boys broken, very conveniently bursting through his chariots as they routed. My other superior armoured swordsmen with my chariots should make short work of the other unit.

Those skirmishers have held on very well against mine, but are now fragmented and one base away from breaking automatically. My average swordsmen who had been providing some support on the flank have decided they can leave the javelinmen to it.

And they've gone! Unfortunately my swordsmen were charged by some of his spearmen and double-dropped to fragmented in the impact phase.

The other lot of Nestor's spearmen have broken, with my heavy chariots pursuing into contact with the light chariots.

My right-most swordsmen have decided to try to force Bob's chariots back off their edge of the table.

Oh, damn! I bet that this is where things start to go wrong for me.

Oh crap, they'd routed through their rear support, disrupting them.

Yup, the rot is setting in....

The rot is definitely setting in....

Back to my left flank - the right flank is turning into a horror story. One enemy unit broken, one fragmented.

"The horror, the horror...."

Errr, didn't I have 3 superior foot units and some chariots here? How come I've only got two foot units in the centre now? Well, the answer is astonishingly simple really - my dice were terrible, Bob's were bloody superb and my chariots and a superior foot unit were wiped out.

Not much left of Bob's right wing though.

The two fragmented units on my right wing dropped to broken in the next melee phase, which meant I'd lost 6 battle groups (half my army) giving Bob the win. However, I'd also broken 6 of his battle groups, but as he had started with 13 I hadn't quite managed to rout him as well. The final score was 16-9 to Bob.

It was a fantastic final game and I was oh-so-close to winning massively, only to be let down by awful dice rolls in the last two turns.

"Derby" AAR 3: A Dust Up in the Delta

Those of you have been paying attention will have worked out that this was my least enjoyable game of the tournament.

I was facing an Old Kingdom Egyptian army - lots and lots of shooty medium foot. Rich's army was composed as follows:

1 x Inspired Commander, 3 x Troop Commander
2 x 8 Nubian Archers (MF, Superior, Undrilled, Unprotected, Bow)
6 x 6 Archers (MF, Average, Drilled, Unprotected, Bow)
3 x 8 Archers (MF, Average, Drilled, Unprotected, Bow)
1 x 8 Conscript Spear (MF, Poor, Undrilled, Protected, Light Spear)
1 x 6 Bedouin Slingers (LF, Average, Undrilled, Unprotected, Sling)
1 x 6 "Elite" Close Fighters (HF, Superior, Drilled, Protected, Heavy Weapon)
2 x 6 Close Fighters (MF, Average, Drilled, Protected, Swordsmen)

I've just run this list through the army generator spreadsheet, and found it comes out as 833 points. I've double-checked against my photos and the list above is correct. My suspicion is that Rich may have submitted the list with just 2 Troop Commanders and accidentally (*cough*) deployed 3 during the games.

Rich won initiative and selected Developed terrain. I made a bit of a screw-up here - I wasn't really awake and forgot that I could have selected 2 "open" pieces which might have prevented some of his terrain falling where it did. Unfortunately for me, most of it fell into his half of the table.

Given that he was able to deploy his archers almost wall-to-wall across the table, I would have to commit some troops to a delaying action on one wing to prevent him from enveloping my army, whilst committing the rest of my army to advancing on one wing and hope that they didn't get shot up too badly on the way in. Again, this was where not being fully awake didn't help as I would need to waste some time repositioning my main line on the way in. Stupidly, I'd deployed my skirmishers over towards my right.so they wouldn't be able to provide much of a screen for my main thrust.

My deployment - superior troops in the centre of the main line.

Egyptian right wing

Egyptian centre-right

Egyptian centre - the 2 units to the side of the village are the Nubians

Egyptian left wing

I definitely committed too many units for the right wing delaying action....

....and stupidly kept advancing with them

The main thrust crawling gradually toward the Egyptian right wing and centre-right. If I could survive the shooting going in, the Egyptians would be mincemeat at impact and in the melee phases.

Over on my right wing, the Egyptians are concentrating their shooting on just a few units.

My superior troops massing to take on the Egyptian centre-right. Rich seemed to have 3 different-coloured sets of home made measuring sticks - red, green and yellow. I suspect that one was with short inches, one with normal inches and one with long inches, to be used according to which would benefit him most at the time.

If only I had hung back on my right wing, and not closed in....

Almost there! Notice the two bases on the end of Rich's right-most archers, slightly ahead of the rest. In my previous move I'd moved exactly 4" forward which put me in base contact with them when they should have been just short. Rich threw a tantrum, so I moved them back to just outside contact. From the pics it is now clear that those 2 bases must have got knocked forward slightly, perhaps when he was checking ranges for shooting. He threw a couple more tantrums during that turn and the one after.

It seems I stopped taking pics at this point. Over on my right wing, one of my blocking units had been broken from shooting; one had charged in against the Nubians in the field and were broken by his close fighters flank charging them (I can't find pics that show it clearly, but I suspect it wasn't a valid flank charge - I don't think he had a base which was fully behind my front but can't be entirely certain. However, at that point I'd lost the will to live from all the tantrums and let it go); another unit had been shot to fragmented and my chariots had lost 2 bases to shooting.

Unfortunately we ran out of time just before my turn. If we had been able to play on, my left wing was about to charge in and destroy his right and centre, which would probably have won me the game. I suspect that all the tantrums were to deliberately waste time to prevent me getting onto that last turn.


Lessons Learned

1. Avoid playing against him again if I can.
2. Double check the terrain options - if I'd remembered the open terrain pieces, I might have blocked some of his pieces from going down.
3. I should have deployed more to the left of the table, and should have had my skirmishers over to that side
4. A blocking force is just that. It doesn't need to be as big as I made it and it doesn't advance into combat until it has to.
5. Against shooty armies, having an IC would be really helpful.

Edit to add:

As you will know from my previous AARs, I really don't mind losing (even when it's a 25-0 wipeout). What I do dislike is losing to someone who appears to have cheated and thrown tantrums near the end to waste time in order to prevent me getting into contact and possibly winning.

"Derby AAR 2 - The Road to Nineveh

For the second round, our team were up against "State Your Team" who we were in joint 11th place with. My opponent was Pete Card who had also lost 25-0 in the first round. He'd brought a Middle or Early Neo Assyrian (before 890 BC) army:

2 x Field Commander, 1 x Troop Commander
2 x 6 Light Foot (Average, Unprotected, Undrilled, Bow)
4 x 8 Asharittu* (MF, Average, Protected, Drilled, front rank = light spear/swordsmen, rear rank = bow)
1 x 8 Hupshu (MF, Average, Protected, Undrilled, front rank = light spear, rear rank = bow)
5 x 4 light chariot (Superior, Drilled, bow)

*one of these was in ambush in the gully, but Pete revealed it after I'd finished deploying when it was obvious that I wouldn't be sending any troops anywhere near it.

Pete won initiative and decided on Hilly terrain.

Assyrian right wing - 4 lots of chariots screened by light foot; Asharittu in broken ground

Assyrian left wing - chariots in the open, 2 lots of Asharittu on the steep hill, with rear support from the Hupshu

I decided to concentrate my deployment in one half of the table. My superior foot are on the right flank with the heavy chariots next to them. A unit of average swordsmen are in the brush to protect against a possible flank march (the ambush marker could have been a dummy and that was the only obvious route for a flank march). My centre and left wing have the rest of the average swordsmen and my skirmish screen.

My left wing moving forward into the brush to defend my army's flank against the chariots. Part of my skirmish screen is delaying his centre chariots.

The advantage of deploying in one half of the table - I can take a pic to show my whole army! My superior troops are advancing rapidly on the right wing to tackle his troops on the hill. The average swordsmen's job was to protect my flank.

Closing in on target....

Curse his rear-rank bowmen! My heavy chariots have wheeled slightly to threaten his light chariots.

 

Over on my left flank, one of the MF units in the brush decided to chase away the light foot who had taken 2 bases and dropped them to disrupted. Unfortunately their die roll for the charge move took them into the chariots. I'd be on evens in the combats, but with less dice and he would be re-rolling 1s and 2s. I would need to (somehow) win or draw or I'd be taking cohesion tests on several misuses.

Back to the right wing. I hadn't wanted to charge in, but the right hand guys ignored orders and managed to double-drop after losing the impact. My heavy chariots have run off Pete's light chariots.

Somehow, despite being fragmented, I managed to inflict 2 hits in the melee which allowed me to try to kill his general. I'd lost the melee, so needed a 12 - magically I rolled a double 6.

I forgot to take pics for a couple of turns. The right hand unit held on just long enough for their neighbours and the chariots to join in, then broke with just one base loss. Here you see the effects of the melee - both Asharittu units have broken (the one not facing chariots for seeing the other break). The Hupshu behind managed to roll snake eyes for seeing the break and double-dropped to fragmented. The Asharittu on the left of the pic then routed through them which dropped them to broken. So, that's three Assyrian units down....

Following my pursuit up onto the hill, my chariots have turned to menace his light chariots again. My superior swordsmen have also turned, but it will be a few turns before they can get into any fights.

Back to my left flank. The MF who charged out have broken and their neighbours are now fragged. I can't remember whether that was all from shooting or whether they dropped for seeing the break. They will automatically break in Pete's next impact phase as he has light chariots which will flank charge them.

I managed to get them back up from broken to fragged.

4 heavy chariots vs 2 fragged light chariots - Pete has wisely decided to turn his Asharittu to try to get them out of the way of the inevitable rout and pursuit.

The broken retinue have been rallied back to disrupted. At the moment it looks like I have 3 units broken (2 vanished off the table, one being chased by some light chariots). Things aren't looking too good for my flank guards.

Pete's lights have broken and my heavies have decided to try to make it to his camp. The Asharittu did manage to get clear of the rout and pursuit, but in doing so managed to get caught up in a fight with some of my average swordsmen. My protected superiors have moved up into position to flank charge them on my next turn.

This is the last pic I took. I must have fragged those Asharittu and had one of mine somewhere dropped to fragged as I'd taken 9 points from him and he'd taken 7 from me. That was enough to give me an 11-9 win.

This was a good game. Although Pete wasn't as chatty as Guillaume, he was a decent player. He was very unlucky though as, in theory, I shouldn't have won in the battle of the hill. However (apart from the initial charge by the unit that ignored orders), the dice gods smiled on me and I broke 3 of his units for just one of mine broken (although I did rally it back to disrupted later on).