Well... I fight for the King, and I am facing one of his armies, but anyways it is an ENGLISH army so I must fight it!
By that time I knew I shouldn´t place forests but that didn´t avoid another bad deployment. There was no terrain on my half of the board so I could deploy as I wished. Knowing my enemy´s army as it wasn´t the first time I faced them (see viewtopic.php?f=108&t=38363 ) I thought about alternating highlanders with P&S brigades to protect the scottish warriors against the high number of superior cavaliers the english would field, but that would have shown sensible thinking. I finally decided to deploy all the highlanders together in the center, with two cojones, and dare the enemy mounted to come for them, as I would be able to protect their flanks with P&S and the high volume of fire would bring down the cavaliers. Yeah right...
The battle begins. The english try to run down the left edge so I rush to close the gap. A group of highlanders run to occupy the terrain on the middle of the enemy half of the battlefield, while another one would take a hill.
The enemy general did the logical thing and ordered two cavalier units to come to the centar from the wings, aiming for the highlanders.
The highlanders rushing to reach terrain finally arrive, but, aren´t they surrounded by enemies?
On the left wing things are looking good. Their dragoons are disrupted and inside a restricted movement zone, I just need to charge them to finish them, and their cavaliers are about to get trapped too. But... my infantry is less than 12 mu from the border and so have threatened flanks... and shoot with a – poa! The enemy cavaliers laugh with wickedness as I need 6´s to hit them. One of my infantry regiments suffer from english fire, but in the terrain the highlanders punish an enemy regiment.
On the right wing luck is evenly divided, as we both have fragmented units. Their cavaliers on the far right are reduced to two bases and are surrounded by my troops but advance stubbornly.
The highlanders on the terrain will finish the enemy disrupted regiment but be surrounded and massacred by the enemy.
Desaster on the left wing! Trhe regiment about to charge the dragoons don´t follow orders due to being disrupted too and the dragoons eventually defeat them! It had to happen... the other regiment finds itself surrounded by enemy cavaliers, command shot and those same dragoons, so it forms an square. Another regiment does the same as a nearby regiment protecting its flank flees.
The highlanders on the top of the hill decide to leave it and go for the enemy cavaliers in front of them. They kill some of them but the cavaliers aren´t stopped.
On the right wing I destroy the enemy cavaliers, an enemy regiment and, after persecution, the fragmented enemy dragoons that were trying to get out. Good news at last!
The squares resist like titans against the sea of enemies around them. One of them will break the enemy command shot and fragment the dragoons, but both of them are rallied. In the last turn the square will brake due to losses, but not even disrupted.
Out of pictures, the highlanders that left the hill were destroyed by the cavaliers facing them who didn´t care to follow my tactic of beind destroyed by musket fire, yes, that same tactic I developed at the beginning of the battle.
And time was called. After a bloody battle my army was one point from breaking and the english had suffered eight or nine points.
AT THE END: I think this scottish army is hard to lead, it has potential but you need to know it very well and have clear ideas about how to deploy and use it. I didn´t had them and it was reflected in the bad generalship I shown and my final position (11 out of 12, far from last year´s third position!). Next year I will attend this tournament with an army seasoned by many practice games... or my reliable Late Imperia Spanish!
