Slitherine

Hi Guys

Be warned this is my first report and could be a bit long. As aloways any questions/comments/critisisms appreciated


Saturday saw the first time that we have run a Starter List tournament here in Wellington. Storm of Arrows was chosen as the theme; was a bit loose however due to short notice given to players? (This is the first themed tournament I have played in, not sure if first in NZ?) 10 Players attended with most being regular local players with a couple of relative new players. Not all of the lists in Storm of Arrows have Starter Lists available so Greg was kind enough to design lists as requested. Preset terrain with the player winning initiative either choosing to deploy first and move first or choosing the table edge.
The following armies were present:
War of the Roses – Yorkist Pretender
War of the Roses - Richard III
War of the Roses – Tudor
2 x Ordonnance French
Medieval Swedish
Welsh
Scots Isles & Highlanders
Low Countries
Free Company

My list in deployment order was (all drilled except Irish and Art):
Irish Kerns (6) – LF, Unprotected, Light Spear, Javelin
Irish Kerns (6) – LF, Unprotected, Light Spear, Javelin
Hand gunners (6) – LF, Unprotected, Firearm
Longbow (6) - MF, Protected, Longbow, Swordsmen, Defensive stakes
Longbow (6) - MF, Protected, Longbow, Swordsmen, Defensive stakes
Longbow (8) - MF, Protected, Longbow, Swordsmen, Defensive stakes
Men-at-Arms (4) – HF, Heavily Armoured, Heavy Weapon, Superior
Men-at-Arms (4) – HF, Armoured, Heavy Weapon, Superior
Mercenary Pikemen (8) – HF, Protected, Pikemen
Light Artillery (2)
FC
2 x TC

The list of armies was released before the tournament and looking at most of the lists I was going to have an advantage in manoeuvre against everything except maybe the French Ordonnance and the Two units of Knights in the list. Most of the other armies were a mix of Drilled and Undrilled with few skirmishers in short supply; I think that the 3 units that I had was just about the same as the other lists combined. This and everything was drilled means I should be able to get the matchups that I want? I also had one of the larger armies there, most were eights and nines so I could afford to sacrifice some units to achieve success elsewhere which was basically my plan in most games.

Note: all directions are from my point of view.

Game One – Free Company -

Not sure about posting pictures of maps on to forums so you will have to use your imagination unless one of the more computer literate players decide to posts the maps used (Greg?). The table was essentially a mirror with both sides if divided into quarters on my left was a line of three pieces, one enclosed field on my base edge, plantation straddling the centre line and an open field on my opponents base edge. All were roughly in the centre of the quarter about 1’ away from left edge. On my right were one open field and one enclosed field basically a few inched apart either side of the centre line, just under 1’ from the right edge.

My Opponents army was deployed from my left to right: Crossbow (6) – Undr, Prot, ave; 4 x Men-at-Arms (4) – HeavArm, Heavy Weapon, Super; Longbow (6); Brigands? (8) – MF, Prot, Swd; Longbow (6). The crossbow was set behind the plantation with the Men-at-arms (including 1 BG of dismounted Knights) set in columns in the open area in the centre of the table and the MF grouped around the rear edge of the field to my right.

My deployment was 1Bg of Kerns and hand gunners deployed behind the Plantation on my left the other Irish as far forward as possible on my right in the rough. On the left I deployed 1 BG of Longbow (6) in the rough with the Light Art and the Pike just to my right if this. A large gap in the middle to the rough where I grouped the remaining BG’s. One Men at Arms on the far right with the other between the Longbow to either be used as rear support or for guarding the flank depending on what my opponent decided to do with his HF decided to do with his own HF.

My plan was to push hard with my left most Longbow and kerns to attack his baggage and his undrilled crossbow – there was a large area on my left for me to escape to if he managed to bring some HF across to help his crossbow. The hand gunners and right side kerns were to slow down the HF in the centre. The pike and Light Art were to hang back and provide a target for his HF, trying to draw away as many battle groups from his centre as possible and leave me with a MF Vs MF in the rough where I thought I had superior numbers and the ability to outflank on the far right where I had a BG of HF without opponents.
On the first turn my opponent surprised me by pushing forward aggressively across the board except for the Crossbow. I had thought with his deployment he was planning to hold back on my right and use the HF in the centre to try and roll my flank similar to what I was trying to do to him on my right. In the end this cost him the game. On the left the Kerns and longbow were left unmolested to deal to the crossbow and the baggage – my opponent failed a few CMT’s to try and escape but failed most. In the centre my opponent pushed forward and gradually started to wheel a couple of BG’s of HF to my right to try and help his MF but by the time they arrived the battle was over. The other two just about made it to my pike but again came up short. On the right I sent a BG of HF with a general wide around his right flank and was eventually able to get a flank charge on a BG of longbow. I lost a BG of longbow to a combined charge by Longbow and brigands through base losses but was able to frag the brigands in return; the Men-at-Arms that were in reserve were able to finish them off. I managed to get the baggage while this was happening to break his army. 23-2? May have had something else fragmented at end of game as well to make it 22-3?

Game 2 – Scots Isles and Highlanders – Dave Kinzett

Game 2 saw me playing a large Scottish army. He had 5 Bgs of HF (8), prot, Heavy weapon. 4 BG’s of MF (6), prot, Impact foot, Bow*. The table was a woodland themed table with one forest in the centre left on my opponents’ side, a marsh in my left hand quarter. A piece of difficult (can’t remember what?) towards my base edge in the centre of my right hand quarter and a forest in the centre right close to the centre line.

My Opponent deployed from my left to right: roughly from the centre of his base edge to my right hand edge. 4 Bg’s of HF angled from the base edge towards the forest; 1 Bg of MF was placed as rear support behind the left most BG of HF; 3 Bg’s of MF behind and too the right of the forest and 1 Bg of HF close to the right hand edge. In opposition to this I had 1 Longbow, 1 BG of Irish, the Pike and 1 Bg of HF to my left; 1 BG of Longbow in the centre on the base edge. The two remaining Bg’s of Lf went into the forest; the remaining longbow and Men-at-arms went to my right beside the baggage on the base edge with the intention of trying to do some damage before they were destroyed and to try and buy some time for the pike to win on the far side.

I pushed up aggressively on my left hand side while my opponent tried to wheel his line of HF anchored on the base edge around to face the pike and friends. The pike kept pushing up as fast as possible towards the Bg of HF anchoring his line while the longbow and the Man-at-Arms moved to the right of the pike to protect their flank. The kerns stayed to the left if the pike in an effort to draw the Highlands away. The highlanders turned to attack the Irish and charged them a couple of times drawing them away from the HF. The Pike charged the HF and managed to disrupt them at impact then force a double drop either the same turn or a turn later breaking them (the extra minus for fighting near the table edge would prove decisive in this game). They pursued and were ended up within 2” of the Highlanders who were facing the LF and away from the Pike; the highlanders passed their test to not charge the LF (and be intercepted by the pike) but failed the test to turn to face the pike allowing me to break my second Bg.

While this was going on the BG of Men-at-Arms covering the flank of the pike were gradually ground down failing a succession of death throws but passing their cohesion to break leaving a disrupted Longbow facing 2 Bgs and HF – managed to survive the game however.

In the centre the longbow moved to support a BG of hand gunners being attacked by a lone Bg of Highlanders. In reply a Bg of HF was taken out of the line threatening my left to deal with this new threat. The longbows were charged in the same turn by a BG of highlanders and the HF Scots. In the Impact phase the longbow do 2 hits against the highlanders only taking two in return; against the HF Scots 2 dice at a + vs. 3 dice at a minus the longbow manage to do a mighty 3 hits and only take one in return and win the combat – the HF roll a 5 and drop two levels again due the proximity of the table edge.

On my right the BG’s that I assigned to delay on this flank manoeuvred so that they were in the very corner on my right hand edge; 1 BG of longbow and one of Men-at-Arms facing off against a BG of highlanders and the HF Scots over there. The Irish evaded off table. Leaving the combatants aligned 6 highlanders + 2 HF Scots vs. 6 Longbow; 6 HF Scots vs. 4 Men-at-Arms. In the impact phase the Men-at-Arms manage to do 3 hits taking 2 in return (thanks to superior), the longbows manage 2 hits against the HF and 4 or 5 Hits against the Highlanders taking 2 and 1 in return both of my BG’s winning the combats the Scots dropping a level and the highlanders dropping two again thanks to the proximity of the board edge. Ended up breaking both BG’s in the next turn followed by his army when the Longbow completed their heroics in the centre of the table. He got my baggage the Men-at-Arms in the middle of the table and fragged the longbow in the middle getting me a 20-5 win.

While my dice were running hot in combat I never achieved anything with my shooting, and in return my LF were taking a bit of a beating with his Highlanders shooting at me – falling to disrupted a few times. I never expected to win this game, I thought I could get the Bg’s that my pike targeted getting the enemy BGs on the right was a bonus, saying that choosing to fight near the table edge was intentional on my part to try and capitalise on any lucky results in combat knowing that if I managed to survive the impact through Superior and overhead shooting that combat would be fought at evens but with my opponent receiving more dice. Saying that I had already allowed for their loss and with a 10BG army could afford the loss but still allowed myself the chance to win if I could get to the enemy baggage + 3 other BG’s before that flank expired.

Game 3 – Medieval Swedish – Che Tibby

My opponents army had (all undrilled) 6 BG’s of (6) half HF, armoured, heavy weapon’ half MF armoured crossbow, sword; a BG of Knights (4) - superior, heavily armoured, lancer swordsmen; and a Bg of mounted Crossbow (4) – Cav , Armoured, Crossbow, Swordsmen. As soon as I saw the table allocation (preset terrain) I new that I had a good chance to win this game – playing on the same table as in game one(see first report for description of table) so 5 large rough goings to move through where few of his troops could go. I was however on the opposite side from the first game however the table was largely symmetrical so didn’t really matter for terrain.

My opponent deployed with five of his mixed BG’s centrally four in front with one behind for rear support; joined in the rear by the Bg of Crossbow Cav. These groups were spread across the table from the rough going in my now left to just behind the plantation now on my right. On my far left between the field and the table edge was the knights (closest to table edge) and the remaining mixed Bg. Leaving a gap of roughly a foot between the parts of his army.

I deployed very conservatively waiting for the Knights to go down (I was deploying first and the Knights going down last) mainly grouped around the rough going in my deployment zone. From my left to right I deployed a BG of Men-at-Arms had against the board edge to tempt the knights forward. One of the Irish was deployed as far forward as possible in the rough. Directly behind this was a Longbow (8) BG and directly behind this was the Pike on my base edge behind the rough ground ready to move to where the knights were likely to attack. To the right of this was the Light Art facing at an angle towards the open space in the centre of the table but just inside the terrain. To the right of this was a Longbow (6). A large central gap to the remaining LF again set to enter the plantation and attack the end of the Swedish lines.

Having deployed first I had the first move, both the longbow and the Irish to the left moved as far as possible aiming for the gap in the Swedish formation. The Pike moved toward the left and the knights while the Men-at-Arms on the far left started moving inland and behind the pike to give them rear support. The central longbow moved in front of the Light Art to protect the flank of the longbow that was advancing through the terrain from the Mixed Bg’s in the middle of the table to make sure that I could isolate the enemy Bgs to the left. Over the next couple of turns the Knights decided to have a go at breaking the pike reasoning that he felt his army was not capable of achieving a win otherwise on the terrain that was given and risked going for the big win as opposed to minimising his losses. The knights were broken in short order (lost impact, lost melee, had to break off in impact phase and was charged in my following turn breaking them). In the meantime the longbow had managed to work their way around the end of the far left side mixed BG; which was also broken through a combination of shooting, combat and seeing friends break. The Irish rounded up the routers destroying them.

In the centre Che sent a mixed BG into the terrain to try and support the left hand side, but a combination of being undrilled and heavy foot in terrain meant that the longbow BG that I sent to cover the flank of the forward longbow was able to get enough shooting against the unit to break this also. Two mixed Bgs were sent after the light Artillery and the baggage but failed to make it before his army had collapsed.

On the far right hand side I sent the reaming LF into the plantation to harass the advancing mixed BG’s. Che advanced 2 BG’s and the mounted crossbow to deal with this. Seeing where he was committing his forces I started moving the remaining longbow and Men-at-Arms up the outside of the plantation to try and get around behind his lines and attack the mixed Bg’s that were unsuccessfully trying to shoot my LF. Eventually I was able to get the remaining BG required to break his army when he was forced into a rash charge to try and garner some points. 25-0

As soon as I saw the table allocation I new that I had a good chance, combined with fighting a slow moving undrilled army Che was always had pressed to get a result. He may have been better trying to keep a more unified advance but with my superior shooting and the large amounts of terrain on that particular table was always about limiting his losses or hoping for some bad dice on my part – in the end he opted for the latter trying to break the pike with a frontal assault.

Game 4 – Welsh – Richard Woolford.

By this stage I was 12 points clear of Richard in second place so had a good chance at my first podium finish in a FoG comp. Seeing as Richard is also one of the top players in the country this was going to be a real challenge against a player that had to go for the win to have a chance of winning the tournament.

The welsh army was (all undrilled) 3 x Spearmen MF (10) – Unprotected, offensive spear; Longbow MF (8) - Protected, longbow, one of which was also swordsmen; LF (6) – longbow; LH (4) – Lancer, Swordsmen; Cav (4) – Armoured, Lancer, swordsmen (+ something else that I can’t remember now).

The terrain was a village in the centre left on my opponent’s side near the centre line with an enclosed field adjacent to this to the right. Also a vineyard in my right centre about 5-6” from the right edge of the table; and one other piece that never had any effect on the battle.

Going into this game I realised that he never had anything that was going to be able to go toe to toe with any of the HF but if he got them one on one he would be able to grind them down through attrition relying on his large BG’s to absorb casualties. To avoid this I decided to anchor one flank against the table edge and fight on as small a frontage as possible (again relying on the additional negative for fighting near the board edge to break things quickly).

Richard was deploying first and moving first so I had a small advantage in that he would be putting down most of his army before I would be forced to deploy my HF. Richard deployed in only half of the table width starting well in from the enclosed field with all three longbow BG’s. Next to this was the three MF extending from this towards the right hand end. He deployed the LH and LF as far forward as possible opposite the vineyard. The cav was deployed as a reserve about half way along his line.

I again tried to stretch his initial deployment by deploying one Irish to the left in front of the village ready to go for his baggage which he had left unguarded. Behind this was a longbow (6). In the centre of the board edge as far back as possible was another BG of longbow. Over to the right around the vineyard were; the light artillery just in front of the baggage; in the vineyard was placed the remaining longbow (8) and the two LF were placed. In the small gap to the right I placed the pike men as far forward as possible with the two Men-at-Arms Bg’s placed behind.

On the left hand side of the table I made a couple of bad decisions, my intention was to try and draw a few of the welsh BG’s out of his line to try and take the pressure on my right. The central longbow moved to assist the longbow on the far left taking two welsh longbow with them and drawing the cav across from the centre of the table. In hindsight they did the job that I intended for them but they stood and fought too early I should have focused on my drilled nature to try and get two BG vs. one of his and allowed the LF to go for the baggage. In the end one of my longbows was broken rolling three ones in consecutive turns for death rolls after being shot at. The light foot having got most of the way to the baggage returned to distract the cavalry. The Irish were broken after a few turns when I forced the Cav to charge me on the edge of the enclosed field to give my longbow more time to break a welsh Bg that I had managed to get down to fragmented. In hindsight the cost of both the longbow and the Irish was not worth breaking the welsh longbow in instead should have gone for the baggage and left eh longbow to die.

The game was always going to be fought on the right however. The light artillery was broken by shooting eventually although they managed to disrupt the longbow Bg that was shooting at them. On the far right the pike were able to charge a Bg of spearmen. They were able to disrupt the spearmen at impact, in melee they were able to affect a net -4 test on the welsh which the welsh were able to pass (bugger). Next turn the pike lost combat (4 dice each at ++) lost a base and dropped a level and the spearmen were able to bolster (hmm?). I also managed to loose the next combat and only just passed my test. The pike were able to turn it around and eventually bolster the break their opponents over the next couple of rounds. While this was happening odd things were happening to my LF (haven’t been playing much lately and got the LF into a bad spot with no easy evade), managed to get away unscathed in the end but it was a close run thing.

In the vineyard the longbow were facing a large mob of Welshmen (with shorter spears than the Pike). The longbows held the charge and were stuck in an even melee. To the left of the pike men I had a Bg of Men-at-Arms, these were able to turn and eventually flank charge the spearmen engaged with the longbow in the plantation. In Impact I lost combat (severely disordered) and lost a base, but managed to swing the combat in the longbows favour thanks to fighting enemy in two directions. Over the next couple of turns was able to break the welsh. Thanks to enemy having to bisect the angle when engaged in the flank the longbow was able to pursue into another spearmen unit. The welsh longbow seeing their friends break dropped to fragmented when they were only about 1 cm from my baggage . Eventually I was able to fragment the spearmen and with it break Richards army.

I was only 3 points off breaking which could easily have happened so got away with another one. However if the pike had managed to break the spearmen quickly they would have created a problem that the welsh may not have had the tools to deal with.

Overall I got 1st in generalship but lost 1st overall by a couple of points to Greg Jennings who got a big win in the final round and got better soft scores (painting/sports) to take first by about 1-2 points. If you made it this far thanks for taking the time to read. Please post some comments/ questions

Overall thought about Starter Army Tournament

I really enjoyed the tournament and found that I used similar tactics that i use with this army in 800 points on the bigger table. I don’t feel that the starter armies are limited in any way because there are so many within themes that you should be able to find one that will suit your style of play. The main advantage is that we were able to play 4 games in a day at a reasonable pace but with plenty of time between each round.

5’ x 3’ vs. 4’ x 4’

Not sure about this but there was a suggestion that a 4’x4’ would have been better for the theme than the 5’ x 3’ that we used. I personally felt that the 5x3 was better because the armies started on top of each other but still left the flanks for manoeuvring on but allowed for completion of games. One a 4x4 the armies are further apart means skirmishers are more important. The only real affect is that different armies become better depending on the table. On a 4x4 Swiss become better because of their mix of troops. As long as people know in advance really a non-issue.

Themed tournaments

Fantastic. Using starter armies also meant that no real effort needed to get a army together to play in the tournament, with a lot of players able to provide more than one army if needed. Already looking forward to a softer than beagles tournament next year. With only one day needed I may try to run a number of small tournaments next year will have to gauge what periods people are capable of playing.


Cheers
Mike