Slitherine

In view of a themed "1050-1300 european wars and crusades" tournament, what do you think about this list?

4 TC
4 Kn superior undrilled
4 Kn superior undrilled
4 Kn superior undrilled
4 Kn superior undrilled
4 Kn superior undrilled
4 CV armoured drilled average
4 CV armoured drilled average
6 LF jav/LS poor
6 LF jav/LS poor
6 LF bow poor
6 LF bow poor
6 LF bow poor
6 LF bow poor


12 BG...

1 dimensional but could be very effective with so many Kn. Unless there is a lot of terrain on the table to hide all that poor LF in you will need to keep it close to your Kn as they are what people will aim to kill. So you will have a very samll frontage and probably deploy first due to lack of cav/LH.

If I was facing that army I would do everything in my power to avoid the knights and pick off the dross. In a lot of ways there are rather too many BGs of poor LF that you may struggle to hide/protect.

The other difficulty would be that the knights, to be effective, need good going. So it will be obvious where they have to deploy. I imagine the enemy will stick to bad going so you may have a stalemate.

It depends what other armies you think will participate. if it is likely to be close combat style armies and players who want to fight your army could do very well. If it is tricky players with manouver armies you will chase shadows a lot...

You have to figure someone is going to have Ilkhanids or Mamluks in this period....

I don't know excactly which types of armies will participate. However, my experience is that italian players love shoot-and-flee armies...

Nubian MG Company or Middle Earth English

In this period I would go for Nike Byzantine. No Knights, people will think you are a push over. Teach them.

How will you handle a heavy foot spearmen or pike army?
How will you handle a longbow army?


4 BGs of knights are ample IMO. Any more is a lot more points for not much additional value.

I'd take Latin Greek heavy foot or catalan allies to escort the knights into battle.
Or even try a saracen ally?

Moro wrote:In view of a themed "1050-1300 european wars and crusades" tournament, what do you think about this list?

4 TC
4 Kn superior undrilled
4 Kn superior undrilled
4 Kn superior undrilled
4 Kn superior undrilled
4 Kn superior undrilled
4 CV armoured drilled average
4 CV armoured drilled average
6 LF jav/LS poor
6 LF jav/LS poor
6 LF bow poor
6 LF bow poor
6 LF bow poor
6 LF bow poor


12 BG...

expendablecinc wrote:How will you handle a heavy foot spearmen or pike army?

manouver

expendablecinc wrote: How will you handle a longbow army?

LF, Mounted and manouver.

The period choice Andrea is talking about it is here: http://slitherine.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=13430

expendablecinc wrote:How will you handle a heavy foot spearmen or pike army?

No pike armies. IIRC the only army with decent (armoured) aggressive heavy foot in numbers is Imperial German. Protected spearmen are therefore more viable, so Fanatic Berbers may be a reasonable choice.

expendablecinc wrote:How will you handle a longbow army?

Only one, Middle English. No stakes and undrilled, so...

expendablecinc wrote:'d take Latin Greek heavy foot or catalan allies to escort the knights into battle.

Catalan allies are out of period for Latin Greek. Sicilians can though, but no LH allowed if you use the Almughavars.


For me, the best armies are Nikes, Seljuks, Christian Nubians and Mamluks. Then Middle English, Komnenans, Fanatic Berbers and Sicilians. And possibly something with a lot of cavalry lancers like Middle Serbians. Fatamids with maximum drilled lancers would be an interesting choice too.

Cav/LH armies may be popular in Italy, but in the last competition, which was basically a more open version of this (post 1000AD), none were in the top three.

peterrjohnston wrote: No pike armies. IIRC the only army with decent (armoured) aggressive heavy foot in numbers is Imperial German.

U forgot my russian ;_;
My beloved russian armoured (useless vs Kn) defensive spearmen surrounded by cav and LH

ok, thereore, no hope with an heavy-knight based army?

It sounds a bit sad and discouraging...

No I think it is a reasonable choice - a big wall of Knights is difficult for any enemy to deal with. And I've certainly lost plenty of games against them But the LF could be a weakness. if they don't stay near the proper troops.

As Graham says, the big wall of knights is a handful for anyone. A particularly effective combination is Knights with Light Horse, bulked out with Poor LF. Early Hungarian or Serbian both fit into your theme and both have enjoyed recent success in UK tournaments.

At 800 points you may find 5 Knight units limits your options for support troops but 4 would still be intimidating.


Kevin

5 KN + 4 TC
have a chance to run over anything with a touch of luck.

I think it is a very dangrous list. You just need to be very careful not to get the LF in a fight.

what about playing with only 4 units of knights, and add 4 units of LF bow?

Moro wrote:what about playing with only 4 units of knights, and add 4 units of LF bow?

the list already has lots of LF and people are suggesting that it will be difficult for the fighting troops to protect them all. Ans you want to swap real troops for another 4 BGs of LF???

If you want to swap out a group of Knights, I'd suggest using the points on troops that can fight.