[custom scenario] A Bridge Too Far

[StuccoFresco]

Fourth scenario of my custom campaign; previous one:

A mere decade after the fall of the Vijayangara King, the Confederation has united the North and vassallized most of the South. In his march southward, the Confederated Army arrived to the Panhala Bridge, a key passage on the Dhrava river. Here, however, the Marathi Kingdom has decided to stop it. Thanks to its martime trade partners, it got news about a new way of fighting in foreign lands, learnt about his strenghts, and quickly adapted to adhere to it. Now the newly forged cannons look down the hills in front of the bridge, guarded by thick formations of pikemen.


My position is immensely favorable, being on a hill with artillery on top and pikemen guarding the slopes. The enemy, however, has a great number of firearm-wielding cavalry, and if my units rout an enemy and decide to chasing them down the hill, I may be find myself surrounded and fire upon/charged from all sides.

In the first 5 turns the enemy methodically advances on my positions and engages me frontally without using his cavalry to pepper my lines properly. My own artillery tries to soften up their cavalry, but with not much success. In Turn 6 I start moving my Marathi cavalry out of the woods, seeing that most of the enemy infantry is committed and I could try to score some flank charges on them. A couple enemy infantry units have already been routed. Enemy cavalry is approaching the smallest hill, while the reports of enemy Irregulars on the other side of the river, behind our backs, have been proven true. If those pesky carbine-wielding Irregulars were to invade my backfield they could crush my cannons and rear-charge my Longbowmen, so I try to keep them off the bridge by parking a Marathi Cavalry unit in front of it; the Irregulars can fire on them only one at the time, while my Longbowmen fire on them from the top of the hill.



In the 7th Turn most of the enemy infantry has been routed by the Pikemen, that start advancing down the hills. The enemy Nawab's Guards and a single spearmen block keep fighting valiantly on the slopes, but are now isolated. Many enemy cavalry units are not doing anything.

Enemy cavalry units try to move down the road avoiding my pikemen blocks, but they are mostly intercepted and forced to fight.

[StuccoFresco]

Finally, in Turn 11, the Bengali cavalry moves forward engaging my own cavalry on the right flank and harassing the pike blocks. Meanwhile, the enemy archers have found two ravines in which hide themselves, and my pikemen and artillery aren't able to chase them off from that difficult terrain.

Enemy infantry tries to rally in the fields and mounts a couple corageous counterattacks, but the battle is already decided. The Misl Irregulars on the other side of the bridge have been beaten back by my Longbowmen, never trying to force their way through my Marathi cavalry guarding said bridge.





The battle ends in Turn 15. Ultimately, the Bengali were able to rout part of my cavalry and push a unit of Lancers uphill behind my lines, but a Pike block was chasing it and overall the enemy army has been utterly crushed.

It has been a pretty straightforward affair, due to the decision of the AI to not use his cavalry to soften my pike blocks before sending in the infantry. The pikemen proved terrifying in melee, routing the enemy spearmen without breaking a sweat. Had the Irregulars behind the river tried to force their way through, they could have spelt havoc in my backfield, but the threat of the Marathi Cavalry (that got decimated by carbine fire) was enough to scare them off.