My apologies for the delay in this AAR, I managed to lose my army list and experienced some difficulties rebuilding the thing, for reasons which will be clear shortly.
So I foolishly allowed Anton to talk me into swapping armies and he ran a Patrician Roman Army and I ran the Arab Conquest. Anton's army was as follows (foreshadowing of the result Anton was so confident he typed up his army list).
Patrician
Roman #81
1250pts.
Commander
in Chief as EHC L/B/Sh 100 100
Bodyguard,
Reg A HC JLS/Sh with PA standard 42 142
Unit
A 10x Equites Reg C JLS/Sh 110 252
Unit
B 13x Franks Irg B MI HTW/Sh 52
17x
Franks Irg C MI HTW/Sh 51
10x
Saxons Irg C MI JLS/Sh 30 +Com 25 158 410
Unit
C as Unit B 158 568
Unit
D 20x Franks Irg C MI HTW/Sh 60
20x
Saxons Irg C MI JLS/Sh 60 + Com 25 145 713
Unit
E 20x Franks Irg C MI HTW/Sh 60
10x
Saxons Irg C MI JLS/Sh 30 +Com 25 115 828
Unit
F Auxilia 6x Reg B LHI JLS/D/Sh 48
9x Reg B LMI JLS/D/Sh 54 +Com 10 112 940
Unit
G as Unit F 112 1052
Unit
H Auxilia 18x Reg B LMI JLS/D/Sh 108
16x Reg B LMI B/Sh 80 +Com 10 198 1250
Meanwhile, my army was as follows.
CinC LHI JLS & Sh, Bodyguard LHI, IA, JLS & Sh, PAS standard (yup I went Sacred)
Unit A 11 x Arab Citizen Cav, IA, MC, L & Sh
Unit B 12 x Persian Cav, IC, EHC, L, B & Sh
Unit C 12 x Ghuzz, IC, LC, B
Unit D 42 x Arab foot, IA, LMI, 15 w/2HCW & Sh, 17 w/JLS & Sh
Unit E 39 x Arab foot, IA, 21 LMI W/JLS & Sh, 12 LMI w/B, 6 LI w/JLS & Sh
Unit F 39 x Arab foot, exactly the same as the last group
Unit G 21 Armenians, IC, LI, B
I tried to learn from Anton's failings in the last battle and decided to maximize my Irregular A loony infantry (at least the melee troops), what is here represents all 75 melee troops allowed to the army. I found myself reduced to using Light Infantry to get units up to decent numbers, but still I had hope.
As is our usual we neglected to take a picture of the initial deployments, the picture above is from turn 2. I won the scouting 47:11 so Anton deployed first. In Terrain I tried to clutter the battlefield with terrain, to exploit the advantage my LMI had on his MI, but all the stuff on Anton's side diced off and only the stuff on my side remained. Also, Anton decided to steal my village, which naturally stayed. These developments left me with two options, wait on my side of the woods for Anton to straggle through with his close order infantry, or race through and try and gain the advantage on him. I choose to harry forward.
Anton deployed his units from left to right as follows: D, B, F, H, G, C, E, with Unit A cowering behind his general. My troops are deployed as follow: C, A and B are on the far left taking the only avenue open to the cavalry around the forest. Units: D, E, and F are in wide frontage and crossing the woods, with unit F exposed in the bog on the extreme right of the picture. My Armenians (unit G) are swinging around the edge of Unit F and headed for the steep hill next to the village.
On turn 3, my cavalry continued it sweep around and our infantry bumped into each other at Anton's side of the woods. Anton's cowardly cavalry moved left to try and slow my cavalry charge.
In the resultant "surprise sighting" morale tests, all three of my Irregular A infantry units went impetuous as expected. However, quite unexpectedly, Anton's barbarian mob's B and C also went impetuous! Furthermore, Anton's barbarian mob D, had to take a morale test for coming under fire from my horse archers and they too went impetuous! The white arrows indicate impetuous units.
On turn 4, the battle was basically over. With two impetuous units of his own and my dice testing the value of "A" class troops (they can not roll down ... but I tried ...HARD!), Anton managed to push back all three of my units. I did manage to push back Anton's larger unit of Auxillia (Unit H), but that would only be a temporary reprieve. On the left, my horse archers evaded the charge of Anton's mob as the other two units moved into position to crush them the next turn. Upon getting a view of Anton's mob and a charge land my Citizen Cav (Unit A) promptly went impetuous.
On Turn 5, when testing to charge, my citizen cavalry charged, but the Persians failed to do so (don't you love subject races?). Meanwhile in the woods, my units E and F continued to fight, but get pushed back (takes four push backs to break A class troops). However Unit D, my largest unit, the one with no archers in it, the one with the 2HCW's in it, managed to get broken due to further Anton hot dice rolls and my repeated attempts to roll down with troops that can not do so. Anton also had his smallest mob drive my Armenians off the hill top on the right.
Turn 6 saw an extremely rare event. In the woods as my Axemen turned tail and fled, Anton's unit of Regular "B" Auxillia got excited and went impetuous chasing after my axemen! Truly a rare moment for such a morale grade. In the woods my Unit E broke Antons small Auxillia unit (Unit G) and My Unit F was pushed back once more by Anton's impetuous mob. On the left my Unit A (Citizen cavalry) were pushed back which brought them out of Impetuous and back to reality. Meanwhile my CinC with the PAS standard has gotten out of the woods and rallied the Persian cav, who I was surprised to learn along with the Ghuzz, ARE influenced by the standard, only the Armenians (being Christians) ignore the sacred aspect of the standard.
Turn seven saw my Citizen Cavalry recoil from the fight as my Persians charged in under the watchful eye of My CinC and influence of the sacred banner. However the CinC then hurried away to the right of the photo to try and retrieve the situation in the center. My Unit D continued its flight to the rear with Anton's Impetuous Auxillia in hot pursuit (or was it the clear sight of my unguarded camp they were running for?). Meanwhile My Unit E reorganized itself for the impending onslaught and My unit F were once again (third time) pushed back by Anton's Impetuous mob. On the far right my Armenians formed up to begin delivering archery to Anton's small mob.
Turn 8 was the end of the game as without the watchful eye of my CinC and his sacred standard my Persian Cavalry promptly pooped themselves and were routed by Anton's Mob (Unit D). This left the mob too close to allow my Arab Citizen cavalry a charge bonus , or the use of their LANCES! so they would be forced to evade the incoming charge of the impetuous infantry. In the woods my long suffering Unit F was finally pushed back the fourth and final time causing them to break. Unit E was unfazed by their rapid departure (mandatory morale test passed), as neither were the Armenians (no love for the Muslim overlords I guess). While the Armenians continued to apply arrows to the small mob (Unit E) on the hill it would have taken many more turns for that to lead to a decision and most of the rest of my army was in retreat or rout, So I conceded the game.
In the final analysis, we have not scientifically determined that the Arab Conquest Army is Truly terrible, and most assuredly NOT worth being used by any gamer. In fact it is quite unclear how they ever managed to "conquer" anything, based on the troops at their disposal.
Until next time.
No comments:
Post a Comment