BBDBA at Cold Wars 08

Cold Wars 2008 BBDBA Report

The Lords of the Valley (Sean and Alan Spencer) running Later Crusader (IV/17) with 1 Syrian (IV/6) ally went forth to Cold Wars 2008 with dreams and plans of victory. Here was our army list for this:

Crusaders: 7Kn, 1Cv, 10Sp, 6Bw.

Syrians: 3Cv, 3Lh, 2Wb, 2Ps, 1Hd.

Game 1: Versus “Team Tin Star” (Jack and Peter Sherriff ) Konstantinian Byzantine with Georgian Ally. 17-83 loss. The Crusaders invaded with final setup shown below (Crusaders left, Byzantines Right). Our Syrian ally in on our far right, while their Georgian Ally in the center (with the lighter colored stands). The lines show our plan. Sean (running our major knight wing) was to try and go for his flank, while pressuring with his infantry all on our left flank. My goal was to pressure the center and skirmish on the far right flank.

Jack had a beautiful hand painted picture of the Madonna and child on one of his banners (which is shown below).

 

 

Well, the Syrians moved up the Lh, and the Psiloi marched out and took the oasis in front of them. Meanwhile the crusader infantry line tramped slowly forward. As Jack’s CinC command (with the Madonna) on our right moved up and formed some cav in column to run down the road. The picture below shows the battle at this point, with my Syrian Lh attempting to slow the Byzantine CinC advance until the Crusaders could make contact.

 

 

Well,all my light horse all died in 2 rounds of combat (I rolled nothing but 1’s and 2’s for the first 4 combats). In addition, the Georgian bowmen killed one of the psiloi in the oasis, promptly breaking the Syrians. The picture below shows the battle on the Crusader right with the Byzantine Cav closing on my demoralized Syrian Cav (left of photo). My other Syrian Psiloi was killed in the oasis as well. In the distance the Crusader infantry and knights are slowly closing on the Byzantine right wing. (Sean’s pips were atrocious).

 

 

 

We broke their right wing eventually, but the Crusader CinC (in the center) finally lost after some desperate struggles to the Georgian and Byzantines to break at the same time as the Byzantine right. While all this went on, they killed EVERY last one of the Syrians in either shooting or hand to hand. A tough lose, but well fought (by Sean at least!)

 

Game 2: Versus: “Army of the Ohio” Jim Kasper and John Loy (Thematic Byzantines with a Slav Ally). 96-4 win. Again we invaded (arrgh! we never did get to defend in all 3 BBDBA games). They placed the roads, a steep hill on our right, 3 woods and a gentle hill on our far left. In the picture below, the Crusaders are on the right, with all 3 commands packed in there (from bottom to top, Syrian, Crusader, CinC). A lone cav unit blocks the back door near the road.

 

 

Sean and I were able to concentrate all 3 commands against Jim Kaspers’s CinC cavalry command while delaying the other two with terrain and keeping far away from them. Jim bravely went in to a line of bow, only to be totally shot out of the saddle for the initial contact, the knights did the rest. John moved up a load of Auxila that did get one of my spear in the woods, while one of Sean’s knights died to Jim’s Cav. Picture below shows the movement that took place.

 

 

 

Game 3: “Team McDonald” (Bob and David McDonald) with Normans and a Muslim Ally. 87-13 win. Again we invade, so the Normans put down a road, a woods on our far right, and two gentle hills (center and far left).

 

We deployed with Sean being the Crusader CinC this time in the middle. The Syrians were again on the far right, which I think surprised Bob. He then had to “scrunch” up his last Norman command to fit there. The picture below shows both forces after setup (Crusaders on the right).

 

 

We angled our Crusader lines to refuse our left and the Syrians to skirmish on the right. Sean had the task of being our “spearhead” with my infantry in support. The goal was to break the CinC command with both Crusader commands, while skirmishing on our right. See the plan below.

 

 

Well, things went well for us. They decided to skirmish with the Muslim, and to take on the Syrians in the woods. In the center, Sean’s crusader spears were backing the bows, who were shooting away at the their ally, while on the hill, knight clashed. My crusader foot continued forward guarding Sean’s flank, while refusing our far left. Here is what the battle looked like from our side at this time.

 

 

Well we broke the Muslim command with both bow shooting (from Sean) and my psiloi and Warband in the woods (Bob roll abysmally in hand to hand, with me blowing away 3 of his Ps in one round of combat. This left both crusader commands with the opportunity to close on the Norman CinC, run by David who was trying his best (and doing well) at keeping us at bay.

 

Meanwhile on our left, the Syrians were getting hard pressed for time. Even when I had overlaps, Bob was throwing off my skirmishing Lh and Ps, killing a Wb and Ps in the process. He finally sunk in his knights into my cav and (as shown below) while desperately holding off my attacks from the woods.

 

 

Finally, they broke the Syrians, but in our turn, we broke their CinC’s command ending the game.

 

Loads of fun and Sean and I look forward to teaming again soon. But at Historicon, I will be bringing my youngest son, Nathan the Giant Killer!