ADLG - Game Report 157

Feudal French (182) vs Later Crusader (196)

My Feudal French kindly accepted the offer of battle presented by Robin’s Later Crusaders! It was interesting to see Robin’s very different army design to that offered by Kevin’s Crusaders. But both equally challenging. In this case Robin went for the mixed spears and crossbows whereas Kevin prefers his Mongol Allies.

What was surprising in this battle was the terrain. Happily, for me the terrain was certainly more conducive for the French to attack over; Robin won the initiative and asked me to attack. However, if you have been reading my battle history and my comment on the similarity of the terrain I faced when fighting Paul, well here we are again with a hill on the defender’s side, flanked on its left rear by a field with rough going. I decided that this time I wasn’t going to get into the nonsense of fighting uphill with my Knights, so I went right flanking with them.

As Robin was deploying his Knights on the right I moved forward my infantry command, but I wasn’t going to expose my medium swordsmen out of the field to the Crusader Knights! Robin has started to respond to my outflanking manoeuvre by wheeling to face me and the gap between his centre and left is expanding.

I have held back the centre knights while those on the left advance and force the Crusaders to bend their line even further to their left. However, the crossbows are starting to cause me problems; this would become somewhat of an issue for my Knights as the game progressed – every time I rolled reasonably out came an even better roll from the crossbows.

I couldn’t hold back the Knights in the centre for a second time, and they were forced to charge with mixed results. Here the Knights on the left of the attack perished on the enemy spears (even though they were mediocre, where no level of enemy mediocrity can be overcome when one rolls a one!). However, the right of the line rode over the enemy in grand fashion and have opened up the game for the second wave to pass through. On the right the Crusaders have split their line even further to try and force the issue.

With gap in the centre opened wide by the French Knights with the commander of that wing heading to the camp, all manner of nice flank attacks started to appear and the Crusader spearmen start falling like leaves before the flower of the French nobility. It would have been even better if once again those Crossbows of theirs weren’t infernally good at knocking of hits on my Knights. On the right the French Sergeants have passed around the Crusader left and are now ready to join the attack. And on the French left we decided that the Knights need to support and advanced out to meet the Crusader Knights.

The Crusader Knights, who having seen my Knights perish on their infantry’s spears, have wisely decamped to the rear. More Crusader spears fall to attacks as the battle becomes increasingly fragmented. The commander of the French centre is fighting a lone battle deep in the enemy position, and despite his wounds.

And if the Crossbows weren’t effective enough even the light infantry in the fields with their bows started to get into the mix and causing losses to the Knights! In the centre the French commander fighting his lone battle succumbs to the pressure of the battle as dusk descends.

Outcome

A win for the Crusaders by 22 to 16. A game which could have gone either way at one stage if the Crusaders had not equipped their crossbows and bows with depleted uranium tipped arrows! – the cohesion hits and losses they inflicted were remarkable.

Lessons Learnt

Although not perhaps the finished article this revised Feudal French army list fought much better than the previous variants.

I started the advance of the French Infantry at least a game turn too late and missed the opportunity to pin the Crusader Knights.

Note to self, unlock the printer files and print some more nights to make an included commander knight grouping!