ADLG - Game Report 233

Feudal French (182) vs Central Asian Turkish (140)

Another day another trial Feudal French Army. For this army it was again around the southern French, the difference was that I gave the brilliant CinC the infantry command, and the two supporting commands were much smaller with four Knights and one light cavalry unit. Both of these commands had included unreliable commanders. The battle was fought against Kevin's Mongols deployed as Central Asian Turks. I defended in the Plains.

Kevin opted for a coastline, so I deployed the infantry on the left against the secure coastline flank, with both Knight commands to the right. The major challenge was to ensure that the flanks remained as secure as possible and where necessary manoeuvre the Knights to try and chase the Turkic horsemen off the table.

The French were discomforted by the rain of arrows from the horse archers, but they didn't break. Of greater significance is that we have, so far, prevented an encircling move from the Turkic Light Cavalry.

Where we were able to do so we charged the enemy. Fortunately, the impetuous French Knights were kind enough to roll down and hence didn't pursue too far!

By this stage we only had one leaker, a single Turkic Light Cavalrymen who has penetrated the line.

We were able to redeploy one of our own Light Cavalry units a counter, but lacked the ability to close to charge the enemy. The Knights have engaged enemy Cavalry and have destroyed one of the heavier enemy cavalry units.

The Mounted Sergeants, Heavy Impact cavalry, have not manged to gain ground in the centre. However, on the right the Knights are well placed to try and corral the enemy off the table.

At the end the Turkic's command and control problems were growing as they were finding it increasingly difficult to manoeuvre their units and disengage from combat. For their part the French Knights are pursuing as hard as they can, but their movement distance always prevents them fully engaging the enemy.

Outcome

A creditable draw, albeit a winning draw for the Turks by 4 to 12.

Lessons Learnt

It was always going to be difficult for either side to secure a result.

The one positive takeaway for the French was that the balance of commanders to their commands worked much better.