ADLG - Game Report 281

Song Chinese (225) vs Graeco-Indian (46)

After an excellent Curry and Chilli party with friends and family on the Saturday night it was onto two more Beachhead games on Sunday. First of which was against Pete's Graeco-Indian army. He kindly invited me to attack in the plains. I duly deployed with cavalry centre and infantry on the flanks. This meant I had infantry facing the elephants, but that meant the Song cavalry were facing the enemy pikes – not a good matchup.

With all of that in mind I was fortunate to be attacking as it allowed me to move the Song cavalry left and the right-wing cavalry to the right.

The infantry has now formed a coherent line with the cavalry formed on their left. Of course the big question would be how much attrition could be we deliver against the pikes and elephants before we engaged. And of course, I didn't have enough light troops to drive of the enemy lights protecting the elephants.

Well, that cavalry battle could have gone better for the Song. However, we have managed to inflict some pain through our Crossbows by way of some compensation.

A little turn around for the cavalry as the Song manage to hit back. On the right the elephants have engaged, with one combat going the way of the Song and the other has decidedly gone the way of the Indians.

Once more the Song cavalry is defying the odds and winning where they have no right to do so. Importantly the support of the polearms has destroyed a pike unit freeing up the cavalry to outnumber the remaining pikes. You may wonder what happened to the elephants. Despite being on their last legs the heavy polearm unit destroyed the elephant to their front, which in turn went on rampage and destroyed the elephant to its right, finally rampaging to the rear! What a great result, now to win the rest of the battle.

A further pike unit has been destroyed by fighting to its flank and front. Elsewhere, Chinese infantry are moving forward to inflict the coup de grace.

Outcome

A Song victory, losing 16 of 24. This left me on two victories and two losses for the competition.

Lessons Learnt

Just because it looks bad on initial combat, it can turn around – not always but sometimes.

The advantage of attacking is that you can correct deployment once the battle starts, but only if you have sufficiently good command!