The Battle of the Red Gate. Part 2.

The Chronicle of Kermit the Hermit (a.k.a. The Dirty Fakir) continues.

“Toghtekin and his guard, and the dead Count’s guard, did battle upon the summit of the hill until, exhausted and disheartened by the death of their Count, the knights gave way. But now it was Toghtekin who found himself in peril of his life; the Count’s foot soldiers, in the village and to Toghtekin’s left hand, sought vengeance on him; they marched from the village in which they had taken shelter, and from a stone’s throw let loose such a volley of quarrels that Toghtekin’s guard was weakened and forced to withdraw from the field, though Toghtekin himself rode into the valley where his other cavalry lay.

The King’s army was now in two halves and surrounded. In the rear, what remained of the Counts foot soldiery were hard pressed and constantly under hail of arrows. The King’s rear was desperately open to attack and only a body of knights stood in the way of the Saracen. Seeing these knights fighting valiantly against the odds, a certain knight called Peter D’Idiot grasped the True Cross from the Patriarch and charged into the flank of the Saracens, followed by the Patriarch and his personal guard. Peter D’Idiot, sword and Cross in hand, drove deeply into the midst of the ungodly hordes, but was unhorsed and slain and the Cross taken [Peter was rolling a d12+1 Vs d6 –Baffoon result 3, the Saracens rolled 6! Peter immediately admitted that he would not do this kind of thing with the True Cross again!].

The King now had but one hope, his now exhausted soldiers [now down to zero morale] must seize the doors of the Gate [objectives] and pray for nightfall. They tried with what might they had remaining, seizing the two hills on either hand of the village, but at the village itself they were thwarted. The Saracen cavalry was now all about them, and the King was locked in hand to hand combat with Klimuk’s guard. Klimuk, seeing the King at the head of his knight’s surged with his picked men towards him, striking him with many blows until his helmet was cleaved and his brains smashed out. Leaderless, the King’s army, so close to victory, gave up all hope and broke [the King’s battle had just failed their Army Morale check]. Scattered, they suffered terrible slaughter at the hands of the Turks, only the Count’s infantry, saved by easier pickings elsewhere managed to limp from the field.”

Thus the battle ended. It had been hard fought throughout. The Damascenes, who started the battle with 25 morale chips were down to just 5, and given that they had gained 6 from the Franks, were very close to zero themselves at one point. The Franks had started the battle with only 16. The whole thing, played by Peter and I, was a fantastic war game that will be remembered for some time to come. Peter’s email to me on the following day said it all: “Can’t wait for the next one.” Some times you set out on a war game project not knowing what the final outcome will be; I knew they would be pretty, and I had bought enough for the set ups to be impressive and the terrain had come out looking good early on; but I had no idea what the games would be like – TURNS OUT THEY ARE GREAT FUN!!!!

We are sure that all the rules now work very well. All I need to do now is actually type up the amendments and add the bits thought best left for later, such as army lists. This I hope to do over the next month or two.