Solo testing the Harran 1104 scenario - part three.

So we come to latest solo testing session. I played the game for a couple more turns. This is what happened.

 Baldwin's knights supported by Crusading foot sergeants tangle with Saracen heavy and light cavalry cavalry in an attempt to buy some time for the Antiochenes to come up.

 Baldwin's lieutenant, Joscelin, is still in uncontrolled advance and charges into a mass of Saracens under Soqman.

 Bohemund and Tancred are advancing in support as fast as they can and their line is becoming disjointed and vulnerable.

 Baldwin's time is running out. Now flanked, his situation is dire.

 The general situation looks like this. The Eddessans under Baldwin and Joscelin are scattered all over the place and being pressed by overwhelming numbers of  Saracens everywhere. Baldwin's cavalry are destroyed and Baldwin is killed.

 Joscelin's knights are flanked but, somehow, he manages to beat them off. He is cut off from the rest of his force. He is surrounded. 

 Bohemund forms a line at the foot of the hill. Tancred is more tardy (he rolls some rubbish motivation dice). Just across the river....

 ....Joscelin, with losses and in disorder, tries to break out.

  The dice are in his favour yet again!.....

 .....and, by some ungodly miracle, he makes it back to his own lines.

 New lines are forming. I am, BTW, liking this scenario set up less and less: The table edge is becoming a hindrance to free movement.

 Behind the Saracen, an isolated band of foot sergeants is surrounded and pounded to destruction. The Saracens are poised for their final thrust....

.......and that is where I choose to leave this battle because I have learned all I need to know. I have learned:

• That the special rules regarding all of the contingents largely worked to an acceptable extent. The only one that might need tinkering with is the one regarding the compulsory advance by Baldwin's army (including Joscelin of Turbessel). I think I might change the definition of the Saracen's Stratagem card to an immediate Momentum March (plus one move for infantry and cavalry) card affecting Baldwin's army. This will ensure at least one lurch forward. Baldwin's units must rally or move at full rate on subsequent March cards to move to with the easiest to reach enemy, and then attempt to resolve melee. I think I will keep both Stratagem cards in the deck, but have only the first apply, Hmmmm.
• I found that Jekermish was overly strong in unit quality. I will change the composition of each of the Saracen forces whilst maintaining the numerical strength of each. The overall numbers and types of units will not change. I will also downgrade some of the command group Motivation Die to D10. Only Soqman and Bohemund will be D12.
• The sequence decks were quite nicely balanced so I will make no changes there - the new expanded types of card worked nicely.
• Rivers. The general terrain rules in AS don't work that well for troops in rivers. As a blanket rule I think that there should be a penalty modifier equal to the type of river - e.g. in this battle a type II river gives a down 2 modifier - to all troops in it and the other terrain type modifiers should be ignored. If the river bed is firm, cavalry reduce the penalty by one. Troops defending the bank get the terrain advantage modifier.
• Finally, I stopped the battle where I did because instead of it being a free flowing battle on a fairly open plain, it became a head on assault, by the Saracen, on an artificial isthmus created by the table space. I need to try to prevent this somehow. The change of axis, largely due to Jekermish's position and direction of attack, will usually create an artificially closed flank. I am going to have to orientate the table differently to extend the Crusader's left rear and / or the position of Jekermish; Jekermish might even be lost as an 'independant' army.  I fear that the game will generally do what it did in the solo test and become an end to end, rather than side to side, battle unless I do something fundamental to the initial set up. 

Solo testing the Harran 1104 scenario - part two.

And so the battle began....

 The Saracens pushed their scouts across the river towards the hill. Knowing that coming within 12" of the Antiochenes just beyond the crest would activate them, the scouts were happy to stop at the bottom.

This photo shows a slight change to the shape and position of the river on the Saracen left flank - I've pulled it back a bit to slow the scout's advance. 

The main bulk of Turcoman horse skirmished with the Edessans using 'advance, fire and retire' tactics, effectively firing at closer range whilst the enemy shoots at longer range. 

In Ager Sanguinis the movement isn't actually performed because the cavalry must always end up where it started if it wishes to gain this tactical advantage. Shooting otherwise stops further movement on the sequence card - advance, fire and stop.

 Then the Saracen turned his first Stratagem card and the Eddessans were put into uncontrolled advance. The Crusaders immediately turned a March card and went forward.

 Jekermish decided not to wait for the Eddessans to cross the river. He attacked and put the first unit of Eddessans to flight (turcopoles, right foreground). This was pretty much the end of turn one.

 The Crusading units in 'uncontrolled advance' were marked with 'wheel counters'. However, it wasn't long before they were removed as the Crusaders rallied on command cards. They seemed to rally very easily. They were rolling D8 or D10 vs D8 in the main, so perhaps they were just lucky. This was partly the fault of the Saracen as most of the turcomans had moved too far away to down rate the Crusader's chance of rallying.

Having two Stratagem's helped a great deal in keeping them coming on.

 It was probably a good thing that Jekermish had chosen to advance.

 His cavalry began to pour across the river.

 Jekermish's advance had activated the Antiochenes. Bohemund and Tancred came forward to Baldwin's aid. It is now a race against time.

 They have a long way to go, especially as they are impeded by the move rate of their heavy infantry.

 Not all of the Eddessans rallied. Some were still going forward and had to fight, against the odds, at the river bank.

All of the time the Eddessans were being enveloped. The first of Jekermish's cavalry have crossed the river. Also note the Frankish knights uncontrollably advancing across the river. 

Crunch time is narrowly avoided by the ending of the turn quite early on 'same Army Dice initiative rolls'. It's a good point to stop and do this post. The game will continue..........

Some interesting new purchases - hakbuts for the Marignano game

Except at the start of a project I rarely post about new purchases. I would normally wait until I'd painted the things and then post the result. But, this morning, I received these figures from Martin S. at Vexillia. They are designed by Copplestone and produced in Italy by Mirliton.

I suppose, given that Copplestone was the designer, I shouldn't be surprised by the quality of these sculpts but, I am. These are just the ticket and I haven't minded, especially now I've seen them in the flesh, paying more than my usual £2 per figure maximum: I'm calling them artillery, and for that you usually pay a premium, so I will pretend that my arse is duly covered! 

Service from Vexillia was, as usual, excellent - Martin is so organised that he could probably herd cats.

I'm going to base these 'artillery pieces' in pairs on 90mm square bases. I'm going to add a few spare figures to bulk them out - in this case by Foundry, TAG and OG, one of each. The Copplestone figures are the two figures with each hakbut. You get 2 hakbuts and four figures per pack. I think, from memory, the packs were £11 each.

I'm probably going to buy a few more of these. At Marignano the French fielded 300 of the things. I think I might field them mixed in with the French crossbow units (for flavour) to cut down on the ridiculous numbers I would need otherwise. We will see.

Solo testing Harran 1104 AD - Battle Report. Part 1.

The Battle of Harran is one of those scenarios that could be set up and played in several ways.

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• It could be done as a rigidly programmed game where the players have little chance of changing what actually happened tactically on the historical day. 
• It could be done as a straight forward encounter war game where only the initial deployments are used, everything is 'known' and the game is simply fought without special rules. 
• It could be done as a partially programmed game where what actually happened become what Featherstone referred to as 'military possibilities'; a game where the players have some control of their army's tactical progress unless a historical event is activated by chance and supersedes it.

Of course, I'm going to go for the third option. But, here's the rub, as a scenario it will be the hardest option to balance.

Even before the battle has started, I've changed the position of some flanking terrain. I've moved the village, farm land and river on the Saracen's right flank. Moving terrain in this scenario is easily done; although a short description of the battlefield exists its exact location is unknown. Indeed, a village does not feature in the description of the battlefield at all. I put one there to hinder any ambition Jekermish might have of making an unhistorical wide flanking movement. 

Jekermish still doesn't really have this option but now he has the option to attack on the opposite side of the river obliquely, rather than lie in ambush. 

I've decided to use Ager Sanguinis 2 rules because it is easier to add a 'military possibility' programme to them and because I like the changes to the sequence decks. Before you ask, very little of Ager Sanguinis 2 is written down. Ager Sanguinis 2 is Ager Sanguinis with major changes to the sequence decks and minor changes to the rules based on game developments in Ager Proelii, which itself was a development of Ager Sanguinis rules tailored for the Punic Wars. I'll try, where appropriate, to outline rule changes in this test report.

Initially, I'm going to try the scenario with these four special rules:

• All of Jekermish's units will be discovered if any of his units move or shoot, or a Crusader unit crosses the river and comes within 72 inches. 
• All of Bohemund's units will be discovered if any of his units move or shoot, or a Saracen unit comes within 12 inches.
• Bohemund's units cannot move until discovered, any of Baldwin's units reach the river, Saracen close order cavalry cross the river, or Jekermish is discovered.
• When a Saracen "Stratagem" sequence card is turned, Baldwin's units are in uncontrolled advance until rallied from pursuit. Whilst in uncontrolled pursuit, Baldwin's units must move full allowable rate, rolling for motivation normally, on all Crusader "March" cards, attempting to close and melee with the nearest unengaged enemy unit.

I'm quite happy with three of the special rules but I'm unsure about one of them. I'm not very confident in the rule regarding Bohemund's movement restrictions. I'm not sure if they are too restrictive or not restrictive enough. Historically, when Baldwin's army made it's unplanned advance over the river, Bohemund decided not to support his ally and, whilst Baldwin and his army were being slaughtered, he marched away. But, that wouldn't make for much of a game so the military possibility of his participation must be made likey - we'll see.

Because I'm playing this game as a solo scenario I must take two decisions, for fair play, before the game starts. 

• Bohemund will move to support Baldwin at the first opportunity.
• Jekermish will move to attack if Baldwin's units do not reach the river before both the end of the turn following the play of the second Saracen "Stratagem" card.

On non related Fiasco fronts, I'm busy painting stuff for the Marignano 1515 demo game next year, and my Italian Wars collection. I've knocked up about a hundred new figures so far, mostly shot, crossbowmen, and some rather nice mounted arquebsier. I'll post some pics soon. 

I've also made some new, and for a change interesting, lead mountain purchases, more anon.

A game for Fiasco 2014

 This year Fiasco is on 26th October at New Dock Hall, The Royal Armouries, Leeds. 

http://leedswargamesclub.webs.com/

This is a regular fixture for The Ilkley Lads and we will attend this year with a Crusades demo game. It has been a busy year so we are going to do something that requires little extra work. We will do a scenario based on the Battle of Harran 1104 AD. 

I've just set it up to check table sizes. It fits very nicely on an easily manageable 12 x 6.

 There are five distinct 'battle groups' in this battle. In the centre Baldwin of Edessa faces Soqman of Mardin. Soqman will try and draw Baldwin across the river. Baldwin will try and draw in Soqman.

 Soqman has already sent his Turcomans across the river and sent more horse archers off to his left flank (in front of the 'yurt' camp) to scout a large hill to Baldwin's right. If Soqman can entice Baldwin to attack across the river he will hold them with his heavy cavalry until.......

 ........his ally Jekermish of Mosul, hidden in gently rolling scrub land, launches a flank attack into the hapless Edessan army. The Battle will be over in short order and Baldwin will be captured for ransom - cue evil laugh. 

It's just a pity that there are so few Christians for the slave markets, the Edessans have come alone; or have they........

 ....... because Saracens are not the only ones capable of dirty tricks. Crusaders have a few up their sleeves too. Bohemond of Antioch, smelling a chance to expand his own domain has joined with Baldwin to take the rich city of Harran. The crusaders will draw the Saracens across the river, then when they are fully engaged with Baldwin, Bohemond will launch a flank attack from behind a hill on Baldwin's right flank. Before nightfall the Saracen leaders will be in chains and his army destined for the slave markets - cue evil laugh.

Fact is stranger than any fiction. If I'd made this scenario up you would think it too contrived to be realistic - but it is true, at the Battle of Harran this was the basic set up.

We will use Ager Sanguinis rules for the battle with a few extra scenario rules to govern the hidden deployments and battle plans.

Just for the eye candy, here are a few close ups. If you see this game at the show, remember to say hi.

So, what makes green acceptable table green?

I must have been using a 'cloth' as my basic terrain for a few years now. I've been using a very fine and expensive baize cloth. A cloth that is, yard for yard, far too valuable for the purpose for which I'm using it. 

It's not what you know but who you know, and when. I was fortunate in knowing the right man at the right time. The cloth I've been using is a very high quality snooker baize (93% merino wool?) by Hainsworth, obtained as a rejected length because of a slight fault (that I've never found). I would not have even considered it for a table covering if I had to buy it. This cloth is probably a better cloth than my best suit is made of, and it's price by the yard (don't ask) reflects this, but I needed a very large cloth for the Trasimene 217 BC demo game (at Sheffield Triples) and it fitted the bill.

It was not exactly the right colour for a war game cloth, it was a very bright dark green, but it was the right size. It was over six foot wide and nearly 20 feet long. The colour, I thought, would easily been toned down with a few rattle cans of spray paint.

The guy in the red T-shirt is Dr. Ken, the man to know for cloth, and this is a very old photo of my room.

A few rattle cans..............

Before I say what I'm about to say, let me be clear, I'm very, very grateful to Ken for my getting me my cloth. But, by God, it's been a paint sucking chore to get right. It's been a surprising experience to discover how green bottle green can be. Before today, I had already applied well over a dozen cans of spray paint (mostly yellows) to this cloth (now roughly 16 x 6). It has featured for years in battle reports and no one has said a bad word about it. But to my mind it has always been too green, and as the spray paint wears off in use it gets greener by the day until I respray it - usually every six to twelve months. Recently, my friend Tim has started stocking spray paint at The Art Shop in Ilkley. These are not the usual car colours. They are artist's acrylics, by Liquitex, in artist's colours with several shades of 'beige'. I thought they looked just the ticket for a 'proper' respray. Usually I would use a couple of good quality rattle cans (like Plastikote) when I do a respray, this time I decided to pull out the stops and use four rattle cans - the best part of £30 worth.

Here are a few pics of the cloth and the recent painting process. The cloth is hung out in my back yard on the washing line using some old pegs. It has to be done on a calm windless day without much humidity, so timing is everything - morning tends to be best - and the breeze, if there is any, has to be a westerly so that my house acts as a wind break (my house is one in a street of four storey west facing terraced houses). Today was such a day, and given the windy weather we've had recently, I had to take my chance. The one thing I forgot to do, much to the chagrin of my wife, was to put down newspaper at the foot of the cloth - I now have a two foot wide beige yellow stripe running the length of my back yard, from 'paint drop', clearly visible in the last outside shot; hopefully it will wash away by next spring.

It basically goes, dark beige, light beige, yellow, light beige, yellow. The tie colour was definitely yellow.

Spray paint rubs off so it will not stay this colour for long. I don't mind. A few cans of spray paint every year is a small price to pay for such such a great table covering. I hope that having given it a very full coat this time, that just a few cans will touch it up next time. An off cut from the cloth shows the difference that nearly 20 cans of spray paint, over the years, has made.

The cloth's next outing will be for a Harran 1104 AD Crusades game - I think it looks arid enough for the grasslands of northern Syria.

Ager Sanguinis army lists found!

I've had about a dozen enquiries this year for the army lists for Ager Sanguinis (Crusades rules published in Miniature Wargames 309). The two lots of army lists were published somewhat later (MW issues 311 & 319), but as far as I'm aware all the hard copy, rules and army list issues, sold out years ago. 

Until recently I thought the lists were lost on an old defunct computer (I will not scan and send the copyrighted MW version). This last fortnight I've been away soaking up sun in France. On Friday I packed to come home and whilst doing so I found a memory stick in a suitcase side pocket - I checked it out at the airport and, guess what, I found some of the article notes for the army lists. I think they are complete, if not exactly as published in MW.

If you were one of those wanting them, drop me a line again and I'll send you a copy. My email is in the side bar and at the bottom of the for sale post below.