TTS AAR: Welsh Open Game Four: Venice Abroad versus WOTR Yorkists

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My fourth and last game at the Welsh Open To The Strongest tournament was against Steve’s Wars of the Roses Yorkists: a difficult army to face, packed full of longbows and with infantry armed with two-handed cutting weapons!

Attacking an enemy like that with a frontal advance is suicide: you walk right into a hail of longbow fire. The only way to do it is to attack its flanks and/or wings. I therefore sent the Knights forward, with the infantry pausing just outside longbow range, waiting for their own opportunity to go in.

Unfortunately, on the right, my Knights were wearing their ceremonial cardboard armour, and were soon fleeing the field. The intervention of my Light Mounted Crossbowmen, who had started the game off table and Lost, didn’t achieve anything and, despite huge opportunities for success on that flank, my attack petered out into nothing, with Steve able to bring the infantry that had disposed of my Knights back to counter the strength of my Later Knights.

I did have an opportunity to take the Yorkist camp there, but chose to try and improve the situation overall by sending the Lights into the rear of a Yorkist unit, but that didn’t work, leaving me to regret a potential three coins squandered.

Meanwhile, on the left, my Knights had broken onto the enemy flank, but the units they wer facing were veteran and proving very tough to actually evict from the tabletop, and I had to content myself with killing their general. I also just couldn’t quite get my Knights into the enemy camp: the cards weren’t quite falling for me.

I was now slightly ahead in terms of coins captured, but I needed an outright victory if I was going to make up for the crashing defeat I’d suffered against Peter in the last game. I therefore then made my second mistake of the battle: with the wings tied up but with the potential for my cavalry on either to head in to the centre, I sent my infantry forward to pin the Yorkist troops in place.

This was a mistake, as my poor spearmen and even the Alabardiers promply got cut to pieces by enemy Billmen!

This gave Steve enough coins to draw level and, with the game absolutely in the balance, astutely break through my line with his foot and attack my weakest line unit, the crossbowmen, sending them and my last two coins fleeing from the table for a 10-12 close fought loss!

A great game of To The Strongest despite the result, and very well played by Steve.

Overall, I was surprised to end up in 5th place, a good deal better than I was expecting and probably down to the size of my first two wins. Steve ended up second…which is presumably where I would have been if I’d beaten him!

Cracking tournament: my thanks to Ty for organising and for all four of my opponents on the day.

It’s now on to the delayed 2025 Doubles next weekend…

First go with Command & Colours

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Friend Neil wanted me to try Command & Colours, a board-wargame featuring wooden blocks representing units moving around a hex battlefield, with activation being card-driven and combat being resolved through throws of custom dice.

We played the Napoleonic version (there are versions that cover other periods in history), specifically the battle of Eggmuhl between the French and the Austrians.

So, what did I think? Firstly, let me say that this is definitely a wargame and not a boardgame. Put this onto a big table with a hexed mat (i.e. no different from To The Strongest’s grid) and substitute the wooden blocks for figures, and it plays exactly the same as a tabletop system. In fact, my first thought when I saw the game set up, was “oh look, it’s kriegspiel”.

We played two games, swapping sides for the second. I lost the first one, then we started another game but I made a critical mistake in my first turn and got heavily punished immediately, so we stopped that game and started again (consigning that encounter to the forgotten history file) and then won the second.

The system was easy to learn, although there are nuances that you need experience to exploit. For example, the cards drive what units you can activate…which means that to launch a game-winning attack, you have to make sure you have enough cards in your hand to allow you to push that attack forward for at least three turns, otherwise you will find yourself unable to exploit any success you might have had with your first card.

It also takes a little time to adjust your play for how brutal the combat can be. You definitely don’t want to be infantry caught out of square by cavalry, and using your artillery effectively (and without getting them killed!) is tricky.

All in all, I really enjoyed the two games we had. I’d always choose to play a figures-on-the-table game over a wooden-blocks game, but Command & Colours would certainly provide a great alternative if no full wargame was available.

I’m also tempted to get a huge hex mat on a suitably sized table and see what it would be like to fight a slightly later game with my 15mm collection: perhaps an 1859 Franco-Austrian encounter as I don’t really have any Napoleonics…

TTS AAR: Welsh Open Game Three: Venice Abroad versus Pradithra Indians

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With two big wins under my belt it, it was inevitable that my next game was against Peter and his Pradithran Indians: lots of heavy cavalry, lance and bow, supported by horse archers…sounds very familar…

I lost the scouting and, despite my best efforts, managed to deploy with half my army facing thin air. It’s a familiar story when playing Peter, and one that usually ends in disaster!

Turn one and forward came the Indians, their pooping camels straight down into the corner!

I counter-advanced whilst frantically rushing my troops over to the right.

The Indian cavalry charged my veteran Later Knights (saving on 4+) and disaster struck: I drew five Aces in the first eight cards and promptly lost the Later Knights and therefore my army standard!

No matter: these things happen and I had more Knights that I could use to recover on the left whilst still trying to shift my army over to the right.

Then disaster struck again: I pulled three consecutive Aces and lost both those Knights and some Handgunners that were in the area!

Words fail me! I had drawn eight Aces in about thirteen cards. At this point even Peter was telling me that he had never seen such appalling luck!

With my left flank now vaporised and my back firmly against the wall, I fought on, desperate to recover the situation.

As you’ll also see in the right hand picture, above, I managed to get my troops that has started the game on the left over into the centre, and began an heroic defence of my position, managing to stretch the game out (playing normally, I hasten to add: no long pauses to deliberate!) until there was only five minutes to go.

At this point I was still on something like six coins, so a losing draw would have been okay. Keen to keep hopes of a good placing alive, I did get a bit gamey (translation: act like an arse!) and tried to claim that we had no time to play another turn - in competition, the organiser can’t afford to let the time spent on a round go too much over the allocated time or you could end up giving out the prizes in the Donmar Warehouse (if you know, you know!) - but Ty consulted the competition pack and declared that even though there were only minutes to go, and any resultant turn could take the game considerably over the limit, the rules said that if a player wanted to start a new turn they could do.

Unsurprisingly, Peter did…and, with some very skillful manoeuvring, managed to infiltrate some light cavalry through the gaping holes in my left flank (which I had denuded to prop up the centre) and take two of my three camps. Game over and a 2-12 loss to the master!

So another shoe-ing from Peter…but I could take some comfort from the fact that this one was down much more to the cards - eight pooping Aces in thirteen pooping cards - than to lack of skill or error on my part.

On to the last game…

TTS AAR: Welsh Open Game Two: Venice Abroad versus Later Romans

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After dispatching Colin’s Ikko-Ikki in Game One, my opponent in Game Two was friend Si and his Later Romans: in effect, a repeat of my third battle at last year’s Warfare tournament. I’d won that one (beating Si for the first time in competition ever) so settled down to try and do so again.

Things didn’t start very well, as I lost the scouting and had to watch as significant numbers of Roman heavy cavalry thundered towards my left wing!

At this point I managed to muck up the settings on my camera, so some of the photos are weirdly focused: which is absolutely gutting as this was the key moment of the battle!

I advanced my Knights towards the Roman horse and managed to get the first charge in. Incredibly, a fortuitous run of the cards saw me knock out one of the Roman cavalry units along with their General, with their accompanying lights also fleeing the field in shock. That’s five coins won (about half the Roman total) in one hit!

It was now very much the case of not throwing away this advantage, so I calmed myself down (no easy feat after that bit of good luck) and took stock. A plan quickly evolved: the Knights to finish off his Roman cavalry on the left then advance on his camp; send everything else in against the so-far-untouched Romans on the right.

Romans are really hard to kill, especially when commanded by an experienced general like Si. I threw everything I had available at the enemy on the right, and despite having a considerable numerical advantage and Knights, at the end of the game I still hadn’t fully broken them there!

So it would all be down to what happened on the left.

First task was to polish off the rest of the Roman cavalry…

Again, this took much longer than it should have done, particularly once some Roman infantry got involved…but eventually the last enemy cavalryman fled the field and it was time to break the foot.

Stubborn? That word doesn’t properly encompass how difficult it was to finish them off!

In particular, the Roman legionaries on the hill at the back survived charge after charge in the rear from my light horse, and weren’t even much bothered by my Knights coming in from the front, disordering them the first time they tried it!

In the end, however, the Later Knights managed to break the infantry unit caught out in the open, and the game was mine.

This was another big win (12-2) but, I emphasise, solely down to the luck I had in the first turn in knocking five coins worth of veteran Roman cavalry and their general off the table with my first charge. Without that bit of extreme good fortune, things would have been very different indeed!

TTS AAR: Welsh Open Game One: Venice Abroad versus Ikko-Ikki

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My first game proper at this year’s Welsh Open (held at the ever-excellent Firestorm Games in Cardiff) was against Colin’s beautifully-painted Ikko-Ikki.

This is an unusual army consisting of a mix of raw and veteran fanatics wielding naginatas and other polearms, supported by a small contingent of fanatical cavalry and the odd unit of bowmen and handgunners.

I won the scouting, and was pleased to see Colin set up in one corner of the table, ripe for some kind of outflanking manouevre with my Knights on the left!

I knew the Ikko-Ikki would come straight at me - that’s what fanatical monks with big choppers do - but I also knew that they would all be very vulnerable to missile fire. I therefore determined to get forward into missile range, then wait for them to come to me as I pelted them with crossbow bolts and fire from my handgunners.

There was also the matter of their cavalry on my right: that was job for my other command of Knights!

The shooting was also going very well on the right, with a couple of units of raw fanatics neutralised, so I thought it was safe to send the infantry forward to distract Colin’s main line whilst I developed my flank attack on the left.

This worked surprisingly well: with last of the Ikko-Ikki disposed of by the Knights on the right, an attack by Lancieri Spearmen on the side of one unit that had swivelled to face my flank attack was enough to knock their target off the table and give me a 14-2 victory without my left-hand flank attack even going in.

All in all, a succesful start to the tournament. It has to be said that Colin was unlucky with his saves against my missile fire and, as you can probably deduce from the pictures above, did manage to kill my one unit of Later Knights on the right.

Facing a solid wall of polearm-wielding, fanatical infantry and cavalry is terrifying, by the way, and I was pleased I never had to properly close with them throughout!

Welsh Warm-Up: Venice Abroad vs Graeco-Bactrians

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It’s late afternoon the Friday before the Welsh Open To The Strongest tournament at Firestorm Games in Cardiff. There’s beer to be drunk and a curry to be eaten later, but now there’s just time for a warm-up game between my Venetians and Mike’s Graeco-Bactrian (GB) successors.

[Mike had obviously heard that I was a VIP player as he had taken the trouble to dress very formally for the occasion. Although not featured in many of the photographs (it’s all about the figures, man) you may note his very natty suit and tie in the background of some of them. My thanks to him for making the effort: much appreciated!]

As the GB’s two pike blocks made the centre of their line a pretty dangerous place to be, my plan was to hold back my infantry there but attack strongly on both wings.

However, as the two armies advanced towards each other, it seemed as if the GB pikemen had decided to do the same thing: his wings advanced towards me whilst his centre stayed put.

This suited me down to the ground and, moments later, my left wing knights were charging into the GB veteran ‘Companion’ cavalry, ably supported by handgunners and the Alabardiers - free to intervene here as the enemy pike were still stationery.

Likewise on the right…although, as now seems customary, the later knights there seemed to have put on their ceremonial cardboard armour rather than the real thing!

My lights were meanwhile clearing the other GB troops from the field with missile fire (Mike was being very unlucky with his cards) and although of the left the knights were now making heavy weather of things, on the right they had recovered and were driving forward nicely.

As for the GBs, they had started to bring their pike forward…gulp!

My veteran later knights on the left (my best unit) were able to rout the companion types in front of them and then, with a glorious charge, sweep sideways and take one of the GB pike phalanxes in the flank, double-disordering them in one go: I told you Mike was being very unlucky with his cards!

At the same time, the advance of the other GB pike block and the fact that missile fire had stripped them of their accompanying/protecting lights meant that it’s flank was vulnerable as well: proving to be a very lovely target for my other unit of later knights, now dressed in proper metal armour rather than the nonsense they had started the game with.

It was all going a bit horribly wrong for the brave (but doomed) GBs, and it wasn’t long before one of the pike blocks gave way giving me Mike’s last three coins and the game!

So a big win for the Venetians in their warm-up game: my thanks to Mike for being such a fun sparring partner even in the face of some appalling cards.

Onwards and outwards for the promised beer and curry, and then the tournament proper tomorrow…

Postscript

Michael Lane reminded me of another incident in the game:

In the practice game that Douglas Baldwin and his Bactrians fought with Robert Avery’s Venetians Abroad on the Friday evening before Godendag, Mike (Douglas - don’t ask!) had the Patroclus Stratagem and he too forgot to use it when his General was turned into a pin cushion by Rob’s Crossbowmen. He didn’t even have the chance to save another General unlike me! It was Rob who reminded him of the lost opportunity when the game ended!

Practice for 2TS: Game Three

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This was the third game in Peter and I’s practice game for the forthcoming 2TS Doubles tournament (already past by the time this post gets published).

Preparations had been intense: morning fitness sessions; a strict dietary regime; classroom sessions on strategy, tactics and the rules; and, of course, a series of practice games of which this one was the third. Again, I would take the Northern Dynasties Chinese, and Peter would field Later Romans.

I won the scouting and, again, forced the Romans to deploy across the table to protect their flanks.

I then advanced forward with my main strength on the right and centre, intending to overwhelm him there and then turn and roll up the Roman line from that direction. Left to right, the situation before the two lines closed was now as follows:

Keen to avoid the consequences of my cunning plan, the Romans pulled back on the right. In the centre, a hail of arrows hit their steadily advancing infantry, with light cavalry harassing their flanks.

All was reasonably going to plan, and the Romans were slowly getting battered…but then disaster struck as their cavalry finally arrived from the left, heading straight for my lightly defended camps!

A ferocious melee broke out around the left side of my camp, but somehow my cavalry, armed only with bows, and a unit of horse-archers held back the veteran Roman lancers.

But this couldn’t last, and I now needed to win the battle quickly, sending everything forward into battle in the centre and on the right!

And still my two cavalry units, somewhat incredibly, held the camp!

Fortunately, the strength I had been able to deploy at the beginning of the battle, when the Roman heavy cavalry were occupied by a couple of light units off to the right, began to take effect. Often tactically outnumbered, and weakened by the constant bow fire and flank attacks, even the veteran Roman legionaries and auxilia began to waver…and, perhaps fittingly, a unit of raw Chinese spearmen, striking from the rear, finally inflicted the coup de grace: taking the final Roman coins and giving me victory!

As incredible as the stand of my cavalry around the camps was the fact that this was the third time I had beaten Peter in a row. As I write this, the Fimbulwinter (three consecutive, brutal winters with no summer) is upon us, there is moral decay leading to brother killing brother everywhere (well, Minnesota), the sun and moon are being devoured by the wolves Skoll and Hati, and I swear I can hear the breaking of chains holding monsters like Fenrir!!!

Practice for 2TS: Game Two

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With the TwoTheStrongest (2TS) competition fast approaching, Peter and I have been practicing with our new army: the Northern Dynasties Chinese. For this game, I would field the Chinese and Peter would command a late Roman force.

The Chinese won the scouting and, after deployment, my plan evolved as follows:

  • on the left flank, a command of light cavalry would keep the expensive Roman right hand cavalry force occupied

  • on the right flank, I would overwhelm the Roman cavalry there then sweep in to take the rest of the enemy army from the side

  • I would move my centre gradually towards the right, seeking to beat the enemy infantry by bowfire and sheer weight of numbers

Well, that was the plan, but how did things actually work out?

The left flank plan worked exactly as it should have done: my three light cavalry units kept the whole Roman cavalry command occupied for just about the whole battle, tying up double their number in points terms thus giving me a points-advantage in the clashes in the centre.

On the right hand side, a slow start by my heavy cavalry meant that the Roman troops managed to get forward in time to prevent me lapping around their left flank.

My heavy cavalry, however, pinned the Roman infantry in place in a Mexican standoff as superior numbers of cavalry and lights dealt with the enemy horse on the far right, but effectively this flank was a stand-off until the end of the battle when my cavalry and lights finally managed to win their fight and start to lap around the Roman flank.

It was therefore in the centre that the battle was decided, with my plan working well as the advantage I had given myself by tying up his cavalry on the right with lights proved successful.

To summarise the action, we went head to head, unit by unit, but I had more decent fighting units that I could deploy and the extra numbers eventually overwhelmed the Romans in the centre.

There were obviously a few dicey moments, but the combination of my heavy cavalry with lance and bow and light horse archers worked very well: shoot with the bow until the enemy becomes disordered, then charge in with the lance to finish them off.

The coup de grace actually happened on the right flank, when some heavy cavalry charged into the rear of some retreating Roman horse, taking Peter’s last victory medals and giving me the victory!

So this victory gave me my second against Peter in as many games: cue checking the news for other signs of the coming apocalypse!

Practice for 2TS: Game One

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With the TwoTheStrongest (2TS) competition fast approaching, it was time for Peter and I to get in some practice games. Our armies this year would be Northern Dynasties Chinese and, as a first trial, Peter would take the Chinese whilst I would field a late Roman force.

The Romans found themselves immediately on the end of a powerful flanking attack coming in from the left hand side: an attack that would eventually just about wipe out my cavalry command there. If I hadn’t kept the Roman Cataphracts in reserve, then things would have been over a lot earlier!

Meanwhile, however, my centre and right flank had been concentrating their efforts against the center and left flank of the Chinese army.

As you can see from the first photo, my right hand cavalry force started the battle facing nothing but air as the Chinese concentrated their attack on the other end of my line, but I managed to get them back into the action quite quickly - mainly by merit of ignoring the enemy light cavalry in front of me (designed to temp me to chase them into obscurity) - and they were soon supporting my main infantry attack: something that pushed forward nicely with my legionaries and auxilia doing what they do best!

So, after the first phase of the battle, the Chinese had destroyed the left side of my army, and I had destroyed the left side of their army: in effect the game now swivelled through 180 degrees as the victorious flanks of each force turned to face the other.

The first action was around the Chinese camp, where two legionary units faced two units of raw Chinese spearmen: surely an easy target for their gladiii, despite the fact the Chinese were defending camps. Unfortunately not: and the game ended with the Romans still trying to break into the enemy camps: a testament to the fortitude shown by the raw Chinese!

Each side was now so battered that it was very much a case of “sudden death”: with the next unit to fall deciding the fate of the army it belonged to.

The Romans had a narrow escape in the centre, where a unit of equites alares managed to avoid being overwhelmed by Chinese cataphracts accompanied by heavy and light cavalry.

So it all came down to a fight on the Roman baseline between more Chinese cavalry and more equites alares, this time supported by auxilia.

The melee swayed backwards and forwards, with extreme bad luck on either side playing its part, but eventually the Roman horse prevailed, the Chinese horse fled, and the battlefield belonged to Rome!

So the narrowest of victories for the Romans, and some vital lessons learnt on both sides.

IABSM AAR: Monmouths at Mouen Playtest

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One of the things I look forward to every year are the I Ain’t Been Shot Mum games put on by fellow Lardy, Phil Turner, and friends.

Here’s a pictorial report of a playtest of their latest offering, due to make it’s debut in a few weeks time: the Monmouths at Mouen.

Click on the picture below to see all:

TTS AAR: Burgundian Ordnance vs Sassanid Persians

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Time for a quick game of To The Strongest, with my Burgundians facing Neil’s Sassanids.

Unusually, the Burgundians won the scouting, so I positioned by Knights to face one command of Persian heavy cavalry on my left, with a couple of units of mounted crossbowmen aiming to sneak around that flank as well; and my veteran spear/archer units in front of the other command of Sassanid heavies: I was pretty sure than the combination of longbow fire and spears would keep them at bay.

All this meant that I had to weaken my right, so I used the This Way Effendi! strategem card to push back his infantry and horse-archers there, and placed the Ducal Household Infantry supported by handgunners and an organ gun to cover them.

To tell the story of that right flank first, although the Sassanid elephants, horse-archers and Daylami javelinmen advanced forward, they did so comparatively slowly and, when they did get close to my line, were stopped by missile fire: the organ guns being unusually effective against the Daylami. The battle ended with that flank still very secure.

The action kicked off very quickly, with the Sassanid heavies charging my line as soon as possible.

The Persian attack on the far left was enough to force back my Knights there, but at the cost of the Sassanid general of that command. Any gloating on my part was, however, immediately cut short as the Sassanid attack on my other Knights in the left-centre, although largely unsuccessful, killed Charles the Bold. Turn one and both sides had lost a general!

Centre-right then saw the Persian Cataphracts charging my main infantry command:

Attacking undamaged veteran spear/bowmen with horse, even cataphracts and veteran heavies, is never going to go well, and soon two Sassanid cavalry units had been sent fleeing from the field, another Persian general dying in the process.

On the left, I then stupidly lost a unit of mounted crossbowmen by allowing them to be squished between two Savaran units, but this actually opened up the opportunity to hit the squishers in the flank with the unit of Gendarmes that I had been forced to pull back to rally.

Victory here gave me the game: the Sassanids had lost two generals, one infantry unit to organ-gun fire, and three units of heavy cavalry

Not a game with a huge amount of tactics in it: the Burgundian missile-fire was exceptional throughout right across the army, which meant I was generally charging disordered units when it came to melee…and there’s nothing a Gendarme likes better than riding over disordered troops!

Here’s a couple of shots of the rest of the field at my moment of triumph:

The good news was that as that game was over so quickly, we had time for a re-match, but more of that later…

"Lust for Glory" Playtest

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Lust for Glory (or Lust for short) is the latest set of rules due from Big Red Bat publishing. Chronologically it covers the period 1650+ to around 1760, so could be said to follow on directly from For King & Parliament.

We playtested the rules with a clash between the Polish-Lithuanians and Ottomans with a quite large 200 points a side game.

The pre-game activity was a little more involved than with TTS or FK&P, including both the usual Scouting phase and an interesting Bombardment phase when you get to try and soften the enemy up with your artillery before the action proper begins.

I played the Polish-Lithuanians and, nervous of the hordes of Turkish cavalry in front of me, forced all the horse onto one side of the battlefield, with the infantry lurking along in their wake on the other.

With two sets of shock cavalry desperate to stick their lances into each other, it was not long before the mounted troops met approximately in the middle of the table, with the appropriate and evenly matched amount of carnage ensuing.

Meanwhile, my German infantry on the left attempted to outflank the Ottoman Azabs, with the Haiduks also advancing to bring the Janisseries under fire.

Although the main cavalry clash was still continuing, the good news was that in the centre some Winged Hussars had smashed through a unit of Janisseries, and was now in a threatening position just about behind the Ottoman line.

At this point I had to abandon my command, but handed over the baton to friend Mark with instructions not to throw away the obviously hugely advantageous position I was gifting him!

Fortunately, Mark was able to complete my work successfully, although I was informed that the infantry action proved a stalemate, and winning the game became a very close run thing, with the Polish-Lithuanians having only two coins remaining when the Ottomans finally fled the field.

Anyhoo…a great game, and what looks like a great set of rules on its way.

TTS AAR: Anglo-Normans vs Fanatical Berber

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It was now my turn to play the Anglo-Normans versus the Fanatical Berbers.

My plan was simple: load all my veteran Knights onto the right flank, opposite his heavier cavalry unit, and utterly refuse my left flank. The Knights would then go in and crush all opposition before swinging in behind the enemy line in time to win the day before I was overwhelmed from the left. Simples!

As the game began, my Knights thundered forward, with their Spearmen following, with the Anglo-Saxons hanging back as much as possible.

The right hand unit of Knights forced some Berber light horse back, but the left hand command was temprarily halted as the opposing Jund cavalry proved tougher than expected.

Meanwhile, the Berbers had sent more light cavalry forward on the left at the gallop. This developed into a standoff between a single unit of Fyrd supported bt light archers and two units of enemy light cavalry.

More Berber light cavalry ignored the Fyrd and headed into the centre, threatening the flanks of my advancing line (left hand photo below) but the good news was that the left hand Knights had finally managed to disperse the Knights in front of them, leaving them clear to turn towards the enemy centre (right hand photo below).

The Berber light cavalry were too mobile to be pinned by the Fyrd/lights for long: one unit sneaking through the gap on the Anglo-Norman left.

This pesky unit then made its way down to the flank of the Anglo-Norman camp and (with a bit of help from the cards) charged in, dispersing the defenders and costing me three coins. What had looked a promising situation was now back in the balance!

Worse, the Berber infantry that had been so far excluded from the action out on their left flank had by now managed to move sideways and began to engage the rest of the now-outnumbered Fyrd (left hand picture below).

The Norman Knights needed to win the battle soon, or the left would be overwhelmed by sheer weight of numbers. Fortunately, they were now in a position to turn sideways onto the left flank of the Berbers, and quickly advanced forward to charge position whilst the Norman infantry pinned the oppositino from the front (right hand picture below).

Things quickly became a bit critical on the left: even the Fyrd suffer when faced with over two-to-one odds.

Fortunately the Normans on the right were now in the perfect position to hammer the rest of the Berber infantry.

Although the Berbers turned to face the Knights coming in from the flank - and even Knights don’t like charging formed Spearmen - this allowed the Norman Sergeants to attack their flank, disorder them and make them vulnerable to a charge from the front: the perfect combined arms attack (the top two photos below).

The Knights thundered forward and smashed the disordered Berber Spearmen from the field. So horrible was the carnage that the Berber lights guarding their camp routed from sheer fright!

This obviously left the berber camp unguarded, allowing the other unit of Knights to calmly take possession, taking John’s last three victory medals!

A great game in which my cunning plan to weight the right and refuse the left worked…but only just!

If my final attacks coming in from the right hadn’t succeeded when they did, then I was in real danger of losing the game due to losses on my left, including the fall of my camp. I was very glad of the resilience of the Fyrd even if a lot of Saxons perished whilst the Normans won the battle!

TTS AAR: Fanatical Berber vs Anglo-Normans

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Time for another game of To The Strongest: with the Fanatical Berbers played by me versus John’s Anglo-Normans.

The large numbers of Berber light cavalry meant that I won the scouting and, seeing that the Anglo-Normans had deployed in a compact mass in the centre of the field with Knights on either flank, I decided to shake things up a bit and placed all my cavalry, light and heavy, on my left flank, intending to overwhelm the Knights there and then swing in to take the rest of his army in the side and rear.

As the game began, my horsemen thundered forward, and quickly got behind the Anglo-Norman line.

A unit of Berber light horse charged into the flank of the massed Norman Knights and, with the cards helping me out, sent one fleeing from the field.

With the Arab Jund cavalry and a unit of mercenary Christian Knights on the way into the action on that flank, the situation was only really saved for the Normans by the intervention of the Knights from the other side of the battlefield (along with Bishop Odo and a piece of the True Cross) who had quickly re-deployed across the width of the table.

This meant, however, that the Anglo-Norman left flank was left unguarded and, although a bit slow off the mark, the Berber Black Guard was soon forward and threatening there.

With the Berbers curling in from both sides, the Anglo-Normans desperately sent the Fyrd forward to try and cut through the main enemy line, but although they fought bravely, Berber light horse were all over their right flank/rear and the Norman spearmen who might have turned the battle in their favour were busy trying to hold off the Black Guard on the left.

It all proved too much for the Anglo-Saxon infantry, who were finally broken by more Berber light horse coming in from the rear. The main Anglo-Norman infantry line collapsed and the day was to the Fanatical Berbers!

A cracking game which actually felt a lot closer than the report, above, would suggest. Unit for unit, the Berbers were weaker than the Anglo-Normans, but there were more of them, and once the initial flank manoeuvre on the left had been successful, the Anglo-Normans were very much on the back foot.

Getting the Knights across to defend the right was genius, but that in turn allowed the more numerous Berbers to outflank on the other flank as well, and suddenly the Anglo-Normans were fighting in three directions as once. A gap was bound to appear somewhere, which allowed the Berber light horse to dart into a position where they could attack the rear of the heavily-engaged main Anglo-Norman battle line and that, as they say, was that.

Next game will reverse the sides and we’ll see how that goes…

2025: A Year in Review

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Time for the annual round-up!

Overall, it’s been a good year for playing games and not such a good year for painting figures.

Gaming

Another record-breaking year, with 78 games played, six more than last year’s previous record total.

By far the most games have been Ancients/Medieval at 61 games, followed by Pike & Shot on ten games, and then a smattering of WW2 (4), Napoleonic (2) and 19th Century (1).

A Magnificent Table for the “Storming the Starmerskaya” Game At This Year’s Operation Market Larden Games Day

As with last year, one of the reasons for the huge number of games played was playing on the To The Strongest tournament circuit - about half the Ancients/Medievals games played were in tournaments - and it tended to be at shows that I played other periods.

One of my resolutions for 2026 will be to play more games from other periods.

Tournaments

I played in eight of the nine “official” To The Strongest tournaments in 2025: all great fun and the usual mixed bag of results.

The only result I was unhappy with was the 19th position at the World’s in February, but my poor Romans had an absolute ‘mare: losing five Legionary units in one turn against the Dacians; and then being up ten coins against the Persians and then suddenly collapsing!

Obviously I was very happy to retain my title at Britcon for the second year in a row: it was hard fought tournament that, after four games, all came down to the fifth and final clash.

Facing the Hoplites in the final, deciding battle at Britcon

Many thanks to all the organisers and my various opponents: all the games I had were played in the very best of spirits, with none of the unpleasantness I’ve sometimes seen at other events. I do remember laughing a lot when playing, always a good sign.

My thanks also to all my opponents throughout the year. Just looking through the AARs has made me realise again how much I enjoyed all the competitions I entered this year, and I would highly recommend the To The Strongest competition circuit to those who fancy a bit of “competitive gaming without numpties”.

Painting

2025 was not a good year for painting: only the second time I have scored under 1,000 points since the Challenge began.

Nearly all my painting time was taken up with creating the various Arabic armies of medieaval times: from the Arab Conquest to Ayyubids to Fanatical Berbers. The vast majority of the figures used were 3D prints from Red Copper and 3D Breed: beautiful figures that paint up really well. Overall I painted 618 Arabic infantry, 122 mounted troops and three camps.

Other than the Arabs, all I painted was a smattering of troops to bulk up existing armies: a few Hittites, some Polish/Lithuanian types and even some more Venetians.

New Year’s resolution number two is to do more painting in 2026.

Shows

A light showing on the show front in 2025, and even those were mostly connected to tournament play. I missed out on Salute and both Partisan shows, but did manage Roll Call, Overlord, Warfare, Colours and Vanquish.

All the shows I went to had an incredibly high standard of demonstration games that really motivated me in a year when I was very busy with work and other real life issues.

I think NYR #3 must therefore be to do more shows in 2026.

Summary

So that was 2025: a good year for games (the best ever so far) but a bit light on the other aspects of wargaming.

Thanks for your continued support to Vis Lardica - over 100 posts in 2026 - and a special thanks to those who have Bought Me A Coffee of two: very much appreciated and you can be sure the money went on more wargaming kit!

I’m very much looking forward to 2026, and hope to see you on the other side of a tabletop sometime in the next twelve months!

All the best

R

TTS AAR: Venice Abroad versus Northern Dynasties Chinese

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Time for a pre-Christmas game of To The Strongest: my Venetians Abroad versus Peter’s Northern Dynasties Chinese.

The Venetians are not know for their scouting, so I was unsurprised when I lost that phase of the game. After deployment, the reltive postions were as follows:

Those of you who have played Peter in the past will know what is going to happen next!

Forced to deploy on a wide frontage to prevent myself being outflanked, Peter has concentrated his army against the left side of my army, meaning that all his force will effectively fight half of mine!

The game began with the Chinese advancing forward and putting their plan into action. The picture below shows exactly what this entails: you’ll see that they have managed to concentrate against my left wing and, with a bit of luck with the cards, even start to outflank me there.

I’ve played against Peter before, however, and so was expecting exactly these tactics. I therefore moved the Venetian (well, mercenary “broken lances”) to match the Chinese veteran heavy cavalry, and my mounted crossbowmen to block the outflanking force.

I now needed to get my right flank force across the table as soon as possible. With luck, I might even be able to hit the flank of the Chinese advance before it has time to deploy its extra numbers.

Unfortunately, the cards weren’t with me, and the right flank force spent two (yes, two!) turns refusing to follow orders!

The toher thing that needs to happen to defend against Peter’s favourite tactics is for the Knighst facing the main thrust to hold their ground as, if they go, the successful Chinese cavalry units will flood sideways into the flank of my main line.

On paper, the Knights should have been able to do exactly what was needed: one unit of veteran knights and one unit of later knights are not insignificant when it comes to melee! Again, unfortunately, the cards punished me for some imagined previous infraction, and the veteran knights were smashed from the table by the first Chinese charge, releasing hordes of enemy cavalry to swing sideways.

All was not lost, however.

The right hand knights finally got moving, and the infantry Alabardiers, with the aid of the handgunners, cut through some enemy lancers to dominate the centre of the field.

The Later Knights on the left were, however, now isolated and were unable to stand up to an assault by three Chinese heavy cavalry units supported by lights.

It was now a race to see whether the Chinese cavalry coming in from the left could kill enough of the Venetian infantry defending their camps before the Venetians in the centre (i.e. coming in from the right) could kill enough Chinese there to take the day.

Unfortunately, it was the Chinese who had the initiative and managed to win the game but, after a shaky start, the Venetians almost managed to snatch back victory: if their knights on the right hadn’t delayed getting across for two turns right at the beginning of the game, then things might have been very different.

But they didn’t…and things weren’t…but I was a lot closer to surviving Peter’s “weight one side” tactic than before!

TTS AAR: Hittites versus New Kingdom Egyptians

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As Rob had defeated me quite quickly in our game of FK&P, we had time for a quick bout of To The Strongest. Rob wanted to play New Kingdom Egyptians so, after a brief flirtation with fielding an Ancient British army, I decided to get as contemporaneous as possible and play the Hittites.

The New Kingdon Egyptian (NKE)’s main strength is in the devastating amount of arrow fire they can deliver from their massed light chariots, many of them veteran. The Hittite chariots, on the other hand, pack a much better punch in melee, so my plan was to match my chariots commands directly against the NKE chariots, aiming to get into combat as soon as possible.

Does that sound familiar? Was it, in fact, a re-run of my plan for the Polish-Lithuanians to fight the Transylvanians that had cost me so dearly in the last game? Errr…

As battle commenced, therefore, I sent my chariots hurtling forward on the left. It was my two commands of ‘impact’ chariots versus two commands of ‘missile’ chariots, with my Syrian lights trying to get through the Egyptian line on the far left.

I managed to get within charge distance very quickly, and duly thundered forward ready to get amongst the light chariots as soon as I could. Unfortunately, being lights, they evaded easily, meaning that although I was driving them back towards their baseline, I wasn’t closing to melee, and all the time wave upon wave of arrows were heading my way.

Meanwhile, as you can see, the Egyptian infantry was grinding forward, heading for my own infantry contingent, held back guarding the Hittite camps. Worse, the Egyptians had found some more chariots from somewhere, led by Pharoah himself…just what I needed: decent infantry to the front, marauding lights on the flank!

The Hittite chariots were still driving the NKE lights backwards, but the relentless bow fire was having an effect, and I couldn’t bring the full weight of my chariots to bear as some more Egyptian infantry had moved to threaten my chariots’ inner flank.

Still my chariots ground forward, and still the NKE evaded backwards right up until they had nowhere left to go. Yes, I now had them pinned up against the table’s edge, but the enemy infantry coming in from the inner flank were now starting to cause me real problems.

If I could just force those chariots off the table, all would be well…but what was happening back at the Hittite camp?

Unfortunately, I had underestimated the manoeuvrability of the Pharoah-led Egyptian chariots there, and thrown away the Hittite Royal Guard by leaving them vulnerable to a flank attack.

This let the chariots hit the flank of my camps whilst the main Egyptian infantry contingent assaulted the front, and although my men fought bravely and did some damage to the enemy, it wasn’t very long before my camp and my last few victory medals fell!

I’d like to say that the day had very nearly been mine…that the Egyptian chariotry was about to crumble leaving my own chariotry free to rampage through the enemy camps before driving into the rear of the infantry assaulting my camps, but that really wasn’t the case! The Hittite chariots might well have beaten their light Egyptian counterparts, but the effort had exhausted them, and they were in no fit state to intervene elsewhere on the field.

Not only that, but the Egyptians had infantry protecting their centre, infantry that were also preventing any spare chariots I had from intervening in the fight for my camps.

Could I have held my camps if I hadn’t thrown the Royal Guard away? Perhaps: it would have been four Egyptian infantry units versus three Hittite infantry units plus some lights…but the NKEs were in the ascendant at that point and even a one-for-one exchange of units would have seen an Egyptian victory. All in all, very well played by Rob, and Egypt continues to rule the Delta!

FK&P AAR: Polish-Lithuanians versus Transylvanians

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Time to get my new Winged Hussars onto the table for the first time. I would command the Polish-Lithuanians versus other-Rob’s Transylvanians.

My plan was simple: as I reckoned that my troops were better than his man-for-man, I would advance into contact and defeat each individual enemy unit that my men encountered. There was a little bit of detail involved: I would try and get my German infantry with their pikes into contact with the Transylvanian infantry without pikes; and I would try and loop one command of Hussars around the Transylvanian light cavalry on the far right of my line. Otherwise, it was just forward at the double!

My deployment was not strong, however, and my first few turns were spent trying to sort out my troops and get them where I wanted them. In the picture, below, you’ll see that although my German foot are where I want them, the Hussars are still deploying into a line as huge mass of Transylvanian cavalry head towards them.

Forward at the double!

The two lines came together with an almight crash: toe-to-toe literally right across the battlefield.

My German infantry exchanged a couple of volleys with the various Transylvanian types on the other side, then charged in with their pikes. Unfortunately, despite my strong belief that they should have swept all before them, the Germans soon got bogged down in a protracted melee-come-firefight where neither side could get the advantage.

German foot making no headway!

Likewise with the cavalry. Despite their technical superiority, the Winged Hussars failed to smash straight through the opposition, and a swirling melee broke out, with the Transylvanian Household Cavalry proving their equally elite status to be a match for the Poles.

As for curving round the pesky lights at the end of the line, they evaded backwards from the Hussars’ charge, effectively tying up two of my best units for the rest of the game.

Hussars failing to break through!

Meanwhile, on the left, my Tatar allies, backed up by some Polish Dragoons, were keeping some more Transylvanian lights occupied.

Tatars hold the left

So the Poles were now fully engaged right across the line, not bursting through as I had hoped but perhaps now gaining a slight advantage. What, however, was somewhat worrying was that there seemed to be another line of enemy cavalry and infantry behind the first one, ready to take me on even if I did achieve initial success.

Why do the transylvanians have another line of both infantry and cavalry in reserve!!

Finally the Hussars just right of centre managed to break through the first line of enemy cavalry, but they were quickly engaged by the second line of Transylvanian horse…and apprently taken off guard as they evaporated under attack!

Not only this, but the Hussars driving back the Transylvanian light horse on the far right were now in danger of getting swamped by the nimble lights, who were making the most of their superior numbers!

Meanwhile, on the left, although the Tatars had managed to dispose of the majority of the Transylvanian light horse in front of them, they then had to retreat as the enemy brought up his reserve infantry. This freed the remainder of the enemy light cavalry to hit the Germans in the flank, turning what had been a bloodily inconclusive fight in the center of the field into a rout!

Fortunately I had reserves of my own I could deploy: a squadron of Petyhorsy and a squadron of Pancerni.

These I sent in to support the crumbling Hussars, but unfortunately their initial success was then wiped out by the last uncommitted unit of Transylvanian Household Cavalry, which charged the Petyhorsy at their moment of victory, sending them and any hope I had of victory flying from the table!

So a pretty horrible defeat for the Poles, mainly due to the fact that Rob, my opponent, had a good plan and executed it brilliantly, and I didn’t have any sort of decent plan and even executed that badly as well!

TTS AAR: Warfare Game Four: Venetians Abroad versus Timurids

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My fourth and final game of To The Strongest at the 2025 Warfare tournament was against Peter and his Timurids.

This was one of those frustrating games when I could see exactly what was going to happen…and it did!

Unsurpringly, the Timurids won the scouting, forcing me to deploy in a line to protect my flanks whilst they, as you can see in the picture above, could concentrate their efforts on one side of the battlefield.

With the first move advantage as well, that meant that Peter could get his light cavalry down my right flank before I had a chance to move to counter the manoeuvre: very frustrating and next time we meet under similar circumstances, I think I will ignore his set up and deploy in a block on one side of the field as well, and see what happens!

The first couple of turns were spent with me rushing my troops on the left over to the right, and the Timurids thundering forward, especially down my right flank.

The fighting on the centre-right got intense very quickly as I tried to stop Peter overwhelming my troops there before my reinforcements could arrive from the left.

I lost my veteran later knights and army standard, but managed to take out a unit of Timurid heavy cavalry in return, but by this stage the Timurids had managed to properly get around my right flank and the writing was on the wall!

Meanwhile, although some of the troops from my left had made it over to the centre to bolster my defence there, far too many of them were forced into action to deal with the threat from Peter’s “throwaway” troops: flaming camels, kharash driven slaves etc.

I did manage to get some mounted light crossbowmen out and around Peter’s right flank, but this was too little too late, and eventually my last coins went as the Timurids managed to get some light cavalry into one of my camps.

I rather miserable 2-12 loss to finish off my 2025 competition season, with a 9th place achieved overall at Warfare.

Still, a great day overall, with some goodies bought for future armies, plenty of great chats with people and, of course, fun games of TTS as well. On to 2026 now!