March 01, 2026

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

March 01, 2026/ Robert Avery

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…

July 27, 2024

TTS AAR: To The Longest Game Three: Venetians versus WOTR Yorkist

July 27, 2024/ Robert Avery

The afternoon game at the 2024 To The Longest event was a maga-game where everybody would fight at once. In effect, this meant eight games of To The Strongest played simultaneously, with movement of troops from one table to another allowed.

My opponent was Steve and his Wars of the Roses Yorkist army, with all its units based and painted to its historical equivalents. It was a very good looking army consisting of bows, billmen and knights: not a combination to be lightly dismissed. Terrain-wise. the left side of the battlefield was dominated by another ruined monastery, impassable to mounted troops. In addition, lunchtime rain meant that the ploughed fields that had been good going in the morning were now rough ground. The presence of the monastery determined my deployment: infantry on the left, with my Knights on the right.

The picture above was taken after the game had been going for couple of turns. On the left you’ll see Steve advancing some infantry through the monastery grounds and, on the far right, my Knights advancing forward in an attempt to turn the Yorkist left flank where, actually, the game had started quite well for me: one units of Knights managing to drive some Yorkist knights from the field.

All seemed to be going well until, that is, we each deployed our final commands (in To The Longest, you started with one command off table until the end of the first turn).

I put my final lot of Knights onto the table centre-right, where they could either re-inforce the centre or follow up on any success on the right, but Steve deployed a huge command of billmen and bowmen right opposite where my original Knights were trying to turn his flank, neatly plugging the gap at the end of his line.

The picture below shows my original Knights on the right retreating in the face of this mass of veteran infantry!

With an advance on the right now looking a tad dangerous, I switched my efforts to the left and centre.

In the centre, my newly-arrived Knights and some infantry managed to clear some light units out of the way and then punch a hole through the Yorkist line. This was good, and I now threatened the enemy camp, but there was a huge mass of Yorkist units (seven of them) on the right hand side of the table and it would not be good if they pivoted through 90 degrees and headed to their right.

I needed to keep them occupied to their front, so my main body of Knights retreated back just far enough to keep the enemy pinned in place whilst I frantically worked out how to win the game elsewhere.

On the left, my light handgunners had put themselves into pole position for the “men of the match” award by managing to drive back the enemy infantry trying to infiltrate my left through the monastery grounds. They, supported by the Lancieri (spear) and Pichierrii (pike) had actually driven the Yorkists back onto their own side of the table, even though the enemy had survived several flank attacks from the ‘gunners.

The pikemen, after their humiliation in the last game, were also on a roll, squeezing through the gap between woods and fields to drive an enemy unit from the field.

I really needed to finish the game now: my Knights were running out of retreating room on the right, and although I had cleared the enemy centre, his troops on the right were starting to do what I’d feared they might: move to their right to re-take the ground I’d taken in the middle of the field, knocking off my units there from the flank.

Taking the enemy camp would do nicely, and I had a unit of Knights in position to do that…but the camp was defended and I’d had some bad experiences in the past trying to take a fortified camp with mounted troops.

So that left the pikemen…who could take the camp with an easy move forward and then a difficult diagonal move into the undefended portion of the Yorkist camp.

I drew a card for the easy move: a “10”.

Well, they certainly were keen, but were now presumably puffing and blowing and not in the mood to go again. Or were they? Only another natural “10” would get them into the camp and win the game for the Venetians…

Lady Luck had, for a change, smiled on me and my pikemen marched neatly into the Yorkist camp costing Steve his last three coins. Victory was mine 14:5!

So a decent final game for the Venetians, although it didn’t stop the English winning the event overall.

A great day’s gaming: many thanks to Peter for organising, and to all the players, especially my three opponents.

December 23, 2023

Two the Strongest Tournament: Game Two

December 23, 2023/ Robert Avery

Peter and I’s second game at the inaugural Two the Strongest Doubles tournament organised by the London Guild of Wargames was against Tom and Nathanial, each fielding a Wars of the Roses army: lots of longbows, billmen and knights!

Our plan was very much the same as in the first game of the tournament. My solid legionaries would hold the bulk of the enemy in place whilst Peter’s lighter cavalry got around the enemy flank and rolled them up. As our opponents wavered at the sight of their flank collapsing, in would go my Roman mincing machine to finish them off.

Much to our surprise, the first stages of the game saw everything going to the plan: Peter’s men got around the right flank of Tom’s troops and started knocking units off the table, then turning to head into the centre. Meanwhile, I advanced cautiously forward, wary of a storm of longbow fire.

Nathaniel also took a cautious approach so, for a time, all the action was on one side. Here’s a montage of these first evolutions:

Then I’m afarid our opponents made what must be considered a fateful mistake.

Concerned about their right flank, they turned some of their units in the centre to the right, intending to take Peter’s legionaries, now heavily engaged with the right side of the enemy line, in the flank. This, of course, left them open to a rapid advance from my troops into their now-exposed left sides, knocking a couple off the table and certainly preventing them intervening to the right as Tom had planned.

At this point Tom’s half of their army collapsed, leading to all his remaining troops being removed from the board and leaving Nathaniel to face the might of the Empire alone!

Now severely outnumbered and already in a poor tactical situation, it was only a matter of time before Nathaniel’s troops were overwhelmed. It also didn’t help that his artillery now showed an alarming propensity to draw Aces!