War of the Strategists at Alicante 2023
Berber vs Maurikian Byzantine
The Journey to Alicante (via Valencia)
Game 3 Berber vs Maurikian Byzantine
Game 6 Berber vs Feudal English
The Journey back from to Alicante (again via Valencia)
With a tortilla omlette sandwich and several strong coffees consumed for a weirdly timed lunch break, the third battle in the epic Berber conquest of Southern Spain hove into view, against this time a Maurikian Byzantine army
Maurikians are a slightly unusual choice for an essentially Open event given that the Nikephorians also have a Strategist as an option, however it's a solid army with high command and control, a bucket load of those almost-excellent shoot and charge cavalry, and no mandatory infantry at all if you wish to take an all-mounted force.
The lists for the Berber and Maurikian Byzantine from this game, as well as all the other lists from the games at Alicante can be seen here in the L'Art de la Guerre Wiki.
Looking at the terrain I suspect I may have elected to defend in the Mountains, with an impassable lake dropping neatly on the Byzantine right.
Having expected a nearly all-mounted force I was therefore surprised to see a line of rather anachronistic Mediocre Skoutatoi anchoring their right shoulders firmly against this perfect flank guard piece I had unwittingly gifted them
Maurice's Reforms of the Byzantine Army
The rest of the army was a more traditional set of cavalry armed and equipped (exactly) in the Steppe style.
It appeared that these mixed shoot and charge horsemen would be spending much of the game playing with the Christian and allied elements of the Berber host, with both the Knights and the Andalusian spearmen firmly positioned in their path
Quite how the Byzantine Khan planned to get his horsemen past the horse-unfriendly mountain terrain on this side of the table remained almost as much a mystery as what the Berber army would do to protect it's flank should it eventually push past that same terrain item later in the game
The African Spearmen, fresh from their ambush triumph in the previous game and keen to repeat it now found themselves with no prospect of any enemies falling into their trap.
As one they exited their mountain fastness and descended onto the plain of battle, and with swords and shields held high, and hearts filled with pride they marched to face the might of the Byzantine Skoutatoi shieldwall.
A much clearer photograph reveals that the hill was in fact covered with a plantation (or possibly a wood as I didn't bring any trees to this event) and had a handy gap alongside it. The Byzantines had of course already spotted this, and had quickly pitched their yurts and set off at speed, seeking to shove some of their mounted archers to try and outflank the Taifa Andalusian elements on the Berber right.
The Berbers and Andalusians had however already formed a Papist Christian-dominated front line with which to oppose the more Orthodox approach of the Maurikian cavalry in the centre, with neither side having much in the way of troops capable of clambering over the hill.
What's in this nonsense of a Berber army list then?
The Third Command: The Taifa Andalusian Ally
Competent Ally General
2 Arab Lancers Heavy Cavalry Impact
4 Berber Light Horse Light Cavalry Javelin
2 Berber Spearmen Heavy Spearmen
Why take an ally with this list? To be honest it was a combination of wanting a bit more "cutting edge" than the 3 Medium Knights were going to provide, and also looking to use some Arab lancers from Legio Heroica that are amongst my favourite "arab-style" figures in a list which isn't allowed any Lancers if you take the options with the supported African Swordsmen foot.
Having 2 Heavy Cavalry Lancers means the army ends up with 2 separate "cutting edge" blocks of Impact-capable mounted troops (even though 2 non-Elite HCv are clearly not a patch on 2 Impetuous Knights in that respect) which can appear, or at least move to cover quite a lot of the table if needed.
The spearmen in this ally primarily operate as a 3rd piece of "mobile terrain" (along with the 4 spearmen in the Strategists command) to shove in the face of any enemy Cavalry or Knights, getting up to a fairly meaty and wide 6 spear units across the width of the army in total such that enemy mounted troops will be unable to avoid having to deal with at least some of them. In the list they can be either Berber or Andalusian, but as the Berber list has a restriction that "Andalusian" troops can't be used with the Christian Knights these guys should really have been Berber figures. However to help differentiate them on table from the non-allied spearmen I used some rather "Andalusian" looking Two Dragons "Norman" spearmen units as they were long overdue an outing too - so in a literal, visual reading of the list restrictions they can't be called "Andalusian", but in reality it made life easier all round for me and my opponent as well. And anyway, perhaps they were Berbers in disguise..?
Having a 3rd block of Spearmen also meant there were now 2 "gaps" between paired units of spears which either (or both) the Archers and Crossbowmen could operate, giving any enemy cavalry a dilemma by making the normally-squishy bowmen really dangerous to attack due to the presence of the "shoulders" of spears, but still able to pump out some full-fat shooting to prevent enemy mounted archers simply standing in front of the spearmen and trying to shoot them down.
Finally the 2 LH Javelin gave the army extra width with LH operating on both flanks - here either as a stand-alone pair to bully enemy LH, or in tandem with one or both of the HCv Impact to provide a tricky and impossible to ignore or skirmish away mounted threat on the enemy flank.
This command was led by a Competent General - with 3 types of unit under his command, all capable of operating independently an Ordinary General would not have been enough to keep all of them moving up together, and having a Competent + a Strategist also bumped the army initiative up by another notch as well. With 6 LH across the three commands, and a Competent and a Strategist the Berber initiative actually ended up as a very healthy +4.
With the longer ranged composite bow shooting of the Byzantine skirmishers doing a little too much damage to the Berber light horsemen it was time for a quick change of pace.
The Berbers fell back, leaving space for the Taifa Andalusian Heavy Cavalry Lancers to turn up and block off this passageway to Constantinopalese success on the right flank of the Berber army
The Christian Knights had, uncharacteristically, stayed together for this battle so far - knights who pray together, stay together I guess.
Working in close coordination with their Andalusian spearmen, and now supported on their other flank by the terrifying sight of the Black Guard, the powerful strike force was starting to put the fear of a rather scary and martially-inclined Catholic Christian God into the highly skilled and pastoralist Orthodox Christian horsemen standing in their path
The Khano-Byzantines may well have been infused and enthused by the spirit of the Steppe Nomads from whom they had borrowed their military technique (and here, it appeared, their clothing and millinery stylings too), but against Knights and Spearmen that would require a lot of good quality shooting to pull off.
The Byzantines continued to shower arrows into the resolute line of Andalusians, who held their shields high to catch the rain of fletchettes pouting down on them, batting almost every one away harmlessly to stand firm ready for their upcoming charge.
The Byzantines were all well accustomed to a life in the saddle, and together with their near-legendary command and control meanwhile also allowed them to coordinate this shooting with more low level infiltrations of their countless Light Horsemen
Even as we speak a unit is here trying to find a path across the wooded hill to put more pressure on the Arabized Andalusian lancers holding up the flank
But the meat of the small but well drilled Byzantine force was its line of sub-par Anachronistic Skoutatoi, and they were now firmly in the crosshairs of the African warriors and yet more of the Berbers densely packed spear infantry
The cluttering of terrain had forced the Byzantine into a narrow frontage, and so the Berbers could even look forward to their Black Guardsmen joining in the assault on the Byzantine infantry once the Byzantine cavalry had been driven back out of range by the pressure of the Christian Knights
With the Byzantines almost ready to move forward on the Berber right, the Andalusian Lancers corralled yet more Berber horsemen and launched a fearsome attack, charging home at speed to force the issue before Byzantine archery could tip the scales in their favour
Well, that was the plan. Unfortunately the Khan-stantinopl-ese horsemen had other ideas, and swiftly and brutally despatched the Andalusian attack, leaving the whole right flank of the Berber army exposed to their future depredations !
Berber History
Meanwhile, the Africans, brightly clad Berber Spearmen and dour, dark and mysterious Black Guard were now all fully lined up on the Skoutatoi.
This would be a frontal charge and a face to face honest battle in which any breakthrough would see a route to sack the Byzantine camp open up - no need for a Trojan horse scenario here to breach the enemy defences
L'Art de la Guerre Stats
Swordsmen and Spearmen start on the same factors, so in this combat the only difference for most of the line of scrimmage is the Mediocrity of the Byzantine infantry. The Berber swordsmen do have Rear Support, but this only applies if they stand to receive an enemy charge. In this case as they are initiating the combat by charging in, Rear Support will not come into play
The victorious Byzantines on the Berber right had paused momentarily to drink some horses blood and chow down on a yak burger or two before continuing their advance
This pause had given the embattled Andalusian commander time to scratch together another ad-hoc force, this time using the rest of his Lancer cavalry and the rather obscure and undismounted Elite Medium Cavalry Javelineer to try and do better than the last lot had managed.
The sound of clashing steel filled the air as the two lines of warriors, horse-borne and fully pedestrianized met on almost the entire frontage of the whole battle.
The Byzantine spearmen, drawn from ancient cities in the eastern reaches of the Empire all along the Turkish coast and fighting in their traditional style were rocked on their heels by the force of the Berber charge, even as the Christian knights forced the Byzantine Khanate's men back, their steppe-born horses struggling against the weight of the European horsemen's fury.
The Byzantine Strategist is Maurice, although some people called him the space cowboy (yeah!) and some people called him the gangster of love.
He was Eastern Roman emperor from 582 to 602, and the last member of the Justinian dynasty having been chosen as heir by his predecessor (and father in law) Tiberius II (who's actual son "James T" ended up being rather narked about all this, prompting him to leave Constantinople and take a job in Starfleet). Maurice's reign was supposedly troubled by almost constant warfare, but given that allowed him to be classified as a Strategist in ADLG some 1400 years after his death, this wasn't all bad really. After he became emperor he brought the war with Sasanian Persia to a victorious conclusion, but rather incompetently failed to bring any of their elephants back for inclusion in the Byzantine army (I mean, what an oversight - did he not read the actual rulebook or something??).
As well as being a great general, Maurice was also a picker, a grinner, a lover and a sinner who played his music in the sun, especially when on campaign against the aforementioned Persians. Maurice also campaigned extensively in the Balkans against the Avars (the only Byzantine commander ever to do so, and the last commander of any nationality to beat them under ADLG until a Swiss army finally took them down in 2012).
He was known as a joker, a smoker and occasionally a midnight toker who also took his loving on the run while conducting campaigns across the Danube where he established two large semi-autonomous provinces called exarchates, ruled by exarchs (not exactly pushing the linguistic boat out there). In Italy Maurice kinda halted the advance of the Lombards (ish) for a bit, and also established some overseas holiday resorts (all inclusive) on the North African coast.
It was reported after his death that he also really, really loved peaches.
This was indeed combat on an epic scale - and those scales were tipping in favour of the Berbers with every sword and spear thrust as the Mediocre Skoutatoi failed time and time again to defy the odds against their better quality opponents, shedding hit markers behind them apace
Shouting prayers up into the North African sky under the constellation of Musa ibn Nusayr's sand-blasted Sardine and Chocolate Tajine, with each strike and thrust the African swordsmen on the left were getting past the large tower-shaped shields of the Skoutatoi.
Their faith gave them strength, their courage was unshakable as they battled their way forward driving back the Byzantine infantry at every turn.
The Moslem forces were outmatching the Byzantines all along the line, proving their bravery and skill with each blow.At the other end of the line the Black Guard were also proving their worth, fighting with a deadly precision.
Despite their best efforts to conjure the spirit of great warriors of Greek cities from times gone by, the Skoutatoi were no match for the Black Guard's skill and strength, and one by one they fell to the ground, or at least started to shed multiple hit markers behind them like coloured confetti at a Hold Steady show.
The right flank was now a complete mess, with the Andalusian Knights the chief architects of the carnage, scattering the Byzantine horsemen so much with their fierce charges that some of them probably didn't stop evading until they hit the foothills of the Himalayas!
The Andalusian spearmen had also more than proved their worth, their bravery and skill unmatched as they resisted every attempt by the enemy cacalry to come back into the fray and threaten the flanks of the Knights.
The Christian spearmen now stood tall, their spears held high and resolute - a very visible symbol of their strength and courage
As the fighting continued, the Skoutatoi began to suffer heavy losses - the right hand end of their line evaporated suddenly, granting a unit of Berber bowmen a clear opportunity to rush forward and besiege the enemy camp
With their baggage under threat and with holes appearing in their formation, the resistance of the Skoutatoi gradually weakened. The African warriors continued their relentless attack, using their superior quality, righteous zeal and possibility of wholesale theft that their proximity to the enemy baggage camp gave them in order to gain the upper hand.
L'Art de la Guerre hint - Capturing the enemy baggage contributes toward the demoralization of their army. A fortified camp (such as this one) costs points to buy, counts as an extra unit in the army break point, and cannot be looted by enemy light troops. Other troops have to successfully pass a die roll to loot it after they move into contact with its walls. Cavalry require a higher tariff on the dice to break down the walls than an infantry unit would do.
The Byzantine army was now scattered to the four winds, and every element of the Berber and Andalusian force was involved in frantically mopping up the last few remnants to claim a seemingly inevitable victory
The coup de grace was delivered over on the right flank, where the Andalusians had firmly shut the door on the Byzantine attempt to sneak round the edge of the mountains and outflank their army
Instead the fierce javelin volleys of the un-dismounted wannabe elephant hunters had cut the enemy cavalry down to size, forcing them back to the very edge of the table
With the men making up the pile of Berber casualties jeering behind them, the Byzantines finally incurred the last fatalities needed to break their army.
The Result is a third win for the Berber/Andalusian alliance!
Click here for the report of the next game in this competition, or read on for the post match summaries from the Generals involved, as well as another episode of legendary expert analysis from Hannibal
Post Match Summary from the Berber Commander
Ladies and Gentlemen, today, we stand here victorious, as our Berber army has claimed a decisive victory over the Byzantine Empire. This is a triumph for all of us, for our courage, for our unwavering spirit, and for our unwavering faith in Allah and the power of a good cup of honest Yorkshire tea.
I stand before you as a proud leader, proud of the bravery and determination of these Yorkshire Moors and Berbers. They have fought valiantly, they have shed their Yorkshire blood, and they have overcome insurmountable odds - mostly the hot weather which is not at all right . They are a true testament to the strength and resilience of The Yorkshire Moorish people.
But, let us not forget that our work is far from over. The challenges ahead of us are numerous, and our foes remain relentless. But I have faith in the strength of our people, and I know that with Allah on our side, pies in our bellies, knotted hankies on our heads and a flask of tea in our napsacks we will emerge victorious from every battle.
So, let us continue to stand together, to bounce like the home end at Bramall Lane, and to strive for yet more tea and biscuits in future. Allahu Akbar and Sheffield Steel!
Hannibal's Post Match Analysis
Fear not, for I am here to offer thee guidance. Let me show thee the more easy path to victory, the way to lead thy troops to glory. For I am Hannibal, the conqueror, the master of war
And as for you, well, let's just say I wouldn't trust you to lead an army of ants to a picnic. You're just not cut out for this business, my friend.
To those who would call themselves generals, I say this: study my methods, learn from my successes, and strive to reach the heights that I have attained. Only then will you truly understand the essence of what it means to be a great commander and Strategist
Forsooth, the art of war requires a careful balance of cunning and strength, a delicate dance between offense and defence. And thou, good sir, hast fallen out of step despite your good fortune here. I foresee a swift return to defeat in your next game
My own 10-minute video run-through of the game
Read on for the next game!
You may also like....
The Journey to Alicante (via Valencia)
Game 3 Berber vs Maurikian Byzantine
Game 6 Berber vs Feudal English
The Journey back from to Alicante (again via Valencia)
View My Stats for My Match Reports Pages
