The Worlds in Charleroi 2016
Italian Condotta - Florence vs Han Chinese
Game 1 Italian Condotta - Florence vs Condotta Italian
Game 2 Italian Condotta - Florence vs Medieval Scots
Game 3 Italian Condotta - Florence vs Han Chinese
Game 4 Italian Condotta - Florence vs Late Roman
Game 5 Italian Condotta - Florence vs Seleukid
Game 6 Italian Condotta - Florence vs Italian Condotta - Venice
With two losses, a ham sandwich for lunch and the purchase of a The Worlds t-shirt on the basis that the one I had started the day with was now unwearable due to the combination of heat and sweat, the prospect of fishing in the bottom of the pool in the third round of a 2-defeats Swiss draw gave me some hope of redemption. My potential for joy was also greatly enhanced by the equally dismal performances of the rest of Team Central London, where we had barely a win between the 5 of us to scrape together after an aggregate 10-game first part of the first day!
The opponent who greeted me, clambering out of the primordial mud at the bottom of the pool was a brightly painted Han Chinese army. The lists for the Italian Condotta - Florence and Han Chinese from this game, as well as all the other lists from the games at Charleroi can be seen here in the L'Art de la Guerre Wiki.
The Chinese armies in ADLG are known for their halberdiers - highly effective in theory against Pikes and Spears - and in the early period also for their Knight-like Heavy Chariots, which can be of high quality as well. This combination of good stuff can make for expensive and small armies, and so I was expecting something akin to my own army to face me across the table.
The board had a really useful hill in the forward part of my deployment zone, and, trying to be clever and also mindful of the mass of rough terrain over on the far left I deployed my Knights behind the hill, expecting them to be able to face off against enemy halber-armed infantry. My whole deployment was skewed to the right, seeking to unbalance and wrongfoot my opponent with the Free Company on the far right and the shooting command on the left. The Chinese, as with the Scots, had not really conformed to my plan and had fast moving Swordsmen - an anathema to my Bowmen - on their right, and had their chariot force seeking to repeat the feats of the French Knights on their left.
This was looking tricky - but it soon became trickier still as Hawksmoor, clearly still smarting from the blame heaped on him for not winning the previous game, decided to become Unreliable in the first dice roll of the game.
L'Art de la Guerre hint - unreliable generals can't move until they next roll a 6 or if enemy come within 4MU of them. All allies are unreliable, but you can choose to have unreliable sub generals too, as they are cheaper.
With one third - the dangerous third - of my army becalmed and with the bow command facing its nemesis in the form of fast moving Elite infantry, the battle plan was already in utter tatters. Rather than just give up however, memories of redeployments in Saumur scratched their way into my consciousness and I sought to drag the endangered and over-extended left flank of my army back into a position of relative safety in a highly pip-intensive fashion as my opponent simply swept forward in a neat long line
The Knights were also not now keen on advancing across the table with an entirely unprotected right flank as Hawksmoor looked on, and they too went into reverse gear, balancing the possibility of staying uphill with the need not to allow Chinese Chariots to have a free hack at their right side.
Han China at War
Pulling the left flank in was rather tricky, with the unmaneuverable Pikemen holding things up as the multiple units shuffled around like Lego bricks bobbing in a bucket of dirty water. The Chinese were sweeping round in a wide arc, with LH outriders threatening the handful of Italian skirmishers who were there buying time with their Euros as the main body of their command fled like cowards back towards the camp.
What's Going on Here Then?
With the Free Company currently uncommitted my army is falling back as fast as it can, seeing if it can lure the Chinese close enough to the Free Company to trigger them to join the fray. The Chinese however have set up with their main attack on the opposite flank to the Free Company men, and so can swing round in a wide arc onto the Florentine left and centre without getting too close to the Free Company command. With fast moving Chinese medium foot beating down on them, the slower-moving Florentine infantry on the left will have problems getting away, and the presence of a well positioned hill in the middle of the Florentine line is also now a conundrum that needs to be solved - retreat too far and it becomes an advantage for the Chinese who could find themselves attacking downhill into the Florentine deplyment area.
The Chinese had drawn a 38th Parallel on the table, and slammed on the brakes of their Chariotry just short of the point at which they would activate the Free Company, who resolutely continued to fail to roll a 6 - even with the CinC lending them his not entirely spare pips.
Pictures of Chinese Infantry in 15mm from my Ancients Photo Directory
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Some sort of a defensive perimeter was being established, stiffened by a lone Knight despatched to strike fear into the enemy medium Foot Swordsmen. But, with LH already eyeing the Florentine baggage there was a lot of table to cover and no real quality in the Italian command with which to anchor the L-shaped defensive line at the point at which the Chinese forces would surely hit it.
With the Chinese Heavy and Medium foot closing in faster than it was practicable for the Florentine foot to retreat, the Italians had little choice but to try and make a stand where they were. Leading with Inferior Spear Pavisers against Elite Halberdiers was about as bad as it got, but they had nowhere to run to and not enough pips to do it even if they had. The battle would be fought here....
China at War
Hawksmoor continued to procrastinate...
The Free Company
The game was about buying time for Hawksmoor to change his mind and commit, and buying time for the rest of the army to reorganise. Italian Knights combined with close-order halberdiers to draw a line in the sand and try and stop the onrushing Swordsmen and battle was joined. This could be a dagger punched into the heart of the Chinese army, bursting their bubble of confidence...
Nope... the Halberdiers were wiped out at a stroke, leaving the Knight double overlapped and now rather unlikely to magically win the game on his own....
Elite enemy foot were now all over the Inferior Spearmen of the bow command, and the baggage looked largely indefensible too. With the Chinese Chariots turning and withdrawing, even if Hawksmoor committed right now he would be too late to do anything at all, isolated and cut out of the battle. Defeat was calling, and the only sensible option now was to see how many points I could rack up in going down. The Knights charged down the hill into the wall of Halberdiers and even the Pavisers committed to combat to support the remaining Knight....
What's Going on Here Then?
The Chinese right hook has smashed into the retreating Florentines and the speed of their Medium Foot's advance has meant the Florentines have been forced into a rearguard action they really would have preferred not to have fought right here right now. It is also now becoming clear that there are not enough Florentine troops in my army to cover the distance between the current front line and the back of the table, and so the baggage is also at serious risk from maraudering Chinese LH. Even if the Free Company were to decide to join the battle they are badly out of position to do anything of note, as the entire Chinese force has drifted to its right in order to smash into the weakest point of my Florentine army and so is well clear of the Free Company men's most likely line or advance.
The Knights were good.... in places. Knocking 3 hits out of a Halberdier at impact was great, but doing 1 hit each on all three might have been better...
On the left the innumerable Chinese infantry were swarming all over the hapless Florentines, putting in a flank charge that put paid to any hope on the part of the Knight that he could be a hero today..
The Knights were steadily being destroyed by the inexorable chop chop chop of the Chinese halberdiers whilst the rest of what could only laughingly be called a "front line" was now made up of 2 Inferior Spearmen Pavisers, both overlapped and facing immanent flank attack to boot. Light Horse were fully in my rear and the baggage camp was lying almost totally unprotected. The game was so over that Hawksmoor and his men were now more likely to pack themselves up and get back in the storage box than join in and have any role in the outcome.
What's Going on Here Then?
The game is already lost, and so now the possibility of the Free Company rejoining the fray is irrelevant as the Florentine army will be broken with or without their participation. My only strategy from here is to cause as many casulaties to the Chinese army as possible before slumping to defeat, and the only realistic chance of doing so lies with the Florentine Knights, who commit themselves quickly to maximise the number of turns of combat before the rest of the army is overwhelmed. With that same aim in mind, buying time for the Knights to scrape a few points to make the defeated score as respectable as possible, a frantic rearguard action to save the baggage is being mounted by some of the fw remaining elements of the Florentine army - losing the baggage would cause 4 more break points to be added to the alread impressive total scored by the Chinese, finishing the game even sooner.
Finally, a small success - the Knights engineered a breakthrough only moments before one of their number is charged in the flank...but even in this moment of abject triumph the victorious knight is already carrying 2 hits....
The Chinese have at least been mildly delayed by the eating of the Paviser units, giving time for the Pikemen and longbows to almost get close enough to each other to pretend they are a second line of defence rather than a second line of easy VPs for the Chinese to collect as if they were a new form of medieval Pokemon.
The last knight was in play....with no other troops and no hope of surviving the game with an unbroken army the Florentine CinC committed himself to combat.
What's Going on Here Then?
The Knights have done some damage, but it is merely a sticking plaster to salve the pain of defeat as the game is well and truly lost. The biggest challenge currently facing the Chinese army is finding the last few elements of the Florentine army to despatch - and if they can do so without triggering the reliability of the Free Company they will have won in handsome style
And was promptly removed.
Another small moral victory for Italy, as the Longbowmen drive the Chinese LH away from the Florentine Camp. The forces of China will have to win this game by killing soldiers, not by looting their washbags.
Longbow Shooting
And the prime candidate for that victory is on hand - the Inferior Pikemen have avoided combat as long as humanly possible but time catches up with them and they are quickly overwhelmed by the onrush of swordsmen.
The battle ends with just 3 units out of my two committed commands alive and left on table, and Hawksmoor and his men in splendid isolation, uncommitted to the very end, off in the distance.
The Result is a spectacular defeat.
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 Italian Condotta - Florence Commander
Well, that was thankfully brief, but still brutally painful. Playing with only 2 commands has made me realise yet again how important it is to have more men than the enemy, but here the enemy had more men than me, and of better quality. I fear that unless I up the salaries of Hawksmoor and his mercenaries that I may not be able to persuade them to take up arms in my service again this weekend - yet clearly I need them as without their steadfast force of arms this army, even to me, seems dangerously thin and ill equipped for the rigors of battle
In truth I was so outmatched here without 1/3 of my men that it seems difficult to draw any conclusion other than to marvel at the uniforms and banners of the opposing forces and admire their painting. Next time I am sure also that Hawksmoor will not be so reticent, as I will force him to deploy in a position where he cannot avoid a fight.
If there is one or two small crumbs of comfort for me to take from this defeat they are that on occasion I did prove that Knights are a very potent answer to even the most well trained of halberdiers, and also that my newly painted baggage tent, from Donnington's New Era range does actually look quite spiffy in photos as well.
When you are looking for takeaways, thes ones I found here were admittedly more e Shack Poulet Grille du Kansas (avec Nouvelle Peri Peri!) on the Charleroi ring road rather than the historic first site in which the Colonels own secret blend of herbs and spices were deployed to such great effect, but in such a disaster one must take anything that is offered no matter if it is difficult to identify which part of the bird has been minced and reconstituted to create it.
Hannibal's Post Match Analysis
Aaah, this weekend in Charleroi is doing the same for your own self assessment of your competence as the decline in the Belgian steel industry has clearly done for the profession of contemporary architecture. Whether I look on the tabletop of around the town I see the same grim vista's of desolation and despair, enlivened only by the slow emergence of green shoots of hope. In the town they are literal green shoots, but here on the gaming surface the only green is seen in the faces of your men as the retch at the thought of having to carry out your incoherent and imbecilic orders
This game you committed almost too many errors to count. A heavy foot command led by an allied General has no place other than in the thick of the fighting, in the middle of the table and for you to gift your opponent an easy win by beating the lesser 2/3 of your forces was as obvious as it was inexcusable. You also had your list design exposed cruelly, and the inability to recognise that every general has at least 2 pips to spend per turn (his own, and those of his dice) and thus can always have a decent fist of commanding both foot and mounted components yet again condemned your lopsided command structure to the impossibility of putting one group of knights in 2 places at onc
Such a stunning catalogue of despair was set to drag you down before you started, but your only flash of genius here was to find the ability to add to this not inconsiderable competence deficit a few flourishes of your own in the course of the battle. The Han flirted with coming close to your uncommitted command, but you then chose that exact moment to push forwards and spare them the decision - surely the only course of action here was to turn all of your force about (as a series of groups) and retreat at full speed ? This dithering and half-hearted penny packeting of sideways retreat did only your opponent favours of the greatest kind.
I see that many learnings are being splayed before your ungrateful readership in this competition - I only hope that you too manage to read them at least once before we head into the next game
Click here for the report of the next game in this competition
You can also comment, "like" or give feedback on these reports on either the Madaxeman.com Facebook Page or the Madaxeman.com Blogger Site.
Game 1 Italian Condotta - Florence vs Condotta Italian
Game 2 Italian Condotta - Florence vs Medieval Scots
Game 3 Italian Condotta - Florence vs Han Chinese
Game 4 Italian Condotta - Florence vs Late Roman
Game 5 Italian Condotta - Florence vs Seleukid
Game 6 Italian Condotta - Florence vs Italian Condotta - Venice
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