Ancestors of the French : A Tournament in Normandy, 2023
Norman vs Komnenan Byzantine
Game 1 Norman vs Communal Italian
Game 2 Norman vs Komnenan Byzantine
Game 5 Norman vs Sicilian Norman
Following a hearty lunch of deeply Normanditian products (lets just say that even the coleslaw had pork in it and leave it at that) game 2 gently ambled into view at the start of a coffee-fuelled afternoon session
This time my opponent was Baillainvillers-based Xavier, with a Komnenan Byzantine army
Komnenans are one of the later Byzantines, relying on mercenary Knights rather than the earlier typical dancing and shooting Heavy cavalry.
This is supported by oodles of light horse, and a tasty block of Varangians which, if they had appeared, would have caused my spearmen to have palpitations more intense than those I had experienced the previous night as a consequence of pork-based meat sweats. Instead this would turn out to be a fairly big knight-led army with only light troops in support
The lists for the Norman and Komnenan Byzantine from this game, as well as all the other lists from the games at Normandy can be seen here in the L'Art de la Guerre Wiki.
This time Guillame's ability to pick the right sort of battlefield had improved considerably, with the Byzantines trying for a gentle hill that ended up nicely in the middle of my deployment zone after the terrain shuffling phase had concluded.
With a coast also secured the layout of the armies ended up with a probability of inconclusive skirmishing on my right, a huge Knight on Knight battle on my left and hopefully the Norman spearmen soaking up some of the Komnenans knights in the centre and in the process tipping the scales on the aforementioned Knight-fest on my right very much in my favour
The first couple of turns immediately developed into a mounted race to gain advantage of the slope of the hill, with my screen of skirmishers delaying the Komnenan mounted contingent sufficiently well that the Normans were pretty confident of shuffling across and forward to do so
Mange Toute! The Byzantines had been caught somewhat off balance by the extreme left leaning French attack, and a couple of very much second-string supporting horse archers soon found themselves pressed into service in the centre of the Byzantine army
In the dead ground between the armies, light horse lobbed javelins and drew their bows to try and make things interesting before their inevitable retreat to safety
Boeuf a la Mode! The indecisive right flank of the Norman army was occupied by the Bretons, who found themselves facing an equally dismissive 2 Light Horse outflanking command of Elite Byzantine horse archer skirmishers.
This would be a contest between quality and volume in the low-impact shooting stakes, but one which the Bretons were sufficiently confident of winning that the allied commander sent one of his guys off to try and hunt down baggage almost immediately
Coquilles St Jacques! The two mighty armies moved inexorably together, everyone starting to drift coastwards as they advanced.
There were gaps in both side's lines, but the weight of Norman Knights was totally leaning to the left, leaving their echeloning infantry to face down fully half of Komnenuses Knight contingent on the other flank
Poulet Roti! What had at one point seemed a solid gold plated plan on the part of the Bretons was rapidly turning to nonsense as the Byzantine Horse Archers pinged shot after accurate shot at the zero-protection embedded Breton General, all the while also finding time to dodge the hail of javelins heading their way in return from the fromage and pear-loving striped sweater wearers on the Norman side.
Tripes a la mode! The Byzantine horse archers seemed not to have read the "shoot then fall back" memo this morning, and suddenly launched themselves into a series of unexpected attacks on the Breton and Norman mounted scouts, who gladly stood to receive while sharpening their javelins in anticipation
Cartoon Normans!
Pont L'Eveque! In a new venture for this website we are now running a Spot The Difference competition in which you can try and work out what if anything has changed between this situation and the near-identical picture only 2 paragraphs above.
L'Art de la Guerre hint - A yellow shield represents 2 hit points lost, and a green one represents just the one. If the Breton General's Medium Cavalryman takes another hit therefore he will be killed outright and removed from play.
Growing increasingly tired of the Byzantines byzantine plotting the Norman nobles urged their steeds forward, lowered their lances and charged home at great pace
This was do or die time for the Byzantine Knights, and also their bow armed cavalry in the centre who had opted to stand their ground rather than let Norman Milites sweep around the flanks of both of the blocks of Knights they were supposed to be linking together
The Breton General bugged out, but only after calling back the light horse unit that he had previously sent away on its own private mission to inflict some terrible flank-related justice on the overly effective Byzantine shooters. Surely this now would put paid to their annoying presence on this outer flank of the battlefield?
What's in my list then?
The Breton ally command is - as you can see - tiny, but has a key role in occupying a lot of space (and distracting as many enemy troops as it can) while keeping the door ajar for a sneaky raid on the enemy baggage as well.
With William soaking up many of the army's command points, and with any Milites needing a decent commander to try and stop them charging off into the sunset at the drop of a croissant, having a small command that can function effectively with only an Ordinary General also buys command space for the other 2 commands to utilise all of the available command points in the army on 2 good generals rather than 3 OK-ish ones.
The Breton command was made up of:
- 1 Medium cavalry Javelin with included ordinary Ally General
- 2 LF Javelin
- 2 Breton Scout Light Horsemen with javelin
The General is included in a seemingly vulnerable Medium Cavalry, which isn't even Elite - partly as I didn't really have the points to upgrade him, but more because this command is not there to actually fight - the theory being if the Breton General needs his bodyguard unit to be Elite then he's doing something wrong to get into that situation in the first place!
The two light horse are self explanatory really, working with the General to bully any set of the traditional 2 enemy LH you find on any flank in any battle.
The 2 Light Foot act partly as filler, boosting the army break point with cheap troops in an otherwise quite expensive set of units, but also give a rough terrain capability that can delay or even hold enemy units in difficult or rough terrain. I felt they might be a bit of a surprise too, as combining LF in a LH+Cv command is quite counter intuitive as it could slow the Cv/LH down - so they could hide in an ambush marker and jump out to cause genuine surprise - and then potentially do something useful too.
The Bretons are almost inevitably going down on a flank, and may well be the first command to deploy as well in most games - although doing so would give away that I intended to skirmish and delay on that flank, so not always!
The Clash of Knights had gone extremely well for the better quality Normans, as they scattered hit markers with abandon across the back of the Komnenan horsemen's line of combat
With Breton scouts having already snuck round the back of the Byzantine cavalry to prevent them escaping the Knightish carnage to come, things already looked exceedingly bleak for the forces of Anna and her Komnenan Guards
It seemed that this flank would soon be claimed for the men of Caen
The fighting continued at close quarters, lances discarded and swords unsheathed.
Telling blows continued to be struck by the aggressive Normans, carving holes in the Byzantine lines which they already had designs upon exploiting
Not even the return of some Byzantine skirmishers clattering into the rear of the Breton Scouts could dampen the Gallic enthusiasm of the Norman Milites as the Byzantine line started to fall apart
Bonnet de Douche! If their Knights were crumbling, the cake of combat being baked up by the Byzantine outriders was being made up of a much stiffer mixture
As metaphors everywhere groaned under near impossible strains, the Prokursores just shrugged, batting away attacks from all sides from supposedly more combat-capable Breton light horsemen, causing the as yet still unrallied Breton leader and his half-baked bodyguard to mutter ever darker Gallic obscenities under their garlic-infused breath
The Byzantine line on the Norman left was falling apart as Milites ran seemingly at will through and over the shellshocked Constantinopalese cavalrymen. The game here was up for Komnenus, and only time stood between these Knights and total erasure
The other wing of the Komnenan Knightly attack formation was seemingly still becalmed, transfixed by the forest of spears being waved in a menacing way in their direction from atop the well-placed hill in the centre of the field of play
Mr Grimsdale! Norman archers rained down arrows onto the milling enemy horsemen, picking away at their already flaky self confidence as if it were the outer layers of a perfectly baked croissant
(Sorry, but having proper French croissants available in the morning when you arrive should IMO be a mandatory part of every wargames event from now on)
Steak et Frites! The enemy right wing and centre were both now thoroughly routed, only a handful of the most tenacious Komnenans hanging on more for pride than anything else at this stage. With the rest of the army having already suffered a trickle of casualties from Norman archery and other low level attacks, the Byzantine army slumped to defeat and Guillame celebrated his first victory of the weekend!
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 Norman Commander
Well well well Mr Grimsdale. This was a battle in which the Norman Wisdom of charging everyone they can see with a load of Impetuous Milites seems to have done very well indeed, in a great example of doing simple things quickly and effectively.
The bottom line here was that the Komnenans didn't have an opportunity to use their advantages as they were constrained both by terrain and my rapid attack. This left some of their second string troops in the front line, which my Knights exploited ruthlessly
Having the bonus of the Bretons appearing in the enemy rear was also a further bonus, which really tipped the balance in Normandy's favour
Perhaps this is the dawn of a new golden age of Norman hegemony over the Eastern Empire ?
Hannibal's Post Match Analysis
Oh, how the conqueror has become complacent! William, thou art but a bloated buffoon, swollen with the pride of thy recent victory.
Thou hast let thy success go to thy head, and hast become blinded to the dangers that still lurk around thee. Thou art a pompous and arrogant fool, who dost believe thyself invincible and impervious to defeat.
But mark my words, for thy hubris shall be thy undoing, and thy overconfidence shall lead thee to ruin. Thou hast forgotten the art of war, and hast become a vainglorious braggart who thinks he can win without effort or strategy.
Thou art a laughingstock among thy enemies, and a disgrace to thy soldiers, who shall surely suffer the consequences of thy foolishness in the next game
Click here for the report of the next game in this competition
That's the end - so why not go back to the Match Reports Index and read some more reports?
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Game 1 Norman vs Communal Italian
Game 2 Norman vs Komnenan Byzantine
Game 5 Norman vs Sicilian Norman
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