Murabits in Milan

I was a member of the Wild Geese team – we picked that title because it's the
nickname applied to Jacobite Irish soldiers who left Ireland in the 1690s after
their defeat to fight on the continent.
Coincidentally, there's an Irish whiskey of that name and at Richard's
suggestion we brought miniature bottles to present to our opponents. I hope they
enjoyed them. I was in the book 4 period. I was going to bring Tudors but
figured most opponents would have thought of counters to Bw(S) so looked for
alternatives. When I use Tudors I don't like facing big, mobile opponents that
can swamp me so on that basis I went with Islamic Berbers using figures kindly
lent to me by Jan.

My list was Murabit, 1146AD:
Lamtuna command: 1xIrr LH(O) C-in-C, 4xIrr LH(O), 12xReg Sp(O), 8xReg Ps(O),
2xIrr Ps(S), 2xIrr Ax(I) – 28 ME
Gudala command: 1xIrr LH(O) S-Gen, 4xIrr LH(O), 12xReg Sp(I), 12xReg Ps(O) – 28
ME
Sanhaja command: 1xIrr Cv(O) S-Gen, 11xIrr LH(O), 4xIrr Ax(I), 5xIrr Ps(S),
1xIrr Ps(O),4xReg Ps(O) – 24 ME
Spanish command: 1xIrr Kn(F) S-Gen, 3xIrr Kn(F),2xIrr LH(O) – 12 ME
Baggage command: 1xIrr Ax(I), 6xIrr Bge(O)
Stratagems: Delaying Battle, Ambush

With a high element count and plenty of regular Ps the basic plan was to use the
Sp to pin opponents/act as a target while the light troops worked the flanks and
any terrain to get behind opponents 'lines. Delaying Battle was useful for flank
marching against linear opponents but against small, high quality outfits I'd
keep everything on-table. Ambush would be useful to put the Spaniards where
their impetuosity wouldn't be a problem. In colonial warfare against the French
the Berbers were adept ambushers so it seemed appropriate to use the stratagem
in any case.

Game 1 V Paolo Paglianti (Catalan Company)

Hmm….One of the few armies in the pool with plentiful, and very good, terrain
troops and led by a very strong player. I defended. The battlefield was rather
cluttered and effectively cut in half by DGo – a dune in my central deployment
area and then two wooded hills stretching across the middle of the table into
the Catalan deployment area. There were difficult hills on the flanks and Paulo
put down a small rough hill in my left centre.

Paulo deployed first and it was muddy with a risk of rain (which fell during the
battle so we had mud for most of it). He deployed entirely on the left hand side
of the table from my point of view. He had a right wing of 12 Turkish LH(S) and
lots of Catalan Ax(S), a left wing of more Ax(S) deployed partially on the
wooded hill and a reserve of a few Kn(O) and Cv(O) with Turkish Ps and other
foot.
My deployment map had the Lamtuna on the left, Gudala in the centre and Sanhaja
on the right with the Spaniards delayed. If I deployed directly opposite him I
was worried the Turks, moving first, would get around my line before I could
deploy out so instead I decided to fight across the width of the table, ceding
the rough hill to Paulo. The basic idea was to cover the hill with the Lamtuna
Sp whilst the Lamtuna Ps, backed by the Sanhaja LH, would hold off the Turks.
Meanwhile the Gudala Sp would cover the gap between the Lamtuna and the wooded
hills backed by the Spaniards when they arrived. The Gudala and Sanhaja Ps would
meanwhile attack through the centre via the wooded hills.

In hindsight it was a complicated enough plan and really not within the
capabilities of an irregular command structure. Also, my army is quite big and
the space available was quite small so when the Spaniards arrived in bound 1 I
ended up with a traffic jam and never quite got the PIPs to clear it. It would
have been a good idea to deploy the Lamtuna's Ax(I) wide as march-blockers,
which was the reason I brought them, after all, but instead I kept them with the
rest of the command. The Lamtuna didn't roll higher than 2 for PIPs until Paulo,
who attacked really aggressively, had actually made contact so ended up only
partially deployed. Paulo's LH(S) slaughtered the supporting Ps before the
Sanhaja LH could intervene in support; although they managed to kill some Turks
their own losses were heavy and soon both the Lamtuna and Sanhaja commands were
disheartened.

The Spaniards now completed a suicidal performance by rolling 1 so
single-handedly took on the rest of the Catalan army on a frontage of 2
elements. In mud. The resulting combat was brief and they broke; my army was so
congested that everyone else was in range so took the -1 hit, which was enough
to break the Sanhaja which in turn broke the Lamtuna and the army. I had just
failed to kill 10% of Paulo's army so it was 0-25, a fair reflection of our
relative performance.

Game 2 V Herbert Wong (Low Countries)

Herbert, from Hong Kong, was accompanied by his charming wife – he was playing
during his honeymoon. He defended and got a formidable defensive position. His
left rested on a narrow river that ran from his baseline to mine about a third
of the way in from my right. His right rested on a large wood and a gentle ridge
ran from the wood to the river. Beyond the river on his left was a BUA. I had
two woods on my side, one on the left and one on the right.

Herbert's front line consisted of a single massive command of (I think) 40 Pk, 6
Art(I) and 6 Bd(S) plus a few Ps. The Ps were in the wood whilst the Pk occupied
the ridge, files of Pk intermixed with Bd-backed Art. He had two smaller reserve
commands behind each wing. On his right was 3 Bd(S) and some Hd(F) and Ps in the
wood, whilst on his left there were about 8 Pk, 4 Bw and some Bd(X).

I put the Sanhaja on the left, the Lamtuna in the centre and the Gudala on the
right, their Sp to the left of the river and the light troops on the right. The
Spaniards were in the wood on my right as they were essentially useless. A
frontal assault was out of the question but the wood on Herbert's right offered
me a path into his rear. However I didn't want him to realise that too early as
it would be pretty easy to move reserves to close off the exit. I therefore
advanced the Lamtuna Sp towards the hill, sending the Ax(I) ahead to hamper
marching. The Lamtuna Ps advanced through the wood on my left. The Gudala Sp
crossed their river and marched wide on the right while the Sanhaja did the same
on the left.

Herbert took the bait and wheeled to his right off the hill to engage the
Lamtuna Sp. I left the Ax to delay him and pulled the Sp back (Herbert didn't
realise that a regular group could make a 180 degree turn). His advance was
covered by his left wing micro command which lined the riverbank but didn't have
the width to cover all of it even with the Pk only two deep so he had to
reinforce them with a couple of files of Pk from his main command.

The Sanhaja and Lamtuna Ps meanwhile cleared the wood on Herbert's right and he
formed a thin line of single-ranked Pk and remounted his Bd(S) as Kn(I) to bar
the exit. I brought the Sanhaja LH through the wood and these attacked along his
baseline, killing a Kn to break his micro command and also sacking his baggage.
The Ps kept his Pk busy and killed a few to create gaps whilst more LH went
hunting his main command's general, alone on the hill trying to control his
large command. To keep the pressure on I launched an attack on the riverbank
with the Gudala but it was a rash decision and I suffered heavy losses though
luckily not enough to cost me any VPs. Time was called at that point so it was
14-11 to me.

Game 3 V Marco Cioffi (Post-Mongol Samurai)

I invaded again. Most terrain fell on the flanks, close to the edge. There were
two big woods on the right edge from my perspective whilst on the left there was
a BUA on the centre line, a wood on my side and a difficult hill on Marco's
side. As the Samurai were irregular and I didn't want to face Bd with Sp I
flank-marched the Gudala on the right and the Sanhaja on the left and put the
Spaniards in ambush in the wood on my left so only the Lamtuna would be visible.
The delayed start stratagem meant the battle started at noon.

Marco deployed in line had a right wing (C-in-C) of 8 Bw(S) Samurai, a block of
Ashigaru Pk(F) and about 10 or so Ikko-Ikki Hd(S). His centre had Bd(O) Samurai,
more Pk(F) and Hd(S) whilst his left had Bd(O) Samurai, yet more Hd(S) and 6 or
so Cv/Ax DBEs. I put my camp behind the wood on my right which was occupied by
the Lamtuna Ps. The Sp were in the open pointing to the right and the Ax and LH
faced to the front. Marco advanced most of his army, turning Hd to face the
flanks and delay my marchers. These arrived early, coming on-table in turns 3
(Gudala) and 4 (Sanhaja).

The Gudala uncovered yet more Hd in ambush in the wood, whom Marco allowed to
move spontaneously forward against the Lamtuna Ps; his centre's Hd also went
sponno to attack the Gudala Sp who hit them before they could line up. They were
eventually all cut down, but they bought enough time for Marco to get his
centre's Bd into line to face off the victorious Gudala.

On my right, having eliminated the march-blocking Ax(I) Marco wheeled his Cv
inward to hit the Lamtuna LH, who had run out of retreating room and were close
to my baseline. Despite being 4-1 or 4-2 down these heroes held Marco's Cv up
for 3 or 4 bounds. Meanwhile in the wood my Ps had mixed fortunes against the
Ikko-Ikki, losing on the outer wing but, crucially, winning on their left which
meant they could help my Sp in their fight against the Samurai Bd who had formed
a column to allow the Cv room to fight. I hit this frontally with Sp and from
the flank with Ps to dishearten the Samurai though I was disheartened myself by
the eventual loss of the LH and the Cv killed a Sp element to break the Lamtuna.

On my left I was getting worried as the Bw(S) approached the Spaniards' wood but
was relieved when Marco turned them about in column to counter the Sanhaja flank
march. I came out of the wood next bound to attack him in rear. He turned
elements to delay me but initially his shooting was ineffective and I killed 4
Bw. However he then found the range and killed 2 Kn to dishearten the Spaniards,
then a LH element to break them. However the Spanish general continued to fight
effectively and rode down another 2 Bw to dishearten. The Sanhaja meanwhile had
been chewing up the Ikko-Ikki and Marco's right became disheartened. The Spanish
general administered the coup de grace when he hit a Hd element from behind to
break the Samurai C-in-C's command. The Pk(F) from that command were _just_
close enough to the Japanese left for it to pick up the 2ME penalty which broke
it, and thus Marco's army. I had lost over 40% of my army so it was 17-8 to me.
A cracker of a game fought in the four corners of the table and it could very
easily have gone the other way.

Game 4 V Massimo Vecchia (Mongol Conquest)

Nothing much to see here, I'm afraid. I defended and got a terrain fortress
whilst Massimo's side was completely open. I had Ps-supported Sp between two
wooded hills which swarmed with more Ps; my rear was protected against
flank-marchers by a difficult hill infested with yet more Ps. Massimo had 3
LH(S) commands and one of Cv(S). He had feigned flight, but against a
well-ordered line of regulars infantry it was likely to be ineffective and we
agreed a 13-12 to him, then played it as a friendly with me emerging from the
terrain to take him on in the open. Predictably, I was massacred but it was an
enjoyable experience as Massimo has a great sense of humour.

So that left me on 43, slightly less than average which reflected our team
performance. Still, it was a most enjoyable weekend and I'd like to thank all my
opponents, not least for their excellent English.

Cheers
Mick