Club Night 12-13-22 Lion Rampant 2ed

 Club Night 12/13/22
Lion Rampant 2ed.
The scenario is A Gentle Stroll each had 2 commands of 24 points
(Lego Style figures)

Eastern Medieval style with war-wagons
1 unit of elite Knights 6 points
2 units of war-wagons 6 points each
3 units of heavy cavalry 4 points each
2 units of Bow Cavalry(light cav) 4 points each
1 unit of Elite Foot 6 points
1 unit of Russ Warriors(warriors a.k.a. berserkers) 4 points

Vs

Western Medieval style
4 units of Spears(Heavy Infantry) 4 points each
2 units of Crossbows 4 points each
3 units of Knights(Elite Cavalry) with fearsome 8 points each

The defender is Eastern

We modified the scenario a little.
    The Eastern force could only have one unit from each force on the board and for the first two turns units had to role a 4 or better on one d6 to get on to the table.  This is to represent the idea of pickets standing watch and them sending a runner back to get the rest of the force to come up.
    The Western force could only start with one unit from each force on the table and only half of the rest of the force could come on to the table on the first turn if they activated.  This is to represent the force in march column not expecting resistance.

The Story; The Bishop of Kyiv received a letter from the area of Serbia asking for help because the pagan tribes from the mountains in the north were raiding their villages.  The Bishop declared a crusade to save the good people from the pagans.  A force returning home from the crusade has to pass through a small duchy run by a prince who has recently converted to Catholicism and hates all things Eastern Orthodox.  The prince has decided to make a point and not allow the crusaders to pass.

The Catholic forces decide to put a unit of spears for each force as their pickets.  The Eastern force puts both war-wagons on the board.

On the first turn only about half the units that could get on the board do before an activation failure ended things.  But the war-wagons did advance and this will prove to be critical.
The Catholic side has more spears and crossbows make it on to the table and advance but the powerful knights seem reticent to come to the field of battle.

    The second turn brings all the forces on to the table and both sides begin to move toward the each other.  It is interesting both sides have different approaches.  While the Eastern groups head straight down the road like a juggernaut prepared to blast through the catholic forces with brute force the catholic’s choose to block the road with part of their force and then send most of their knights around the edges of the table in a pincer move.  

Very quickly the war-wagons arrive within firing range of the spear units and begin firing.  Both the of the catholic spear units are in Wall of Spears which increases their armor rating if attacked but it does nothing to help the spear units when shot at.  The spear units take losses but stand their ground.

As the rest of the Eastern force moves forward to drive past the wall of spears two units of crossbows make their way to support the spear units.  It is at this moment that the Eastern knights arrive within wild-charge range and strike one of the spear units head on.  Both the knights and the spears take one figure loss and stand their ground.  This is where Wall-of-Spears makes the difference.  A second wild charge on the next turn would break the spear unit but not before it would drive the knights to half strength.  Now it comes to the crossbows and they make a mess of the knights and with the loss of the knights goes the loss of the leader for one of the Eastern forces.

The war-wagons did their duty and with accurate fire drove another spear unit back and then off the field.  That opened up the fire lanes for the crossbows, who with enemy cavalry breathing down their necks, began opening fire on every thing they could see and just wreaking havoc.

Despite the heavy fire from the crossbows the Eastern cavalry came on strong but at just the right moment a unit of lance wielding catholic knights arrive and wild charge one after another Eastern cavalry unit breaking them all with no loss to the knights.

With most of the Eastern force broken and just the two war-wagons and two units of foot left on the board the Eastern force surrendered to await ransom.