Battle Report - 2-Jan-2013 - Dux Britanniarum

The table layout, before I
populated the wood bases
with trees. 

As if you couldn't have guessed from the previous post, Andy and I managed to squeeze in another game in our campaign on a non-club night. It was another raid, since I don't /quite/ have enough funds to promote Aelfric to Warlord, which would allow me to actually fight a battle, so once more the brave Saxons (without Leofric *snif*) set sail across the Humbre to kick some British butt...

Terrain was deployed randomly, and as the raider I got the honour of dicing for scenario - another attack on a village. Evidently Aelfric thinks they produce good loot. It's always an interesting gamble placing terrain - if I win the rolloff for the big pieces, I tend to place them somewhere pretty central, because terrain and Shieldwall doesn't mix. Equally, sometimes I'll move a piece a fraction of an inch if I get first go at moving pieces purely so my opponent can't then move it again (sorry Andy!).

(As an aside, this is actually a part of the Dux B system I really like - it ensures that you can't set up the terrain knowing what's coming, and what's good for one raid scenario can majorly screw with another - for example, I wouldn't have fancied running away with Andy's cattle on this one!)

The late Leofric's job in Valhalla -
being a force morale token:
how are the mighty fallen!

We rolled for the location of the village (just in the lee of the hill - typical Lincolnshire village!), and the British start point. And then for the Saxon's initial moves (four!) and the number of British groups on the table in turn 1 (just the two). Maybe my luck's changing. Andy prophesied a short battle - but then, he did that last time as well, and look what happened there!

Looking through the woods
to the village, where the
Saxons have just arrived.

With some mostly decent dice rolling, in four moves the Saxons made it to the village, and started looting, all except for Ecgwine and a bunch of warriors, and the missile troops, who picked a spot on the hill to watch for approaching Britons. And sure enough, there they were, including Andy's shiny new 8-man warrior group. They advanced on the village, which was already being looted (or at least, we were trying to - dice not being my friend as usual...)

Turn two, and the legendary Maximus Minimus and a large group of levy appeared, deciding to approach through, rather than round, a small wood. Their dice weren't that great either, doing roughly 4" a move for the first couple of turns.

Much looting ensues.

I had a really nice Fate hand - Carpe Diem and four boar-suited cards - but it quickly dawned on me that it actually wasn't entirely the kind of hand I wanted. Given the hill was rocky ground, Andy would be at a disadvantage trying to move on it in Shieldwall, and furthermore he was, effectively, the attacker in this scenario, and it was in my interests to avoid battle. I ditched one of the two Goad's I held, in the hope of getting an Evade, Disengage, or Step Forth... and got another boar-suited Carpe Diem!

Lavinia's missile troops took a pop at the approaching Britons, taking off a couple of points of shock before the British missile troops returned the favour - time to retreat, as missile fire is the only thing that can do for them, but not before losing one figure. In the meantime, the hearthguard in the church had rolled a 1 and moved out, while two groups were busy hunting in the other two buildings. As the Britons were approaching, Ecgwine's group hopped the wall into the village, while the unit of hearthguard not busy looking moved up onto the hill. I swapped out one of my two Carpe Diem's, first for a Desperare (junk!), and then, lovely, an Evade. Which meant when the British formation of three units charged the lone hearthguard group on the hill, they got to fall back 3d6 instead of being thumped.

Sadly, next turn, the Britons got to activate first (mostly because the hearthguard were out of command range of Aelfric in the village), and I was out of useful cards: two rounds of combat later (quite surprisingly, despite being outnumbered 14:6, I survived the first round) the hearthguard had taken two kills and 8 shock, and fled the field. About this point, I made a looting roll. One to go!

Those lads do know there's two
groups of hairy-arsed Saxons round
the far end of the church, right?

Which was, actually, just fine. Beornwulf and a band of warriors popped round the corner of the church, just as the other group was fleeing, took a round of archery fire and popped back again, forming up with Ecgwine. The archers, being perhaps less wise than their Saxon counterparts, followed.

At this point, Andy was pondering deeply, as both his Lord (Andrusius) and one noble with the big group (Geraint)'s cards came up. He decided to turn his formation of warriors and comanipulares back round to try and catch the looters. Beornwulf's card was the next of any significance....

Cue large formation of screaming and yelling Saxons re-appearing round the end of the church, like a bunch of kids playing "Here We Go Round The Mulberry Bush". The British missile troops took one look and ran for the hills.

Next up, Aelfric. Looting roll time.

SIX!

Result, and definitely time to be off with the ill-gotten gains.

A very interesting game - we had a grand total of two rounds of combat, not counting the archery fire, and neither side suffered enough casualties to matter, so we'll be back again next campaign month. Thanks as ever to my opponent Andy, who I'm sure will be along shortly with his version of events.