With only two weeks to the Godendag slugfest, the denizens of Firestorm Games come together to introduce Wargames grandfather Mike ‘ the Brief’ Lane to L’art de la Guerre. With bow armed cavalry being the Cardiff troop type of choice it was time to see if we understood how to use them……Judge for yourself!
Younger gamers look away. Mike has collected this lot over many years. He tells us that many haven’t seen daylight for ten years. It’s to be hoped that L’art de la Guerre continues to rescue such collections from the darkness of the spareroom. We were playing a classic game of Patrician Rome against the remnants of Attila’s hordes.
James and I ‘commanded’ the Huns. Two commands of eight light horse superior should keep up the arrow storm on both flanks. A command of Heruks gave us some solid combat troops. Our reserve would include three elite heavy Hun cavalry.
The glory days of the Legions are over. Mike had an infantry centre of medium swordsmen auxilia. Would they stand up to battle in the open? They should hold up against the Hun light horse but the heavies?
Mike Lane positioned an ally Alan command on his right. I was confident that my wing could beat the old Patrician Michael to the hill on the flank? After consultation with Mr X, the Romans and Alans were to ignore the flanking massif.
In classic nomadic horse archer style I thought to envelope the Alans. However, my ally had other ideas!
Being outnumbered by the Roman horse archers ( fielded as cavalry), James decided that the best course of action would be to enter into a close range archery duel. Similarly, the fading Empire called in six units of Visigoths from Southern France. James had four units of Herul heavy cavalry. The only option of course was to send our Heruls to seek glory against the effette proto-Frenchmen.
In glorious synchronicity, Heruls fell from their horses as Huns slumped in their saddles. Our only hope lay in stalling the advance of the Roman infantry in the centre. Could our heavy archers roll up the Alans!?
The light cavalry nearly broke the Roman centre. The archery from our Huns nearly broke the Alans. Mike Lane tried the “drop the six on the model tree” trick, followed by the “slide the dice over the back of your hand sideswipe”. Is anything beneath this old veteran? But wait a minute, who is this by our camp?
It was time to call a draw ( before we lost!). The Hun general made an ignominious retreat.
Lessons learnt? With a missile strong army you need to attack! We also remembered that light horse don’t have a zone of control so protecting flanks is problematic. Should I rebase all my Huns as cavalry in the remaining two weeks? Please send in your advice…………Thanks for reading and a big thanks to Mike Lane for the visit!😭
Despertaferres 
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