To the strongest game 3

Having played 2 games of to the strongest and enjoying the simple mechanics a third game was to be played. As with the other 2 games I was given the troops and just had to get on with it. The two armies in question were Ptolemaic Egyptians and the Classical Indians. I do not believe the two armies ever fought each other so I am not aware of any historical precedence. But just looking at the army lists it is EASY to predict the result.

I was given the Indians. Facing off against Dave. With Relfie on my right and Kev diagonally opposite.  Dave and Kev the Ptolemaics and me and Relfie the Indians. before any of this starts sounding wingng I will say I did enjoy the game but understood and vocalised the result LONG before it happened. Anyone with any knowledge of ancients has probably already worked it out.  Both sides had a lot of units and both sides had limited space and I could have deployed far better than I did so some of it is my fault. And I put my hands up to that. If I had been a real life general I would have chosen a better place to fight the battle which allowed for manoeuvre which was about the only advantage we had. Still sometimes you have to fight in areas not of your own choosing.  So fair play.

All the dice in pictures represent remaining missile weapons that unit has.

I did manage to score the first success and killed some Ptolemaic skirmishers so the game was of to a good start. Now the classical Indians had some raw quality longbow archers and a good amount of ammo.  However neither Relfie nor myself were able to cause any lasting damage on the pike armed phalanxes as they closed the distance. All that happened instead was that we ran out of ammo and while we did disrupt them they were able to re order their ranks and move forward without much difficulty.

My cavalry on the left were able to stop Dave moving down my flank and went into position on turn 2 of the game and stayed there as I tried to move elephants to support but due to them being hemmed in and poor card draws were not able to support them. Just as well they did not need my support. While they did fail to kill anything else in the game they did stop Dave from advancing. And were my most valuable troops despite the points indicating otherwise. I did manage to get some heavy chariots close to that flank but they were unable to assist because of the terrain and location of enemy troops.

Relfie on my right had also run out of arrows and replacing them was a struggle. The right flank did seem to see-saw a few times, mostly sawing on the Indians But Relfie was doing OK. Dave and myself were not quite in a stale mate position as Dave did manage to kill all my skirmishers and seize my only bit of defensible terrain.

But despite trying to win the raw Indians with only 2 wounds wer in the end just no match for the Ptolemaic's in pike blocks with better saves and 3 wounds. So eventually the inevitable happened and the Indians lost.

Congrats to Dave and Kev on their win and commiserations to me and Relfie but at least we delayed the inevitable for as long as possible.

Final result was 6VP (Victory points) to me and Relfie and 16 VP to Kev and Dave. Kev to his credit did offer to swap side with me when I stated a the beginning that the forces were not balanced which was nice of him, but what was the point, it would still have been an Indian Loss and a Ptolemaic win!

If we had room to manoeuvre we might have been able to attack the pike blocks in the side (Relfie did manage it once against the same unit twice but the cards did not favour him. ) But in front of me was just a solid mass of pikes and unarmoured bowmen would have trouble killing them in any set of rules when they are out of ammo.

I do not blame the rules or the army lists but perhaps we did have far to many troops in far to smaller area so (Not our choice although we could have deployed better). My first time in using that army and not an army I would choose to use again. The army match up was just not good and you could see from the start how the game would end. I am sure some players would have done better. But we did what we could with what we had and took a long time in dying. I am sure some players who know the armies better would have faired so much better and may even win. But that on the day did not happen.

Thanks for reading all the best Clint

To the strongest!

yesterday at the club I had my first game of "To the strongest". Dave set the game up and with Kev controlled the Hittites. While Ian and myself had the New Kingdom Egyptians (NKE). These are all Dave's Figures, rules, Terrain, Maps well everything.  Dice represent the missiles the unit have before they run out and need to get supplied again.  The little white skulls represent there is a hero in the unit. While the red hearts tell you the unit is close to breaking, or has suffered a hit and another will kill it.
WE played 2 games in all and the pictures are taken on Dave's phone as I forgot the camera and he was nice enough to do it.

The rules worked very well indeed.  In the first game I was of course daunted by facing heavy chariots with only 1 unit of heavy infantry several units of light infantry and some light chariots. But with some luck I did manage to destroy half the heavy chariots of the Hittites and slip a light chariot unit behind the Hittite lines where it sacked the Hittites baggage trains and generally made a nuisance of itself. It was hard fought everywhere else and I did have some light chariots chased from the board never to be seen again (yeah OK they did turn up in the next battle). generally speaking it was hard fought by all four of us but due to the baggage train being sacked the Hittites lost faith in the battle and the NKE won.

The second battle was somewhat different. Firstly let me state that I failed to kill anything at all. Dave did out play me I cannot say otherwise. Kev also out played Ian and I had a Hittitte light chariot in the rear (Make up any rude joke you like) and my Baggage was sacked. Ian on my left had completely crumbled as Kev had learnt how to use his chariots and Ian unfortunately had not adapted quite as well. But a loss is a loss and it would be ceorlish to blame anyone else for such a thing.  So I take full responsibility!

So where do we go from here? That is the question! I did very much like the rules, they were easy to play uncomplicated and yet at the same time versatile. The army size is very nice (bigger than DBA of course but not so large as to make them unruly and difficult to transport.

So the consequence is that I think I will get an army. Ahhh but which one. I do have a choice of opponents. Big Lee has some 6mm Romans and Carthaginians ready for these rules. Dave has 2 Biblical armies. I think Another club member has some NKE as well so I would seek something else. My pet love is Italian renaissance, but that would mean getting 2 armies as I do not think anyone else in the club has them, also the rules are just on the edge of that as a timeline so perhaps not. Unless I was to do them in 10mm or smaller. (Just for cost/storage/transportation purposes).

I have had a "Seapeople" army before and they were fun and very hard hitting and I do have some Minoan/Mycenaean figures sitting in the lead pile. So that would be another option and would be a better army for my character than the NKE. And knowing Dave he would want to use the Hittites again and again.

So if you know the Biblical period and know a good army drop me a comment.

All the best Cheers Clint

Finally, just for Sander. here are some Bare Naked ladies!