the Battle of Gravelly Hill, 892AD

[Sean Clark]

Last night, Ade D and myself played a game of Longships using the battle rules. It's the first time Ade had played the battle game and I hadn't played since the days of playtesting way back when. We have played several raid games and so were still familiar with the main rules but the differences in the campaign and in a few other areas slowed us down a little to start with. We soon got into the swing though.

The campaign saw Ade become the attacker but with just a 3 point advantage meaning I only had to risk 6 bases and ended up losing just 3 from my army. He did manage to move a hill from row three meaning the advantage of defending high ground was mitigated somewhat but I still felt confident with my Saxons lead by that rascal Skelegrim the Hound taking a front and centre position amongst my all armoured unit.

It was a good job I was defending, due to the fact my units had to roll a 4,5 or 6 before they could begin contemplating moving as a result of the pre game campaign.

Ade started the game boldly but rashly as I achieved an early success in routing one of his units in the first turn of the game as they streaked out ahead of the rest of the Viking army and were met with brutal force by my right hand most unit defending an area of meadow.



You can see Ade's rash unit in the marshland top right. My unit, to the right of the central hill saw them off with minimum fuss!



A view down the line. The mat is from Deepcut Studios. That's Ade's arm moving his men forward.



You can see Skelagrim the Hound here. waving at the Vikings. I think he's spotted someone he knew.



This is a shot form later on the game. My line is thinning and struggling to hold its position. Interestingly Ade made great use of the Swinehead formation which is great in the first turn of assault.



Ade undoubtedly outplayed me. So when he did this with one of his rolls, I thought I might take up crochet as a hobby instead.



The Saxon line looking even thinner....



My reinforcement dice were very poor and this unit only appeared once the writing was already on the wall. Ade paid for an extra turn to get his men up onto the hill and he ended up with a very solid win (80+ VPs to 29Vps).

We both thoroughly enjoyed the game, even though it was a tad one sided. I'm pretty sure I could have made some better choices but c'est la guerre. I highly recommend giving the battle game a go for a break from raiding. The game played out rather like one of the climactic scenes from one of the Uhtred novels. I like to think Skelegrim was badly wounded but managed to sneak away to fight another day.

To be continued....?

[martin goddard]

Excellent Sean
Do you want the pictures put on the PP website for people to see??

martin

[Sean Clark]

Yes that's fine by me. All Peter Pig figures of course. Although I now can't see the pictures from on device....

[Colonel Kilgore]

I'm not sure anyone can see the pictures...

I get little icons in the top left-hand corner.

Although previous pictures elsewhere on the Forum that I was unable to see have miraculously reappeared.

I'm guessing that Mr Admin may have been busy patching stuff: if so, thanks!

[Administrator]

I'm guessing that Mr Admin may have been busy patching stuff: if so, thanks

Photobucket had a 48hour outage , nothing to do with me. the  photos here are in a Dropbox , so it will depend on the sharing previliges if you can see them .. I can't

[Sean Clark]

Took me a blooming age to do that post too ☹️

[Administrator]

https://www.dropbox.com/help/167

read this on dropbox links. Basically you need to create a link and then copy a link (making sure that the link is public)

What you've done is copy the link that is specific to your account (thus not visible to others). It can be done...

[Colonel Kilgore]

Took me a blooming age to do that post too ☹️

Go on, Sean - you can do it!

You have whetted our appetite with your AAR and now your eager audience awaits...

[Sean Clark]

Done. Taken 2 hours out of my afternoon to sort. I am the definition of a luddite.

[Colonel Kilgore]

But it was worth it 

Lovely game, photos, scenery and figures - many thanks!

So, will you build up the courage to do battle with Photobucket once more, and post a further installment...?

[SimonC]

Urraah!

[martin goddard]

Nice work Sean

could you post it to TMP too??

thanks

[Sean Clark]

Martin,

Done, with a link to here. I couldn't figure out how to get the pictures up on TMP.

[Stewart 46A]

Great pictures Sean, this rule set is getting an outing at the games weekend