Thought on a Mongol Army

[Moggy]

Thought on a Mongol Bow armed Horse Army

8 x cav bow unarmoured (Upgrade 1 to elite, 4 to veteran (2 of which to become armoured) other 3 normal trd)
10 Cav Skirmishers
4 Aux Levy Shield

330 points

Tactics

Most Armies in the current list have little in the way of shooting power. Use this to your benefit.  In all likelyhood you will have less "real" units than your opponent. You need to hit half his army with all of yours. use the skirmish cav to hold the others in place.

Piggy chase should be yours unless up against another cav army.

Use 2 blocks of 4 skirmish cav in flank columns.  Remaining cav skirmishers to go with main blocks.  Flank forces useful for blocking, nipping in and annoying with 8 shooting dice.(2-3 hits 1-2 cas).

Form Cav into 2 blocks of 4. 1 of the armoured vets in each fo a little place to soak a few more hits up.

Use the aux troops to fulfil the central deployment condition up into the outermost of the central blocks.  These are used to block off any flanking movement at a low cost use an advance token on each other these blocks..  Once the 20 has gone by these 4 units can be used to provide rear support. where needed.

Turn 1 only move 1 zone forward but move sideways to get the 2 cav blocks to the side you wish to fight. Your opponent will see this straight away but it will take him time to get his deployed troops across to help. Hopefully after the fight is done. 
N
Normally, if terrain is in row 2 he will move forward. This will allow you to move right up to him and pepper him with arrows. Cav blocks will deliver 18 dice worth of gloom each. this should generate around 6 hits and 2 to 3 cas. If you can get both blocks onto the same zone it can be devastating especially if he has an isolated block of troops. 

Dont forget you may also get a block of skirmish cav shooting at them the same turn for more fun and games.

Chances are the defender will lose 1 unit out of the line the following turn in 1 or 2 blocks. Yep skirmishers may soak some up in which case rinse and repeat during turn 5. It is possible you are down to halfway through the battle countdown by now so look to hit hard on those 2 blocks once they have damage and units knocked backwards.

Pounce when you have the advantage in units then prey to the dice gods. Make use of skirmishers  or better still those aux units with the advance markers to provide rear support Your skirmish blocks are keeping any flank units busy so they should be safe'ish.

By this stage

Terrain

I try to get 1 obstructed terrain down in the defenders corner first. try to move this into his deployment zone to break a wall of close order. I am happy to let the defender have a hill or 2 on his second row. In all likely-hood this is where he will end the battle and all the fighting will take place.


However if you have to face a foot bow army such as Nubians you WILL have a bad day. Just cant match that many foot units with 6 shooting dice each.

[martin goddard]

Good analysis Derek.

We need to fight it out.
Southampton club??
It would be even better if players new to CK tried it out and reported back?


martin

[Moggy]

Think I will see if I can get a couple of the guys to play a guided game for fresh eyes and opinions. Depends if they are interested though. Will let you know.

There are a lot of peeps on here that we haven't heard from regarding having a go as well. Would be nice to hear fresh views from the people familiar with the PP family of rules.

Derek