Turin tournament was the second round in the italian dbmm champ. Just

second period and second book armies were allowed. The news was that

draft lists replaced old ones.

I decided to use African Vandals for a variety of reasons, mainly for

I'm still testing to see how effective IKnF are, and also for I

wanted an army able to deliver a mighty blow and force a decision in

few rounds.

African Vandals in DBM was crap. Now KnF are slightly better imo and

benefit from the huge boost of Genseric, one of the very few

barbarian brilliant leaders.

I tried to think a way to improve the army performance, and after

some testing I came out with this list:

C1 Brilliant CiC, 11IKnF, 6ILhS, 2IBgI- 36

C2 SubGIKnF, 8IKnF, 2IBgI - 24

C3 SubGIKnF, 4IKnF - 12

C4 AllMoorICvO, 7ILhO, 6IPsS, 2IBgI - 18

Stratagems: Feigned Flight and Flank Attack

The main plan was to deploy terrain to have a flank suitable to a

mounted attack. There the CiC would have charged with C2 marching,

while the Moors delayed the center. The idea was to use speed to put

myself in a tactical advantage and exploit it immediately.

C4 task was to be delayed to feint a second flank march and

psicologically hinder the opponent, or attack his open enveloping

wing once this was to be made against the moors. The inability of the

moors (apart the commander) to prevent a quick march to me was

wanted, to have 2 side effect: first lower the reg dice in the enemy

corps I would target, tempting him to assign the higher pip to the

envelop manouver and second due to the fact delayed corps enter quite

soon on the table, so to have the enemy as forward as possible and in

position to well hit him.

FF was mainly a tactic to avoid retaliation once i charged, for IKnF

engaged in combat could flee and turn before enemy mounted pursuit.

Against infantry this tactic worked extremely well and let me destroy

in test games several deep enemy formations. The activation through a

brilliant stroke gave me enough flexibility.

Given the corps balance I just had to be careful to not engage alone

the CiC for its demise would almost mean army break.

IKnF had to fight deep, with a reserve to fill in casualties, while

generals were to stay behind to avoid Ammatas and many more vandal

leaders fate.

I had a couple of more plan, but this was the main army doctrine.

This the theory. Now the practice:

Round 1 vs Picarelli using Warring states chinese.

Terrain was very open, except for a very big gentle hill on my centre

left. I attacked and chinese deployed well back and very deep, with

some PkF blocks in line 3 deep, 2 KnO and a CvO column as reserves.

I made an overambitious plan (Gelimer stepped in to Genseric :)))

keeping just the CiC on the table, on the hill, flank marching 2 big

corps and delaying the small one.

It was a big mistake, for the chinese had a brilliant general, and

being all regulars manouvered at will.

They started to surround me fighting 3 corps on one.

My marches entered too late (round 6 and 8) so basically I used half

the army. The small corps was sacrified once entered (round 3) to

slow his more mobile wings, and died shamefully against a lesser

number of ILhF. I saved the army for Genseric lead three consecutive

charges versus the enemy army followed by feigned flight. Chinese

even overwhelming me in numbers feared my counterchage if disordered,

so didn't follow. The very late march entering had anyway the effect

to divert some pips from the chinese, that could not deliver the coup

de grace once I made the fourth charge getting stuck on pikes.

10-15, and I could have deserved to lose it.

Round 2 vs Paulatto with Gepids

I attacked again, and the Gepids were able to put a terrain well

suited to their tactic. There was a rough on the left, a big valley

and a wood on the right. Gepid army had a wbs corps and 2 IKnF corps,

each of 33EE, with a huge number of Pso.

They deployed the wb on the left, then 2 KnF corps. Both flanks were

protected by massed psO sheltering in the terrain.

I skirmished the wb with the moor, and attacked head on his Kn with

mine. As advance guard, my alans charged the KnF mass, killing some,

losing some, but basically letting me deliver the first charge on a

disordered enemy.

The combat went forth and back, casualties mounted, and I gained some

advantage not having my commanders in front. This gave me more pips

to use the reserve. The stall was broken by a round with bad dice for

Enrico and soon I destroyed the enemy army, ending with 2 corps

disheartened in a balanced contest. I used my kn superiority to good

effects, but in a IKNF combat luck has a very important impact.

21-4

Round 3 vs Gallo using Juan-Juan

This was the opponent I feared more: 15ICvS and massed LhS.

I attacked and saw how bare Mongolia can be. He deployed LhS in line

ans CvS in reserve behind, near enough the front line to helo and

stop marching.

I massed my army on a flank, with moors wide open, and 2 KnF side to

side and quite deep. The small corps was delayed. My mounted mass

targeted one enemy flank corps, I wanted to smash it before being

enveloped.

It worked. Nomad corps on the open portion of the table had huge pips

but advanced slowly fearing my reserve. My attack was savage, I

killed his wing and was 0.5 EE from enemy army rout when the time was

called (by me lol).

15-10 in a game I could win, but this made the balance even with my

first game.

Round 4 vs Paglianti using EIR

Paolo's EIR was cesennius version, with sarmation ally. We were on

table 2, and Paolo was above me. He didn't want to lose, and was

quite afraid of a Kn charge. He defended and deployed his legions

deppe inside a valley made by 2 DH garrisoned by Ax. In front of this

strong position he had 4 artF.

I knew he had the sarmations and expected a march, so I deployed well

back in the open, waiting for them to enter and crush them using more

troops as possible. The idea was to put myself ahead with a 15-10,

and maybe forcing him to come out. The game started with an

interesting skirmish between ArtF and Lh that in the end produced

nothing. Then the sarmations entered and faced 3 corps of mine.

Unluckily when I charged I rolled extremely low combat dice, so he

was able to break my small corps before sheer numbers destroyed him.

Plan failed. Paolo didn't come out and I would need to much time to

reform, apart any consideration about how suicide was enter the

valley. 13-12 for me and 5th place with 59 points and surprisingly

never losing the army.

So in the end I had just 1 decisive result out of 4. but could be 3.

Vandals were fun, and also quite effective but showed that, being a

monotype army, they have a lot of limitations. While I planned how to

cope with cvS, expendables, El, Bw or massed Lh, there was nothing to

do vs bad terrain. Anyway stratagems and brilliant general boosted a

lot the army performance from DBM, so I will play it again.

Lorenzo