I was using Medieval French, constructed as follows:

CinC (Inert General King Philip VI) Irr Kn(S), 7 Irr Kn(S), 12 Irr Hd

(O), 4 Irr Ps(O), 4 Reg Bw(O), 2 Irr Bw(O), 2Bg(I). 36/9.5/12.5/18.5

Sub Irr Kn(S), 7 Irr Kn(S), 12 Irr Pk(F), 3 Irr Bw(O), 2 Irr Bg(I)

37/9.5/12.5/19

Sub Irr Kn(S), 7 Irr Kn(S), 8 Irr Hd(O), 8 Irr Bw(O), 2 Reg Bw(O), 2

Irr Bg(I). 36/9.5/12.5/18.5

Strategems: Scouting.

The fact that I used scouts when I shouldn't only actually affected

the first game, but hey-ho.

All positions are from my table edge.

Game 3 v Jim Gibson - Later Hungarian

I had watched Jim's Hungarians get quite brutally dealt with by Chris

Robinson's Mongols, so knew a bit about them before the game started.

 I defended and chose a River, Road, BUA and a Wood.  Jim put some

rough going down.  The Wood finished in the centre of the table, just

in the left flank, the River was not deployed (ended up starting and

ending on the same table edge :() and the Road went from the right

short edge to Jim's base edge.  I placed the BUA on this road covering

my right wing - it was less than an element from the right table edge.

 This left approximately a 2 foot gap in the middle.  One of the bit's

of rough ended up on my base edge behind the difficult going, leaving

about a 10" gap of good going between them, the other was inconsequential.

We threw the dice for deployment and I was lucky enough to deploy

first... I put all the pike's in the rough going and filled the middle

of the table with knights.  The CinC was in the middle and the Psiloi

and Bowmen were pointing to the left as I suspected Jim was going to

come swooping around the flank.  The Right Flank was guarded by if

necessary a mass of Irr Bw(O) and the other 2 elements of Reg Bw(O).

Jim deployed with a Crusader ally and a bunch of Hungarian Kn(O)

opposite all my knights, some Light Horse from the CinC were on the

road and clearly intent on flying up the road before I could react and

a third command which was going to do exactly the same thing with 4

LH(S) and 4 LH(F) on the left wing.

Jim took the first move as I was Inert.  Thing's started off as

expected the 8 elements of LH went around the Wood and threatened my

left flank, the Light Horse from the CinC's command went through the

BUA (along the road) and out the other side.

I reacted to this by pushing all the Pike forward on the left and

started to send my Bw (both regular and irregular) to meet the 6 LH(S)

or so that were now threating my right.  There was a general advance

with all my Knights.  My CinC's bow also moved to try and catch the

light horse in a pincer movement.

Jim threw some fairly awful pip dice and before much longer the 2

lines of Knights met.  during the initial hit, Jim's combat dice also

proved to be somewhat poor when he lost two elements of Kn(S) on

straight die rolls.  Elsewhere Light Horse was busy bouncing of

pikemen and Bowmen.

My two elements of Regular Bw on the right wing were absolutely superb

, normally double overlapped but managing to survive for bound after

bound (I suspect they must have had some fairly good dice to survive

this battle...), meanwhile my Pike also managed to survive and ended

up getting some LH(S) in a pickle, with their backs to the difficult

going.  Three elements were chopped down for only one loss.

However, the LH(S) on the right were determined to show them how it

was done.  Leaving a couple of elements to "deal with" those pesky

bowmen the rest saddled up and went general chasing.  Quite

succesfully too as the dragged him from his horse, which proved to be

quite a pip drain, being Inert and with no general.

In the middle the Kn(O) were getting a serious pasting from the Kn(S),

which left gaps everywhere and despite the generals being in the

second (or even third) rank they ended up becoming exposed and "picked

on".  This became a race of time to see whether my by now static and

outnumbered right wing could hang on before the Hungarian army went.

 However, in one key round two Hungarian Generals died which signified

the end of the day as all three Hungarian commands broke in the same

turn.  22-3 to the Froggies.

Game 4 - Chris Robinson - Mongols

My French Generals (nothing to do with me you understand) decided it

would be a good idea to invade Mongol.  This being the case I went for

the maximum amount of difficult going I could get, which was two

halves and a single FE of Woods.  Chris surprisingly went with almost

no terrain at all....

However, what little there was finished quite favourable for the

Frogs.  One piece finished on the far right, up to the table edge the

other finished in the middle, leaving a three element wide gap between

them.  There was then a sixteen element wide gap before the other Wood

finished on the left flank.

I deployed first..... I put the knights from two commands (including

the generals) into the sixteen wide gap, filling it nicely.  The third

set went on my right flank between the first wood and my base edge.  I

put the pikemen in the wood as I felt it was the safest place for

them... On the left flank I put all my Irr Bw(O) at an angle and put

all the Reg Bw ready to "swoop" if some mongols decided to get fruity

around the wood.

Chris deployed with his baggage on the left flank, with his Brilliant

CinC Subedie just in front.  A single general with 8 Hd(I) deployed in

the middle and on the right a bunch of LH(S) looked wistfully at a

trap with jaws of steel.

Chris went first, me being inert and it transpired he is flank

marching, which meant I largely did nothing until the second turn when

it turned out it was a flank attack on my left flank.  This meant my

knight on the right could deploy, they moved forward and completed a

90 degree turn and headed towards the girly light horse in front of

them (My pips were really very, very good in this game).  On the left

I performed a 90 degree turn so that all my knights could still go

either way if the Mongols got Tricksy.

Which they did.  These were obviously Mongols of the chicken variety

(which I helpfully pointed out to Chris at the time) as the flank

march came on and to my bowmens immense surprise went flying around

the back of the wood and wouldn't stop until they were virtually on my

right flank!

I had moved a horde element to stop the CinC's column from marching,

however the Mongols had an answer for everything as they swiftly

dismounted two elements and shot the horde dead!!!

The rest of the column then turned tail and followed the Sub General

towards the other side.

This did, however, leave the Sub General with the Horde, the Baggage

and 2 elements of Cv(S) from the CinC's command somewhat in the poo.

My Knight columns in the middle suddenly veered off towards this

target rich environment, with some going around the wood incase the

Mongols came back with another twelve elements heading towards all

this good stuff.  The other four elements headed towards the middle to

protect the left wing of my other command who was attempting to face

off all the light horse.  This ended up in the rather bizarre

situation where I had wheeled around the wood with my flank edge

pointing the Mongols daring them to charge.  I didn't really care that

I would be hit in the flank as it would eventually mean I was fighting

LH with Knights :)

There was a couple of turns gap where I was forced to wade through

these rather strange civilian like people with their hands up and

screaming at all my knights.  Still, they died easily enough when my

Knights charged them.  This ended up that I pinned the Sub General and

eventually got within charge range of the Baggage.  The two stray

Cavalry got a bit of a shoeing as well, as they were miles from

Subedie so forgot what they were meant to do.

In the middle it turned out into quite a slugging match, I had loads

(well five elements) worth of Knights all single elements facing a

wodge of Mongol Cv(S) with Subedie driving them.  The Light Horse on

the right eventually charged my cavalry, which surprised me.  The

Light Horse started dying slowly but surely.

Meanwhile on the left My knights gobbled up the baggage and the

Sub-General with only the horde, meaning the Mongols were now down to

only three dice.  With only a few French Knights dead and every Mongol

command now disheartened (losing the baggage can be quite nasty when

you only have small commands) Chris was suddenly concerned about

getting 10% of the French army before the Mongols collapsed.  Which he

managed to do, but only just as my CinC personally cut down the last

Cavalry to break the Mongols.  23-2 to the boys from France.

Thoughts:

This is an absolute monster of an army to face.  I can afford to lose

18 elements of Kn(S) without a command breaking, they can't be pulled

about because they aren't impetuous and they can all dismount.  So

would I use them again?  No.  It is highly frustrating when you don't

get pips (i.e. about a third of the time) so you just wait for your

opponent to impale himself.  In the game against Chris I was very

fortunate with pips (and didn't realise that a single element wide

column still costs two pips if it wheels...) so managed to outmanoever

the Mongols to an extent.

Against the Hungarians it was a similar story - I just lined up

against troops that couldn't get out of the way, didn't get bothered

about the flanks and then just charged in and wiped the floor with them.

The game I lost was due to me making a couple of mistakes, but more

importantly Peter Haines' Romans had a large amount of foot which can

tie me down.  I will win against that foot, but it takes several

bounds, which gave Pete enough time to get around me before I could

dispose of the troops in my front.

I enjoyed the weekend as I think did everybody else who attended,

there was certainly a pleasant atmosphere during all the games, so

what more could you want?