Wintercon 2012 Game 4

The last game.. almost there, and I have a good chance of a finish if I can win convincingly. I was playing Michael with EIR!  I knew that Michael had an Armenian ally, so I was going to be cagey.

I ended up defending, the table had a road running form my rear to my left edge, a giant orchard pretty much in the middle, a sea on my right, and some hills and bits and pieces.

I placed Green command on the road ready to turn and march in whatever direction the action was, and took the precaution of putting a couple of Auxilia in ambush in the wood facing the left edge. Red Auxilia were in the rightmost side of the wood supported by a couple of Psiloi, next to them some blades, then the artillery, the rest of the red blades and then the Blue Command between the Reds and the sea.

Michael deployed three commands I could see, not the Armenians. from his left, artillery + cavalry and auxilia on and around a small hill which commanded the flank. A small command of Blades plus Auxilia and Psiloi. In his centre, behind the orchard, more cavalry, a column of Auxilia, a small number (4) of Blades and another pair of Psiloi.

Deployment had finished at 3am, so under the rules Michael could have conducted a night attack, but it wouldn't probably have helped him much, and so in the spirit of a fair game, he elected not to, but then had to face the first three bounds with Dazzle form the rising sun behind my troops. This gave him a combat disadvantage, so I decided to pile on in with the reds, mask his cavalry with the blues and start marching the greens around the orchards and into his rear.

Needless to say - it didn't work out like that...  lots of pushing and shoving, Michaels Armenians emerging (eventually) from behind a hill on his baseline, and very slowly coming up to attack the Greens, the Green Auxilia in the wood catching some cavalry, surviving a combat where they couldn't recoil and then mowing down the three mounted elements that they caught.

In the meantime, I had an artillery shot against Michael's Commander in Chief, and rolled a 5-1 - which by my calculations, meant he was dead....   Michael duly removed him. I then double checked the rules, and had to ask him to put him back...  doh.. the combat disadvantage only counts when shooting or in close combat, so presumably not when shot at! (I would claim he didn't see the artillery bolt coming out of the sun till it was too leap out of the way ..;-)

Meanwhile, his artillery was having a field day shooting down my Blue cavalry and things were getting dicey in the centre. my flank supports were being stripped, and the Auxilia I were throwing in were losing badly.

I had some joy when the red general having failed to kill two psiloi who were flanked at odd of 5-1!!!  doh, managed to do it at the second attempt, and then advanced and killed an opposing blade element. 

I had a shot at the Armenians with Auxilia in the front, Psiloi in the flank, and failed. That wing was starting to look interesting. My Green command was untouched, and at 24 ME to his 12, plus the highest regular dice versus a barbarian ally dice, I would have fancied my chances.

Time beat us both, with both armies teetering.. I was 1/2 an element off two commands disheartening, but also had just disheartened one of his and had another one, half an element away. So a slight edge to me.  I think it scored as a 13-12 
 
This game was noticeable for the 'anything but a one' syndrome..  where I had set up attacks, Michael had rolled, and 'anything but a one' on the dice for me would have killed him. Needless to say, on at least four occasions I managed to roll the one.

So my final score was a relatively respectable 3 + 23 + 14 + 13 = 53.  Just over a pass mark. 

Dice summary for the 2 days?  Swings and Roundabout vs Lawrence, In my favour vs Paul, and decidedly not vs David & Michael.

More chicken entrails please....