HOTTBAP 2004

"Hordes Of The Things at Beer And Pretzels"

A tournament organised by Richard Tyson of RT Games which took place on 15th May 2004 at Burton-on-Trent Town Hall as part of the 2004 Beer & Pretzels weekend organised by Spirit Games. Great fun was had by all, especially me as it gave me my first tournement victory!

The theme of the tournament was England Invaded with each player bringing one army on 40mm frontage bases. Invaders and defenders were roughly evenly split, and although variants on Medieval armies were common, there were many alternative interpretations.

My army was The High Crusade consisting of:

Hero General - Sir Roger de Tourneville (4AP)
Cleric - Brother Parvus & Branithar (3AP)
Artillery - Trebuchet with tactical nukes (3AP)
Flyer - "Borrowed" aircraft (2AP)
Knight - Knights and men-at-arms (2AP)
Rider - Hobilars (2AP)
2xSpear - men-at-arms (@2AP = 4AP)
2xShooter - longbowmen (@2AP = 4AP)

For terrain, when I was the defender, I tended to use a wood, a field or two of strewn caltrops, and a road.

1st Game - Defending against Martin Golay's Welsh

Martin's army included a hero-general Owain Glyndwr, with historical standard, and less historical dragons (one used as a dragon, with two bases of babies as flyers.

Martin rolled a six on his first turn and on came the dragon... ouch.

Here is the position after a few bounds: on my right flank the dragon, assisted by the flyers, engages my flyer assisted by the knight and an element of longbowmen. In the centre, the trebuchet and my archers have destroed two elements of Wesh archers across the caltrops. On my left, my heavy infantry face the mounted Welsh elements in the gap between the woods and the caltrops.

The Dragon attacks!

My flier proved no match for the dragon, but my spears doubled a Welsh rider, while Owain pushed back Brother parvus.

My knights were in an awkward position: too close to the bad-going, but fortunately Martin did not have enough pips to manoeuvre all his aerials to take full advantage of this quickly.

Owain was now in an exposed position, Martin moved his remaining riders to one side to oppose my archers, while his dragon ate my knights, and one element of babies attacked and destroyed my artillery.

Owain was still exposed - Sir Roger moved through the spearmen to beyond him, while the men-at arms pivoted to attack Owain's flank. Owain lost the roll, and had no room to recoil. Game Over.

2nd Game - Attacking Peter Duckworth's 1984 - The Enemy Within

Peter's army, based on the 1984 Miners' strike is spectacular. I did, however, spend the first few minutes running through which element was which.

Peter defended, leaving his slower elements on his right (I don't think they moved significantly thoughout the game). He advanced his fast elements: Arthur Scargill (hero general), crusading newspaperman (paladin), and pickets on motorbikes (riders) advanced up his left onto a gentle hill. Peter's flying pickets overflew my lines, but lost one element to bowfire.

I responded by swarming the mounted wing - Sir Roger beat the paladin, my Knights forced the bikers to recoil into King Arthur, leaving Mr Scargill poised for a glorious last stand!

His fiery oratory (and the bonus for being uphill) through back his opponents several times, but they just came coming back.

The surviving Flying pickets flew over into contact behind the men at arms, and destroyed them on yet another recoil. My reserves advanced towards the hill.

Once again Arthur was surrounded on three sides - everywhere but the front. Arthur chose to face Sir Roger, Arthur started one factor behind, but I had forgotten that heros are quick-killed by heros, so Sir Roger was taking an unecessary risk - but it paid off, and Arthur was defeated.

3rd Game - Attacking Brian Pierpoint's Arthurian Epic

Two heros (including the general), a paladin, two archers and four knights - eek!

Brian deployed most of his forces to his right, so I decided to make a break for his stronghold with my fast-moving forces, while hoping to delay his mounted elements with the artillery and the slow foot.

I did not keep detailed notes, or pictures of what happened... but everything went well for me, and disastrously for Brian. My right flank forces got tangled in the bad-going with Brian's archers, and paladin coming over to assist, but Sir roger killed Sir Galahad, one of Brian's archers also died, I think, and in the middle several Brian's knights died either to artillery fire, or in hand to hand combat with the trebuchet crew.

The final move came when my flyer flew back at high speed to contact the flank of a hero - I won the combat - game over.

Brian was very unluck indeed on the combat rolls.

4th Game - Colin Evans 13th C. English

Another Medieval game. Rule 1 - when playing Colin count his AP - there may be a lurker hiding in the box...

I did not count, deployed Brother pavus in some bad going, and was duly jumped by some Merry Men.

The rest of Colin's army consisted of knights (including the general - I don't think it was a hero), archers and hordes

My memories are now a little uncertain, but I think my archers killed a lurker, and then with the aid of Sir Roger killed several archers in a confused battle in the middle.

The remains of the battle-lines closed slowly and raggedly, leaving Sir Roger rather vulnerable to mobbing.

On Colin's final bound, Benedict pointed out a shot we had missed (as shooting is compulsory I don't think that this was unfair to Colin) and my Archers outshot and doubled his - leaving me on 11 AP killed.

Sir Roger, therefore, bravely decided to ride down some peasants. he succeded - Game over, and I won the Tournament on tie-break.