Migard: A Song of Ice & Fire on Tabletop Simulator

 With Mal falling ill, the Wednesday group was forced to improvise, so it was back to Tabletop Simulator on Steam! Fortunately Rob had done all the hard work, in creating (or more accurately ‘borrowing’!) ‘A Song of Ice & Fire’ set-up on Tabletop Simulator and creating the Midgard set-up.

After a quick rescaling of the hill and “salient points”, off we set to play Scenario 3, from the book, with the Lannisters attacking the Starks on the hill.

The Lannisters (Steve & Phil) mounted an echelon attack on the hill, with the Knights of Casterly Rock on the Lannister left. The Mountain & his men, plus a unit of Guardsmen were in the centre. Finally Tyrion Lannister had two units of halberdiers & two units of crossbowmen on the Lannister right.

On the hill, the Starks (Rob & Dave) had their cavalry on their right flank. Curiously the Stark bowmen held the centre and the Stark Sworn Swords held the Stark left flank. Great John Umber and his men were due to arrive at the start of Turn 4.

Steve wasted no time in riding down the Stark cavalry. Knights vs medium cavalry, was never going to be a fair fight, even if the Starks were uphill. However, Steve’s knights were in no mood for stopping and some crushing dice rolls swept away the right hand Stark cavalry unit. The Stark cavalry unit closer to the centre only managed to hold on for a little longer, by virtue of Jon Snow dashing over to stabilise things, but this did not last long and he was soon forced to dash back to the archers, when the second Stark cavalry unit ceased to exist!

Jon did manage to pivot the archers, to shoot into the flank of the knights, removing a stamina point from them, but then the Mountain & his men crashed into the formed archers, who just managed to hold onto the hill, at a cost of losing two stamina. They then, rather foolishly decided to charge the Mountain & his men, getting rather chopped-up for their troubles! This left Jon Snow contesting the ‘salient point’, all on his own!

In the centre, Tyrion (Phil) was being more cautious. His halberdiers advanced in echelon, covered by fire from the crossbowmen. The Stark Sworn Swords made a brave attempt at holding the hill, but weakened by the crossbow fire, the Lannister halberdiers managed to dislodge them from the hilltop. Eddard Stark dashed to mount a desperate counter-attack, but was soon left holding the hill solo!  The last drop of Reputation had just run out for the Starks! Great John Umber, spying the Lannister knights waiting for him and hillside strewn with Stark dead, decided to quietly march away again!

Romans vs Goths to see who is the strongest

Having played To the Strongest many times it was now up to me to actually run a game. Making a gridded mat from an older less used one was initially quite daunting, but a friend gave me some pointers and I found it fairly easy in the end by using a length of wood with the 15cm spacing marked out.

As usual, the game was played over Zoom and this involved a bit of back and forth emailing of the deployments until finally both sides were deployed.

The Goths advanced with the Romans holding back

but moving their right wing cavalry into what looked to be an easy flanking manoeuvre.

However, the Goths were holding back one of their warrior units and it now appeared in front of the cavalry. The heavies held back but the lights went forward trying to get behind the Goths.

On the other flank the Goth cavalry advanced but soon were reeling from an attack by some Roman Auxiliaries.

The Goth infantry advanced in the centre

And things were starting to go bad for the Romans as they were starting to get disordered and Rob the Goth managing to make all his defensive saves.

It looked as if the luck was turning back to the Romans as they managed to punch a Legion through a gap

And it about faced to fall upon the Goth rear.

 

The Goth Luck was holding as a veteran warrior warband destroyed a legion and marched into the Roman camp

with their centre just managing to stay on the field of battle.

The Roman light cavalry had managed to sack one of the Goth camps and it was now down to a couple of victory points left each. The Goth cavalry attacked the skirmishers in front of the camp forcing them back but it was a hard struggle with the Goths finally taking the second camp and victory.

It was definitely a game of two halves with the Goths looking at an early victory but the Legion are tough and managed a very close contest in the end.

Midgard, Artos stuffs it to Aelle: Scenario 1: Artos & the Britons vs Aelle & the Saxons

This was the second of two learning games, in 2 days. The first game saw Chris’s Aelle & the Saxons getting his ar*e handed to him by two OAPs, over Zoom! No pics here, as Phil was too busy explaining the rules to Chris & managing the tech.

The next morning saw Greg lead Artos’ forces to a stunning victory, over Phil’s Saxons, in just over 90 minutes! This being Greg’s first time with Midgard too!

The Saxons opened with a strong central advance of the Hearthguard, screened by skirmishers. The Saxon left hung back, cautiously facing off the Briton cavalry. The Saxon right advanced in echelon to the centre, hoping to exploit the success of Aelle and the Hearthguard centre punch.

All seemed to be going to plan, the skirmishers even managing to inflict a stamina loss on Artos’ hearthguard! However, then it all started to go wrong. The left centre Saxon Heathguard advance stalled, in a draw, while Aelle was driven back (Aelle still smarting from Artos’s refusal to fight him in a duel!). Artos rallied his men, flashed Excalibur and plunged through the Saxon Hearthguard.

In the previous day’s battle, Artos’ Legendary Tool had done absolutely nothing! He hadn’t even soiled the useless thing. In Greg’s hands, Artos’ tool was truly legendary. With the Saxon hearthguard smashed, Osric tried to plug the gap bursting open in the Saxon lines, but Artos, his legendary tool and his Hearthguard, simply steamrollered over the Saxon Young Warriors. Artos again casually dismissing Osric’s challenge to a duel.

The Saxons took some small solace from holding the Briton Cavalry back on the left and even driving back the Briton left flank, but to no avail. Artos has now helping himself to the last Reputation token, by humbling Osric, amongst the bodies of the young spearmen!

We have played this scenario 3 times now, using the same forces, but each game has been quite different. Plenty of see-sawing and little tactical choices, among the bigger battle strategy. Midgard will be on the table for some time, we suspect!

Chain of Command – Closing the Gap, Scenario 2, “Disaster at St Lambert”

 

Lt Buchannan surveyed the outskirts of St Lambert with some dismay. This was going be a tough nut to crack! The river looked deep and he could see a Panzer IV nestled down behind a barn in the centre of St Lambert. OK he had mortar support, a Vickers MMG and call on a Sherman, but unless he could get across that river, unseen, this could turn into a bloodbath!

The Canadian patrolling did manage to establish a toehold on the East bank of the river, well North of the bridge, so the Canadians pushed red section across and started to creep Eastward, trying to flank to the North of the village. The Canadian red section crawled cautiously forward, until they could just spy the German red section, waiting behind a stone wall, to their front.

Sgt Bowe decided to throw caution aside and dashed the red section Bren team into position, behind the hedge and opened fire, hoping to silence the exposed German MG42. With both sides suffering, the Canadians then pushed the much depleted yellow section forward, hoping to flank South of the German red section.

However, Sgt Sumnur spotted the Canadians leaving the wood and rushed the German blue section from South of the road, into the house just NE of the bridge. But, as the Germans bundled into the building, one of them kicked over a stove (bl**dy  fours 6s on the Command dice!!). Soon the house the Germans had just entered, was a blazing inferno, forcing them to tumble back out onto the street, in disarray.

The Canadian Yellow section breathed a sigh of relief and seeing that the firefight between the two red sections was starting to go the Canadian’s way, called for blue section to deploy (from the moved Jump-Off point), to storm the German position behind the wall.

The Canadian blue section swarmed forward, through the orchard, to attack the Germans behind the wall, but even pinned down, the Germans threw them back, the Canadians also losing the section Corporal . To add insult to injury, the Germans then deployed yellow section, in support the depleted red section and the Panzer IV rumbled forward, to lob 75mm rounds into the orchard.

Even the normally gung hoo Sgt Bowe had to admit that it was time to abandon this attac! Across the other side of the river, the Canadian FAO frantically searched for targets, as did the Sherman that had just trundled up, but all they could see was the smoke from the burning house next to the bridge.

Canadian losses were 12 men, including the blue section NCO. German losses weren’t light, with 8 men down, but with a high force morale, these losses were almost immediately recovered.