Impetvs: 400pts Later Crusaders vs Seljuks

Simon and Stephen joined us tonight. Kent reorganised his army as Stephen is keen to get himself a Crusader army and wants to have some military order knights in it- so we got our first taste of fighting the nasty knights.

I had done a bit of rearranging of my two commands. Having decided to put all our light horse in one command to try to dominate one flank, the Ghulums were to go in the other command.

	Command: Average (range 60cm)
	Commander: Poor (+1 leadership)
2	CM Seljuk Nobles (*)	Comp Bow B
2	CL Turcomans (VBU 4)	Comp Bow B
2	CL Turcomans	Comp Bow B
2	S  Archers	Shortbow B
	Commander: Poor (+1 leadership)
4	CM Ghulums	Comp Bow C
2	FL Daylami	Javelins
2	S  Archers	Shortbow B

Kent and Stephen had something like:
3x Military Order Knights
3-4 Knights
3-4 Foot sergeants
3-4 Bows
2x crossbows
1-2 Skirmishers


Our plan was simple, avoid the knights and attack anything else we could. Simon and I rolled to see which command we got and he took the light horse and deployed on our left flank. H used the light horse very well- smashing the enemy bow in front of him, although it as a bit touch and go for a while as to whether or not he would succeed.

Both Kent and I managed to turn our poor commanders into incompetent"Muppets" and then roll lots of doubles for activations so ended up missing 3-4 turns each! We have both decided poor commmands is a very, very bad idea!

Once again the game went to the wire. Simon made good early progress vs Kent while I held back and waited for Stephen to advance. In the end Stephen threw his knights forward and they smashed all before them. Game was called with both Kent and my commands 1 point away from being broken and so automatically losing the game. We shook on the game and diced to see who won the critical final initative- Kent would have managed to get himself doubles again but my general, badly damaged and near the base line was down to 3 VBU left and facing two units of very angry military order knights under the command of Stephen so it was going to be good night nurse to my command. A very, very close game again with acction a plenty- which is why I love Impetus!

Kent advances his misisle troops onto a hill- whcih was difficult terrain but which Simpn still treated as a speed bump for his light horse.

 Simon sends his light horse towards the bows on the hill- I have my doubts about this.

 Stephen's knights on opportunity waiting the commnd to advance (or as we prefer to think of it "Sit. Good doggie."). 

 Simon and my few skirmishers and Daylami (javelin armed light foot) advance into the fields to try to slow down the advancing foot sergeants and bow.

 The (now incompetent) Seljuk commander sitting back and relaxing with the baggage- probably the best place for him. 

 The light horse closing with the bows and crossbows- luckily we won two activations in a  row so Simon's hail of comp bow B fire whittled them down- Kent becoming a muppet at this point of the game and so forfeiting a turn didn't help his cause either- as he was lined up to do some serious damage to Simon troops. 

The Seljuks have destroyed two bow units on the (difficult going) hill- in hand to hand combat despite the penalties involved.

 Kent commits some crusader knights which destroy a light horse that gets itself pinned against the hills and so couldn't evade.

 

 Meanwhile the skirmishers and Daylami try to keep the foot sergeants from getting to close. We managed to disorder a a couple of units but did nowhere near enough damage to destroy any of them.

 The light horse finish off a unit of knights- Kent's command is starting to be in real trouble.

Inspired by the light horse the Daylami storm up the hill only to be repulsed by bows!

 Meanwhile the Military knights (at least in spirit if not body) have just charged and desttroyed my one of my units of Seljuk nobles. Stephen then got to throw 17+ dice vs my Seljuk general who managed not get himself killed and so lose us the game!

 Meanwhile on the far right flank I have lost yet more Ghulums to "lesser" knights but I did manage ot kill a unit of Crusaders and so inflict Stephen's first (and only) loss of the night.

 Seeing his incompetant ally about to explode Simon throws all he can at a single unit of knights on the far right flank, destroying it at no small effort and leaving Kent 1 point short of breaking.

Final result- a bloody draw although next turn both sides would have broken. A very entertaining and fun game- no more poor commanders for us though!

Craig