Estonians at the Guildford 1-day DBMM240 tournament
By Club Member Lawrence
This year, the Guildford tournament, organised by Ray Briggs, was set in the late medieval period, (armies from 1321-1515 AD). This period is usually dominated by longbowmen, dismounted knights and Swiss pikemen so I looked for an army that would have an advangtage over all of them. I didn't have one, but my club (Milton Hundred Wargames Club) has an Estonian DBA army. If I expanded that out to 240 AP it would have enough warband to roll over (nearly) any infantry army I was likely to meet. I was able to muster enough troops by pressing into service the Slavic auxiliaries from my Khazar army (and a few Russian woodsmen loaned by my regular opponent Dave Mather) as fast warband, some superior warband from my teammate Jon Smith, an assortment of other troops from my medieval collection, plus some log barricades scratch-built for the purpose. A few stratagems made up the points (well, nearly).
After minutes of exhaustive design and development, the army ended up as:
CinC with 6 nobles (mounted Warband(Superior)), 6 warriors (Warband(Fast)) and 4 skirmishing archers (Psiloi (Ordinary))
Subgeneral with 18 warriors and 4 archers (Bow(Inferior))
Subgeneral with 9 warriors, 3 Russian crossbowmen (Bow(Ordinary)), 1 artillery (superior), 2 boats and 3 log barricades.
Army baggage: 3 carts (Baggage (Inferior))
Stratagems: Ambush and Guides.
The whole army (apart from the artillery) is irregular and the generals are all mounted superior warband (same as the nobles).
Game 1: Tim Child using Morean Byzantine with a Venetian ally.
I invaded Byzantine territory so it was appropriate that we were playing on the prototype Travel Terrain “semi-arid” terrain cloth (Production version now available from https://www.bagsoflove.co.uk/stores/travelterrain/gaming-mats-terrain-cloths ). The terrain ended up with a difficult hill on each end of Tim's half of the table and a built up area (BUA) forward right in my half.
Tim deployed a command of 3 knights and 10 psiloi opposite my right, 3 knights and 2 light horse in the centre and 6 light horse, 3 inferior cavalry, 3 auxilia and 3 psiloi on the left. There were some bowmen lurking around, but they mostly kept out of danger.This wasn't what I had been hoping for at all. The numerous light foot would outflank me through the BUA and the light horse would outflank me in the open while the knights would ride me down in the centre. On the positive side, the inferior cavalry would be vulnerable to my archers if I could get to them. I deployed the two subgenerals forward and the C-in-C behind and wide with a view to protecting both flanks.
The game progressed more or less as expected on the right and centre, although a couple of Venetian light horse got involved in a fight against my inferior bowmen in the centre. The left was more interesting as the Byzantine light horse initially had to retreat out of the field of fire of the artillery, which gave me a chance to send the crossbowmen towards the inferior cavalry. However, they were intercepted en route by the Byzantine auxiliaries.
The Byzantine auxiliaries were themselves then intercepted by some of the C-in-C's warband and then caught in the rear by one of the subgenerals' warband that had advanced rapidly and then doubled back. Eventually the Byzantine light horse arrived from its long march behind the hill and engaged my flank guards, but luckily for me didn't kill enough to win the game by the time limit. I had lost nearly 30% of the army and had two commands disheartened. I had killed only 4 or 5 elements. A losing draw got me 2 points in Ray's scoring system.
Game 2: John Fry using Catalan Company.
Another army with a combination of knights, light horse and infantry that could fight my warband (in this case Catalan almughavars graded as superior auxilia).
He invaded, which gave me a chance to place my new Travel Terrain DBMM200 sea as a lake on the right hand side of the table. Other significant terrain was two boggy areas next to the lake and a large marsh that was somewhat left of centre. John deployed first, almughavars near the lake, knights and Turkish light horse in the open centre, psiloi and more almughavars facing the marsh and some cavalry positioned to move around the marsh onto my left flank. I put the C-in-C next to the lake, warband/bow command in the centre and the artillery etc command to the rear, mainly positioned to oppose the outflanking threat on the left, but with the boats on the lake. The first photo is part way through the Catalan first turn.
Both of us advanced. Initially the knights didn't get into combat, but the Turks did and so did the two commands next to the lake. There, the Catalan C-in-C decided to fight in the front rank and soon found himself pursuing ahead of his troops and getting surrounded. However, he fought off all attacks from whatever direction, including troops landing from the boats. The Catalan cavalry rapidly advanced down the flank, but after that their general was busy controlling his infantry in the marsh, which I was contesting, so the cavalry never moved again.
In the foot versus mounted fight in the centre we were both losing casualties, but the Catalans didn't have much depth and soon gaps opened up that I could exploit. Near the lake, my superior warband nobles, backed up by the warriors, had a slight edge over the almughavars. And eventually broke them, but I didn't manage to finish off the mounted command and I think I had one command disheartened. A winning draw for 3 points to me.
Game 3: Mike Pickering with Malay
Not a good match-up for me as his superior warband would rip through most of my army with impunity. Only my nobles could fight them on even terms and his elephants would stomp all over them. He would also potentially outnumber me in psiloi which might allow him to control any difficult terrain, although my warriors would stand a decent chance against them.
I defended and was able to get a wood and a built up area left and right of the centre of the table. I had brought trees and huts to garnish the fabric terrain, but in the heat of the moment forgot to put them out. There were also three boggy areas, but only one played any part (in front of the wood).
I deployed the command with the artillery next to the wood with most of its warband in ambush in the wood. The CinC's command was mostly next to the built up area with a few elements ready to move into it. I put the warriors in front to break up the expected elephants, the nobles in reserve. In the centre was the other subgeneral with his archers in front of his warriors, intended to shoot up any elephants in that zone.
Mike deployed two commands of mostly superior warband between the two terrain pieces and hardly any elephants. These commands also had some mostly inferior psiloi both in the boggy ground opposite the wood and on the edge of the BUA. A small Ming Chinese ally was at the rear (3 cavalry including the general, one blade and an inferior artillery).
I initially advanced into the BUA and held the centre back because they would not be able to stand up against what was in front of them. I moved the central archers into a column next to the artillery with a view to expanding them into the open area to the flank of the enemy warband. The first party of ambushers revealed themselves and started advancing towards the enemy psiloi. They were a long way back so it would be some time before they arrived. The Malayans also advanced, cautiously towards the wood, more aggressively into the BUA. However, the Ming Chinese ally proved unreliable and steadfastly refused to do anything. I moved the central archers into a column next to the artillery with a view to expanding them into the open area to the flank of the enemy warband. In the next two turns my central command rolled a 1 for PIPs so the archers couldn't expand and the warband had to advance, bringing on the central engagement much earlier than I had intended. On the plus side, I eliminated nearly all the Malayan psiloi in the BUA and the second wave of ambushers, combined with the first, plus a couple of elements that leapt over the log barricades to join in gave me superiority of numbers against the psiloi in the bog.
The heavy casualties inflicted on my centre by the superior warband were enough to convince the Chinese that they were on the winning side and it would be safe to join in. The moved their artillery up to where it could shoot at me. I continued to win on the flanks, but the game was decided in the centre where I was almost completely wiped out. Complete defeat with no significant damage done to the enemy so it was zero points for me.
My total of 5 points was enough to keep me out of last place, but not enough to push my team into 3rd despite the valiant efforts of Jon Smith (11 points) and Chris Jones (8).
Overall, the Estonian army offers some, shall we say, “interesting challenges” to the player, not least that the warriors want to go forward while the artillery and troops defending the fortifications don't, as well as the rapid rate at which the fast warband warriors die once they get into combat. In all my games there were things I could do, even if I didn't do them very well. I think there is a reasonable army in there, but it might take a lot of games seeing how things play out to find it. It will be 6 years before the same period comes round again in this competition, so by then I might have it developed into a finely honed killing machine with all my own figures.
Many thanks to Ray for organising the tournament, my opponents and all those who lent me figures, especially MHWC who provided the nucleus of the army. Don't miss our convention, “Broadside”, 14th of June 2020. https://www.miltonhundred.com/broadside
