Nellie the angry elephant

 Friday and another War and Conquest clash against Ian's Classical Indians, this time we went large, or largeish with 3,000 points, this still only allowed us both to field half the figures we have.

I have a little system for laying down the terrain, once it is down the pieces are then possibly moved so you do not always get the effect you are looking for. In this game it was a disaster for the Seleucids as most of the terrain moved towards my side of the table and a large difficult hill ended up right in the centre of my deployment area which restricted my deployment somewhat. Despite this my plan was to advance as quickly as possible to limit the incoming fire from the bamboo longbows and slay the infantry as they were inferior to mine. Sadly for me I found a line of elephants blocking my path to the rabble.

Indians on the left, Seleucids on the right.

Indian centre.

Seleucid centre.

I pushed my whole army forward especially the flanks with the thought I would kill or ride down the enemy skirmishers and chariots, this was successful on the right as Ian lost his light chariots to the Skythians but on the left my vaunted Macedonian light cavalry were shot up and routed. I loosed arrows where I could at the elephants but only managed a few hits, my bolt shooter failed throughout the game to hit anything, so much for that plan. Ian managed to rush one elephant at my Purple pike block and to my disgust they ran taking the Blue pikes with them in sympathy, nearby my second unit of skirmishers had also routed from incoming fire, I had also had to pull back my otherwise victorious Skythians due to incoming missiles. To make matters worse one of my elephants went out of control and started to head towards the right of the battlefield, I had almost nothing left, a humiliating defeat was on the horizon.

Doomed charge by the light chariots.

Steady boys, steady.

Then Lady Luck intervened, all my troops rallied, apart from the out of control elephant of course which almost blundered into the Blue pike block on its travels. It was now Ian's turn for the bad luck, his left flank elephant went out of control and headed for the rear while two others refused to charge the Galatians, I had managed to get some breathing space. The elephant which had routed the Purple pikes now came in again but the lads had now found some grit on the hill and fended it off, I was now forced to charge the elephants which had stalled with the Galatians and Hoplites, a dangerous ploy but the only one left to me. Several desperate struggles now ensued. In the meantime I had once again advanced my Macedonian cavalry with archer and elephant support and wiped out the Indian right flank. Things looked better.

My elephant goes out of control.

The elephants get ready.

Courage lads.

Eventually I killed most of the beasts and forced another to go out of control and head towards the Indian left flank, the Galatians surged forward despite the deadly fire coming at them and took out the first of the Indian infantry, the Skythians rode back to support. The Indian spearmen looked on aghast as the Seleucids prepared to fall on them. It was all over.

The Indian general thinks of running.

The Indian left is destroyed.

What a change in fortunes and an incredibly exciting battle. My useless bolt shooter was a disappointment while Ian's volleys were deadly, I am also learning more about chariots and elephants in War and Conquest and they are very scary. Despite the Indian infantry being of low morale I suspect that if they had been moved up to support the elephants Ian could have sealed a victory, although to be fair they are just as deadly at long range due to the longbow effect and they have a tendency to fail morale checks without officers leading them. The Indians looked especially nice due to Ian using nail transfers to spruce up shields and elephants, a great idea, I would have said female nail transfers but hey, it's 2025.

I was pleased to finish my first unit for the new army, the first of many. It is a bit difficult to get transfers at the moment due to the change from LBMS to Victrix, I was lucky with this unit as I got some straight from A&A and some from Phil Robinson. I did however get two sets from Victrix which fit their own range, the small banner sheet will fit the A&A vexilum with a bit of trimming so I was pleased to actually get one which had I Minerva on it. The second sheet is a little large for the Moors' cavalry shields but I think they will fit with a bit of trimming, fingers crossed. As I start on the cavalry I have a second unit of infantry and two bolt shooters in the queue so thought it was appropriate to order another batch, more infantry, Roman horse archers and some Clibinari. I did varnish the figures in the end, a light one then highlighted the metal parts so they do not, hopefully, fade. The Twelfth look on with jealousy.

I went to Vapnartak in York yesterday, the first show I have been to in quite some time and it has been at least three years since I went to York but I actually had a list of things to buy and bases for the new army to pick up. We got there at 1045 in order to beat the queue but we didn't, it wasn't huge but it was still there, they really need to look at this, having said that there was a lot of punters there it was like sardines inside. Quite a few of the big traders were absent but on the other hand there were quite a few smaller outfits which I have never seen before, these were mainly selling 3D terrain and figures, all superbly done and at a decent price. I managed to get everything I went for and a couple of extra things so the trip worked for me. Here comes the moan, the wargames were basically hidden away upstairs on one of the mezzanine levels and that was it, a row of participation games which all looked very nice including our own run by Rob and Stuart and all seemed busy, at least before lunch. There was one large D-Day exhibit on the lower floor which despite being very nice did not seem to attract many people, perhaps because it was up against the traders. The only other large game worth mentioning and star of the show for me was Yarkshire Gamer Ken Reilly's magnificent Italian Wars game. For me the show worked in that I got what I went for and managed to meet and talk to several friends along with upcoming 'Wargaming the Italian Wars' author Conrad Cairns (Colin Ashton couldn't make it) and Helion Wargames supremo Charles Singleton, I am busy drawing the maps for the book at the moment.

My loot.

D-Day.

Rob and Stuart's game.

A nice table.

Italian Wars.

And again.

Parthian Shot: I saw a nice headline this week, "Trigger Warning: Your Local University, Literary Society or School Board May Contain Nuts".