And so we began our fourth and
final year – which was something new in itself as our previous campaigns only
ever made it through three years… one year in the morning, one in the
afternoon, one in the evening… Anyway, this year Myomorpha was a vassal of New
Angland and manga controlled one of Petroland’s cities…
If you haven’t read the reports
of the first couple years of this campaign you should probably start with that.
You can find them here:
FORCES
Player:
Bob
Army:
Centaurs
Country:
Petroland
Cities:
Pavet, Logit
Player:
Tim
Army:
Japanese
Country:
Manga
Cities:
Shojo, Gekiga, Kodomo, Mynet,
Player:
David
Army:
English Civil War
Country:
New Angland
Cities:
Kong Hong, Haiwei, Sintien, Hangshai
Player:
John
Army:
Ratlings
Country:
Myomorpha – Vassal of New Angland
Cities:
Monsei, Hamelin, Leithia
THE GAME
Year Four Declarations
Manga declared war on New
Angland – we had a buffer between us and Petroland, and New Angland would be
coming for me sooner or later… I guess he was thinking later. Because they only
declared war on Petroland (as did his vassal, Myomorpha). Petroland
reciprocated and declared war on Myomorpha and New Angland.
Spring Deployment
New Angland deployed in Haiwei.
Manga deployed in Kodomo
Myomorpha deployed in Hamelin
Petroland deployed in Logit.
Spring Moves
(Remember: click on the pictures
for a bigger version)
Whoops… I took four pictures and
every last one was out of focus….
Petroland marched south to
Sintien to lay siege to it once again. Centaurs just aren’t any good at sieges
(as one might expect). It was unsuccessful. The Rats scurried north to try and
steal way Logit while the Horsie-peoples weren’t looking. The Were likewise
unsuccessful. New Angland marched it’s forces from Haiwei to Hangsahi and back
– effectively patrolling the coast hoping to catch me wherever I landed. The
Army of Manga landed at Haiwei and the battle was joined…
The Battle of Haiwei
My troops shot forward as quick
as they could hoping to break the New Anglanders before Mr. Dragon showed up.
Ihad to deploy in depth as I was flanked by some bad going and impassable
terrain. As I rolled only ONES for PIPs for the first four turns I wasn’t
really able to spread the line out… Seriously… I was rolling almost as bad as
John…
I have to say, I’m really liking
the new DBA random terrain placement more and more – the symmetrical square of
bad0-going was just getting SOOOO BOOORRRRRRRINGG by the end of the campaign…
We did this little dance of back
and forth for a couple of bounds. Luckily David was coming up short on PIPs
most of the time and wasn’t able to engage the Airboat more than once – thus leaving
it partked in the air infront of my artillery and a shooter… We never did get
to shoot it out of the sky, but it caused David some anxiety.
Eventually we put the hammer
down and killed the General and that was that… The New Anglanders fled to
Hangshai.
Summer
In the summer the Centaurs gave
up their fruitless siege at Sintien and returned to Logit to relieve the siege
of their corral there. I pursued the new Anglanders to Hangshai, but ended up
having to lay siege to it as the army fled further South to Kong Hong.
Third Battle of Logit.
I started getting lazy about
taking pictures at this point. Bob and John setting up their battle with David
looking on.
Initial dispositions of the
Third Battle of Logit
I don’t think Bob blasted Johns
General in the first turn this time around… Actually from my notes John only
lost 2AP… So he didn’t’ even lose his general…
The Rats actually won this one
and plundered the Corral at Logit before following the trail of horse-man-turds
all the way back to Pavet…
Autumn
The Army of Manga continued it’s
siege of Hagnshai, which eventually capitulated. The Centaurs of Petroland made
on last final defence against the oncoming Ratling Horde.
There was an awful lot of woods
for a city called Pavet…
John tried to marshal his rats
into a column to sneak around through the gaps in the woods in an attempt to avoid the Lurkers. He likened his
deployment to that of a Napleonic French army… I thought it looked more like
Braddock’s Column… but whatever.
The column touched the trees at
one point and out popped the Lurkers.
Yep, Braddock’s…
Actually there was quite the
exciting little battle, but I somehow never bothered to take any pictures… Ah
well…
The Rats were repelled (or
repelling… I’m a little confused about that… either rway they lost).
At the end of year four we
called it quits. It was only 7PM and we probably could have squeezed in another
year… but I was pretty tired, and the others were probably pretty tired of me…
so…
Here’s how things look at the
end of it all…
Painting the Map yellow. On paper (or MDF, rather, as that's what the map was painted on...) it looked
like I was doing pretty good. But everyone else had found a LOT more actual
battles than me… A total of 12 campaign battles were
played. Bob won half of them, David won three, John won two, and I won a single
battle (I only actually played two).
The Final Tally…
Player:
Bob
Race:
Centaurs
Country:
Petroland
Cities:
Pavet
Battle Prestige: 47
Prestige from Cities: 6
Total
Prestige: 53
Player:
Tim
Race:
Humans
Country:
Manga
Cities:
Shojo, Gekiga, Kodomo, Mynet, Haiwei, Hangshai
Battle Prestige: 11
Prestige from Cities: 36
Total
Prestige: 47
Player:
John
Race:
Ratlings
Country:
Myomorpha
Cities:
Monsei, Hamelin, Leithia, Logit
Battle Prestige: 19
Prestige from Cities: 24
Total
Prestige: 43
Player:
David
Race:
Humans
Country:
New Angland
Cities:
Kong Hong, Sintien
Battle Prestige: 21
Prestige from Cities: 12
Prestige from Tributaries
Cities: 16
Total
Prestige: 49
So… um… Bob won…!? Hmmm… yesterday
when I tallied it up I had David at 55…(Whoops)? I think I must have given him
prestige for three cities, and he only had two… doh… Ah, well. It was very,
very close. We won some, we lost some… and I think everyone had a pretty darn
good time.
While it was fun to actually play
in a game I think I actually prefer to just run them. I was worried that a
smaller campaign might get a little dry having to fight the same people and not
have the same dynamism as the previous campaigns, but I think this one worked
out pretty well. I’d definitely say it was better than some, might have been a
bit more fun/dynamic with one or two others… we shall see.
I also think I like DBA better
than HOTT. While I like HOTT, I could do without the gimmicky stuff- any of the
3AP+ units. Some of them seem like one-trick-poneys that armies get built
around and when they work they’re devastating… and it sort of reminds me why I
don’t like Warhammer…. and without those elements… well, you’re basically playing
DBA.
I am thinking the next big
campaign I would run will be next February (2013). It will be a semi-historical
DBA Greek hoplite city-state warfare campaign. We will be using the army
lists of Early Greek Hoplites (and their contemporaries) but there may be
substitutions of some mythical elements - The Centaurs, for example, could be
fielded using the Skythian army... The Amazons might be Thracians... or some
more Northerly Hoplite Greek Army (Spears and or Auxilia with a few elements of
Cavalry and/or Light Horse...). So there could be some fantastical elements but
nothing
Of course, that’ll be the next NEW one – i.e. one
that I have to paint new figures. But I suppose a smaller campaign –
like this one – could be organized with armies that I already have anytime,
just for locals, from time to time throughout the year – if ever we could just
agree an a date where four or more of us ccould get togehte for a day… I might
not hand paint a fancy new map for each… but in theory it seems plausible.
Alternatively, what I’d REALLY like to do is run an ongoing
campaign with a few local players – if we could agree on a weekly time to get
together – do one season a week (or more, if there ended up being no battle in
one season)… or I could use something more like the old Mighty Empires for a
campaign like that… Hmmmm… Something to think about…
