When Two Tribes go to War

So after six months of hard graft both Mark and I were able to present our two Ancient British tribes to the battlefield. Of course we had to put out everything on the table and, in total around 1500 warriors entered the field.

Mark has painted significantly more cavalry and chariots (he has over 27 of these painted up in 28mm) so to balance up the sides a few of his chaps joined mine. Not that it made much difference....more on that in a minute.

Fortunately when we started this project we agreed a standardized approach to our basing, unit size, and even the colour of the static grass we were going to use. The end result two very serviceable armies painted to wargamer's standards and easily interchangeable.

Did I mention that we are both putting together Roman legions? Once we get into Summer next year the plan is to put out a 50 foot table in the garden and fight a really big battle.

Anyway back to the game in hand. We used Hail Caesar as this delivers the fast, frenetic and friendly game. It also helps that most of the players in the shed are familiar with the rules. Monday night saw us joined by Glen and Alastair.

I was delighted that Glen was on my side as it was his Norman cavalry that overran my Saxon wing at Hastings with some phenomenal dice rolling.

More on my Celtic Army can be found here

Onto the battle....

In the picture below you can see Mark setting out his troops, aside from a few trees the field was devoid of terrain.

Both Armies now face off against each other. It did look rather intimidating.

The two forces stared themselves out and then unleashed war.....

The centres slowly advance...

Large numbers of chariots and cavalry....

Alastair's cavalry launch the first charge and crash into my warbands

Infantry assaults on the far wing

More troops pour forward

Here come the all action shots....

A furious cavalry engagement - these chariots are very tough

Across the field battles are raging...

Its very chaotic and great fun.

By now my right wing has been decimated, and things are not looking too hot for my tribe

The cavalry battles rage on....

More warbands enter the fray...

The opposition survey the damage they are doing to my poor tribe..

More action shots...

The centre's finally meet....

With one massive crunch...

The picture below shows the emptiness of this flank  - some 10 units were destroyed here

The final slog...

So three hours of mayhem delivered a success for Mark's tribe (he had more chariots I moaned)

It was a great learning curve for future games and the nuances of getting warbands, chariots, skirmishers and cavalry to work together will need to be tested, before these chaps meet the Romans.

Talking of Romans I'll be sharing my latest progress in the next blog post.

cheers