Elephants! Don't look to closely. They are Tamil... not Roman.
Italians about to charge across the river into the surprised French! That was a fun game, challenging, exciting... you know what wasn't... what is coming up.... (sigh)
Tiny army, everything is elite. No impact. So it shoots, scots, hunts flanks and then shoots some more.
Six elite elephants! There is some other stuff, but really its six elite elephants! Tell you what it doesn't want to see. An entire army of stuff that wont stand still and take a trunk to the face. Huns are a bad, bad match up. Terrain will be crucial here. Coast, village, brush or fields somewhere central. There is hope.
There is no hope. Billiard table, even the bloody village ended up 2 UD away from the edge so the Hun light horse command has a roadway to happiness and the rear of the Tamil army. For reasons that don't make any sense the Tamil general, who was sober, has sent three units on a flank mark, reducing his already small armied break point AND shrinking the line.... what was I thinking.
Nasty, run awayie Huns that made me sad.
Huns come forward. Tamil wish they had brought more bow.
Tamil advance. Bow does a thing!
This will be fine.
Would be even finer if the Tamil had three more units to shore up the line. Where could I find three more units?
Oh yeah, I sent them on a walk to find mushrooms.
Technically at this point I am winning.
Huns come forward. Tamils left and right flank is looking dicey. The ambush marker in the town has delayed the Huns light horse. Was positioned so the light horse would have to come into the town to clear it.
Okay. Elephants charge, huns evade, all good. Except it wasn't. Elephants have a protection of 0, so are very vulnerable to shooting, combine this with the whole you can't be rallied and you need to protect your pachyderms with a screen of light foot until combat is reached. This all makes sense.
I have six elephants, after charging I have four groups of lights that need to run up and reinsert themselves as 'shields'. So that's three pips to launch the charges, another four pips to bring back the lights. So seven pips from two competent generals. Gets even better. What if your elephants roll long on their pursuit? You can halt them earlier, but this means you are giving up/slowing down your race to push the huns to the back of the board and catch them! I choose to just keep pushing, didn't have the pips to bring the lights back anyway so DAMN THEIR ARROWS!
Huns elect to stay and fight vs the medium foot. The Huns made an excellent decision here.
Huns actually run a little low on pips here and there may be an opportunity in the centre next Tamil turn. In the East the Huns withdraw from combat allow a light horse, firing at -2 (but elite) to take a shot a rout the medium foot. In the West, in the West it is over its just how long and can the Elephant take one Hun with it.
Elephants keep barrelling forward and even get into combat in the West! Huns evade in the East.
In the centre the Tamil move up and ZoC some Huns.
The elephant needed to blow straight through for any real chance of survival. Hun is 0 (+1 natural, elephant panic -1, net 0). Elephant is +2 (+2 natural, +1 impact, -1 disordered). Both are elite, so elephant needed one hell of a roll to blast straight through, gets close....
The Huns are actually starting to run out of board/map. Could it be that the Elephants could have a chance?
In the West the Elephant is hard flanked and gives up his trunk, the huns come back to litter arrows everywhere else. With one exception, a medium Tamil foot is run down. I actually thought this move a little risky. If the Hun hadn't beaten the medium foot by three the nearby elephant would have had some serious words!
Elephants charge! There are opportunities here. Just need some dice to go the Tamils way. In the Centre the elephants go short, in the East the elephants, who just needed to do anything BUT go short, go short... its awful. In the East the opportunity was to take a Hun general in the rear, but alas, not to be.
There is no sign of the Tamil flank march, the Huns are now within range of the Tamil camp. Its all over bar the shouting. The Tamils quit the field and vow to never run elephants again!
What a drubbing! I got smashed, pounded, obliterated, beaten like a wet sock! Was awful... how can I prove this was not my bad generalship but the dices fault.
Okay. Terrain was bad. However, was really relying on a village and a coast (1 in 4 chance), the village having to be placed 2UD from the edge was just extra salt. The Huns strategist means the odds of terrain staying where I needed it were slim, but he got to move the Western Brush 6UD! I managed to move it... 0UD, which is the same distance I managed on the brush covered hill. That was bad luck.
The flank march, can't blame the dice for that catastrophic error. I don't understand my thinking there at all. I couldn't afford the troops to not be on table. No excuse, or as my young mates would call it "skill issue", which I am informed means "You sir, have a lack of skill in the area to which I am referring".
Finally, the elephant ablative shield. You would call them light infantry. Wasn't till after the first charge that I realised the huge error I had made in positioning and deployment. There was simple no coming back from that. I complain about the dice, but the elephants actually bounced a truly amazing amount of shots given they had left their shield behind, maybe the dice don't hate me after all.
Lessons have been learnt, now lets never speak of this game again.
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