Historicon 04
Pennsylvania is a green and pleasant
land...
but muggy..luckily I brought a breeze with me this year!
Showing up
Well.. I
was packed.. I had shipped my figures off to Don Effinger. He had received the hermetically sealed
package days after I had sent
it, all in good condition. All I
packed was terrain for the Imperial Meltdown (more about this later), the
super secret awards for that
event, five days of cloths that
could get soaked through with gaming sweat... a bandana...and the carry-on
full of magnetized based
cavalry and ready to go. All the
figures I had mailed or carried were for the Meltdown, as I was
intending to use Vince Salvato's EIR
for both the doubles and the
main tourney on Friday.
Don and Rob Broom greeted me
again at JFK and we were off to New Jersey, then Pennsylvania. Of course we
chatted about WAB, sales of
my book, the new guy at WHW,
Allen flipping out, you know.. the usual :) A quick stop at Roy Rodgers
Monmouth Courthouse battlefield
rest stop and we then made the
final leg to Lancaster. The drive goes so quick because there isn't a moment of
quiet.... otherwise as soon
as Rob and I stop talking about
something interesting Don will start blathering about Civil reenacting :)
So we arrived and got checked in
this year at the Macintosh, which is not a bad offsite location. Since Don,
Vince, and Mike Bruck, were in
the Host I had a safe place to
stash my stuff, so the "Frogger" run across the highway wasn't all that big a
deal (especially late at
night or early in the morning.
The weather was ok too.. only a couple of really muggy days. I enjoyed this
hotel much more than the
Canadiana... that one has had
its name struck from all temples, and parchments...
Wednesday night found us in the
bar in the Host drinking beer and chatting, saying hey to the guys when
they showed up, talking about
Allen wigging out... you know
the "usual" :)
The next day was the first dose
of high cholesterol at the Host's buffet, as Mike stated. I tend to eat up
a big breakfast that sticks
to my ribs.. sometimes I can go
for the rest of the day... of course I do have massive reserves!
Then we vended for hours... I
didn't find too much new, didn't have a concerted plan, and kind of bounced
around. I found some Mirliton
Condotieri for a budding AoC
list. I was thinking of buying the whole mass of a Han Chinese/Chin army,
but backed down when I
realised I still hadn't
completed most of the Indians I purchased at HCon last year. The good new stuff was
Molniya's Timurids, but I
wasn't interested, too out of
period for me.. maybe Ken Winland will consider some Western Skythians and Getae? It looked
like Newline
Designs had redone their Indian
elephant, I stupidly did not buy one to compare at home to my finished ones.
I was disappointed by
Navigator's new Alexandrian line, pumpkin heads and not very crisp detail. However I felt
that their Hypaspist would meld into my Foundry late Successors, maybe.. so I bought a
coiple of packs. The cavalry were a real disappointment and I stayed away from them. I
was also disappointed with
Battlestandard's display of their new Macedonians. It was nice to see their Late Persians
on display (even with the
giant horses). This of course
meant that the only decent new range of Alexandrians is brought to us by
A&A, who did not seem to be represented. Vendel
figures are carried by
Brookhurst, but I don't need any more of those, and tend to stay away from adding them in
since they are so big.
I took solace by buying way too
many Newline figures, outfitting a Seleucid pantboy phalanx, more Greeks,
and other odds and ends I
didn't have. Other than a few
books, that was my vend.
 |
| Tom Opalka and Steve Schifani observe the mighty Sassanian/Indian alliance |
Doubles
Mike Bruck and I decided to play
as a team in the doubles both of us brought 2k of EIR, both armies were mostly
the same... nothing fancy.
I was borrowing my 2k of
excellently painted figures from Vince Salvato. I had decided to play EIR for
three reasons, one they are
noted by many as being weak and
difficult to win with, and two I was tired of playing my own Macedonian
lists, and three, I was unable to
finish my Persian cavalry in
time :)
Mike and I first played Rob
Broom and Don Effinger's Mongols and Successor AoA armies. It was a killer
combination for Mike and me.
We hardly got untracked against
the looping Mongols. Our plan was to use cover to slip around their left
flank. But their human shields
and elephant delayed this
effort. Eventually we were able to start to push the center against some nomads that
stuck their necks out too
far. Unfortunately instead of
charging, my Romans ended up fleeing and compiling of 10's routed back a
bunch of units... the end of the
game saw these routers counted
as points and the Mongol/Successors moved on.
   |
| Mike Bruck and I teamed with EIR against, Rob Broome (mongols) and Don Effinger(Successors) |
Mike an I then faced Duncan
MacFarlane's truly ancient Hinchliffe Sassanian army (used as AoA Persians)
and Tom Hamilton's Indians. Duncan's army was
an old mix of Hinchliffe Sassanians painted to a high standard by Peter Guilder, methinks
I've seen these in print before :)
This was a test of our ability
to defeat two shootist armies. Mike took on Duncan's Persians and I took on the
Indians. This was another
game where I couldn't quite get
untracked. The first 22 longbow shots struck home against my legionnaires
without me making even one save.
Since I only had 60
legionnaires, well you can see how devastating Tom's luck was. I pulled back my whole
wing to get away. Tom started
to move and that broke up his
firepower, so I tried a quick reversal. This caught him off guard and I actually
was able to get into hth
combat with my much depleted
units. However I didn't have enough gas left and my counterattack crumbled.
   |
| Mike tries to work his wing, my attack bogs down against Duncan MacFarlane and Tom Hamilton |
Two fairly
luckless games for Mike and I... the good news it was just the doubles, and I was happy to
slough off the bad luck! I went
back to the room that night
thinking about what I had done wrong with an army I don't use too much (occasionally
I will play with Rich
Norton's EIR locally, so I have
only played them 3-4 times myself). After the doubles it was dinner and room
gab over a few beers.
Thanks to Vince for running the
event which seemed to go without a hitch.
Singles
Friday morning saw us begin the
singles tournament. Don as usual had everything organized, from set terrain
tables, to well though out
deployment for the set-up. My
first opponent was none other than Duncan Macfarlane again and his shooty
Persians. He set up three of
his four noble cavalry blocks
across the center, deployed his levy spara to this left with his elephant
smack in the middle. Skythians
patrolled his flanks. You can
see Duncan in the photos warning me not to pull and “stupid Roman tricks” on him
J
My OOB was the same as
yesteday's doubles:
General (mtd)
ASB (on foot
1x15 veteran legionaires C/S/M
2x15 regular legionaires C/S/M
1x15 raw legionaires C/S/M
(all with lt. armor)
1x12 auxilliary foot with
throwing spears
1x10 auxilliary cavlary throwing
spears
1x11 auxilliary archers with
bucklers (Cretans)
1x11 barbarian skirmishers
1x35 germans with throwing
spears L/S/M
  |
| Duncan tries to warn me not to abuse my "stupid Roman tricks", my EIR carefully advances under cover. |
After last night's debacle, I
had decided that I would just try to play well with the Romans, and utilize
all the "stupid Roman tricks"
to the fullest. I deployed in
Wellingtonian fashion on a reverse slope, all on one wing. The skirmishers
patrolled the right wing and
were to hold a wood against his
army. Also, units that could be shot at, were in testudo.
This time things went well for
me. I used a hill to march in column toward his right flank. Initially his
Skythians got a shot off at my
cavalry... but then I was able
to charge them and they ran off the table. In the center his fire against my
testudos was ineffective so
he concentrated on the Germans.
They absorbed round after round of fire and were whittled down but never
lost heart. Every shot against
them was one more fresh
legionary creeping forward. By use of terrain, column and testudo my fresh
legions confronted his Noble
cavalry. On my right my unit of
skirmishers messed up his advance and could not be rooted out of their woods.
In the center I held back,
then the whole army rushed his
cavalry. A couple units broke back but got away, I followed up and the same
happened... finally his General
routed and that sealed things as
his unit stopped making panic checks.
Duncan was an excellent opponent and has a clear grasp of all the rules (including reminding me of my warband checks :) This was a nice start after yesterday's luckless doubles... I think Duncan learned that he couldn't stay static too long against troops maneuvering towards a flank. I felt I had played well enough this game and was rewarded with a win for the effort.
  |
| Other games get rolling |
Game two
saw my outnumbered Romans facing Al Revere's massive and dynamic Dacian army... he had gobs of
them in units of 32, 40, ...gobs of
them! We deployed in the
"Take and Hold" and I pretty much gave up on taking or holding and was intent on
surviving the hordes. I deployed
mostly to my right with
auxilliaries and cavalry holding the extreme left. My plan was to work the fringes of a
large wood and hope that
would mess up his army cohesion.
I moved first and zipped across the table in column (fewer missile troops to
worry about here). This was
kind of a weird game.. things
went too much like clockwork for me. As I predicted he was having trouble with
the woods, my Germans were
flanking it and were rapidly
trying to get on his flank. In his center he tried to move his masses
forward, but they got in each
other's way. The curse of the
6x4 foot table. I continued to move on turn two.
 |
| Al Revere's Dacian horde awaits my punch. |
His turn
saw the beginnings of a disaster that usually one
can only describe in an ancient
sourcebook. Almost all his front line skirmishers failed their warband
tests... this made them charge fully
ranked and deployed legions
front on.... needless to say they were slaughtered. The pursuing legions rolled
forward and smacked into two
of his units. The resulting
combat saw one 32 unit break, and the other barely held. That Breaking unit
caused some other units to
break. His round saw a Chieftain
cause my left hand legion to burn stubborn. My round saw me sorting out
the mess. His next turn saw off
my cohort in the center, but his
General panicked because fleeing mobs were causing panic tests
everywhere. Eventually his general's
mob and others ran off the table
as I was getting in position to push them off with legions... Al gave in
as this game was not going
his way. This was shaping up as
a good luck day for me, diametrically opposite to
the day before.
 |
| Revenge against the Indians as I slowly creep onto his right flank. |
The third round saw me face Tom
Hamilton's Indian once again. We were tied on VP's so off I had to go through
'No-man's land' once again.
Tom deployed the same as the
night before, infantry supported by elephants. I deployed the same as against Duncan
earlier, with only my Germans
holding the extreme right wing.
Initially things went bad for me
as he got off a full shot at my cavalry on the left and they ran off the
table. But by judicious use
of testudo, terrain, and columns
I was able to creep up on his right flank... this time after only losing two
or three legionnaires to fire
(I actually rolled some
saves!!)... as he concentrated on the Germans and other long range targets I gave him..
my skirmishers were
whittled down but my auxiliaries
finally took a wood which began the unhinging of his line. On the last turn
(we only got to turn 5 with
all that shooting) my veterans
destroyed his unit of light chariots, and three of my cohorts were close on
his flank.... I felt the end result
was well in grasp. However, time
constraints set in and we were forced to end the game at that point. It
turned out to be a draw
slightly in my favor.
I was lucky to end up in third
place with my borrowed army, but I felt I had done justice to the EIR this
day. The fact that I had
reversed yesterday's disaster
against the Indians made we walk away feeling very good about how I had played
the army to the hilt, and
used every Stupid Roman Trick
possible.
Next was preparing for the
"Meltdown" the next day. Click the link to go there:
**************************
Saturday Night action
After eating and relaxing on Saturday night we tried Mike Bruck’s brand new trireme’s out. We used the GW rules for naval action and had a good relaxing time. The rules were a bit dicey as narrow triremes could not accommodate many boarders, myself and Mike Reardon managed to board Rob Broom’s vessel and were driving the crew back to the stern. Don Effinger’s admiral tried to jump aboard but fell into the drink.. splash J
This made me happy J
It was a great Historicon for me.. too short! Eight games of WAB, some I actually played well, others I just managed to hang on in. I got to vend, and play, and have a few beers with the guys I only get to hang out with on the internet throughout the year. It is always worth the expense and hassle to get there, but is over far too quickly.
Now I really motivated to have a big new army for next year!
Jeff