I have enjoyed reading other peoples's accounts of battles at tournaments so I am going to try my hand at it. Five of us left Houston to go play in the TWISTERCON DBM tournament held in Norman, Oklahoma. Two of us had played tbe previous year and had a good time. Monty Walls, who had beat me in the finals last year was going to referee the tourney.

TWISTERCON was a 350 point, one list DBM tournament. I had wanted to play my Ch'in Chinese, but to me they are a two list army and I was not able to convince Monty to allow two lists. Afler having my butt kicked (while running Bactrian Greeks) at the Norbert Gischir tournament last fall, I wanted to run a one list army with enough balance that I could play any other army and have a reasonable chance to win. I almost decided on Classical Indians because I had just finished two war wagons which add a lot to that list, but at the last minute settled on Portuguese. In a short period of time, I have come to really like this army.

Portuguese Army List

Command A

Elements	Type	DBM Notation
1	C-in-C	Irr Kn (O)
8	Portuguese men-at-arms	Irr Kn (O)
12	Archers	Irr Bw(I)
2	Archers	Irr Ps(O)
3	Slingers	Irr Ps(O)
4	Catalan almughavars	Irr Ax(S)

Command B

Elements	Type	DBM Notation
1	Sub-general Kn, military order	Reg Kn(S)
3	Military order knights	Reg Kn(S)
4	English longbowmen	Reg Bw(S)
3	Slingers	Irr PS(O)
2	Jinetes	Irr LH(O)
4	Granadine cavalry	Reg LH(O)

Command C

Elements	Type	DBM Notation
1	Sub-general, Kn	Irr Kn(O)
2	Catalan almughavars	Irr Kn(O)
3	Archers	Irr PS(O)
2	Jinetes	Irr LH(O)

Command "A" is the main body with a lot of punch. I am coming to like Bw(I) more and more. The Portuguese knights dismount as Bd(S) which gives you a lot of flexibility. This army also has two of my favorite troops types regular Bw(S) and irregular Ax(S). I have both a Sicilian army where I love my Catalan Almughavars and a War of the Roses army where of course the English longbowmen are the subject of my affections. I run Command "B" as entirely regular and usually use it as a flank command. Command "C" is a screening command.

The first game Friday night was with Monty Walls. I wanted Monty to play at least one game of DBM since he was not going to be to play since he was refereeing. I ran my Ch'in Chinese against his Lydians. After a long and bloody fight where one of his knight subgenerals had the lives of nine cats, Monty's Lydians prevailed. I was happy though. I usually have streaky luck and I had rolled enough ones Friday night to last a month.

Tournament Game 1

Saturday morning dawns and we have a good turnout, sixteen players. Monty believes in historical matchups as much as possible so I draw the Swiss played by Chuck Clark in the first round. I am defender and put down a small river on one flank, a roll on the other flank, rough going at the back of one center sector and a small hill in the back of the other central sector. Chuck makes the rough going area bigger and gets that side of the table. Using the rough going to anchor his flank, he puts out all of his pike and most of his fast blades. His flank command consists of four fast blades, seven Lorrainer Kn(O) and some psiloi.

My regular command "B" faced his flank command and my LH quickly outflanked it. Then my pip dice went south (rolled two ones in a row) and Chuck brought up his fast blades and knights and engaged me. The one major weakness of the Portuguese is the irregular generals. I usually run regular armies so it is both exciting and frustrating to roll pip dice for this army. My longbows and light horse get kills, but then the next turn I roll three ones in a roll and lose two knights. Chuck tells me he can feel my pain (Chuck is a nice guy though).

I retire that die and break his command the next turn with my LH and longbow. I love my English longbow. However Chuck makes a great move and uses his only offensive move to have his sub-general attack mine in such a way that I can not recoil. It is 4 versus my 5 plus my general is superior. I roll another one and he kills my general. That is my third loss, but I finally get lucky and roll a five on my next pip roll so I do not go demoralized.

Meanwhile in Command "A", I had dismounted my knights and was slowly advancing towards his pike blocks. Command "C" was on his flank and killing psiloi and fast blades. By the time the Swiss pike block met my dismounted knights, my command "A" has reached the baggage and was looting it. I do not think Chuck lost a single stand of pike, but I had killed almost everything else and looted the baggage.

Monty is still trying to match historically where possible. I get to play the Free Company who also won its first game 10-0. I have to comment on Monty's first round pairings. We had 8 games the first round and the score of every game but one was 10-0. The other game was 9-1.

I had lunch with my friends from Houston. Bob had played the Free Company the first round and he warned me to watch out for the double-based German Kn(I) generals. Bob had had one of his generals killed by a doublebased German Kn(I) and that had cost him the game.

Tournament Game 2

Eric Lauterbaeh was running the Free Company. I am defender again and I place a road on the flank, a small hill in the center and brush in the other flank sector. Eric makes the small hill a big hill. Erie has two commands. Most of his knights and longbow are in one big eommand which he places in the center. His small ally-general eommand eonsisting of a double-based German Kn(I), two other knights and a blade is placed directly behind his first command.

I have my main body, Command "A" in the center, with the other two commands on the flanks. Erie gets very high pip dice his first three turns and gets to the hill in the center before I do. I had placed three Ps(O) behind the hill to delay him because I had wanted to get to the hill before he did. My pip dice failed me and Eric beat me easily to the hill.

I fortunately have enough pips to retire my Ps(O), but Eric keeps coming with his main command. Eric had initially moved his small Kn(I) command to one flank to support his attack. My screening force (Command "C") had enough pips to move my LH on a broad sweep around his small command and towards his baggage. This caused Eric to slow down the advance of his small command and this would keep them out of the battle. I had placed my Bw(I) in front of my line of Irr Kn(O) in the center with Ax(S) on one end of my battle line.

The Ax(S) were in front of Eric's longbow and managed to kill several of his longbow and one knight that got killed on a reeoil. On the other flank my regular command "B" for the second game in a row has poor pip dice and I can not take advantage of Eric's open flank. However, my English longbow are having their second good game and kill a couple of knights. Eric advances his main body in the center and my Bw(I) get several recoils and a couple of kills. I let my knights in the center go spontaneous and they charge through the Bw(I) and make contact with Erie's knights.

Unfortunately for Eric his pip dice go cold and he can not react to what I am doing on his flanks. My Almughavars continue rolling up his flank and his main command finally breaks.

Tournament Game 3

Game 3 on Saturday night is with a Classical Indian opponent, Mark Greenwald, who had won both of his first games by 10-0 scores. The winner of our game will play the Bulgar/Libyan Egyptian winner in the finals on Sunday morning. I am the attacker and Mark puts out a large waterway on one flank, medium size rough going in the center and medium woods on the other flank. I shrink the woods to 2" by 2". I hope Mark puts his elephants in the center (I have question for Classical Indian players. Why do most of you put your elephants in the center and chariots on the flanks? I always put my elephants on the flank and chariots in the center).

Mark puts five elephants, lots of fast blades and four longbow in the center. Guarding the flank of that command is two war wagons. I have my regular command "B" with 4 Kn(S), 4 English longbow and 6 LH opposing the war wagons on that flank. On the other flank, Mark puts 5 or 6 chariots (Kn(S)) and some Bw(X) with their flank covered by the rough going. I have my screening Command "C" on that flank.

Since Mark had deployed his elephants and fast blade first, I had deployed my Almughavars against his elephants and my Kn(O) against his fast blades. I leave my 12 Bw(I) in my rear area guarding my baggage. Mark's third command was mainly 6 Cv(I) with four Bw(S) and one elephant commanded by an ally-general facing the rough going between his chariot flank and the elephant center command.

Both sides slowly move forward. I have the two LH of my screening command stay close enough to the chariots and Bw(X) to prevent any marching and they never get into the game. On the other flank, Mark had left enough of a gap between the war wagons and edge of the board that march 4 of my LH around the war wagons into his rear area. All that is between them and the Indian baggage is some Hd(O).

Unfortunately I roll two ones and a two on my pip dice for that command and the LH raid slows to a crawl. Mark nicely redeploys one of the war wagons and the 6 Cv(I) with their Cv ally-general and cuts off my LH and puts them in danger. Fortunately Mark rolls a one for the Cv(I) just when he could hurt my and I manage to withdraw them with only loss of one.

Meanwhile, Mark's center command along with the rest of my regular flank command an center command had advanced into combat. My English longbow are heroes again and kill a fast blade and one elephant. Mark had had two Ps(O) hiding in the 2" by 2" patch of woods, but my Almughavar flushed them out. Mark initially pushes back my Almughavar with his elephants. My pip dice betray me again and I am unable to dismount the knight I have facing his longbow.

I lose one knight longbow fire and his fast blades kill two of my knights. I throw my C-in-C in one of the gaps and psiloi into the remaining gaps. In the rough going, my psiloi and dismounted knights (Bd(S)) had killed most of the longbow, or elephant of the ally-general's command and was turning Mark's center.

I then got lucky and had two Almughavars kill two elephants and that opened the other flank of Mark's centet The game ended the next turn. This had be the toughest game to date and at one point Mark had fewer losses than I did. The war wagons had nearly prevented me from turning Mark's flank. If Mark had managed to get his chariots mto the game he would have beat me. This is only the second time I have faced war wagons and I still believe they are much too powerful.

Bill Reese from Houston had beat the Bulgar player with a large flank march that had come in on Turn 3. I had played Bill's Libyan Egypdans once before with my Ch'in Chinese. This would be much different.

Tournament Game 4

Sunday morning arrives and Bill is the defender. He puts a 6" waterway on one flank and a long narrow Built-Up Area (hereafter, BUA) on the other flank about three inches from the table edge. He has a small rough going area placed on the same side as the WW at the center sector/flank sector boundary. I make the rough going bigger (12" diameter) and move it six inches towards the center.

Bill deploys a mixed warband (10 Wb(F)) and chariot command (8 Cv(S)) along with some psiloi and LH in the center with the warband fronting the rough going. I place my command "A" in the center with the Almughavar and psiloi fronting the rough going. The gap between the rough going and BUA is too long for just my knights to cover so I place the Bw(I) on the end of my knight line by the BUA. My regular command "A" goes on the flank between the rough going and the WW. My screening command goes in front of the BUA. Bill has placed a second and small comrnand of chariots and LH behind his main command. His third command is not in sight. I had figured he might flank march a command so that is why the screening command is on the flank in front of the BUA.

I move my regular command "A" forward as fast as possible and Bill informs me that it sees something. That something is about 8 chariots (Cv(S)) and some LH hidden behind the BUA. I had thought it has been discussed on the DBM List that you can not hide behind a BUA so I call Monty over to discuss it. He says that is not true and since I had planned on a flank march this really does not change my plans.

The LH of my screening command with the knight general and two Almughavars go forward and block the gap between the BUA and the edge of the table. I hold in the center with my knights and Bw(l) and send the psiloi and Almughavars into the rough going. Bill sends his warband into the rough going, advances most of the rest of his center command forward. He sends his small chariot command and some fast LH to delay my flank command "A". He sends most of his chariots including his chariots around the end of the BUA and makes a beeline towards my inferior bow.

I have sent my regular command "B" though his open flank heading towards Bill's baggage. He delays me with two fast LH and sends out hus small chariot command. I make my big mistake of the game. I am nervous about my inferior bow so I want to end this game without them fighting if possible. I decide to go after the warband in the rough going so I send the Almughavars and psiloi of the center command (4 Ax(S) and 3 Ps(O)) plus three Ps(O) from flank command "B" against 10 warband (F) and three Ps(I).

My Almughavars fail me for the first time. I lose all of them plus a psiloi for nothing in return though my psiloi do kill two warband later in the game.

On the other flank in the BUA, swarms of inferior psiloi have come streaming out trying to engage my screening comrnand and inferior bow. My Almughavars and Ps(O) kill several Ps(I) and beat back the attack. Bill makes his big mistake of the game. By sending his flank command general with most of the chariots around the BUA to attack my bow he loses sight and command control of the chariots and LH trying to defeat my screening command and I am able to drive them back and kill some LH and psiloi in the process.

Meanwhile in the center, Bill has advanced his central command of chariots and I have advanced my knights leaving the inferior bow behind. Into that eight-inch gap between the end of my knights and BUA, Bill advances 8 Cv(S) chariots including a general. Directly in front of him is my 12 Bw(I). He advances to three inches away in a line 5 chariots wide. I recoil one chariot and move a psiloi in front of another chariot.

I now have four elements of bow shooting at each chariot. The moment of truth. First shot and I kill the general. The other two shots have no effect, but it does not maner as the command breaks. That pretty much ends the game as I now work on the flanks of Bill's center command and finally my flank command has engaged his small chariot command by the baggage. The English longbow are heroes again and kill a chariot.

This is the closest game by far. Getting beat up by the warband in the rough going should have cost me the game but the inferior bow save me.

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