You know the scenario. You have the perfect tactics developed over several long months to deal with your opponent. You know him like the back of your hand. You've played against him for years and know exactly what he will do in a given situation. If he gets his terrain picks (a hill or hills), he will put his archers up there and defend. If there is a water feature on a flank, he will anchor his line and sweep around that part of the field. Woods? He will put some ambushers in there. He never flank marches. You've got his number.

As the evening of the big game approaches, you contemplate doing something new, something different that he won't expect…remember, he knows you as well as you know him. He knows that you like to trya a flank sweep with a large portion of your heaviest troops. He also knows that you usually hold back your center in support until he has committed to stopping the flank attack, and then you push ahead to force him to keep his center committed. Okay, this time we will take a page from Richard I. Instead of showing him our had, we will not only march a portion of the army off-table and around his right flank (which is hardly ever done because of the risk of the troops not showing up) and also keep a part of the army off-table in reserve behind our left flank. When he has committed his army to a tactical plan, we will be able to not only attack his exposed right, but also be able to support this attack with previously unseen units arriving in support on our left. Brilliant! Oh, boy, this is going to be good!

Awry

Unfortunately, plans usually go awry. My suppositions for this particular game were that:

My off-board units would arrive (they didn't).

My opponent would act as usual (he didn't).

I would stick to my plan (I didn't).

My opponent uncharacteristically sent the bulk of his army against my open flank (where my off-board troops were supposed to come on in support). Turn after turn, I tried to get the off-board flank marchers to arrive, but they apparently had managed to get themselves lost and never showed. In desperation, I brought on my supporting off-board reserves, only to see them smashed by enemy knights. Finally, I attacked the enemy center in utter frustration…and the attackers were cut to pieces. The best laid plans….

Often, the simpler the plan, the better. Try this one: Your opponent has managed to get himself established on a line of low hills. He has his longbowmen lined up side-by-side with his knights in reserve. Remember, he never uses off-board flank marches. How to attack him successfully…hmmm. Well, that seemed simple enough. Concentrate missile fire on one of his end longbow units, disorder them and charge in with a couple of units of cavalry, shattering and routing the longbows, causing untold chaos to the enemy command. Okay, so I dutifully moved my crossbowmen and archers around his flank to get converging fire on his lone end unit.

Supporting my own missile troops were two cavalry units which moved up to exploit the expected enemy debacle. Three turns of blissfully firing away were doing the trick…the longbows were nearing their breakpoint. My plan was working…until my opponent's off-board flank marching knights swept out of nowhere and crushed my own cavalry when they were hit in the back! Never say never.

One other game found the battlefield littered with three large wooded areas, two on my opponent's side of the table. He always puts ambushers in woods, so caution has to be the watchword when approaching them. The foolish thing to do would be to ignore them and simply march past (in AW/MW once you get stuck in a woods, there is a chance you might not get out again for quite a while). Ambushers love hitting an open, exposed flank. Well, there was not much to think about here, I would have to send skirmishers ahead to check out what he had put in there.

My battleline slowly moved toward the dreaded woods, warily watching my enemy as his two flanks swept forward, pinning my own flanks, but leaving my center free to push ahead. I was reminded of the situation in the War of the Roses at the Battle of Wakefield in 1460 where the Yorkists had been fooled into sallying out and attacking the weak enemy in front of them, only to be slaughtered by the massive flank charges of the Lancastrians. But this was a momentary thought. My opponent had probably not read about that particular battle, right?

As he pressed my flank my flank units, my skirmishers reached the woods and slowly moved into them, the rest of my center also moving forward. As his troops passed around my flank and started destroying my units, I realized with alarm that there was nothing in those wooods except my won troops. I had outfoxed myself!

So you can see, for all of your brilliant tactics and skill at handling your army. Plenty can go wrong if you always assume your opponent will act as you expect him to - the best way to counter such inveterate thinking is to constantly be coming up with tactical twists of your own. Here is one: The 'stacking up' tactic, used by more than one Crusading army and most notably at the Battle of Nocera in 1132 where Roger II of Sicily lined up his troops, one unit behind the other. If you opt to try this, most of your units will will remain off-table in reserve. Your opponent won't know whether you are flank marching most of your troops or if they are in ambush somewhere. Neat, huh? Unfortunately, at Nocera, the Apulian rebels had no trouble in outflanking the ponderous column and slaughtering the Sicilian troops. You can only hope your opponent has not read about this battle before you try it.