Part 1 of A Damaged Mind

I need to preface this with a warning. I was to have one of my legendary cold streaks. I rolled 20-30 1's or 2's in a row. My opponent had a similar string but of 6's. While statistically normal, such dice rolls would screw up any rule system. Terry's rules have two die rolls per combat which should even out the random factors. But when I play anything is possible and I am now writing about the 1 in a million example.

Anyway Judd has a unit of 16 Light Horse stand to receive charges from two of my units that where identical to his. He bounces one and routs the other. And it only got worse. So separation is necessary. Ignoring the wild dicing, the rules were easy to understand. I was getting very frustrated by doing everything right and still getting my clock cleaned.

This is when I noticed one of the best aspects of Terry's rules. Both sides had three or four commanders. However victory conditions effected all commands. Once an army had lost a certain number of units it lost morale. Translating this into English what this means is if one flank is commanded by an extremely aggressive general who only has skirmishing troops and he loses several units the rest of his army cannot afford to dance but must commit its best units as soon as possible. Unlike other systems you cannot build "disposable" commands. In short it pays to fight as long as you win. When you lose you really need to start beating some of his units which means getting your best guys in the fight as soon as possible.

Anyway, excluding the weird dice at my end of the table, both veteran and newbie players got the feel of the rules and all seemed to have a good time.

That night we decided to have a pick-up game. I had to supply the toys and we ended up with a Scots Isles/Highland army with some horse against an Anglo-Norman army. Originally it was to be Gore, Taylor, Fish and Abrams. But we conned Jeff Ball and John Stafford into playing and then several onlookers asked if they could play.

Lady Gwendolyn

One was an attractive young woman named Gwendolyn. She had never played but her boyfriend wanted to play. I said he could if she would. She said "ok" and I immediately made her the commander in chief of our side.

She said plaintively "But what do I do?" "What all women do" said I. "Boss the closest men around." John Stafford advised me to play nice. She looked at John and said "but I can do that." I knew we had the right commander.

We put John on the left flank, myself on the right and the good Lady in the middle with our last commander to her left. She was given the only unit of knights we had and by far and away hers was the most expensive command. We had two other horse units; one for each of the other sub generals but mine. My general was heavy infantry…

We put her boyfriend on the other side and when she ask "Now what?" We told her "kill your boyfriend. Establish yourself as his Lord and master now."

Boyfriend said "hey"; she made an evil grin and Gore said something to the effect of "he might as well learn that lesson early."

Without boring everyone it was an extremely enjoyable game. On the left flank John Stafford's unarmored infantry died horribly (and quickly) under the hooves of the oncoming knights. Panic set in (with the commanders not the troops). Like any good Dark Age commander he decided if he could not win at least he could make them pay for their victory.

Our next commander was like many wargaming generals futzing about in the rear and slowly advancing. Or as I view it; he was malingering in the back, letting others do the heavy lifting. The Lady Gwendolyn and I advanced as a wall on the right flank and right-center. Mid game found John throwing his Vikings into the regrouping horsemen and found Gwen and I facing three knight units that had advanced ahead of their support as they tried to deliver the coup d'grace. John pulls a miracle on his flank and reforms his line and in very unlike John behavior we hear him make a satisfying grunting noise.

The Lady Gwen says "Now what?" I respond "Are they offensive to your sight my Lady? Then command them hence. Make them pay for their boorish behavior. Say the word and we charge. I should point out that two of the units belong to your former escort who has chosen not to switch sides and come to your aid." "Get 'em" she says. And we did.

I believe we "won" but it was one of those victories that left both sides depleted. I believe it caught the "feel" of a medieval game; ebbs and flows until one side is simply bled dry.

Again the key points; in both games I had a combination of various troop types all of which were played by players of various to no experience. Few questions arose over actual game mechanics and everyone had fun.

So what is the bottom line? Let me put it to you like this. I live in rural North Carolina. There are maybe 2-3 other wargamers around here. When we look for something to replace Battletech and someone says I have always wanted to try ancients, I will say "Ancients is a difficult field to start in. But I got this set of rules written by a friend of mine.

Lord knows that boy ain't bright but everyone gets lucky once and these rules like me are easy..."