Philip Abela organised a fun day of DBMM240 at the North Shore Wargames Club on Sunday, with 9 people turning up to play the reduced format game, including quite a number new to DBMM.
Having traced some grumblings of discontent emanating from my figure cupboard to the box of Thracians, I decided to take these along and give them an overdue run.......possibly a bad move 
My first game was against Wayne Watts and his Early Hoplite Greek Thessalians - two commands of mixed Thessalian LH and Ps with a large ally of hoplites, an amazing 75ME at 240AP. Invading Greece, I deployed second and screened the hoplites with Ps and concentrated my mounted command of Cv and LH against one of Wayne's flanks and two commands of mainly Ax(S) on the other.
The Ax(S) certainly did the job on their flank, eventually shattering the opposing LH and Ps (Ax(S) vs Ps(I) is rather one way traffic). But on the other, despite an advantage in both numbers and quality (I had some Cv as well as LH whereas Wayne's troops were all LH) I was being comprehensively beaten by the time we had to call time, having lost 6 elements to 4 and become disheartened.
With the dice for my mounted command consigned to the discard box and replaced with another, I faced my second opponent, Rob Sadler, using Medieval Portuguese. Fearing the English Ally and Reg Bw(S) I expected to meet, I outsmarted myself at deployment by placing my mounted command in a cramped space on the extreme right, hoping Rob wouldn't expect them there and, as the defender, planning to use the first bound get them forward into open space. Unfortunately I ended up deploying second, itself not a bad thing, but gave Rob the first bound whereby he duly bottled my mounted troops up and they struggled to get into the game.
Still, this did absorb most of Rob's two strongest commands and so my massed Ax(S) from two commands charged forward at the opposing outnumbered and seemingly fragile flank command of Ax(O), Ps(O), some Bw(O) and a stray Art(I). Well, 3 Ax(S) went down to 1-6's from shooting on the way in, 2 more were lost in straight up fights with Ps(O) and 3 more lost against Ax(O) while inflicting negligible damage - one command broken and the other in not much better shape!
Needless to say the Thracians, suitably chastised, are now back in their box at the back of the cupboard.
A big thanks to Philip for organising a great day and to Wayne and Rob for two entertaining games that gave my grumbling Thracians a salutary lesson!
https://www.facebook.com/groups/824840264342234/posts/3331713566988212
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A view for the first game from behind the Greek right.
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The under performing Thracian cavalry facing Wayne's left
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On the other flank things are starting to happen......
Wayne has spotted a possible problem!
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| In the second game, my cavalry on the right are bottled up between the wood and the table edge and never able to get into the game. |
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| Never mind though, on the left things are shaping nicely. What could possibly go wrong? |
Vincent CholewaWhat a great turnout for the DBMM 200 club day. The smaller versions of DBMM are a great way to play several games in a day and to introduce new players.
