More Jolly Japes in Japan

Following my failure to deliver a game last week, we were back in Jon's basement for some more Basic Impetus Samurai.

This week we were doing the Battle of Koriyama Castle (1540) in which Clan Amako is ambushed by Clan Mori. Clan Amako are at the bottom, in blue. It was commanded by Chris K, Steve and me. Ian and Richard took Clan Mori.

In turn 1, Clan Mori get to decide who moves first. They let us do so. They have an advantage in turn two's initiative roll, so were probably hoping for a double turn.

Steve moved up in the centre, and charged into the middle of their left flank, driving their spears back. I moved up on the left, and Chris followed up Steve's attack on the right. In order to open up this wing for my cavalry I was forced to move my archers up to the foot of the hill.

The Mori then counter attacked on my wing, advancing onto the hill and pushing my archers back.

On the right Steve's victorious troops from last turn pushed more of Ian's troops backwards. Ian attacked out wide on our right, and the two units locked in combat.

Richard attacked our left centre, and pushed back our spears holding that end of the line.

Richard followed up, hoping for a quick kill.

He succeeded, and punched a hole in our line. Bit of an issue, as one of my units was facing in the wrong direction after its hasty retreat from the hill encounter.

Undaunted, we attacked again on the right, but despite outnumbering 2:1 were unable to drive the enemy back, as their leader died to save face and keep them in position.

The Mori attack in the centre was going rather well, and we were pushed back again.

I moved up on the left, confident I could turn the position, as despite the unfavourable terrain I had a mixture of better troop quality and a leader.

We entered a phase of the game where we just couldn't buy a win at any price. The combat on the right bogged down as Ian succeeded in passing all of his cohesion rolls.

A similar outcome occurred with my Samurai foot attack on the hill, and my flanking attack with the cavalry.

Finally Chris drove Ian back on the right, and Steve attacked with his leading troops. The odds were that if he attacked the slightly stronger unit he would be able to destroy them and trap the unit out on right with a strength on 1, effectively destroying two units. Yeah, well, that didn't work, did it?

Over on my wing I was inflicting "hits" but Richard was passing his cohesion tests. The odds were we'd win over time - as long as Richard didn't get a lucky attack roll.

Steve's mounted Samurai attacked the hill on our right. This looks risky, but he is rolling more dice, and they are already disordered. He should easily push them off the hill.

That didn't work either, and then Richard charged my troops behind the hill on the left. I hadn't looked at this properly, and thought he didn't have a line of attack. I was wrong. Over on the right, Ian was cobbling together a defensive line as Steve found he couldn't hit anything.

Things were getting tense now. Steve got driven back on the right, and we bounced a unit in the centre. The count down "clocks" on the right were both down to three. A quick survey of the table told me the game was tipping towards us. It was going to be tight, but I could see where we'd inflict the three push backs.

Two of these should have come on my wing. I moved up an extra unit to join the combat at the foot of the hill. In the background, my general should make the difference in that combat. On the right, Steve was in a strong position to capture the hill.

Well, none of that worked. The fight round the left hill stalled, and my General had to commit Seppuku to stop a retreat. Steve just couldn't get up the hill.

Chris moved up on the right to try and finish off Ian's flank. In the centre, Richard was able to wheel around and catch my support unit.

That intervention proved decisive (plus two successive rolls of 4 sixes from about six - eight dice, followed by ones and twos to pass multiple cohesion tests). My cavalry top left evaporated, and my supports were driven back. Battle clock for us suddenly on one (Jon hasn't got round to flipping the die)

And then I'm driven back from the hill, and its game over. As the saying goes, we grabbed defeat from the jaws of victory.

Looking back at the game I'm not sure we should have done anything differently. We launched multiple attacks with an advantage in our favour, and failed to break through anywhere, except for Steve's early attack on the right.

Basic Impetus can be a bit like that. If you trawl back through the archives you'll find the instance of the peltasts that were thrown into a phalanx as sacrificial lambs, then smashed a hole through it and won the battle. It's frustrating, but also brilliant. BI means you can plan proper attacks and compute the odds, but it can all unravel spectacularly. It creates a terrific game narrative. Jon's transposition onto hexes makes it a breeze to play as well.

Another enjoyable evening.