A Second Agincourt

 Another 15th century game from Richard as he pushes his rules to the limit. This was the Battle of Verneuil, fought in August 1424, so a year or two after the death of Henry V, when Bedford was Regent of France.

We were in Richard's spare room. The French - an alliance of French, Scots and Italian mercenaries - are on the left, the English on the right. I have labelled the picture so you can see who is who. Probably won't do this again, as Microsoft have broken Photo in Windows 11 as you can't add basic text anymore and I had to load this into something else, edit, then resave.

We went first and advanced at full speed. No point in standing around when the enemy is chock full of longbows.

They closed as well, and we exchanged some shooting, mostly to limited effect.

Except for the French cavalry, who got a devastating volley from Tim, turned tail and left. Richard offered Steve the English baggage train as a command in compensation.

Ian continued to head for the English. Although I was impetuous Scots, I halted to shoot, whilst Phil lined up a charge.

Ian made first contact. Alas he hadn't moved his crossbow men to the rear, so not the most effective charge ever.

Phil piled in at full speed, and tried to cut his way through to the enemy General.

With our left hand flank cavalry gone, there was nothing to stop Jon moving out to get a 2:1 on Ian's infantry.

Under dual pressure, Ian's men were driven back. There's a couple of turns' missing photos here. Phil's cavalry retired whilst I shot again, then charged back in. This returning charge broke one of Chris' lines of men.

The whole unit fell back, with Phil pressing closely behind.

His cavalry then charged into the Baggage Train. Mercenaries and Loot. A tale as old as time.

This left me with a problem. Tim had now broken Ian's troops, and Jon had resupplied with arrows. I needed to get hold of Jon before Tim rallied and got back. I've got a bigger unit that is mostly undamaged, and I have two turns to cover the ground. Touch and go, but the odds are in my favour. Just.

Tim's pursuit gets messy, as Richard makes a hash of moving the figures.

With Phil still hacking up the baggage, I start to head towards Jon. This picture is taken just before Jon rolls his shooting dice and inflicts 5 hits from 6 dice. Ouch.

Another turn, and I'll get him next move. Then Jon shoots again, and inflicts 4 hits from 5 dice. This is an issue, despite my commander playing a "Bolster Morale" card.

My fellows are required to take a morale check, which they fail, and turn to flee. Not surprising as they lost 2/3rds of their morale points in two shots, more or less.

That was it then. A victory for the English in similar fashion to the historic outcome. 

The loss of the French cavalry in turn one probably cost us the game. With a 2:1 advantage on that flank, Ian was doomed to a slow death. I possibly should have swung across to help him out, but wasn't sure Phil could break a full strength infantry battle with cavalry alone. We probably shouldn't have let our horse get ahead, and used the infantry to absorb some archery whilst we used the cavalry to work the flanks.

Having said that, there was nothing to be done in the face of Jon's devastating archery.

Apart form that a historical outcome and an otherwise enjoyable evening.