Early Byzantine vs Turgesh

This is probably my first serious attempt to play with an inert general. After some thought, I decided to test the easiest to use combination, that is a four regular corps version. Early Byzantine is perfect for this kind of organization. This is my list. The pip loss is minimal and the army dimension boost is noticeable. Still the army can be vulnerable to flank attack.

My opponent used a Su Lu lead Turgesh army, with flank attack stratagem.

I attacked and I tried to cover my flanks with two 1FE difficult hills. They landed on left and right of my deployment zone. My army can be seen on the right. The opponent choosed a huge 2FE gentle hill, that can partly be seen on the left. I made immediately a mistake setting up the terrain. I left two small route to outflank my army both on left and right flanks. It would have been better to  close any access there.

I deployed last, and seeing just two turks corps deployed I expected a flank march, so I deployed deep and with some reserves on the wings. The small 4th corps was used to garrison the fortified camp.

My plan was simple and crude: attack and smash as soon as possible everything was on my path, to give few time to the turk layer to manouver.

 On his first turn Su Lu had good pips and the flank march announcing its enter on my right. He correctly launched his Lh on the open flanks, keeping back the center, with CvO in line and CvS in column under the CiC. He did just one mistake. He did keep not any LhS as guard flanks of Psiloi O on the big GH. Probably he expected my Lh reserve to move back to face his Lh column.

Basic plans are the best with inert generals. I simply went forward keeping small reserves to cover my back. I thought that my troops superiority should let me smash the enemy before the outflanking manouver would create trouble. The baggage was defended, so I had not to care abouy it.

The flank march on table on turn two. My righ flank had the second highest pip dice, but I struggled to properly manouver. My PsS in the DH were never able to show in combat because all the pips were used by Lhs, now under attack by Lh from two different commands.

My frontal attack. From this moment on my opponent was in dire straits with his left corps, that rolled in 5 turns four times 1 pip.

The Lh outflank menace never materialised

My fiirst charge was unsuccesful, and I lost one LhS and one CvS. I made a mistake here too, because I had too few reserves. After that bad combat round I used them all and risked much.

On the right wing I was plagued by low pips. I tried to cover my flank as I could.

The Turgesh attack on the right. The combination of two corps gave a lot of mobility to the Turks

The situation after my counterattack. I killed many enemy Lh, but lost the single Lh that protected the rear of my top three LhS, and this happened with an enemy column ready to exploit the opportunity. Guess what was going to happen...

Disaster, three byzantine LhS attacked in the rear and killed

On the left wing the Byzantine CvS slowly gained the upper hand, while the Turgesh frantically tried to move the clumsy ICvS to cover the gaps in his line.

With 6 elements gone the byzantine right was near disheartening. The Turgesh losses were high too, and the small flank marching corps (15ME) was disheartened

Finally I was able to attack on the flank the turk PsO on the hill and exploit a hole in the line to take on the flank the enemy sub general, almost a sitting duck due the abysimal pips.

My right was disheartened

My casualties were mounting on the left too, but the enemy was on the brink of collapse

At the third attempt I killed the enemy sub general surrounded  near GH slope, and the whole Turgesh army broke for a 22-3

The game taught us a lot of useful lessons: inert general weak point, even with four commands, is always manouver the two lowest pip corps in the command chain. I had often 1 to zero pips, and this made anything different from a push impossible. The huge BP kept me in the game. Neverless being under attack from 2 corps vs one is a losing game. Turgesh tactic was a correct one but a gamble too, and failed when one corps kept rolling 1s. Another option could be deploy even farthest or offset the turk center to gain time and flank room to attack me.

Inert are very good for a defensive / counterattacking game. To launch all out attack versus nimble opponent is extremly risky.