Urartians in Milan by Mick Hession

I was the Wild Geese pool 1 player this year and chose Urartian, which I`d used
in the Irish league last year. It's a good all-round army. My list was:

Mounted Command: 1xC-in-C RKnO, 4xRKnO, 6xICvO, 4xRAxS, 4xRPsO – 28 ME
Foot Command: 1xS-Gen RKnO, 12xRAxS, 8xRPsO – 24 ME
Reserve Command: 1xS-Gen RKnO, 2xRKnO, 4xRCvO, 2xIAxO, 2xIPsO – 18 ME
Kimmerian Allies: 1xA-Gen ILHF, 8xILHF – 12 ME
Baggage Command: 6xRBgeI – 12 ME
Total 94 ME

It's mobile and quite PIP-efficient. The standard allocation plan is to give
highest PIPs to the C-in-C and lowest to the reserve. The Kimmerians are very
useful against small armies like Assyrians as they can threaten flanks and rear,
forcing the Assyrian player to thin his line. Although it likes terrain, an
over-cluttered table hampers its mobility. I think it can cope with most
potential Book 1 opponents, but hoplite and Bw(X) opponents are very hard to
break down unless you can get into their rear. Whilst Assyrian chariots are
individually better than mine, they can and do implode and even if they do break
through my line they tend to end up overlapped so a second line of Cv(O) can mop
them up easily enough. I was a bit surprised that none of my Assyrian opponents
availed of the 3rd sub-general, which William's list used to great effect. It
was interesting to see that this year players went for more decisive armies than
those used in the book 1 pool in 2012.

Game 1 V EAP (Tilman Walk; Yellow Dragons team)
I invaded. Key terrain was a large gentle hill in Tilman's right centre and a
small rough hill in his centre rear. Successive deployment rolls were tied so we
ended up starting after dark and I chose to go for a night attack; Tilman had
Scouting so he got to move as well.

Tilman had a Skythian ally on his far right, then a column of Cv and LH under
his C-in-C, who also had some Ps. The immortals, along with some Ps, were on the
gentle hill under a sub-general and another sub-general had a couple of Cv in
front of the rough hill. The irregular Bw(X) sparabara were missing so clearly
he had at least one ambush.

There was no way I was going to fight Bw(X) frontally and uphill so planned a
right hook with my army. I therefore deployed the Kimmerians opposite most of
his army and everything else faced his left wing – Reserve on the left, Mounted
in the centre and Foot on the right.

Tilman's ally was initially unreliable IIRC but was prompted successfully and he
wheeled his Cv column around the foot of the hill, the Immortals wheeling to
their left as well whilst the missing sparabara rolled over the crest. My
Mounted made heavy weather of overwhelming his march-blockers, whose general
escaped, but my Foot reached the rough hill as light improved, revealing
Tilman's second ambush of Kn(O) chariots and some Ps. Unfortunately this was
illegally placed right beside the first ambush so it was re-sited directly to
its rear on Tilman's baseline, where the chariots faced off against some of my
foot for the rest of the game as we each jockeyed for advantage.

On the left, I retired the Kimmerians behind a march-blocking screen of a couple
of Ax(S) from the C-in-C's command. Tilman attacked the screen with his Cv
column which I then hit from front and flank with the Kimmerians. The fight
broke up into an extremely fragmented series of combats; I considered sending in
the reserve command but was deterred by the advancing immortals, while Tilman's
Skythians were fast approaching my extreme left. Their attack was devastating
and they broke the Kimmerians.

Meanwhile my Mounted command continued to underperform and although there was
not much facing it – the two Persian sub-generals and the leftmost immortals -
it suffered a steady drip of casualties and became disheartened from the rout of
the Kimmerians. Tilman's Cv and Skythians had my Reserve command and the baggage
at their mercy and I was headed for a 2-23 result when time was called and got
off with a 10-15. Richard and Jan got good wins to make our team score a
respectable 54.

Game 2 V Sargonid Assyrians (Davide Mura; Zeneixi team)
I invaded. Key terrain was a BUA in Davide's centre with a RF to its front and a
small RH on my right. A lateral road ran across the table through the BUA.
Davide deployed an infantry command around the BUA – Sp(S) and(O) on his extreme
right, Ps in the BUA itself and Ax(S) to its left. His central command had Kn(S)
and Cv(S) whilst his left wing had more Kn(S) with Bw and Ps. I deployed
Kimmerians on the right, Mounted in the centre backed by the Reserve and Foot on
the left to attack through the rough going. My plan was to avoid contact with
the scary Kn(S) until I'd improved the odds. I therefore seized the hill with
the Kimmerians and sent a detachment to the extreme right. Davide over-reacted
to this by countering with his (low PIP) left wing chariot force, which meant
his centre command (high PIP) had to deal with my Mounted and Reserve commands,
plus the Kimmerians on the hill. On my left, I masked Davide's Sp and attacked
his Ax with mine, supported by my C-in-C's Ax. Losses were even, though I had
plenty of reserves and he didn't.

Davide eventually charged in with his centre and although we each suffered a
couple of losses once again I had reserves to plug holes and exploit flank-lock
opportunities so after a relatively short combat I broke his centre. This
exposed his right wing's general who was swamped and killed, disheartening
Davide's infantry and it was only a matter of time before they broke to give me
a 23-2 result. My team-mates all had a good round as well and we scored a
whopping 96 to put us in pole position.

Game 3 V Neo Assyrians (Paolo Vigano; Condottiere 1 team)
I invaded. Key terrain was a large wood in the centre, another on my right, a
small rough hill on my left and a 1 FE RGo in Paolo's left centre. The left of
the table was more open and Paolo deployed the bulk of his army there. His right
wing had Kn(S) and Irr Ax(O) and Ps(O). His centre (C-in-C) had more Kn(S),
Cv(O) and lots of Ps, many of them (S). These screened the wood, backed by the
Cv. His left wing, had Reg Ax(S) and Ps in the wood and Irr Ps extending the
centre's screen. Each command was bulked out by Hd who protected his baggage.

I had the Kimmerians on the far left, then the Reserve to the left of the wood
which was behind the wood. The Mounted were on the right. The plan was to occupy
the wood with the Foot command and feint with the Mounted to draw Paulo to his
left; I'd then rapidly redeploy most of the mounted to the left and launch an
attack on Paulo's right with the Reserve, Kimmerians (initially unreliable but
soon prompted back to loyalty) and the C-in-C's mounted troops, supported by
foot attacking out of the wood. That plan would probably have worked against a
clumsy or irregular opponent, but Paolo had interior lines and plenty of PIPs so
was able to counter each threat in turn. The problem was the wood: Paolo was
unwilling to advance his chariots as if he did I could hit his interior flank;
equally, I was unwilling to fight two commands of Kn(S) without its protection.
It was a stalemate and we were both conscious of not taking risks on behalf of
our teams so we agreed to score it as 13-12 to me (as the invader) and then
fight the game as a friendly.

And a great game it turned out to be. My foot attacked out of the wood and
eventually wiped out Paolo's skirmish screen as well as two chariots he'd held
back in deep reserve. On the right, Paolo's infantry overwhelmed my C-in-C's
foot before Cv reinforcements could intervene. On the far left, the Kimmerians
skirmished against Paolo's Ax and slipped through the odd gap in his line to
threaten the rear of his chariot line and force him to spend Pips in response.
The decisive action was the chariot battle – we each lost a couple and commands
on both sides were becoming badly eroded. Things were on a knife edge but it was
Assyria that came out on top by killing the Reserve's general to break that
command, which in turn caused the Mounted command, and thus the army, to break.
I was glad we'd agreed the tied result earlier! Our team scored a measly 25
points in that round to slap us well down the table.

Game 4 V Sargonid Assyrians (Richard Darby; Old Contemptibles team)
I defended for the first time and put down more terrain than I should which
stretched across the centre line: a vineyard on my left, an enclosed field in
the centre and a difficult hill on my right. There was a small rough hill
between the field and the difficult hill, just on my side of centre line. I
planned to attack on the right, my C-in-C's foot seizing the rough hill to cover
the emergence of my mounted troops from the defile; the Kimmerians would move
wide around the difficult hill to get into the Sargonid rear. Meanwhile the Foot
would attack through the field whilst the Reserve would cover the left.

Unfortunately, the deployment dice decreed that Richard would deploy and move
first. He had a Skythian ally (LH and a lot of Bw) on his far right, a mounted
command of Kn(S), Cv(S) and a couple of LH in the centre alongside a small
command of Sp(O), Bw(O) and Ps. His large left wing had Ax(S), Ps and Sp(S)
stiffened by a Bge(S) element. Richard's ally was unreliable but then so was
mine. Moving first, Richard seized the rough hill with Ax which bottled up my
mounted command; my C-in-C didn't have enough foot to contest the hill so I had
to reinforce from my Infantry command but repeated attacks on the hill were
repelled with losses on both sides though mine were a good deal heavier.

As his Skythians were unreliable Richard transferred part of his mounted command
to his right to attack my low-Pip reserve, however this attack failed with heavy
losses, but the Skythians became reliable just in time to restore the situation
here. My Kimmerians had become reliable a turn earlier; as there was nothing
they could do to unlock my C-in-C's position I sent them on a wide circuit to
attack the Assyrian baggage – if nothing else, the Assyrian C-in-C would
struggle to deal with them while also managing the fight against my Reserve. The
Kimmerians reached the Assyrian camp just ahead of the chariots and a column of
newly reliable Skythians; the camp was sacked but the Kimmerians didn't have
long to enjoy their loot as they were caught and killed, breaking the command.

By now I'd lost almost all of my C-in-C's foot in the hill fighting so pulled
back and masked it with my Cv. Richard launched a late and pretty lethal attack
on my Infantry command with Sp(S)/Bge(S) but that command as a whole was in
pretty good shape so when time was called we'd each suffered 20% losses so it
was 13-12 to Richard. The team had a fairly good round overall: 2 wins and 2
draws to give us 65 points for 240 overall which we felt was respectable but we
astonished when it proved enough to get us 2nd place overall, with just 1 point
to spare.

It was wonderful to come home with some silverware but far more importantly we
all had really enjoyable games and it was lovely to catch up with so many
familiar faces from last year, and to meet new people as well. As ever, the
Italian players were wonderful hosts and I'd especially like to thank Lorenzo
for the phenomenal amount of work he put in to the event. Thanks to all of my
opponents as well, for four great games played in good spirit. I'm looking
forward to next year already.

Cheers
Mick