Welsh vs Navarrese

Recently I have acquired a Welsh army by trade, and I planned to use it in an italian tournament with a pool dedicated to a limited number of western medieval armies.

Unfortunately I will not attend it, but I had the opportunity to play welsh in several games, and I found them not very competitive, but quite interesting and fun to use. This is the army list I used:

C1- CiC IKnO, 4 IKnO, 20 IPkF, 8 IPsI - 28ME

C2- SG ICvO, 20 IPkF, 8 IBwO - 24ME

C3- AG ICvO, 2 ICvO, 12 IBwO, 6 IPsO, 2 IAxO  - 24ME

C4- English AG IKnO, 4 IKnO - 12ME

C5 - 4 IBgI - 4ME

Stratagem: Ambush

Basically I wanted to use the terrain to protect and help my troops in combat, relying on ambushes to confuse enemies and threaten their flanks, so be the defender was very important.

In this game I faced a Navarrese army. A nasty opponent, with many troops that could harm my trusty welsh

I was the attacker, and the battlefield was bad for me, too much open terrain. I deployed second and tried to have the best match ups possible, positioning the phalanx facing the enemy knights and my knights against dismounted BdS. I planned to send my reserve of knights on the right, to bolster a quite weak wing.

The first turns were a nightmare. My opponent rolled 45 pips in the first two turns, I had 13. He skillfully manouvered his whole army and shifted the axis against my right. In this way he concentrated three corps versus one, and cut out of the combat my left wing. Very well done.

The problem that the Navarrese faced was now how to deploy his army to attack me, because on the right there was a traffic jam.

On the worst moment possible, the Navarrese CiC rolled 1 pip. The knight were in three groups and advanced in charge reach with open flanks.

The Welsh CiC charged and in a lucky sequence of combats Navarrese lost three IKnS

The Navarrese charged with his second line of knights, engaging the CiC. In the meantime the BdS advanced to attack the welsh phalanx. English archers protected the men at arms flank.

Welsh had the right flank exposed to the outflanking of navarrese javelinmen and the left wing pikes fast under english archer fire. The situation was tough, and the best solution was to attack all along the line. Again "fortuna audaces iuvat", because th Navarrese CiC, double overlapped, was slain. His corps broke.

The situation had suddenly changed. Now the Navarrese was surrounded and in a couple of bound the english corps was destroyed. An unexpected welsh victory, 25-0.

I played without one corps and with bad match ups, but had the advantage, due low pips, to keep a coherent formation. The Navarese was carried on by too many pips and he overstretched the army. His plan was very good, but failed to pass from the operational phase to the tactical one. Hot welsh combat dice did not help him.