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| All in all, not a good day for the Fatimid defenders. |
Just a quick report this time. I was to get In the Shadows (GMT Games, 2025) to
the table this week, but T has a conference in San Fransisco and asked if I
could come to his for a quick game before he left. I gave him carte blanche to
set up whatever he liked (I owed him that, since he’s bringing some stuff back
from the States), so T chose Commands andColors: Medieval – Crusades expansion (GMT Games, 2024), a
set that has seen a lot of milage this year.
T had nearly set up the Ascalon - 14 August, 1099 scenario,
just putting out the last pieces for his Crusaders. Given the choice, T will
always play the Crusaders in C&C Crusades, the French in Commands & Colors: Napoleonics (GMT Games, 2010), and the British in C&C
Tricorne: the American Revolution (Compass Games, 2017).
At first glance, the Fatamids seem to have an advantage
of numbers (twenty units on the board to the Crusaders fourteen), but as past
experience has shown, the Crusaders can never be underestimated. Historically the
Christians had the element of surprise and managed to roll up the Fatimids from
their flank, pushing the infantry back into the still forming-up cavalry.
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| About five rounds in, and the ranks are thinning. Normally I'd have a photo of the initial set-up; I thought I did this time, but I didn't check at the time, and nothing had been saved. A bit like my Fatimids. |
Art imitated life for the first three or so rounds, as Godfrey (on T’s Left) came forward to engage my weak right flank, supported by Crossbows and conventional archers. I countered with some Light Cavalry under an unrecorded leader. It took some chipping away and lucky rolls, but over four or five rounds I was able to dispatch Godfrey and his Mounted Knights with those Light Cavalry, though it cost me two units. That was to be the Fatimids' high watermark.
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| Crusader casualties, mostly piecemeal, but Godfrey may be ransomed back, so not a total loss. |
T meanwhile had been dressing his ranks for a major
push in the centre. When readied, his Heavy and Medium Infantry, supported by ever
more Mounted Knights and brandishing consecutive Leadership cards, fell like an
avalanche on my unsupported front line, quickly breaking its cohesion and
forcing some to flee, others to fight and die.
Ascalon is another scenario that some may point to
and cry “unbalanced”, but I could see ways to defang the Crusader onslaught. I
was hampered by a bad opening hand; well, but really bad, but nothing that gave
me an advantage out of the gate. If I’d had a Darken the Sky card, or anything
that allowed me to Order Units Center, I may have been able to thin the
Crusader ranks with my Auxilia Bow; I’ve had great success – and suffered playing
the other side of the board – from Light and Auxilia Bow managing to whittle
units down before they get a chance to engage in melee. But that's the beauty of the C&C system - it insists you make the best of what you have available (troops, orders), and sometimes you'll surprise yourself. Just not every time.
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| End state. Camps defended, but at what cost? (Final score: 7-3 for a Crusader victory.) |
As it was, my opening hand offered three Flank unit orders and a Counterattack, which may have been useful if T had done more than tinkering at the flanks himself in those first couple of rounds. I’m proud to say I didn’t lose any points to real estate grabs. The Crusaders would gain a Victory Banner for each Camp hex they managed to hold until the beginning of their next turn, but they didn’t need to. In a small act of defiance, the anonymous Fatimid Leader and the remnant of his Light Cavalry responsible for Godfrey’s ahistorical capture, survived to the end, albeit with a mere vestige (a single block) of his original unit. And the gates of Ascalon held firm.
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