Four Rampant Lions battle it out

If you go back to the start of the year four regular dungeon visitors agreed to collect a Lion Rampant retinue, paint them up and face off against each other. Various combinations of battles have taken place as we learnt the rules but on Sunday we finally got together for the show down. A great effort by all meant we were able to field four fully painted retinues, all of course completely different and spanning much of the medieval period. Interestingly there are figures from most of the popular manufacturers as well.

Anyway I set up a mini round robin tournament, with three simple scenarios and the addition of a hidden boast for each side in every battle (no penalty for failing the boast just extra Glory points for achieving the boast). The only tweek to the rules was we gave each general the commanding rule from the start so nobody was landed with something rubbish for all three battles.

Ranulf de Gernon leads his Normans onto the field

I didn't manage to get photos of all four retinues only Ranulf de Gernon and the Templars, but there are plenty of pictures of the others during the afternoon battles.

The Templars !

With two battles going on at the same time and six battles over the afternoon I can in no way cover all the details.....so the pictures will have to tell the story of the afternoon.

Clifford the Butcher with heavily armoured foot troops

The first two battles saw Clifford up against the Templars with both side trying to get across the table with as many units as possible.

Clifford leading from the front

At the other end of the battlefield Ranulf de Gernon has to attempt to stop the Italians from getting across the table from corner to corner.

The Italians seem reluctant to come out and fight attempting to scare
the Normans with arrow fire.

The Normans are less cautious and immediately look to pin the Italians
back in their own corner



The Italians are fighting with several mixed units flexibility vs strength ?

After a lot of 'to and fro' the Normans got the better of it, eventually killing over half the Italians to claim victory and extra Glory points as well. The Templars and Clifford had wiped each other out ! So on to the second round of battles. Ranulf was back on guard duty looking to hold back the Butcher. (some advantage here for Ranulf with mounted troops)

Armoured Norman Knights charging down the hill !

At the other end the Italians and the Templars are fighting a Bloodbath scenario.


Italians back in the corn field

Templars looking for more Italians to charge down

The Butcher pushing forward his archers as a screen, but armoured
Normans have made it into the woods

Always hard to tell what people are thinking

Norman crossbows win over Cliffords Archers

The Norman crossbows proved too powerful and accurate for Clifford, who valiantly fell in battle attempting to get across the table. At the other end the Templars enjoyed squashing the Italians. So on to our third and final battles.

The Templars turn to charge impressively over the hill.

In the final battle Ranulf had to attempt to escape across the table, this was going to be tough as the Templars have two mounted units.

Ranulf brings on his whole retinue in the corner but he has to get at least half
of them to the far corner !

Lovely colourful Italians with apparently captured French banners ?

Ranulf calls out the Templar Lord !

In the final scenario I picked the kill the enemy lord to gain two extra glory points. So it only seemed fair as the host to try and achieve this in a proper duel. Luckily the Templar lord had purchased a blunt sword and some cheap B&M armour !

Templar Knights look on in disbelief as Ranulf hacks their lord to the ground !

The colourful Italians put on a good show.

I didn't manage to get many photos at the far end of the table, but when I went across there didn't seem to be many Italians left, Clifford had lived up to his Butcher nick name and had pretty much slaughtered the lot of them, leaving on the weakest Italian serfs to attempt the impossible.

A great afternoon, with four well painted retinues fighting it out. By dint of some lucky rolling (as always) and successful boasts Ranulf and his retinue took the afternoon and the prize. I feel slightly guilty as my Normans are the least consistent age wise so I think I  need to organise some later medieval figures for the retinue.