Al Andalus : Battle for the Border

With George still building his wargaming palace/Fortress he came up to the dungeon for a game Friday morning. His only request was not WW2 and something colourful so time to roll out the Al Andalus Arabs. As I wanted something balanced it isn’t based on any historical incident. A simple border battle between two Arab Taifas fighting for control of their border.

The objectives for both sides are to cross the river, reduce the enemy numbers and if possible capture the enemy camp.

The cavalry on my left wing move forward to the river supported by archers who move onto the hill

The enemy right consists of Mercenary Christian cavalry and crossbowmen

My own crossbowmen also move forward and my right wing horse archers move to prevent any crossing of the river through the marshy ground

Not able to hold back my cavalry loose their javelins and charge the ‘lighter’ Christian cavalry, the enemy heavy cavalry is swamped by arrows which gets through thier heavy armour forcing them after a couple of turns to pull back.

My crossbows are also forced back by archer fire and with the right held infantry is pushed forward to contest the river

The heavy cavalry waver but hold the field supported by mounted crossbows.

The infantry struggle in the centre

The cavalry contest continues on the enemy right around their camp

Whilst more infantry is brought up to cross the river

…but eventually my lighter cavalry start to lose their impetus and are brought down, the enemy charge down the hill to hold the crossing knowing they must delay the advance and protect their camp

In the centre things are reaching a climax with four units engaged hand to hand, then the enemy manage to swing their cavalry around the flank through the marshy ground

Almost but not quite the Christian mercenaries having been pinned down for most of the battle manage one critical charge finishing off my cavalry before it can take the enemy camp

and hit in the flank my spearmen lose heart and flee the field. The battle is lost 🙁

A fun battle with both sides running very close, it wouldn’t have taken much for it to swing the other way, the enemy heavy cavalry played almost no part in the battle until that final critical charge. Really nice to get the Al Andalus collection out on the table but does make me want to get on with some Samurai 👍

Only one bit of painting to show for the week as I have finished off this Leman Russ tank for my Tallarn force, not really sure when it might get used but it has been sat unpainted for about 15 years in a box.

Final snap as I was putting away the Fallschirmjager from the other day I needed to put them into a new box due to the expanded numbers. I actually have about 6 more being stripped of paint so they should just fit in the box when they are done. I’m planning a CoC Sicily campaign at some point in the future when I can get round to planning the details ?

Thanks as always for checking in

Matt 😀