My Scots-Irish army arrived and I wanted to get them on-table, so I convinced Chris to bring over his Picts. Chris took the Picts, of course, and Adam commanded my Scot-Irish. This was Arthurian Big Base and Hordes of the Things (HoTT).
Summary: Quick Scots-Irish victory.
Scots-Irish Army
Here are a couple of photos of my Scots-Irish as they were getting based.
The first photo are the Scots-Irish generals. Lately I’ve been basing my generals on 40mm circles but the Scots-Irish generals are on chariots so I went for pill shaped instead (50mm x 30mm). The naked guy at the front is Cú Chulainn himself.
The second photo is about half the army, before I applied flock.
Table and deployment
Adam had a small centre of warband with Cú Chulainn (Hero General) and Cathbad the Druid (Cleric).
Adam clearly took a fancy to Beasts in HoTT. He took two, one of wolf hounds and the other of cattle.
I used my Gallic camp for the Scots-Irish stronghold.
Chris went for his usual mix of Spears, Hordes, and Crossbow.
Battle
Adam advanced directly forward, pushing his Beast out ahead.
Adam had taken a God, actually the Goddess Dana, and she appeared pretty quickly (PIP = 6). Adam placed her behind the left flank of the Picts.
A Goddess is pretty potent in HoTT and Dana quickly scored a kill.
On the other flank the wolf hounds ripped into Chris’s Hordes.
In the centre an ambush by Lurkers (ambush parties) disrupted the Pictish line.
Then the Scots-Irish cattle (Beasts) stampeded through more Pictish Hordes.
Having demolished the Pictish right, the Scots-Irish wolf hounds and cattle turned into the woods.
The cattle then attacked the rear of the Pictish battle line.
Chris brought his destroyed Hordes back on the edge of the table.
The Pictish general, with a couple of elements of Spear, now found himself surrounded.
Adam charged Cú Chulainn (Hero General) and Cathbad the Druid (Cleric) into the Pictish General and escort. Cathbad killed the Pict King himself.
And that was the end of the game.
Conclusions and observations
The game was really quick but we decided not to have another go.
Chris has had a long run of very successes with this Pictish army. Combining Spears, Hordes and Crossbow. This time the combination fell apart. We’ll see if he changes his strategy going forward.
HoTT remains fun to play and quick. It also allows fantastical elements (Gods, Beasts) for those players that want them.
Always nice to see a HOTT game played. It is such a fun rule set. Much more so than DBA (for me) because the fantastical elements make it easier to say “yeah, that’s how the battle would have happened”. Whereas with historicals, I often find it hard to believe that DBA battles are close to how men actually fought.
Yes, I prefer HoTT over DBA for similar reasons.
Both rules sets have their uses. I prefer HOTT for fantasy games and all the quirks that creates. DBA like most ancients rules sets is for gaming and is limited in it’s realism. Both are entertaining.
The important thing after all is to play and have fun and this is subjective. I like DBA and I welcome its limitations in historical simulation, because the gameplay is still good. I’ve never tried HOTT, but the post tells me it’s very addictive!
When we used to play HoTTs regularly we made any player using the spellcasting of the Magicians to declare the spell (e.g. fireball, foot of Gruumsh, whatever) had no mechanical effect. But did result in me seeing Xena and Gabrielle leave the table for “Hot Tub Break” at a decisive point of the battle.
LOL