ALY MORRISON'S "BUTTERFLY" ADVENTURES IN THE WORLD OF WARGAMES AND TOY SOLDIERS

Wednesday 18 September 2019

From my side of the table... The Battle of Leith 1514.

Greetings...


This weekend Michael Perry hosted a Henrician game based on a what if scenario...


The scenario was that Richard de la Pole, Earl of Suffolk, exiled in France and last Yorkist pretender to the English crown had planned and enacted an invasion of England in 1514. Richard had been given a command of a French army of 12,000 mercenaries... mostly landsknechts...but  supported by Scots Pike and Irish infantry.


This bit is mostly true... Suffolk had been given a command in the French army but the invasion never took place... due to an unfortunate case of peace breaking out.
Alan Perry,Simon Chick and myself took the side of the one true king and all round good guys..
Our chums Stuart Mulligan and Dave Andrews took the part of the Tudor usurper.. ably assisted by our completely unbiased umpire Michael (God save King Henry) Perry...




Sunshine over Leith...



David's Northern English troops...


Michael the unbiased umpire informed us that nearly all northern English troops in the Tudor army were armed with light machine guns...









Some splendid French Troops ... Armed with proper manly weapons.





 Showing how brave they were Alan's mounted crossbows trot forward towards the enemy...
They were sadly forced back by a hail of machinegun fire...








Our beautifully dressed and properly armed troops advance in force across the field of battle...





Stuart and Dave's men wait with baited breath...and machine guns...



Simon's brave landsknechts are rocked by a hail of lead... and hand grenades...
We are facing daemons from the pits of hell...








Our brave Scots move forward stalwartly in the face of gun toting maniacs...Alan's Irish unfortunately move a lot slower... Another case of terrible dice...



Stuarts men cock their unnatural weapons and wait for my brave properly armed archers to get closer..





 As the false king and his cavalry arrive on the battlefield...












Simon's men repeatedly attack David's storm troopers... but are tragically torn to pieces by superior fire power...and truly truly awful dice throwing...







My Scots and French press in on Stuarts Tudors... Who it turns out are only armed with some dodgy second hand shotguns... His dice throwing was not as bad as Simons... But mine was magnificent.



At this point Henry personally lead a cavalry charge into my beautiful and brave Scots archers of the Guard...
Rather shockingly they failed and his unit was bounced... Ha!




I continue to press on and start to break the troops in front of me... Gasp!



Henry leads another charge with his cavalry...  You have to give him credit ... he is trying...


TWANG!....
The King is no more, he has ceased to be, he is bereft of life, he rests in peace... this is an ex-king.
YES!...The King is dead.... Long live King Richard.... Gasp!






Okay... I was immediately charged in the flank by David's Death Guard machine gunners... and duly stomped into the dirt...


BUT....   Ding-dong, the king is dead! Which old king? The wicked king
Ding-dong, the wicked king is dead...


At this point beer and mocking laughter called so we ended things there...


This was an incredibly fun game... with a rather surprising ending...
Simon and Alan took over the banner of bad dice from me for the day... I now know what victory however Pyrrhic tastes like....


Apart from my small French force the table was filled with figures from Stuart, Simon, David and Michael's collections... so a truly beautiful thing to behold.


All the best... Long live the King...  Aly


For an alternative version of this game... with all the machine guns edited out ...


Look here...  https://www.facebook.com/perryminiatures/posts/2246275922161168?__tn__=K-R










40 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. It was indeed... for once the dice gods were with me... ;-)

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  2. Excellent battle report, Aly! Lovely troops and a dead king for a win. A very good day for you.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you Jonathan.
      A splendid day indeed...
      The Tudor’s certainly had command of the field of battle... but we most definitely had the moral and strategic victory...

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  3. Wonderful battle report Aly and as always, incredibly enetertaining!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Epic!! What a splendid report with beautiful armies, must have been a fantastic game...Well, except for the King!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you Phil...
      It was great fun... And a feast for the eyes.

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  5. What a great looking game. And an interest result for history!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It was indeed Stuart...
      Michael suggested that next time we should have Tudor rebels versus the army of Richard IV... which would be a very entertaining scenario.

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  6. Wonderful looking game Aly.......only a small twang of jealousy to get to play with such lovely collections 😀

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. At least you only feel the twang of jealousy and not the sharp barb of defeat... ;-)
      I think I spent as much time looking at the toys as I did gaming with them.

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  7. Some super images there old chap, with your usual whimsical narrative bringing them to life.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Replies
    1. It was a lot of fun Tony...
      I enjoyed rolling some decent dice for a change...

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  9. Now that is an impressive looking game and reads like it was equally so to play in. Excellent all round I'd say.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Excellent toys,excellent result and excellent company... what more could you ask.

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  10. A beautiful looking game and one which sounds like a lot of fun to play - which is the important thing!
    long live the King & all machine guns...
    Best wishes,
    Jeremy

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It was indeed a lot of fun...

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  11. A win? Are you sure you weren't dreaming? Grand looking game whatever!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The king in a ditch full of arrows...
      I’ll call that a win any day of the week... ;-)

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  12. DROOL! Beautiful game. You are a lucky man!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Lucky ... yes indeed... though usually not when it comes to dice...;-)

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  13. Replies
    1. It was ... and a joy to play in.

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  14. A proper game played properly...and a splendid spectacle (by my estimate, about two lifetime’s worth of painting time represented on that table!)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It was indeed proper fun and games...
      I think that the Landsknechts alone would be a lifetimes painting...

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  15. Wonderful looking game Aly! Thanks for sharing. Now that you’ve tasted victory don’t let it go to your head or those machine guns will hunt you next time ;-)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I don’t think the victory will go to my head... mainly because my dice throwing is back to it usually well below average quality... ;-)
      Ah!...bout I have the memories.

      All the best. Aly

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  16. Well done Aly... that was a cunning move on your part slipping your dice into the opposition’s set.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ah!... That look of despair when someone realises that I have touched their dice...

      Delete
  17. Lovely looking game and the right result for once!
    Best Iain

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hopefully this is the start of a trend... ;-)

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  18. Nice report Aly - capturing my appallingly chronic dice throwing to a tee!!
    Twas great fun.
    All the best
    Simon

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes... welcome to my world Simon... ;-).
      It was great fun... And I did kill the king.

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  19. Only just getting round to this, a great game with great company, it was good to see you again buddy.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It’s always good to see you old chap...
      It was a lot of fun... especially the king killing bit... ;-)

      All the best. Aly

      Delete