HELVETICA MAXIMUS

End june I attended HELVETICA MAXIMUS at Geneva.

Getting there was a nightmare with ingoing flight cancelled, having to find solutions but finally I got there saturday very early, completely busted but it was worth it.

The theme was an open tournament and as I did want a challenge I did choose an Albanian Principalities army.

My first game would have me face Marcin and his Silla Koreans a very tough army.

I had outscouted him and was faced with a difficult choice : deploying on my right and avoid his cataphracts. have a technical game a few points or go for it . Try my luck and deploy on my left facing his heavies which is what I did

My right not that well aligned ( I was so tired ) . My trap in the center many SK bowmen in difficult terrain all backed up but my loose javelinmen . They would face the allied TANG guard infantry

The other flank I would try vs his SUP cats

Will quantity be a quality ?

Meanwhile I play on the other flank but still unused to the army I will make mistakes

Getting sandwiched. My men at arms will start an interesting habbit charge and get killed at the melee the same turn they charge ..for 3 games it is exactly what will happen even with green dice on green dice they will kill no one just get butchered

Getting in at the same time as my men at arms ...Marcin and I will roll a total of 8 green dice for a single wound ...

Time after time my dice will fail me except unexpectedly in the center

What happened here was rather interesting. The TANG SUP guard units went confidently forward . My skirmishers did some good shooting and he lost a base. When charging he lost another base in the same unit and another in the other unit. Melee with the skirmishers, my white dice continued to kill bases with white dice . He killed them but pursued in the javelinmen who tried to finish the impudent SUP guards and one guard unit was lost .

I was so tired, my left flank was butchered, my right flank could still annoy him but we were nearing the end of the allowed time. In a very gentleman manner Marcin agreed to stop the game after a last melee rolls which changed nothing. It ended 12-6 ( from memory )

I had learned a lot and was happy with my idea : skirmishers in difficult terrain can fight , delay and hurt even loose infantry .

But by God, next time I hope I will not have to take a near night flight to reach a tournament ...2 hours of sleep was a bit too harsh