Pikeman's Lament

Club day again here at Writtle and we had elected to fight a Pike & Shot skirmish game using Dan Mersey's "Pikeman's Lament" rules

Allan has set the board up with his terrain and its a river crossing scenario. 

Martin and Bob have a mixed force of English horse & foot

Here's their first move with pike blocks and shot advancing up a road

Whereas, Ian and I were using my Highlanders - with one unit of Scots "trotters" as support.

Here's Martin's cavalry arriving on schedule

My clansmen are hurrying towards the bridge.

Anxious to get there before this lot !

In fact, Martin has quite a lot of horse - a mixture of "gallopers" and "trotters".

The first enemy cavalry reach the river, faced by Ian's men near the cottage.

One of our Clan units gets to the bridge but the rest of the force are formed up behind the paddock with the horse facing Martin's cavalry crossing the river

Suddenly, a group of enemy horse turn to face my Clansmen concentrating on the bridge.

Due to some poor dice throws, the English foot are slow to advance.

The Scots have got some Shot into the paddock to aid the fire from our men near the cottage.

This combined fire has the desired effect - casualties !

My Clansmen have turned and charged the enemy horse

Watched by a second group of Scots who are probably debating whether this is wise !

Umm ... no, the Clansmen are badly beaten and thrown back in disorder

At last, Bob has brought up his foot to the bridge

and his pike attempt to cross

My second group of Scots Clansmen attack the depleted enemy cavalry in front of them

with success !

Now the Scots rush to cross the river

Bob is seen here moving his foot carefully watched by Martin and Ian whereas Allan is consulting the  rule book - or is it the oracle ?

A quick look over my shoulder at Steve Nutt's group playing an early WWII game in 15mm. "Command Decision" rules I believe.

Back to our game - fanatical Scots charge enemy cavalry again !

We have the bulk of our force across the river ut our leader figure is wavering (see the smoke) - the English commander has already disappeared due to this factor !

Bob's Yellow Coats are over the bridge 

and his shot the other side of the river are trying to target our Clansmen

but with the majority of our force their side of the river, we have gained the objective before the English.

Umpire Allan declares a Scots victory.

That gives us time for a second game. This time we have replaced Highlanders with Covenanters

Whereas, Bob and Martin have chosen a cavalry only force.

We get the luck of the early dice and reach the bridge

and Ian's unit of dragoons are over the river and firing at the approaching enemy

I have a unit of shot supporting the pike on the bridge but they only hit on a 6 at long range.

Here come the cavalry !

They split in two different directions

One unit set on crossing the river way to our left

My shot don't know which way to look - left or ahead ?

Bob's cavalry at the bridge are "caracoling" (moving up, shooting but refusing to charge the pikemen

Bob's cavalry have got around to threaten our left flank

but we cannot ignore our front where two units of horse are firing at us.

The pike back off from the bridge as the shot face around because of the new threat

Charge ! Bob's cavalry take on my shot unit.

Meantime, Ian has turned the paddock into a little fortified position !

The bridge being clear, the enemy horse cross to our side

We had two random effects due to either a double 6 or double 1 thrown during activation. The net result was that our command unit of pike was withdrawn from the battlefield.

Bottled up as we were in the paddock and slowly being shot to pieces by the "caracolers", this game was declared an English victory.

So there we have it, two quite different games of Pikeman's Lament, all good fun.