First of all a disclaimer.
English is not our first language, so this AAR will be far from perfect,
in its writing nor in the gameplay. You’ll probably find many mistakes
we made, some of them we noticed just after playing, or when it was
too late to fix them, but we may have missed many mistakes, please
tell us where we messed up the rules,we would love to play the game
properly. You’ll also find many misplays, some of them we aknowledge
during this AAR, some others we’re not experienced enough to have
noticed, as with the rules mistakes, feel free to comment on anything
you’d have done differently, we’ll take note of it.
I tried to record as many dice rolls as I could, but as we tried to play
as fast as possible not all of them are here, any of those we have
recorded are between brackets [ ] . The same day we played this
scenario we received a rules update so some of the things will be
incorrect by now.
Julio played Christian side and the Muslims were controlled by
Ganix. After the deployment the Muslim player started complaining
and trying to “solve” the more than probable supply problems of the
Almoravid lords, thinking how he could prepare to manage their
movements without getting in too much trouble for the lack of provender.
Turn 1
Arts of War
The Christians drew Bishoprics(C22) and García Jimenez (C10). This
second card went to waste as both lords able to use it were not in play
at the moment. Bishoprics were put under the map as it’s not a “This
Lord” capability .
The Muslims drew Harbah (M5) which was granted to the emir of
Badajoz Al-Mutawakkil and Count Of Barcelona (M23) which Al-Mundir
took thinking about a quick campaign against Aragón.
Pay
The Chistian player paid one of Sanchos coins to shift him to the right
so he would be on par with the other lords.
Muster
Sancho mustered García Ordóñez with a roll of 2 and levied Sancho
Armengo IV of Urgell, getting 1 knight and a men-at-arms with him
Álvar Fañez mustered Pedro Ansurez with a 3 and got the Cabalgadas
capability to ensure good ravaging.
Alfonso levied 2 carts and Pedro the bishop of León (provided by the
bishopric capability) for a knight and a men-at-arms.
Abd Allah got some Siege Towers with the idea of discarding them to
bring in Yusuf later.
Al-Mundir mustered the troops from the count of Barcelona capability,
getting 2 knights and 2 men-at arms.
Al-Mutawakkil got an additional cart.
Al-Mustain levied 1 sergeant from his Huescan vassal.
Al-Mutamid got 2 capabilities Andalusians and Guadalquivir.
Call to arms
Yusuf was called at this point, discarding the aforementioned Siege
towers capability.
Campaign
Álvar Fañez activated first march to Calahorra and then foraging and
ravaging Tudela thanks to Cabalgadas, he fed his troops with the loot
provided by the cabalgada.
Al-Mundir supplies his troops with 3 provender.
García Ordoñez marched to Tudela and started a siege there.
Al-Mustain supplied and marched towards Tudela, while the muslim
player said “We’ve come here play”, expecting a disaster in the
upcoming battle.
1st round of battle :
The Christian cavalry inflicted 3 hits, the hits were assigned first
to the light horse [4], then to the men-at-arms [5,5], routing all
three units.
Muslim cavalry inflicted 2 hits, routing the serfs and light horse [2]
Christian infantry inflicted 1 hit routing the muslim militia.
2nd round of battle
The Muslim player seeing that he had succeded in the combat
as predicted, decided to concede.
The Christian cavalry then hit twice, routing a sergeant
The Muslim then hit ½ and at this point we noticed that we
messed up the whole combat, because we didn’t round up
the half hits, even though we did so in both our previous games…
Playing while both being sick made us a bit too prone to
mistakes. We decided to ignore the mess up and continued
the game remembering to do this correctly in any other battles.
The muslim hit routed one militia from García.
Al-Mustain, defeated had to retreat to Zaragoza, thinking
about his bad command choices… luckily for him, all of his
troops but a militia were recovered after battle. He rolled
a 4 and shifted 2 times getting him to the 8 box (he shifted
once before this turn “thanks” to ‘Álvars previous ravage)
García was not so lucky and none of his troops recovered
from the battle.
Before feeding Al-Mustain paid 2 coins to go back to the 10 box,
trying to avoid dying so soon.
Álvar Fañez seeing García’s success moved to Tudela, leaving
a provender behind, and foraged twice [1,2] and feeding his troops.
Al-Mundir seeing his nephews battle prowess decided that his
death would benefit him in the long run and instead of marching
to help him, got some supplies and marched to Huesca, wishing
that his Barcelonese allies would give him the upper hand against
Sancho.
García Ordoñez sieged at this point, failing [3,4], both he and Álvar
fed his troops without problem.
Al-Mundir marched to Jaca where Sancho decided to defend his
land.
1st round of battle :
Christian cavalry got 4 hits, only routing one men-at-arms.
Muslim cavalry with its 5 hits routed 2 knights and a men-at-arms.
Christian infantry hit twice and nothing routed.
Muslim infantry inflicted 3 hits, and due to bad luck routed all remaining Aragonese
troops.
Disaster ensued in Aragón, as Sancho was unable to recover any of his troops
thus dying defending Jaca.
Al-Mundir, clearly having a lucky streak, recovered all his losses and started
sieging the mountain fortress.
Álvar Fañez sieged Tudela failing, and as García didn’t have enough to feed his
troops, making him shift once left.
Al-Mutawakkil started his campaign supplying twice, seeing an opportunity in the
west, as the attention of the Christian kingdoms seemed to be on Zaragoza.
Alfonso marched to Calahorra, seeking to support the eastern offensive.
Al-Mutawakkil marched to Coria and started a siege there.
García Ordoñez finally got Calahorra to surrender [1,4] and fed all his troops and Álvars
with the loot from the siege. Here we mistakenly awarded the besiegers with the sacking
loot when there should be no such loot, as this was a surrender
Yusuf decided to start supplying himself for the next campaign, which later proved not
to be a very wise decision as he had to drop some later in the wastage phase.
At this point the campaign ended and we proceeded to the wastage phase… seeing
that we made some dubious decisions at the beginning, our excess coins forced us
to leave some of them in this phase, when we could’ve paid some of our lords to ensure
their loyalty for some more turns. In some cases the coinage was the only reason why we
had to get rid of some of our assets, and both of us managed to decide, once again not
very wisely, to leave coins behind.
Turn 2
Arts of War
The Christian player drew 2 held cards, but decided to use one of them immediately
Cluniacs (C15) to shift García once to the right. The other held card was Arid Terrain (C4).
The Muslim player drew an event that really messed up the Christians plans, as the
Galician Revolt (M22) shifted García twice to the left, making him unable to do anything
to avoid going back home this turn. The muslim also held an Arid Terrain (M4) card.
Pay
García paid the coin he had, at least thus avoiding death.
Al-Mustain used a taifa coin to maintain himself on the board.
Disband
García went home to Nájera to enjoy some decent wine.
Muster
Álvar Fañez mustered his vassals Pelayo Pelaez and Fernando Díaz, adding
2 sergeants, 1 knight and a man-at-arms to his forces.
Pedro Ansurez took the Mesnada capability and levied Martín Flainez for a knight,
a sergeant and a man-at-arms.
Yusuf decided to bring on some capabilities to aid with his supplies, making camels
available for the muslim side (thus, unknowingly making the held card from the
christian side unusable) and bringing Dawud ibn Aisha with him.
Al-Mustain levied his Tudelan vassals for 1 sergeant.
Al-Mutamid took 2 carts.
All other lords couldn’t muster anything because they were on enemy territories or
were affected by event cards.
Campaign
Pedro Ansurez supplies himself and marches to Tranduero.
Al-Mundir forages thrice [2,5,5], seeing those rolls a successful siege of Jaca
seemed difficult.
Alfonso moved to Pamplona, supplying himself three times there.
Al-Mundir foraged twice [2,4] and ravaged Jaca. Noticing that he should have done
that in the previous turn.
Pedro Ansurez marched to Coria, Al-Mutawakkill thinking that his javelin armed
troops would be enough decided to stand his ground.
1st round of battle :
Muslim javelin hit 5 times making a serf and a men-at arms rout, while the
other men-at-arms heroicly withstood the volley [5,2,3,2]
Muslim cavalry inflicted 1 hit, the men-at-arms, again avoided routing[3]
The Christian cavalry hit 7 times, a lone light horse unit survives at the end
of the slaughter (militias roll 2,3,5 and light horse roll 5,3,2,2)
The Christian infantry routs the remaining light horse [6]
Al-Mutawakkil retreat to Mérida, where a light horse recovers avoiding disaster and
shifting twice to the left.
Pedro’s both units stay routed after the battle.
Al-Mutawakkil retreats to Badajoz, seeing that his opportunity of a successful campaign
vanish, and wishing to be able to keep his seat.
Alfonso, seeing himself unable to confront Al-Mundir’s forces in Jaca, decided to stand
his ground.
Al-Mundir attempts to siege Jaca and fails [6]
Álvar Fañez marches to Zaragoza, where Al-Mustain, expecting reinforcement retreats
behind the city walls.
Yusuf, supplies himself and takes a boat to Tortosa, preparing to teach some real
warfare to those decadent eastern lords
Álvar ravages both Lérida and Zaragoza, shifting both taifa lords one to the left.
Yusuf seizes his opportunity and marches to Zaragoza, but his heathen killing desires
are trumped as Álvar seeing all those moors incoming decides to run back to a better
position in Tudela, losing some of his provender, which the almoravids quickly used to
feed their horde.
Alvar marched to Jaca where Al-Mundir decided to present fight.
1st round of battle :
Muslim cavalry hits 5 times, 1 serf, 1 militia[4] and 1 men-at-arms [2,3,4] rout
Christian cavalry rout 1 militia, 3 men-at-arms and 1 knight
2nd round of battle
Seeing that the losses were too high, the muslims decided to concede.
Muslim cavalry hit twice, routing 2 sergeants [6,6]
Christian cavalry hit 5 times routing a sergeant, while the lone surviving knight withstood
the brutal charge.
Al-Mustain retreated to Barbastro, where all but a militia regrouped. Al-Mustain used
2 taifa coins to avoid disbanding.
Álvar regrouped only his men-at-arms
After the battle, Álvar ravaged Huesca, and fed his troops with the loot.
Al-Mutawakkil decides that being at the safety of his “pacense” fortress is the correct
option and passes.
At this point, we looked at the board, and all of the Christian Lords would leave play
next turn except Alfonso. The early coin mismanagement, combined with the fact that
we forgot that we could use loot to the same effect during the pay step (even though
it is clearly stated everywhere...we seem to be unable to read properly) was disastrous
to the Christian player, while the Muslims were less affected because of the safe stash
in the Taifa box. Seeing this, the Christian player decided to concede as even with a
lead of 4 VP, having only Alfonso and the possibility to muster Eudes seemed not
enough to defend the Christian Kingdoms.
We enjoyed quite a bit the game, but found a couple things that made the game
too favorable to the muslim. The fact that the Galician Revolt (M22) occurred was
devastating, more so as it nullyfied totally the effect of the event card just used,
being unable to muster anything with Alfonso for a turn left the Christian war effort
maimed and unable to counteract properly the eastern front. And that ignoring the
fact that a vassal with all his army had to disband because of the same event, this
event might be a little bit too powerful. The fact that Camels (M16) affects all of the
muslims was also brutal, as with the decision to play that card, with just the idea of
giving the almoravids better supply management, nullified the second event card
drawn by the Christians. The other card with a similar effect that cancels an event
card is if I remember correctly Adalides(C7), and that card only affects the lord that
takes the capability. We found that having Camels(M16) affect all the muslims lords
might be a bit too strong, as it makes 2 quite powerful Christian events worthless.
We say all of this having only played short scenarios, we acknowledge that all of
this would be less noticeable in a full game. Anyway, as we just received the latest
update of rules, we are already thinking about a replay or advancing to another scenario.
To anyone that was able to read this tedious block of badly written text,
thanks for your patience.
G.
