War of the Strategists at Alicante 2023
The Journey Home
The Journey to Alicante (via Valencia)Game 3 Berber vs Maurikian Byzantine
Game 6 Berber vs Feudal English
The Journey back from to Alicante (again via Valencia)
Well, that was most unexpected!
A Berber army, chosen for what I guess were more "romantic" and culturally appropriate reasons had turned out to be a bit of a beast, taking on all comers and ending up on top
On reflection I suspect the range of opponents it faced was a key factor in its success, as a lot of the army (Spearmen, archers, Knights and even supported Swordsmen) was optimised to give bow-armed cavalry a really hard time, and so facing essentially 5/6 armies that relied on this troop type meant it had every opportunity to do well
Three of the armies also relied on Elephants to give them a blunt instrument to fore an opponent onto the back foot, but again here the Berbers, with their large numbers of dismountable troops (LH and MCv Javelin) had a lot of options to neutralise this tactic, whilst still also having a lower points-per-unit cost which allowed it to outstretch and outlast several smaller, higher quality (and elephant-containing) armies too
It did also feel like a tournament where I managed to use terrain effectively - narrowing the table in most games, and creating places for meaningful ambushes who's effectiveness was almost certainly enhanced by the size of my army which was such that I suspect most opponents would have thought that my ambush markers were either fakes, or only a paltry force of LI perhaps, not the 3 MF + 1 archer that I often used.
The use of a river also played out well whenever it landed on table - I had enough LH to spare a couple to run up the other side of it, tying up and often outmatching the troops my opponents deployed there too, and I also discovered that a river is surprisingly easy for LH to then come back across, denying my opponents a secure flank which they seemed to have believed to be safe
So, an army that was better - against the opponents it faced - than the sum of it's parts, and which was able to make good use of some unusual terrain choices as well. Truly an Andalusian recipe for success!
This rather spiffing trophy (note the reins) was now destined to be squeezed into some already rather full hand luggage and spirited back to less sunny and more chilly England, where it would no doubt either sit on a shelf or perhaps be repurposed into a Great Commander for a planned Hellenistic Successor army in 28mm that is one of my next painting projects
We were all staying for an extra night in Spain, departing from Valencia the next day which allowed us to take a scenic detous along the coast to drop Gordon off for a week of climbing holiday at this rather scenic cliff-carved village quite some distance from the shoreline
With a stunning azure sky in the distance the truly Andalusian terrain gave pause for though as we looked out over a village that may well have been here when the Berbers made their last successful invasion of the Iberian peninsula
Once back to Valencia we headed out into the town again to attempt the tricky balance between not eating too much tapas and drinking too much too early in the afternoon/evening to then ruin our planned evening meal, whilst also trying to fend off hunger until the hour at which most local restaurants would actually start serving their evening sittings
Having just about managed that (well... a lot of fried food was consumed beforehand) we then found a specialist paewlla restaurant, and the remaining 4 travellers shared 2 large paellas (fish/squid ink/local fine pasta) and vegetables (traditional rice) which were satisfyingly crunchy and burnt on the bottom of the pan as well.
The next day we had a little time to kill before heading for the airport, so took a jaunt around the spectacular indoor food market in Valencia
No tomato shortages here !
More fish than you could throw a haddock at as well!
Puts most branches of Lidl to shame really...
And on that note, we headed for the airport for an (inevitably) delayed flight back home to chilly blighty!
That's the end - so why not go back to the Match Reports Index and read some more reports?
You may also like....
The Journey to Alicante (via Valencia)
Game 3 Berber vs Maurikian Byzantine
Game 6 Berber vs Feudal English
The Journey back from to Alicante (again via Valencia)
