This is the third battle report in our long standing campaign to re-fight the Wars of the Roses. Details can be found on the campaign page. Three battles into the campaign it’s become a tradition for the winner to write up the battle report. Which is why Jeremey takes us through the battle of Northampton (spoiler!)
Battle of Northampton
History tells us this was clearly a defensive battle for the Lancastrians, however history also tells us that due to the treachery of Lord Grey the battle apparently only lasted about half an hour. So we dispensed with that aspect and went for the Lancastrians taking up a defensive position. The Lancastrians were allowed enough stakes to cover their front line at no extra costs, but to provide the attackers with a chance this battle was our first game of unequal sides.
Given the Lancastrians static defence Stephen decided to take on full responsibility of command. I as the Yorkists had originally divided up my force to accommodate a guest commander but ended up dividing the army in to three battles to accommodate an additional commander!
Therefore for this battle both Andy and Tim joined my Yorkist forces. For this battle the Lancastrians had 520 points to the Yorkist 700 and we played using the Sword and Spear 2nd edition rules.
The start of the battle saw the Lancastrians in their defensive position with a front line of archers and two artillery units. Andy took command of the Yorkist left with Tim in the centre, I took the Yorkist right near the abbey.
The first couple of turns were all about the Yorkists getting their units moving. The initiative system in Sword and Spear makes it tricky to get everyone moving at a steady pace. You can do a group move of units but that is still dependent on drawning activation dice from the bag and rolling enough to start the group move. It was soon clear some units were being left behind.
Meanwhile the Lancastrians had little to do but wait for the enemy to come within range of their guns and archers. The Lancastrians also had a camp which would allow them to increase the reach and potency of their missile fire through the Resupply strategy.
I advanced my force at a break neck speed outdistancing my subordinate commanders and setting a fine example of how a real commander should lead. Although a pause was required to allow some of my units to catch up. While I did this Tim also managed to advance in the centre, but Andy had the furthest to travel so was somewhat behind.
Realising you can’t make an omelette without breaking any eggs I advanced my archers within range of the Lancastrians taking the chance that they could withstand a volley (or two!) and return the complement, to try and create some holes in the Lancastrian line.
However it was not to be. Some good dice from Stephen and poor dice from me saw both my archer units wiped out before they could even loose an arrow! This made me pause in my advance fearing that I’d have no chance of reaching the Lancastrians with my slow moving billmen and men at arms.
In the centre Tim decided to just go for it and continued his advance. Stephen thought it was worth trying a few ranging shots, but didn’t quite have the distance.
A turn later and Tim and Stephen were able to exchange fire. Tim’s forward units of billmen and spearmen took a bit of damage from the Lancastrians but in return they managed to destroy some of the Lancastrian guns and open up a hole in their defensive line.
Spurred on by this Tim adavanced his units even further. Unfortunately this proved costly with the spearmen succumbing to more artillery fire. Luckily Tim’s captain attached to the unit survived to be able to support the remaining units in the continued attack.
Tim’s bold advance saw the first of the Yorkists units reach the Lancastrian defences. For Tim this was his dismounted men at arms. Unfortunately Stephen had plugged the gap left by the loss of his artillery with some dismounted men at arms of his own. With a supporting unit for the Lancastrians and their sharp stakes taking away the Yorkist impetus, this turned out to be a tough fight that would last for a few turns.
Being slightly embarrassed by one of my subordinate commanders getting into melee first, I decided I’d spent enough time regrouping and launched an attack with my billmen. I had some rather useless cavalry and so I put them out front as cannon fodder to at least take some of the incoming missile fire away from my heavy infantry.
On the Yorkist left flank Andy had finally got his forces in range and was able to start making holes in the Lancastrian defence thanks to some good archery. This forced Stephen to think about plugging more gaps, but he held off this time fearing Andy could just stand off and continue firing on the defensive line.
Meanwhile in the centre Tim had managed to get a unit of billmen into melee to continue the assault. This added much needed support to his hard pressed men at arms.
Following this change in momentum, and thankfully because I rolled some good activaton dice. I managed to get my men at arms and billmen into melee against the Lancastrian archers. Even with the stakes taking way my impetus, the archers were no match for my heavy infantry. These Lancastrian loses pushed them over their Morale threshold forcing Stephen to make tests for each unit. Unfortunately for the Lancastrians this resulted in the loss of a few more units.
Andy was still causing trouble on the Lancastrian right flank, forcing Stephen to move up his billmen to prepare for an assault from Andy’s infantry.
With the Lancastrian line crumbling and more Yorkists arriving the battle reached a final stage. Although the Yorkists were at this point only one unit away from their own morale test point.
But there was to be no last minute Lancastrian revival, Tim’s billmen broke through the Lancastrian defensive line and engaged a unit of militia archers. The blue dice shown are Tim’s Yorkist scores against Stephens black Lancastrian ones. This lost unit pushed the Lancastrians over their break point with the remainder of the turn seeing enough other Lancatrian loses to make the battlefield look like a resounding Yorkist victory. Truth be told there was a moment it was clearly in the balance.
That leaves the campaign at 2-1 to the Yorkists, but Wakefield is up next.
Yorkist Loses
3 Units of Longbows (9 points)
1 Unit of Spearmen (4 points)
2 Units of Billmen (8 points)
Total loses 21 points (Army break point 35)
Lancastrian Loses
2 Units of Dismounted Men at Arms (8 points)
1 Unit of Billmen (4 points)
5 Units of Longbows (15 points)
4 Units Militia Longbows (12 points)
2 Units of Artillery (4 points)
Total loses 43 points (Army break point 31)
Yorkist Victory
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