Capture the Bridge

This weeks game was 15mm Medievals using our usual Hail Caesar rules and the armylists we are developing. Set during the Hundred Years war this was a fictitious battle based on the idea of an English force led by the Duke of York out on a Chevauchee and following a swollen river in search of a bridge. As they approach a bridge they discover that the French have also got there at the same time. Quickly deploying for battle, who can capture the bridge. 

Will my newly finished unit of knights and Commander, the Duke of York get death or glory in their first game? 

With the French (Ian and Nigel) taking the northern edge of the table the dice decided that I would deploy a division first but then won the dice throw to claim the first turn. 

English deployment. 

French deployment. 

Good throws during orders allowed me to advance to a good position on the central hill. 

The bridge that we were fighting over. 

Ian's main commander moved quickly to get over the bridge and threaten my flank.

Ian managed to chase away my skirmishers in the wood with his own skirmish unit who also managed to 'Break' one of my bombards.

 (the gap between the two units show where the bombard was). 

Overhead shot, Nigel's two units of Knights are bottom centre. 

Knights are really tough to get rid of. I got one unit of them to shaken but he was able to withdraw them and rally. 

 

On the far flank Ian's division failed their orders quite often yet still managed to break my hobilars with missile fire. My dice throwing on Break tests was truly awful. 

Nigel's leading unit of French knights managed to defeat my nice newly painted knights in melee and Break them too as I threw a total of 3 on my Break Test.  

(the curse of the newly painted units?). 

Back near the bridge Ian's Men at Arms and mine clashed. I managed to fight him off and wound his Army General (the 5 and 6 on the red dice). 

A final overhead photo as we had to finish the game just as several units on both sides were looking quite battered (shaken and even dis-ordered). I am not sure if it was the nature of the scenario or did we just take too many turns getting into a good position before the main fight started? We called it a really hard fought battle and a draw as there was no clear winner.