Re-fight Bosworth (Again) using Midgard

 Mark wanted to know if Midgard rules were any good for Wars of the Roses, so I invited him over to try them out. As we had all day I thought I'd revisit James Morris' Bosworth scenario.

I took Richard III and Mark had Henry Tudor and the Stanley brothers (if they could be bothered to join in). I tweaked the original scenario so that the Stanleys would only remain neutral or join Henry Tudor. Looking at the historical situation and political machinations going on behind the scenes, I do not personally believe that Lord Stanley would ever have attacked his stepson in support of Richard III. 

TURN ONE

Henry Tudor's forces advance across the whole front. Richard's forces sat on the hill waiting for them, whilst their gonnes shot some serious holes in one of the French mercenary unit's forcing them to retire. Richard repositioned his reserve cavalry to face off against Tudor's horsemen.

On the far flank the Earl of Northumberland was remarkably active, managing to move almost all his troops forward into the marsh in front of them.

TURN TWO

Tudor's men kept up their advance and started bombarding the hilltop with arrows, the Yorkists replying in kind. Both sides suffered losses, but the Yorkist gonnes inflicted more casualties on the French pikemen. Now one of Tudor's strongest melee units was on the point of collapse, brfore a blow could be struck!

Northumberland's archers were reluctant to move out of the marsh, what with loads on mounted men-at-arms in front of them (who could blame them), so they just shot at long ranges, fairly ineffectively.

Stanley's command decided to wait things out for a bit longer and see what happened.

TURN THREE

Tudor's advance petered out and both side kept up their archery exchanges, with more losses on both sides, each seeing a unit of bowmen destroyed. Felling unthreatened my Northumberland, the leading Tudor cavalry charged the Yorkist men-at-arms and forced them back in a fierce melee.

In an effort to step the tide, Richard III rushed forward to join in the melee. His presence in the thick of things obviously encouraged his men who managed to fight the Tudor cavalry to a standstill.

While the intact French pike block kept advancing, a unit of Oxford's bowmen moved up to shield the shot-up pike unit from the guns.

TURN FOUR

For the most part the two sides just kept up an exchange of archery. The French pike charged up the hill to contact one of the gonnne units, which we both expected to be a walkover. However, the dice gods were smiling on the House of York, so the Frenchmen were sent reeling back down the hill.

Northumberland's bowmen continued with their ineffective long range shooting, whilst their men-at-arms and billmen started moving around the marsh to link up with the flank of the Yorkist troops on the hill.

In the first melee round of the cavalry fight, Richard's personal influence seemed to be enough to swing thiungs back to the Yorkist side, as the Tudor cavalry finally dissolved, leaving the hillside littered with fallen men and horses.

This allowed Richard to pull his worn cavalry back and move up the fresh unit from behind them to face the Tudor line. Finally a really rubbish die roll meant that the Stanleys still sat on the side-lines.

TURN FIVE

Again the French launched themselves up the hill against the gonnes only to be thrown back a second time (to the surprise of both players!). Another Yorkist bow unit succumbed to the Tudor barrage, so both sides were getting low on their Reputation score.

In the Yorkist phase I took a chance and threw Norkfolk's melee units down the hill, supported my my final unit of the cavalry reserve. If nothing else it boosted my Reputation score! Luck was with the House of York once again and the charges pushed the Tudor line back.

Over by the marsh, Northumberland's heavy infantry had finally got into a position to support the struggling Yorkists on that end of the hill. We ended the turn with Tudor on 2 Reputation to Richard's 6. If the Stanleys joined him now, even if they could not reach the action in time to play an active roll, the Reputation boost would even things. Unfortunately, they elected to sit tight once again!

TURN SIX

For the third time the French pike charged the gonnes and this time they over-ran the positions and skewered the gunners. However on either side of the them they Tudor units disappeared and the slow attrition of the melee caught up with them. The final bow fell in the Yorkist phase, as Richard led his last cavalry unit down the hill into Tudor lines and destroyed the bill unit in front of them!

The last phase of the turn is to roll for the Stanleys, who, as expected, decided to stay out of the carnage.

The final result at the end of Turn Six, Richard has 4 Reputation to Henry Tudor's -11! An overwhelming victory to the House of York.

A great game, we both had a lot of fun and things swung back and forth constantly. It was only in the later part of Turn 5 that the advantage clearly started to be with Richard III. Even then, if the Stanleys had come in on Tudor's side at this late stage, it could have changed things.

Mark's verdict on the rules, a resounding thunbs up!!!

Battle of Bosworth with Midgard: The Rematch

 We had another go a the Battle of Bosworth using Midgard Heroic Battles, this time using the revised scenario published in the 2025 Lard Magazine.

This gives Henry Tudor a stronger starting force, which allows him a fighting chance in the event that the Stanleys do not join him. We made one adjustment, which was to ignore a result of the Staley's siding with Richard III, we would treat this as they remained sitting on the fence.

Personally I do not think there was ever any chance that the Stanley brothers would have actually attacked Henry Tudor at Bosworth, the best Richard III could have hoped for is that they stayed out of the action (this still would have given Lord Stanley some awkward conversations with his wife at home "I did try to save your son dear, sadly I was just too late!").

Once again, I took Richard III while Colin took Henry Tudor.

The first two turns saw most of Richard's forces remaining on the hill, watching Henry's Tudor's lines slowly advance, with both sides exchanging long range archery. This worked out fairly even with both sides whittling away at the opposing longbowmen.

I did manage to get the Earl of Northumberland's archers up close enough to take some long range pops at Tudor's cavalry, but with out meaningful effect. I also pushed my unit of handgunners down the hill to try and disrupt the cavalry while I manoeuvred Richard and the mounted reserve to face them.

By turn three Tudor had had enough of them and charged a unit of mounted men-at-arms into the handgunners, eventually wiping them out (the first loss of the game) but leaving a, now worn, cavalry unit facing down my two fresh units.

Further along the hill, both sides kept up the exchange of fire. Richard's guns were being particularly effective, so Tudor's forces were taking more losses than they were inflicting.

At this point (end of turn 3) Colin rolled a 10 on a d10, so the Stanleys now declared for Henry Tudor.

The archery was intense on the far flank. The Duke of Norfolk had lost one of his bow units, but had destroyed one of the Earl of Oxford's longbow units in return and the two other Tudor missile units had taken 3 out of 4 hits each! But this allowed Oxford to bring forward his billmen and French pikemen, leaving Norfolk still looking severely outnumbered.

Colin now threw everything forward, launching charges all along his line. Henry Tudor moved out of the safety of the bodyguard men-at-arms to lead the archers in a charge on the end of the hill.

The charges had mixed results, in places pushing the Yorkists back, elsewhere being repulsed with heavy losses. Henry 's charge was unbelievably successful, destroying the archers in front of him and gaining a foothold on the hill. But by moving the supporting billmen slightly aside, I allowed a gap for Richard to charge through, leading his cavalry, destroying Henry's archers in turn and leaving the would-be usurper in a very dangerous position!

Northumberland had held off Tudor's other cavalry charge and was now pushing them back. But in the top right of this picture you can see Stanley's cavalry closing in on the flank!

On the other flank Norfolk launched the remains of his command in a downhill charge, with mixed results. Norfolk's men-at-arms pushed the French pike back, but the billmen led by the Earl of Surrey took heavy losses and had to retreat.

Staley's knights came crashing into Northumberland's flank! Somehow (dice gods were generous) he managed to rally his men and wiped out the cavalry unit to his front and forced Staley's men back.

Henry Tudor was rescued just in the nick of time by his own men-at-arms charging into the fray and in the frantic melee Richard III was wounded and his cavalry pushed back. However, things were not as dire as they looked. So long as Richard to survive another round of melee, there was the other Yorkist cavalry unit, ready to charge in and a longbow unit had worked it's way around behind the Tudor men-at-arms, close enough to charge into their rear. As the Yorkist billmen had just finished of the Tudor bills next to Henry, he, and his bodyguard, were surrounded.

Having gained a breathing space, Northumberland turned his command around to face the Stanley brothers. At this point the bill unit had had been lagging back on the baseline were inspired and charged into one of Staley's longbow units, destroying them and now threatening the Stanley's flank in turn!

And this is where we ran out of time and had to call it at the end of turn 5. We declared a draw, Henry was down to 3 Reputation and Richard on 2. It could have gone either way in the final turn, or just as likely remained a draw.

A great game and a lot of fun. We both thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and it was so close throughout. Enlarging Tudor's starting force had made this a great scenario, so long as the Stanleys do not join Richard! 

We are going to try this scenario again in the New Year, when we have more time so we can play to the end. But we had managed 5 out of 6 turns, with 600 point armies in only two and a half hours, which seems pretty fast play to me!

Refighting the Battle of Bosworth with Midgard

 This week Colin and I got the opportunity to play test James Morris' Bosworth scenario, after I had franticly finished basing more archers. I was Richard III and Colin took Henry Tudor.

It was a fun game, but felt quite one sided. Colin must have committed some transgression against the Dice Gods recently. I tried to play it historically, advancing Norfolk's battle first, whilst engaging in long range archery duels else where and manoeuvring Richard and his bodyguard around to be in place to charge down the hill towards Henry Tudor. Due to an appallingly unlucky sequence of dice rolls at the end of turn 3, the Stanleys turned their back on the Tudor upstart and joined in on the side of the true king of England. If the Stanleys remain neutral Tudor is in trouble, but with them against him it was all over bar the shouting.

We are going to try again in a couple of weeks, it was an exceptional sequence of dice rolls, so I doubt it would repeat in a dozen or more games. (Famous last words anyone?).

Here are some photos from the game.

The battle deployment from Richard III's perspective. The Duke of Norfolk's battle on the right, The Earl of Lincoln on the left and Richard with the cavalry reserve on the hill. In the distance, The Earl of Oxford is on the right and Henry Tudor on the left.

On the other flank the Earl of Northumberland Battle hang back and the Stanleys mass ominously on the far hillside.

By some miracle of luck, I managed to get Northumberland's archers to advance as far as the marsh by turn 3!

Richard II leads his bodyguard around the back of his lines to be in position to strike at Henry Tudor.

Tudor had kept his troops back, just sending the archers forward to shoot at the enemy.

Norfolk was struggling in his advance, caught in a crossfire with his archers on the verge of collapse, although they dished out some punishment to the enemy archers in return.

It was looking quite historical, in the battle Norfolk was killed leading his attack and his troops pushed back early on. But that didn't matter because the battle was decided else where. Henry and his knights were now outnumbered 5:2 with enemies charging their flanks - a foregone conclusion really.

A win for Richard III, let's see how the refight goes.

Painting in November

 I managed to get a bit more done this month, not so much miniatures, but I did clear through some of the terrain backlog I had.

Starting off with some historical minis, 10mm Wars of the Roses. I finished off 14 stands of longbowmen and a few command stands. I had a shortage of command stands in my existing armies, you need a lot for Midgard! I kept the command pretty generic. I do love the look of the colourful banners and livery standards, but the commanders kept changing between battles during the WotR. I'd feel wrong having Richard III leading at the First Battle of St Albans, for example. I also want to use the armies for contemporary European wars as well.

Back to 28mm fantasy, a Forest Cyclops.

Getting a bit weirder, a pack of Dungers from Ramshackle Games.

I have no idea what I will use these for, but I am sure I'll fit them in somewhere.

A ruined cottage, this was a 3D print from Head Bunny Games.

My first though was to tart it up with some over-growing foliage, but that would restrict it's use. As it is, I can put it down anywhere from snow to desert, and it would fit in.

A Mammoth skeleton, also from Head Bunny Games. In fact all the terrain this month came from them.

An ice-bound ruined tower. This will see use in my frozen Reign in Hell campaign. It will also serve as a feature in larger Jotunheim battles.

A summoning circle, complete with a failed apprentice summoner!

Finally a couple of tribal totems. I can see there being used to mark Orc territory in a Sellswords game.

Just one month left in my plan to post all of the year's painting. Not sure what December will hold, as it's looking a busy time, but we shall see.